"Fattie"
I'll never forget the day I heard that word. Those words that first made me sick. It was 9 years ago, when I was eight. Those days, school lunches consisted of chocolate puddings, chips ahoy cookies, peanut butter and fluff sandwiches, and my personal favorite, Tim Tams. In the summer when school was out, my cousins and I would swim in the cool pool water, enjoying sips of sugary lemonade and fattening oranges creamsicles. The word calorie was not yet a part of my vocabulary. I was on the school playground, eagerly rushing to play basketball, my rolls of fat jiggling with each jump in my step, when I first heard the words that brought upon my illness.
"Fattie" the words came from a lanky boy named Connor. When they escaped his mouth, while nearly everyone simply laughed,
I could feel a film of glass covering my eyes. Don't cry don't cry don't cry. I recall repeating over and over in my head. After school that day, at home, glancing in the mirror, seeing my round face and stout body, I came to the realization that he was right. Connor was correct to call me that. And then and there, I allowed myself to cry.
The kids that laughed at his comment wouldn't remember that day. Connor wouldn't remember the comment that he made. Nobody on that small school playground in the middle-of-nowhere, Wisconsin would remember that incident. Nobody but me.
It was unforgettable.
