Sticks & Stones

by Abby Cooper

I know who you are, and I know

what you’re dealing with. I want to help. I blinked once. Twice. Then three times. Then a thousand times. If you’re ready

No, not that. Nobody actually uses the bathroom in middle school. Instead, I rolled my sleeve up to my elbow, and there it was, as

expected: D-O-R-K. The bold, black word itched more than a thousand mosquito bites. I gave it a long scratch. Ahhh. Scratching felt good, but not

According to Mom and Dad, we first saw Dr. Patel when I was barely a week old. My

Normally that wouldn’t be a bad thing, but when they saw BEAUTIFUL appear on my

little baby arm moments after he said it in the delivery room, everybody was pretty freaked out. After all, babies are just supposed to be beautiful, not

have the word plastered on their arms like a weird baby tattoo. Then came the tests. Lots of tests. O...

my life forever: C-A-V. CAV. Short for cogna...

I let out a quiet whimper, knowing I’d be stuck with this itchy thing for the next two to four

weeks before it faded. Longer, if someone said it again.

Snotty Ami had only called me DORK, and no one had called me anything else too bad lately. I knew it had to be a bad word because

only the bad ones itched. Plus, the letters usually formed one by one like someone was writing them on my skin with a sharp fingernail. But that hadn’t

sleeve, my heart racing. The word was horizontal, so I saw it all at once: PATHETIC. Pathetic?

Freaky Thing’s symptoms. I knew it wasn’t. CAV meant itchy bad words and soothing good words. It meant being careful about who I

hung out with so that I heard more good than bad. It meant always watching out for what other people called me.

I had a note and a new secret, and

POOPYHEAD took up a huge chunk of my forearm. And it itched. Bad. Bad bad bad bad bad. The only

the super-wise four-year-old Jeg decided that she would become my personal bodyguard

to prevent any more icky comments. Mom has all these hilarious videos where you can see little Jeg—usually

pants all at the same time—standing right in front of me with her little hands on her hi...

When kids wanted to play with me, she’d ask, “Do you promise to say only nice things?” and the kids had to...

Now it was probably a gross, moldy mess, just like my heart.

When Liam and

I first started going out at the end of fifth grade, he told me all these weird secrets about himself, like how he ...

(Mr. Koala Snuggles) and once kept a piece of gum in a jar as a pet named Chewy. (That’s why he gave me gum: ...

“Yeah … middle school. So?” My voice was shaky. “So…” He squirmed. “I can’t really

be associated with…” He gestured to me. “All your weird stuff. It’s too weird. You were really interesting to hang out with,

wasn’t the Jeg I grew up with, and Liam wasn’t acting like the Liam I went out with. It was like aliens had invaded their bodies or something. They

I will stop thinking about Liam. I will stop missing Jeg. I will deal with Mom and Dad and everybody else. I will just keep going,

As I fled, my arms and legs practically exploded with bad words. LOSER. STUPID.

UNLOVABLE. WORTHLESS. FREAK. GROSS. NOT GOOD ENOUGH.

same time, I had

chocolate chip cookies Nice Andy had baked specifically to thank me for going

out with him this long. They were extremely delicious.

Elyse, Ready for your biggest challenge yet? You HAVE to do this one or else I won’t help you get Explorer

Leader. You have to break up Jeg and Kevin ASAP.

Plus,” I added, “the only certain thing in life is doubt. Sticks and stones. Hakuna matata. Hocus pocus. Et cetera.”

into action that day.

Why did I care so much about people who

didn’t care about me? There were four awesome people staring at me, waiting to hear if I’d go spoil my dinner with them and talk

And I hung out with the coolest people. Like, no weirdos at all.” She was probably saying that to me, but I

barely heard. That’s what happens when you’re surrounded by your own friends and your own happy thoughts.

And I didn’t even need Nice Andy to get those, because I felt that way about myself.

Sigafiss had taught me something, too, I realized. She had taught me to wonder who people really are, because sometimes the person someone

shows your parents isn’t the same person they show you. And sometimes even the person they show you isn’t the person they are.

Even if the word wasn’t on his body, maybe it was written in his mind. Maybe everyone had itchy words in their minds,