The year I ballooned to nearly two hundred pounds because of my illness, my classmates gave me a new name: “The Whale.” During gym class, halfway through the mile run, my legs gave out. I slammed onto the asphalt track, scraping my knees until they bled. Above me, the bleachers erupted in a wave of cruel laughter. I could hear the distinct, metallic clicks of phone cameras recording. When I finally managed to call my mother, sobbing into the receiver, she only had one thing to say: “If you could just learn to control your mouth, you wouldn’t be a laughingstock.” After that, I stopped talking to anyone. Until the day I stumbled upon an anonymous peer-support app called Haven. The voice on the other end of my screen was incredibly gentle, like soft cotton. When I wrote, “I feel like a monster,” the app replied: “You’re not a monster. You’re just sick, and none of this is your fault.” Every night, I huddled under my duvet, whispering my secrets into the screen until two in the morning. For the first time, staying alive didn’t feel like such a chore. Until Monday morning homeroom. I pushed open the classroom door to find the smartboard glowing. Scrolling across the white screen for everyone to see were my private chat logs. “I’m so ugly.” “I want to disappear.” “My mother has never loved me.” The classroom shook with laughter. Brooke, the school’s homecoming queen, stood near the front row holding an iced coffee. She raised her cup to me in a mock toast. “Hey, Whale,” she smirked. “Did you actually think someone cared? I paid a college theater kid fifty bucks to pretend to be your online therapist.” My mother was called to the school by my homeroom teacher. After reading the logs, she didn’t comfort me. Instead, she slapped me across the face in front of the entire room. “How did I raise something like you?” she spat. “Isn’t embarrassing me in public enough? You had to broadcast our private family matters to a total stranger?” I stood frozen by the teacher’s desk, my gaze drifting to the window. Outside, the hallway led straight to the roof. The breeze felt light today. Six stories up would be high enough. 1 “Hazel, stop right there.” My mother’s hand hung suspended in the air, her fingers trembling slightly, as if she couldn’t quite believe what she had just done. But her eyes held no apology—only the sharp, defensive irritation of someone who felt deeply insulted. My cheek burned, and my left ear rang with a dull, steady hum. On the smartboard, the chat logs kept scrolling, an unceasing digital crawl of my deepest vulnerabilities. “I’m so ugly.” “I want to disappear.” “My mother has never loved me.” Fifty-three of my peers stared at me. Some bit their lips to hold back snickers; others kept their phones angled under their desks, recording the spectacle. Brooke sat in the second row, her lips wrapped around a green straw, taking slow, leisurely sips of her drink. She looked exactly like someone settled in for a good movie. “Hazel,” Mr. Humbert, my homeroom teacher, muttered as he squeezed through the back door. His suit was meticulously pressed, and his leather briefcase was tucked neatly under his arm. “What on earth is going on here? Why is there a scene first thing in the morning?” He glanced at the smartboard, his brow furrowing. “Who turned this on? Shut it off.” Nobody moved. Brooke raised her hand, her voice dripping with innocence. “Mr. Humbert, the board connected via Bluetooth automatically. I think Hazel’s phone is just acting up.” She sounded completely detached, as if she were merely reporting a mild technical glitch. Mr. Humbert looked at my mother, then at me. “Mrs. Wood, please have a seat. Let’s take this to my office so we can discuss it.” My mother didn’t sit. She turned on me, lowering her voice, but the room was so quiet that her words cut through the silence like a knife. “You told a stranger I don’t love you? I put food in your mouth, clothes on your back, and this is how you repay me?” “I didn’t—” “You didn’t? It’s right there in black and white!” Her finger jabbed toward the glowing screen. “Hazel, how much longer are you going to drag my name through the dirt?” Mr. Humbert cleared his throat. “Mrs. Wood, please, let’s not get ahead of ourselves. We—” “Mr. Humbert,” my mother interrupted, her voice instantly shifting from rage to a trembling, fragile victimhood. She wiped a tear from her eye. “You have no idea how hard it is to raise her alone. Her father walked out when she was small. I work double shifts just