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write on time young urban adults from boston and providence write about the past events of their k-12 lives e-published july 2012 page 1

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table of contents year up boston 4 floor ashley gomes-tavares 5 ayana haygood 7 benito henri 10 brittney cruse 13 charles ligonde 16 colby greer 19 consuela harrison 22 corey rosinski 25 desmond mcpherson 28 emmanuel francois 31 enrique ramos 35 george rodriguez 39 josh luzuriaga 42 kevin nieto 46 th anne-marie maxi 56 miguel tolentino 60 nakia williams 63 ramon guerrero 66 regine milfort 69 rickey dunning 72 souhail oucible 75 tashi hamilton 80 taylor smith 83 vriky santos 89 zachary capone 93 year up boston 5th floor bob beng 96 imari jeffreys 99 james barnes 102 kevin gilmore 107 brian moitt 113 linda hines 48 linda nabawanuka 51 jonathan gourdet 115 page charles wolliston 118 2

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jose torres 121 cristian feliz 125 jeron cook-bennett 127 giovanni santini 131 leah mohammed 135 laura rosa 144 shurita parson 151 jamaal barker 153 denise tinsley 156 beatrice anacassis 161 torrey johnson 165 d quame brown 168 denisse tejada 171 blanca calvo 177 sara erroummani 181 patrick pinchinat 185 lumine michel 188 devrae tejeda 191 sandra negron 195 jon clark 200 phil vernely 204 travis vital 209 year up providence whitney gumbs 213 maria dillon 215 suvilath hong 217 terri chhay 220 haneefah abdullah 223 ronaldo rosario 229 xavier burrell 232 alex londono 233 christopher alberto 235 jane natt 238 jeff gore 241 kakrona sothan 243 lisa barlow 245 oneida cornelio 247 zuleyma chavez-blanco 250 savoeun loeung 254 terrance hardy 259 cristina velasquez 261 jordan urruita 263 genesis camacho 265 page peter chung 267 3

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daniel carrasco 271 rosheik hendy 274 linda kittirath 276 pamela diaz 279 joshua navarro 282 francheska nunez 284 engers reyes 287 brayam renovales 290 john torres 293 melissa hernandez 296 kenny watts 299 pamela robinson-jones 302 lamar dawson 305 efrain reyes 308 page 4

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year up­boston 4th floor friend 3rd third was the grade at joseph j hurley on the first day of school i arrived with new supplies new clothes new everything eager as a beaver all the children sat in the auditorium waiting to hear their names and classrooms in preparation to make a `single file line and begin the day i sat near a girl her name was kitara she loved candy and cartoons and hated school she saw i had a new lisa frank pencil case and asked want to trade i looked down at her red pouch with pencil shadings on it doodles of cats and it looked like juice had been spilled on it no i replied this is new my mom bought it for me we ended up in the same class she was such a pain in the butt the next day kitara arrived to class she had something in her hand it was colorful and looked very similar to my pencil case on this day she did not sit next to me i searched my bag and my pencil case was nowhere to be found i was so sad and shocked how could a girl i just met steal something from me i thought i walked up to her and asked if she had taken my pencil case she replied no my mom bought this for me yesterday open it i snapped she opened it and there were all my supplies my rainbow mechanical pencils regular pencils hearts and puppy erasers and my change i had in there for snacks that s not yours liar i shouted yes it is you re just mad because i have one i told the teacher she had to give it back 6th page my education ashley gomez-tavares 1st colleen was my best friend she had the longest blond hair i had ever seen we loved each other and pretended to be sisters at lunch we would sit together share lunches and play together she had the loudest funniest giggle that made me laugh until my cheeks hurt colleen and i were so very opposite but to each other we were the same person she was the first person i ever gave my phone number to we would talk for hours about what s on tv what we ate for dinner make funny noises and laugh she was the greatest 5

