At 8:03, the hallway buzzed with sleep and whispers,

The girl stood quiet, third locker from the right,

A finger hooked on cold metal—

she turned the dial,

and there it was.

Folded sharp, like spite tucked into paper,

Edges crinkled, corner smudged with someone’s thumb,

She knew that smell—cheap perfume,

The kind they wore when they played pretend.

The letter was chaos.

Purple gel ink in loopy hearts—faker.

Black ballpoint, all caps—SLUT.

A red Sharpie carved cruel circles—

her name, crossed out.

And beneath it,

A slurry of words no thirteen-year-old should know:

Ugly.

Try-hard.

You don’t belong.

Go cry to your deadbeat dad.

She read each line twice, like studying for pain.

Some words slanted sideways, rushed—different hands.

A project of cruelty,

Passed around like notes in class.

Her face was still.

No twitch, no flinch.

Just a blink, slow as dusk.

She folded the letter in half.

Then into quarters.

Back into her locker.

Click.

The hallway didn’t see her knees go soft,

Or the way her ribs felt like broken umbrella spokes.

It didn’t hear the scream

scratching behind her teeth,

Or notice how her hands clenched

until her palms wore crescents.

To them, she was just quiet.

Maybe cold.

Maybe weird.

But inside—

She was glass under pressure.

And as she walked away,

No one knew

she was rewriting the ending.

“They’ll never see me shatter.”