to keep a roof over her head, and she spends her time writing these horrible lies about me…” The tears flowed effortlessly. Mr. Humbert immediately handed her a tissue, murmuring gentle reassurances. No one looked at me. I stood by the desk, my face hot, my ears ringing. Brooke’s gaze drifted back to me. She offered a tiny, sweet smile. Her lips moved silently. I could read them perfectly: “Deserve it.” My hands began to shake. I turned my head slightly, looking out the classroom door. At the very end of the corridor was the concrete stairwell leading to the roof. The heavy metal door at the top was usually unlocked. I knew that. “Alright, class, quiet down,” Mr. Humbert said, tapping the podium. “Let’s get back to reading. Hazel, you and your mother come with me.” His tone was dismissive, as if he were cleaning up a spilled cup of water. I turned to follow them out. As I passed Brooke’s desk, she subtly stuck her foot out. It wasn’t a violent trip, just enough to make me stumble clumsily. Behind me, the room erupted into a fresh chorus of giggles. Mr. Humbert didn’t look back. My mother didn’t either. Down the hallway, my mother marched ahead of me, her high heels clicking sharply against the linoleum. “Tell me,” she said without turning around, “did you do this on purpose? Did you want the whole school to see those things just to humiliate me?” “I didn’t put those files on the board.” “Then who did? It’s your phone, your chat history. Who else would bother to broadcast your miserable little thoughts?” “It was Brooke—” She stopped dead in her tracks and spun around to face me. “Brooke? As in Mr. Lattimore’s daughter?” I nodded. “And why would a girl like her want to hurt you? What do you possibly have that she would want to target?” Her face held genuine confusion. It wasn’t even disbelief; it was a fundamental assumption that I was too insignificant to be bullied. “Enough,” she said, waving a dismissive hand. “Stop blaming everyone else for your problems. If you hadn’t written those pathetic things in the first place, no one would have had anything to show.” I closed my mouth. Inside the office, Mr. Humbert poured my mother a cup of hot water. “Mrs. Wood, I assure you, I will look into this. Teenagers have intense emotional swings. It’s completely normal.” “Mr. Humbert, I am at my wits’ end with her,” my mother sighed, clutching the tissue. “She won’t speak a word to me. She just locks herself in her room all day, and heaven knows what she’s doing on that phone.” “I’ll talk to her.” Mr. Humbert turned his gaze toward me. “Hazel, if you’re feeling overwhelmed, you should come to me or the school counselor. Posting these things online… it’s a bad look for the school. It causes unnecessary disruption.” “A bad look.” Not “someone violated your privacy”. Not “someone is tormenting you”. Just “you are causing a disruption”. “Do you hear your teacher?” my mother nudged me sharply. “Yes.” Mr. Humbert nodded, flipping open a manila folder on his desk. “Good. Let’s consider the matter closed for now. Mrs. Wood, I know you’re busy, so please feel free to head back to work. I’ll take it from here.” My mother stood up, casting a brief, cold glance in my direction. “Get your own lunch today. I have a client meeting this afternoon.” She walked out. The sharp click of her heels faded down the corridor. Mr. Humbert shuffled his papers, not looking up. “Go on back to class, Hazel. You’re going to be late for first period.” I reached the doorway and paused. “Mr. Humbert.” “Yes?” “Brooke paid a college student to pretend to be a therapist on that app. She did this to get my chat history and play it on the screen.” He looked up, his expression strained and weary. “Hazel, Brooke’s father is one of the school’s largest donors. I appreciate you sharing your perspective, but without concrete evidence, my hands are tied. Surely you understand that?” I understood. I understood everything. “Go on,” he said softly. I pulled the heavy office door open. The hallway was empty; the warning bell had already rung. Leaning my hand against the lockers for support, I walked toward my classroom, one slow step at a time. When I passed the stairwell, I noticed the heavy metal door was slightly ajar. A draft of cool air slipped through the crack, whispering against my face. 2 “Hey, Whale. Your mom’s handprint is still showing.” Brooke’s voice drifted over my shoulder, sweet and artificial. The first-period bell had just rung, and I was trying to bury my face in my arms. She