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sixth grade i was in a new school and a new town new bedford massachusetts i was the new girl and noooobody talks to the new girl/boy so you can imagine how half of the sixth grade was for me i was in enrolled a few days later than regular enrollment so i arrived at an awkward time i sat in the back of the class with steven rorke he was rather big and he farted a lot he didn t talk much only occasionally about his cat matrix and boy was that cat amazing i became his friend because no one else would talk to him nor i so we talked to each other one day on the way to lunch i heard someone say why don t they just hold hands and kiss already i was so embarrassed i went to the bathroom and cried 7th keith junior high school was the oldest school in new bedford it smelled weird and the floors creaked my homeroom was on the first floor right near the gym locker rooms boys who would skip homeroom would go to the locker room smoke cigarettes and yell so loud it s like they wanted to get into trouble my teacher mrs santos with her heavy accent would stand at the doorway of the boys locker room and say hey get out of here go to your class mr.desrosiers is cominggggggg we d all laugh as the first period bell rings the once quiet halls became a jungle girls were chattering boys rapping ipods blasting and a teacher on every corner yelling get to class the classrooms were dark and depressing with lights that flickered and windows so tainted you could no longer see out of them who is allowing this school to remain standing besides the blessings of god i thought 9th my first year of high school was very exciting i was so anxious to start school i stayed up all night gathering my clothes for the week putting my new supplies in my bag in an orderly fashion and just watching tv until the sun came up i had to be at school at 7:30 my first day i was up at 4:45 and ready at 5:50 with a whole lot of time to spare i made myself breakfast and sat in the living room time was dragging by and i was so ready to take that walk to that big brick building i ve been longing to go to finally it was 6:50 and time to hit the pavement i put my head phones in my ear and commenced my walk on my way there i noticed a lot of other possible 9th graders walking and talking about what teachers they heard about and who their older siblings told them to avoid i heard ms velez is really rude she gives conduct cards like christmas gifts said one girl yeah my brother said she s a hard a said her friend conduct cards were something we were used to since middle school when you get sent to the office the teacher escorts you and brings a conduct card stating what you did and what the consequence should be when i arrived to school i was instructed to go to the auditorium where we were given our name tags and homeroom numbers it was like a middle school reunion the conversations were so loud some people were hugging and so excited page 6

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11th junior prom was awesome first time i ve ever rode in a limo from under her and we had the whale the crowd roaredddddddd 6th grade page 12th in my senior year of high school we had a ceremony where my class and a previous twelfth grade class would fight for a whale not literally fight and not a real whale see new bedford is known for whaling and our mascot is you guessed it a whale so during this ceremony we play a basic game of tug-of-war but there is a whale tied in the middle eight students from our class and eight previous graduates duke it out for the whale if the graduating class does not retrieve the whale we would not be able to have after prom which is an after party after prom which takes place at school with fun activities and so on so we began the tug and everyone in the audience is cheering and screaming we were so close many times but they pulled just as hard there was a boy on our side his name was cody parker he was the tallest and the strongest and as far as we know he was the last one in line and pulled the hardest the other side was getting tired and the whale was so close to us so very close this time cody pulled so hard we all got pulled back when i caught my balance all i heard was pullllllllllllllll pullllllllllllllllllllllllll pullllllllllllllllllllllllllll and we pulled and seconds later we all fell to the floor all sixteen of us everyone got up so anxiously to see where the whale was nobody saw it then the girl in front of the line reached life itself ayana haygood preschool i don t even remember the car my mother drove but i do remember pulling into the parking lot surrounded by brick buildings heath st projects my mom would help me out the car grab my little hand and lead me downstairs to the basement i remember eating snacks i remember me and my best friend used to play inside the fence with ugly grassmostly dirt we used the ropes to tie around us to play choo choo train i remember the days my dad would come and pick me up without my mom s permission i remember he would always get me what i wanted from any junk food to toys on the hot days he would let take off my shirt just like him i had his head but with braids i looked just like him you would ve thought we were twins i was the son he didn t have yet 7

