Tiffany Kwok

A person once said to me, “Be a good replacement for me when I leave.” It didn’t really make much sense to me at the time, be a good her? What was that supposed to mean? Why would I have to be her instead of just being myself? Now looking back on it that seems to be the time I remember before everything went downhill.

In elementary school, I knew a girl named Tiffany Kwok. She was friends with people like Tiffany Ng and Corina Lee; even in the first grade there were already people who were obviously more popular. They didn’t have much to do with me the first couple of years of school, I was more of a loner, someone who just liked to hang out alone from everyone else and they seemed to be the opposite of me. The only thing that connected us was Tiffany Ng because she was my next door neighbor and her mom drove me home from school everyday, even then we didn’t talk that much. So with someone who I really had no connection to, I didn’t know why she didn’t seem to like me. I never did anything to her, so why did she just seeme to have this constant dislike for me?

I got my answer the year she said she was going to move away. I didn’t think of it then, but she though of me as a threat. For some reason she thought that I was going to take her place in her group of friends because of my connection to Tiffany Ng. It was true that over the years we had started warming up to each other more, but our friendship was still nowhere near the one they had. So the year she thought she was going to leave, she told me to be a good her because she wouldn’t be there anymore. Btu the thing was, she didn’t move away that year.

It was after that summer when we returned to school that the bullying began. Though I guess it can’t really be called bullying since whatever she did it wasn’t like I was taking it and not retaliating. It was more just a fight that went on and on for a couple of years that consisted of snarky remarks, rumors spread and the occasional physical altercation.

This constant fighting with this girl and just the stress of everything finally got to me one day and I made what I think can be considered as one of the biggest and stupidest mistakes of my life. I can’t really remember when it was or the specific even that trigged it, all I remember was the relief that I felt after Id’ done it. I’m not going to sit here and lie through my teeth saying that I completely regret what I did. This may say something about what my mental health was at the time but it really helped me. For a few short moments I was able to forget everything that was wrong in my life and just concentrate on one thing. And what was a little more physical pain when I was already going through so much emotionally?

At the end of seventh grade I somehow ended up making up with this girl, I don’t really know how or even why but we were able to set aside our differences and stop fighting. It may have been a bit overdramatic and I may have involved some hugging and tears but it actually seemed to stick. Now again I’m not going to say that one apology made everything better and made us become the best of friends but we didn’t hate each other anymore. Now this peace lasted, but for the time it lasted it made some permanent scars on me.