sauntered over to my desk and tossed a peach-scented makeup wipe onto my notebook. “Wipe yourself down. It looks kind of pathetic.” A few kids nearby snickered. One of them whispered, “Man, her mom has a mean right hook.” I didn’t move. The wipe had little cartoon strawberries on the packaging. It came from her limited-edition designer pouch. That was her favorite trick—performing acts of public kindness while twisting the knife, making sure everyone thought she was the caring one. “I don’t want it,” I said, pushing the wipe back. “Oh, don’t be like that,” she said, sliding it right back into my space. Her manicured fingernails tapped rhythmically against the wooden desk. “Tap. Tap. Tap.” “I’m just looking out for you. Your little diary said you wanted to disappear, and I’d hate for you to do something dramatic.” She whispered the last words, but she chose her volume perfectly. The three rows around us heard every syllable. “Brooke,” I said, finally raising my eyes. “Yeah?” She tilted her head, her smile bright and vacant. “You spent fifty dollars of your own money on someone you found disgusting. You must have been really desperate.” Her smile faltered for a fraction of a second. “What did you say?” “Mr. Humbert said the matter is closed. So it’s closed.” I swept the wipe off my desk and into the wastebasket, then buried my head in my arms. A heavy silence fell over the desks. Then Brooke let out a sharp, loud laugh. “Wow, Hazel. You really are thick-skinned, aren’t you?” She spun on her heel, her sleek ponytail whipping against my shoulder as she walked away. I heard her whisper to Kayla, “Can you believe her? The whole class saw her diary, and she’s still pretending she’s fine. Unbelievable.” Kayla snorted. “Honestly, if that were me, I would have transferred schools by now.” During second-period algebra, the teacher’s voice became white noise. My mind kept looping back to the morning. When the smartboard first lit up, the thing that broke me wasn’t my own words on display. It was the look on everyone’s faces. Excitement. Pure, unadulterated excitement. They looked like they were getting front-row seats to a free circus. It had started three months ago. That was when I was diagnosed with severe hypothyroidism. The medication the specialist prescribed triggered an insatiable appetite. I gained forty pounds over summer break. On the first day of junior year, I walked into homeroom wearing the largest size of the school uniform hoodie. Brooke was sitting by the window applying lip gloss. She looked up, her hand freezing mid-stroke. “Hazel?” she drawled, dragging out the vowels. “What… did you eat over the summer?” The class erupted. From that day on, the name “Whale” stuck to me like wet paint. I went to Mr. Humbert about it once. He had sighed and said, “Hazel, kids tease each other. You shouldn’t be so sensitive. If you focus on managing your weight, I’m sure the comments will stop.” “Manage my weight.” I tried to explain that it was a hormonal issue and that I couldn’t stop taking my steroids and thyroid pills. Mr. Humbert had stared at me for a long, uncomfortable moment before saying, “Well, then you’ll just have to ignore them.” “Ignore them.” And so, I did. For three months. Until I sought out Haven, searching for a single soul who would listen to me without judgment. Only to find out it was a college theater student paid fifty bucks by Brooke. Why fifty bucks? Because the student had posted the receipt on his public social media: “Easiest fifty bucks of my life. Just had to talk to some fat high school girl for thirty minutes a day and pretend to be nice. Genuinely nauseating, but money is money.” I saw the screenshot on the school’s anonymous forum the next day. It was pinned to the top of the board. The title read: “Brooke is a genius! Fifty bucks for the best reality TV of the school year.” There were over three hundred comments, all of them laughing. At lunch, I stayed in the empty classroom. I reached into the dark corners of my backpack where my pill bottle was buried, wrapped in layers of paper towels. I didn’t take them out. I just needed to feel the plastic edges. I needed to know they were there. It felt like a safety net. When you know there’s a net at the bottom of the cliff, standing on the edge doesn’t feel quite as terrifying. When I came back from third period, I found a small slip of paper on my desk. The handwriting was unfamiliar, written in hurried ballpoint pen: “I thought what you said this morning was