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i was in the schools play yard around 5 o clock and i was looking for my sister because it was time to go this boy named jordan that had a crush on me came with me to look for my sister because the potluck was over and it was time to go i knew i was going to have my first kiss while in the process of looking for my sister all i remember was it being windy outside i puckered my lips up and closed my eyes i m thinking yessss my first kiss while my eyes were closed and this nigga stuck his tongue in my mouth and i was totally grossed out that s when we connected my little hand to his face there were many after school events because mission hill always had the student s family involved there were numerous potlucks recollections and i wasn t looking forward to the rest of them for the school year 11th grade the previous year me and my best friend had all of the same class together this year the school tried to approach a different alternative for us my best friend and i to get back on track sofia and i realized that we had no classes together until when we got to the end of the schedule we had rob s class math class together we got to class sat next to each other rob looked at the attendance sheet and said sofia you are not in this math class our mouths dropped after class we discussed how they played us and went on about our business as the days went by we grew tired of school school started at 8:30 most of the time to me was 8:45 the days the other day i would arrive around 9 o clock sofia started to come to school later and later because she was always tired in the mornings and it took her a little while to get dressed so maybe like 2 months into the school year we was in our i don t give a fuck mode my mom didn t play that shit so i had to wake up and go to school so i would go to my classes and wait for sofia to come to school and we d leave and go to the mall or northeastern on other days we would just skip the annoying classes and wait for lunch this went on till about november then the school noticed by time we came back to school in january sofia was at new mission and i was at edco before the end of the year they made arrangements for sofia to go to day and evening 2nd grade from k2-4th grade i attended mission grammar a catholic school we had to wear white or light blue button up blouses blue plaid dressit had red and yellow 3 different blues int it stockings and shoes the lunch room where 1 ½ of a classroom with mobile bench cafeteria table from my memory the food was pretty good after lunch we had recess in the schoolyard for a half an hour when school was out some kids went home on a school bus but for my friends and i we went to saint frances after school program in a van the time at the after school was pretty boring and i couldn t wait til my mom came and got me around 6 when she would get off of work one day while at the after school i did something disturbing i think my friend onyinye came up with the plan olivia went and found a good sized rock i hid the rock and asked to use the bathroom went in the bathroom and peed on the rock when i came back outside to the playground my page 8

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friends asked me did you do it did you do it and i pulled it out and we laughed in our small little group we went around the playground and told certain kids to hold it and smell it we also lied and said it smelled like cotton candy some kids said that it didn t smell like nothing we got mad and laughed at them and told them it was pee the last girl we went up to told on me and i we had to stand against the wall till it was time for homework time but since it was my pee and my friends idea we got in the most trouble and had to be supervised by this lady named sister mary i was so scared because i knew what i was doing and i knew my mom didn t play no games she was mad but didn t punish me which surprised me 3rd grade my favorite teachers were sister donna and sister dianne2 twin old ladies and sister pat back then i was use to calling them that but now i would ve found it kind of weird every morning in the beginning of class we would say a prayer and every day at the end of the day we would recite the pledge of allegiance and following with prayer i think it was hail mary i can t remember all the detail but i do remember that when all the class came out into the hallway and stood in line we would have our rosary beads and i would always try to get the pretty looking one with the crystal like beading instead of the plastic one i can t remember if it was every friday or once on a friday the whole school would go to the church and have some type of ceremony during the ceremony each of the catholic student would get the the tan circle chip the represented the holy bread and all of my nigerian friend were catholic and received the holy bread they would think that they were special and gods children and i was just like yea right 12th grade blue and yellow were the colors that represented my high school i remember that day like it was yesterday my cap and gown were yellow and my my tassel was blue and yellow and stole was blue i had my mushroom haircut nice dress on and some heels i was so proud of myself for graduating on time i don t know i did it with my high school years being rocky and i never attended summer school two weeks before june 1st came i was at edco everyday that week after school finishing up my sign language course it was a requirement to graduating and me and my friend was in the same boat had a few hours to complete and she was like forget that i m going home the old me would ve did the same thing but we knew it was the last day and i tried to convince her to stay but she didn t and iidid i was determined not to to go to summer school and take the whole class over so i stayed at edco till 6 o clock to walk across that stage on june 6th 2011 with new mission high 7th grade it was the end of lunchtime and of course there is no life to the school in general it was dead as usual we was in a group of friends and i don t know how it came up but long story short i squeezed the handle on the fire extinguisher and it released the stuff from it into the air everybody cleared the scene because it got smokey and an elementary kid was effected by it because of his asthma the girls in my page 9

