# 1 I N B U L L Y I N G
#1 I N H O R R O R
# 1 I N D O M E S T I C V I O L E N C E
# 1 I N A N T I - B U L L Y I N G
# 1 I N R A I S E A W A R E N E S S
(highest ranks)
CLARK, OLIVIA
15/02/2000
DD/MM/YY
TRENT, ALESSIA
28...
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I breathed out, my breath showing like puffs of smoke in the cold December air. Shivering, I tugged at my coat, as if the futile action would heat me up twofold.
I reached the bench, sweeping rust-coloured leaves off the surface before sitting down. I laid a single white rose down on the wood beside me, knowing that a random kid was just going to come over later and take it or knock it off. It comforted me, though, so I did it.
I ran my finger over the plague as I let out a shaky breath.
'In memory of Alessia Trent 28/08/2000 - 10/10/2018'
That's what the plaque read. After persuading the local council that Alessia was not a murderer, but a vulnerable girl who was being attacked in her own school, she got her own bench. I felt that she needed something like that, a token from me to say...to say that I'm sorry. It was brutal to be targeted in the ways that she was, and by faces so familiar, yet that discarded her so easily.
I closed my eyes. When I did that, I remembered. Having lived her life for seven months, it was easy to see things from inside her shoes; it was a beautiful nightmare. My mum had called it that a week after I had returned home, and I had continued to call it that ever since. No one believed me—that I had lived as another person for seven months, but been in a coma for only one.