really brave. Don’t let them get to you.” There was no signature. I flipped the paper over; the back was blank. I looked around the room, but no one met my eyes. I folded the paper and slipped it deep into my pocket. After fourth period, Brooke returned. This time she brought Kayla and two other girls, forming a semi-circle around my desk. “Hazel, did you report my post on the school forum?” “What post?” “Don’t play stupid. The post got taken down for harassment.” She crossed her arms, her fingers tapping against her elbows. “Everyone in our grade knew that post was about you. You’re the only one who would complain.” “It wasn’t me.” “Then who was it?” “I don’t know.” She stared at me, her eyes narrowing into cold slits. Then she leaned down, her lips brushing close to my ear. Her voice was a soft, intimate whisper: “Let me tell you something, Hazel. My dad literally built the new science wing of this school. You can complain to the principal, the school board, whoever you want—the result will be the same. But if you keep making trouble for me…” She straightened up, patting my shoulder gently. “…next time, it won’t just be fifty dollars.” She walked away, Kayla following closely behind. Kayla glanced back at me once. It wasn’t a look of malice. It was pity. And somehow, that felt so much worse. 3 “Hazel, you failed your physical assessment again.” Coach Riggs stood by the track, clicking his pen against his clipboard. His plastic whistle jingled against his chest. “Twelve minutes for the mile run. That’s a fail. Ten sit-ups in a minute. Fail.” He looked at me, drawing a heavy black ‘X’ next to my name. “Makeup test is next week. If you don’t pass, you’re looking at a failing grade for PE this semester.” “Coach Riggs,” I rasped, my throat dry. “I have a medical waiver for my thyroid condition. My doctor said high-intensity cardio is dangerous for my heart rate right now—” “Then show me the paperwork,” he cut in, not looking up. “Words don’t keep me compliant with the district. Bring me the signed medical release, and I’ll exempt you. Otherwise, I can’t give you special treatment. It’s school policy.” The waiver was locked in my mother’s dresser. Last month, when I asked her to sign the school’s exemption form, she had snapped: “Stop using your illness as an excuse to be lazy. You want the school thinking you’re broken? Do you know how embarrassing that is for me?” She had kept the original medical forms at home, refusing to give them to me. She thought my illness was a personal failure. “Have it on my desk by Monday morning, understand?” Coach Riggs called out, already walking toward the group of students practicing the long jump. I stood at the edge of the track, my gray school gym shirt soaked through with sweat, clinging uncomfortably to my skin. Brooke walked past, her arm looped through Kayla’s. Her high-waisted athletic shorts made her look like she belonged in an activewear ad. She caught my eye and smirked. “Hey, Hazel, if you need someone to run for you, I can do it. You can just stand there and hold my water bottle.” Kayla laughed. “Oh my god, stop. Remember the last time she fell? It took the janitor three days to get the blood off the asphalt.” “Right, right,” Brooke gasped, covering her mouth with theatrical horror. “Someone took a video of that, didn’t they? I think it got like four thousand likes on TikTok.” A dull, throb of pain bloomed in my knees. That fall was two months ago. I didn’t know anyone had filmed it. I had no idea it was on the internet. “Just search ‘big girl track fail’ and you’ll find it,” Kayla added helpfully. “Don’t worry, your face isn’t in it. Just your uniform. But everyone in town knows those colors.” They walked off, their laughter carried away by the wind. I stood frozen, the cold afternoon air seeping through my damp shirt, chilling me to the bone. I searched for it. During study hall, I borrowed my desk partner’s phone. My mother had taken mine away the previous week, claiming I was “addicted to screens.” I found the video. 