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group ran to the bathroom on our floor everybody that was there had the evidence on the bottom of their feet the white powder stuff but i was the only one to wipe it off in when everybody cleared the bathroom as i went to class a few people got pulled into the office and their shoes were checked when i went to check on things my peers were complaining saying how they didn t want to get in trouble for something they didn t do etc after 30 minutes i felt bad and turned my self in and had to stay in the office for the whole day and they called my parents when i got home my dad put a fire extinguisher in my bed mind but i knew that i wasn t going to see my friends and teachers anymore i was extremely saddened by the matter,i remember my mom saying benito its going to be o.k you are going to make new friends at your new school i said heck no i want to stay at my school my mother s face became redder than blood and she struck my thigh harder than lighting i screamed that the top of my lungs i never spoke to my mom like that again 3rd grade this is the year in which i had the meanest teacher ever she was extremely rude i don t remember doing well in any of her assignments i was alway disappointed in her class because i couldn t understand the material like everyone else did i recall a moment when i was having a hard time spelling a word i asked for her help and she said benito the word was already on the board i m not going to help you i felt left out neglected and i ever made any type of progress in her class life was really hard for me in the 3rd grade my education benito henri 1st grade i remember this moment as one of the worst days of my life it was the day the i had to transfer schools my whole world was broken into pieces i didn t understand much about what was happening in my little 4th grade i can remember this day like a movie my fourth grade class and i were all sitting in our reading circle i then noticed something bizarre my teacher mrs froggatt always had a book in her hand right before reading time and today she didn t have anything in her hands mrs froggatt sat there with a face that appeared to look sadder than a bloodhound she mournfully said guys i have some bad page 10

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news two planes crashed into the world trade center in new york and thousands of people lost their lives there was this long defeating silence my fellow classmates and i had their mouths opened in shock while others became teary eyed i had a hard time registering what she had said and all i could do was look among my fellow classmates and wondered how could such a horrific event occur was the pilate drunk it wasn t till later on the news that i found out that it was actually a terrorist attack my little mind exploded in red burning fear and then i said to myself will terrorist sneak up in my house and attack me will my parents and siblings be killed by terrorist before i do what happened to our police what happened to the security what happened to the freaking army after all my anger and frustration bled out i became wretched and prayed myself to sleep 5th grade the john p holland school 5th grade department was filled with excitement the martin luther king speech competition was right around the corner and everyone wanted a chance to win first place i remember my 5th grade teacher mrs.champagne initially announced the event in class she said o.k guys listen up we are getting ready to have our preliminary competition in class to see who would be fit to compete in the real competition each 5th grade class must have three representatives so that means there will only be three winners from this class do you guys understand i couldn t believe what i just heard there will only be three winners my heart was beating harder than bass speakers because i became nervous the pressure was on.students were only required to memorize half of the speech that gave me some relief but then mrs champagne said listen now i don t want you guys to think you re safe with the fact that we are only required to learn half of this piece when she distributed the speech amongst my classmates and i i notice how long the half we had to memorize was and i grew frantic later that evening i rehearsed my heart out of the speech each student in my class had a week to workshop their speeches a week later the preliminary rounds was underway the 5th grade department was filled with anticipation suspense fear and energy i felt confident thanks to all the studying i did for the past week when i stood up to perform my entire 5th class disappeared and it was as if i was performing at home by myself at the end of my performance i was given a standing ovation it was in that moment that i began to thank god for giving me the drive to work hard i later won second place in the real competition and it felt great although everyone thought that i should have first whatever it was the freaking 5th grade 6th grade i really like you benito hehe that was what she always said i can remember her like a terrible chick flick predictable i was extremely insecure in the 6th grade i thought i was fat gross,smelly everything ugly i wasn t the only person who thought that way about me girls just wasn t viding with me back then i would put all my heart and soul into pulling a girl but things just didn t work out for me one day i was page 11

