Free Odd Girl Out by Rachel Simmons Page B

Vanessa. "They went something like, 'Vanessa is fat, Vanessa wears a bra.'" Vanessa was the first in the grade to develop breasts, and she had also put on some weight. "There were these limericks. And they would snap my bra all the time," she said. "The boys wouldn't. The girls would."
    Nicki and Zoe didn't hesitate to back Stacy up. "They were very creative in the way they would torture me. They would steal my notebooks and they would just write all over [them], 'Vanessa is fat,' 'Vanessa wears a bra,' 'Vanessa sucks,' and all this stuff. In the wintertime they would scratch it into the ice on the bus, and we'd ride around town like that."
    The ironic thing, Vanessa recalled, is that Stacy was the only other person developing breasts at the time. "But it was all focused on me," she said. "At the time I thought it was because I was gross and ugly and they didn't want to have anything to do with me. Now I think Stacy saw a lot of things in me that reminded her of herself, and it scared her. I was a bit too close to her. The other girls didn't look at all like her, they didn't act like her, but most of all, they didn't know her secrets."
    Vanessa's closeness with Stacy seemed only to inflame Stacy's cruelty. Nevertheless, Vanessa clung to her. "Every day I'm hearing these songs, and every day I'm hanging out with them," she explained. "I'm going to lunch with them. I'm going after school to their houses. It was like I was her best friend, and yet I was her total target."
    The girls promised that it was just a joke. They told Vanessa they needed to write a song and that she was just so easy to write about. Vanessa wanted to believe them, so she did. "I didn't have any other friends," Vanessa said. "I was so wrapped up in these people. There were other people I knew who were really cool, and I just—I was so wrapped up. I was so wrapped up in wanting to be part of this group because it seemed to me to be the center of power." Since Nicki and Zoe were affectionate whenever Stacy wasn't around, it was easier for Vanessa to stay with the group.
    It also allowed the bullying to be built around the friendship and vulnerability Stacy sensed in Vanessa. One morning at school, before class started, Stacy somberly announced that her mother had died. Vanessa was devastated for her. She got Stacy lunch, told teachers she wouldn't be able to attend class, and covered for Stacy all day. "I thought, 'She finally needs me,'" Vanessa recalled. "She needs me as emotional support, not just to mess with. I was so excited because I'd take care of her, do anything for her."
    At the end of the day, Stacy surrounded Vanessa with a large group of girls and told her she'd lied. You're a sucker, she said. "She had convinced the whole school to be in on this," Vanessa said, anger like gravel in her voice. "She wanted to show everyone that she could manipulate me to such an extent, and everyone else wanted to be involved. They all stood up behind the lie. Everyone. And watched me the whole day feel so sorry for Stacy."
    Stacy never lifted a finger against Vanessa. She abused Vanessa quietly, deftly using third parties throughout sixth grade. She sent so many notes and messages through other willing girls that Vanessa, feeling surrounded by hate, stopped wanting to go to school. "Wherever you were," she recalled, "there would be a note waiting for you."
    One day, the phone rang at Vanessa's house. It was from a trainer at a local gym, asking if Vanessa was still interested in the weight-loss program that she had signed up for. Her father had answered the phone. Vanessa had never been to the gym. Although this might have been a good opportunity to tell her parents about her peers' abuse, Vanessa pretended the call was a mistake.
    When I asked Vanessa why, she replied swiftly.
    "I never wanted my parents to think that I was making bad decisions," she explained. "I think deep down inside I knew. I knew this wasn't good for me and that Stacy was mean. But you