4,316 likes. Over eight hundred comments. The clip was twelve seconds long. I was running, my movements heavy and labored, when my sneaker caught on a crack. I went down hard, sliding across the track. The blood on my knees was bright and clear. The audio was filled with the echoing laughter of the kids on the bleachers. The top comment read: “LMAO the seismic activity from that fall must have registered on the Richter scale.” Another read: “Maybe if she put down the fork she wouldn’t be ruining the school track.” A third: “Is that Lakeview High? They must be overfeeding the kids there.” I handed the phone back to my partner. “Thank you.” “Yeah, no problem,” he muttered. His name was Jared. He was a quiet boy who rarely spoke, but he looked at me now with an uncomfortable, lingering gaze. “What?” I asked. “Nothing,” he said quickly, looking back down at his notebook. After school, I didn’t go straight home. I walked to the public library and logged into my student portal. I found the digital copy of my medical diagnosis from the hospital. “Patient: Hazel Wood. Diagnosis: Severe Hypothyroidism. Undergoing active hormone therapy. Side effects include significant weight gain, lethargy, and joint pain. Strenuous cardiovascular exercise is highly discouraged.” The hospital stamp was visible at the bottom. I spent ten cents to print it out, placed it carefully in a folder, and slid it into my bag. At least this was one thing I could fix myself. When I got home, the house was dark. My mother wasn’t there. On the kitchen counter sat a bowl of cold, congealed pasta. A note was taped to the microwave: “Working late. Eat this.” The pasta had absorbed all the sauce, turning into a solid, unappetizing mass. I took a bite, but my throat was too dry to swallow. With my phone gone and the TV remote confiscated—my mother had taken it after declaring that “watching TV all day is why you’re getting fat”—there was nothing to do. The house was so quiet that the hum of the refrigerator sounded like a roar. I washed the bowl, went to my room, and sat at my desk. I tried to focus on my algebra homework, but by the third problem, my mind blanked. Usually, this was when I would open Haven. I would write: “This homework is impossible. I think my brain is broken.” And the voice would reply: “You’re not stupid, Hazel. The curriculum is just poorly designed. You’re doing great.” And I would smile, and keep going. 4 “Hazel, I can’t accept this printout.” Coach Riggs slid the folder back to my side of the desk, his finger tapping the paper. “Why not?” “It needs a parent’s signature. Your mother didn’t sign the waiver line.” “Coach, the diagnosis is real. You can call the clinic to verify—” “Rules are rules, Wood,” he said, waving his hand to dismiss me. “I’m not trying to make your life difficult, but if something happens to you on my watch and I don’t have a parental waiver on file, the school is liable. I can’t take that risk.” I clutched the folder to my chest, stood there for three seconds, and then turned around. In the main hallway, Brooke was leaning against the water fountain. When she saw me, her lips curved into a sharp little smile. “Waiver didn’t go through, huh?” I ignored her and headed toward the lockers. She followed me, her pace slow and deliberate. “I wanted to tell you something.” I walked faster. “Your mom worked really late last night, didn’t she? Like, past eleven?” I stopped. “How do you know that?” She took a sip from her water bottle, her tone light and conversational. “Because my mom’s spa had an evening event yesterday, and your mom was there getting the full package. She went in at nine and didn’t leave until almost eleven. I was waiting in the lobby for my mom and saw her run her card.” She leaned in closer, dropping her voice. “A six-hundred-dollar treatment. She certainly doesn’t mind spending on herself.” My fingers dug into the edge of my folder, bending the cardboard. “Why are you telling me this?” “No reason,” she said, blinking innocently. “Just thought it was funny. You wrote in your little diary that your mom wouldn’t buy you a new track suit because the old one was so tight you couldn’t breathe. But she has six hundred dollars for a facial.” She laughed, tossing her empty bottle into the recycling bin. “She’s not cheap, Hazel. She’s just cheap when it comes to “you”.” I stood in the hallway, my chest tightening so hard I could barely draw breath. It wasn’t because her words were cruel. It was because they were true. “Anyway, see you in gym,” Brooke said, waving a hand. “Don’t fall today, Whale. They just resurfaced the track.” She sauntered off. I stood alone in the hallway, the pale winter light cutting through the glass doors. My palms were sweating so much the ink on the printed diagnosis was beginning to smear. I didn’t hear a single word the teachers said for the rest of the day. My mind was trapped on that number: “six hundred dollars.” The buttons on my school hoodie were practically