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boarding the school bus and then i noticed a cape verdian girl that i thought was more beautiful than danny lions sitting under the sun i sat right behind and said excuse but i don t think i ve seen you before my name is benito what is your name she replied my name is is elizabeth,but you can call me lizzie that was the longest bus ride of my life because lizzy and i spoke the whole time it only took a week for us to make it official we were like two peas in a pound inseparable when ever someone one of us by ourselves it sparked a concern to other people after months went by our relationship became difficult we got into countless arguments our communication became stale it was horrible one day we were on the bus together elizabeth and i just had just got into argument and our emotions were hotter than metal over fire it was in that moment when i knew i had to end it i said lizzy its over i cannot do this anymore elizabeth began to cry waterfalls into my lap i kissed her one last time and walked off the bus we never became friends again 9th grade this was the darkest was the darkest year of my life i it was a bright and early morning the first day of high school i was extremely excited especially because i got accepted into a performing arts high school called the boston arts academy i made it into the theater department acting has been a passion of mine for awhile and i was pumped to dive into the art form even deeper i got up that morning feeling like a million dollars i hopped into the shower singing louder than the screeching sound of police car sirens zooming down the street my mom became livid so she screamed benito shut the hell up i acted like i didn t hear her and continued to sing as loud as ever when i got out the shower i immediately threw on my all white outfit that i had prepared the night before i thought this ensemble was my greatest work i wore a white tank top,white t-shirt white dickey pants white socks white eveything i was fresh and clean i thought i was the flyest guy around as i stepped outside of my house everyone was staring at me people were shirking and covering their faces i thought they were appreciating my ensemble when i got to the school excitement filled the air and anticipation for the arts were burning in the atmosphere during lunch there was a krump session it is a hip hop dance circle i really liked krump so i hopped into the circle and gave it a try lets just said it didn t go too well at the end of my moment in the circle people were laughing pointing their fingers people were saying things like he is stupid he is ugly omg look at him he is mad sweaty those words hurt me so hard that i fell into depression my life was felt like i had a dark cloud hovering above me nothing made me happy but thought of death the thought of taking my life everything changed when i made this kid named jordan we were both really into krump at the time and one day we were walking home and he said hey man there is a krump group at my church and we krump every friday for about an hour before youth service i was interested and i started going to the meetings then there was one day during the youth service the choir sang a page 12

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song that hit me in an unusually way this was taking about how jesus loves us and there was a moment in the song that went like i know he loves me this quote was repeated over and over and out of nowhere this joy began to develop in me and i started saying things like i am handsome i am awesome i am smart my depression disappeared and i began someone who didn t have happiness because happiness only occurs when there are happy happening in your life but i have joy which is a feeling that you can have no matter what your circumstance may be and only remember the good thank you dad 12th grade my final year in high school was filled with ups and downs the downs were that i was in an unhealthy relationship we were having premarital sex we got into to heated arguments everyday these arguments were filled with so much hatred that it became physical and potentially bloody i had to pick up my slack as a senior gpa wise because i didn t do a good job academically during 9th,10th and 11th grade i was dealing with a bunch of domestic issues my mom got on my nerves my brothers making a fuss over littles things like lotion soap and other stupid stuff my dad going crazy because we wanted to take control of my life but i wouldn t let him the good moments were that i had lost about like 40 pounds the summer before school i was able to hit honorable mention two times i passed my math mcas exam and i finally broke up with the girl that was ruining my life wow thank you god for allowing me to experience so many ups oh and thank for writing my life out in pencil because you could just easily erase my bad not too many memories brittney cruse 6th grade it was 2004 and i was entering a new school with new students and teachers however those weren t the only new things i was going to encounter i soon found out that how you dressed talked and who you hung out with mattered everything about me had to change if i wanted to be one of the popular kids the students would look at you and feel like they knew you without actually getting to know who you are the thought of being judged was constantly on my mind it was also the year i started doing poorly in school i was too focused on being like the popular girls they had the best clothing the best hairstyles the current cell page 13