bursting. When I had begged her for a size up, she had told me, “We’ll buy it when you lose the weight. I’m not throwing money away.” But she had six hundred dollars for a spa night. When school let out, I didn’t wait for her. I walked straight home, went into her master bedroom, and approached her vanity. A brand-new jar of luxury night cream sat on the counter, the expensive packaging still pristine. I turned the box over. The price tag read: “Two hundred and eighty dollars.” I opened her top dresser drawer and found her credit card statement for the month. I scanned the charges: “The Oasis Spa: $600.00.” “Nordstrom: $800.00.” “The Grill Room (Dinner for Two): $150.00.” Dinner for two. Who had she gone with? “What are you doing in here?” My mother’s voice came from the doorway, her keys jingling in her hand. “Nothing,” I said, sliding the statement back into the drawer. “Who gave you permission to be in my room?” Her face darkened instantly as she dropped her purse onto the bed. “Spying on me? What is wrong with you?” “Mom, I need you to sign the PE waiver.” “Not this again,” she groaned, rolling her eyes. “I told you, I’m not signing it. You want the whole town knowing you’re sick? Just walk the track if you can’t run.” “I’ll fail PE if you don’t sign.” “Then run. Walking never killed anyone.” “The doctor said my heart rate—” “Doctors love to exaggerate!” she snapped. “Look at you, always whining about being sick. If you put half as much effort into your schoolwork as you do into finding excuses, we wouldn’t have these problems.” She hung up her coat and walked into the kitchen. I followed her, standing in the doorway. “Mom.” “What?” “You spent six hundred dollars at the spa last night.” She froze mid-movement. She turned around slowly, her expression hardening from annoyance to a cold, flat anger. “Who told you that?” “I saw the bill.” “You went through my things?” her voice rose, shrill and sharp. “Hazel, you are getting completely out of hand! It is my money. I work fifty hours a week for it. Do I not have the right to spend my own money?” “I didn’t say you couldn’t—” “Then what are you saying?” She slammed a frying pan onto the stove. “Are you going to write about this on your little app now? Tell everyone how terrible your mother is?” “The app.” It was always the app. Those words had become a weapon she used to silence me. Every time I expressed an ounce of frustration, she brought it up, as if any boundary I tried to set was just me betraying her to the world. “I just wanted you to sign the paper,” I whispered. “I’m not signing it. Get out of my kitchen.” She turned the stove on, and the smell of cooking oil filled the room, making my eyes water. I walked back to my bedroom and closed the door. I sat at my desk, opened my drawer, and pulled out the paper towels. The prescription bottle was heavy. I unscrewed the cap. The white tablets inside looked clean, almost peaceful. I began to count them out onto my desk. One. Two. Three. From the other room, I could hear my mother’s voice. She was on the phone, laughing. “Oh, of course, Mr. Davies. I have the marketing mockups ready for you to look over tomorrow morning…” Her laughter drifted through the thin drywall. It was a voice she never used with me. Warm. Eager to please. Alive. I swept the pills into my palm. Thirty-two tablets. A small mountain of white. I picked up the half-empty glass of stale water on my nightstand. Without pausing, I threw the pills into my mouth and swallowed. There were too many. They caught in my throat, dry and choking. I drank the rest of the water, tilting my head back, forcing them down. They tasted bitter. Chalky and sharp. My throat felt like it had been scraped with sandpaper. I slipped the empty bottle back into the drawer, laid my head down on the desk, and pressed my forehead against my unfinished algebra homework. My vision began to blur. My fingers went numb first, followed by a cold, heavy ache in my stomach. I don’t know how much time passed. Maybe ten minutes. Maybe more. I heard footsteps outside my door. “Knock. Knock.” “Hazel, dinner’s ready. Get out here.” I didn’t move. I couldn’t. “Hazel?” Her voice changed, sharp with irritation. “Stop throwing a tantrum. Open the door!” Silence. Then came the jingle of keys. She always kept the spare key to my room on her ring. The lock clicked, and the door swung open. I heard the sound of a plate shattering on the floor. Then, a scream. “HAZEL!”
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