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phones jewelry bags and more i knew being popular meant failing classes skipping school getting into fights and doing drugs but at the same time i wanted to be one of them 8th grade this year my cousin started attending school with me the first thought in everyone s mind was the idea of my cousin my best friend and i in the same building together we weren t trouble makers but we weren t angels since my school was already packed with kids who enjoyed altercations our family thought we would be fighting every other day since my cousin would be with me that wasn t the case we did get into some small stuff but that was never because one of my friends or my cousin starting anything first besides that the main thing i remember about 8th grade was of course graduation i remember that i hated my dress my parents took me out to get last minute dresses i got two by force and hated both of them they were just ugly but i kind of didn t make a big deal out of it because my gown was going to cover it anyways i still have the pictures of the 3 of us after graduation with our cap and gowns still on and i laugh at those pictures it feels like that day was 10 years ago but when i see the pictures we don t look that much different than we do now 7th grade as i enter the 7th grade already familiar with what to expect about my wild school i didn t care who was or was not in my class i was one of the first students to enter our new classroom watching other students stroll in even though i didn t care too much about who was in my class i kept hoping for mainly one person to be in my class it was a girl named anite in the sixth grade we never really spoke my friends were close friends with her friends so i guess we were just mutual but strangely for some reason i hoped she was in my class sure enough she came walking through the door and sat down in the last empty seat at the table i was sitting at we automatically became really close with a few other people we hung out with a lot but it was mainly us two that were inseparable the highlight of that year was meeting her and being lucky enough to say the same names when i mention who my best friends are year after year most people have big groups of friends and they don t know who s really their friend or not some people have best friends that change every couple of months or every year and some people really have no one i talk to a lot of people but i have a small group of main people i consider family to me and it s been the same people for the longest now 9th grade when 9th grade was over i was in summer school for math on top of that i couldn t go on vacation with my family and i stayed at home with my grandmother that summer was the worst my best friend at the time and i were both in fake relationships i had a boyfriend which was the first one from high school he was so stupid we were together just because my friend was going out with his friend and i guess he followed page 14

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along and tried to make it a double thing i knew that was going on but i pretended like i didn t why i don t know what made it even worse is that we were both in summer school together i hated seeing him and i would ignore his phone calls and text messages i didn t know how to tell him that i didn t like him or care about him so i just avoided him the situation ended awkward but i didn t care as long as it was done he didn t even attend my school anymore which was a relief for me the only good part about that summer was when i finally got my puppy we went to a breeders house in beverly and they had about 10 puppies the lady separated the boys from the girls because my dad told her that we only wanted a girl all the beagle puppies were so adorable but there was one that stood out the most the dogs were focused on each other playing around and taking the laces out of my dads sneakers only one was walking back and forth between my brother and i and eventually sat down next to me so basically the puppy chose me i named her aisah but her nickname that she responds to as well is bonnie fights or class clowns the school was a joke and it didn t take me that long to realize that don t get me wrong there were a few teachers who cared for their students a lot but it was tough for them to keep that mind set when about 90 of the students didn t care and the other 10 cared but were distracted by the others in this grade myself and the majority of other kids who had ms perez as their humanities teacher became very close to her you could joke with her and have serious conversations and get advice from her but she didn t let you take her niceness for granted or weakness she was the main teacher that did the extra times 10 for us and she really didn t have to but at the same time maybe that s what we needed we needed to see and feel that someone in this school whether they were a teacher or not wasn t out for our blood we wanted to know that she didn t enjoy seeing us go to summer school or have difficulty passing a course like the other teachers appeared to like i said she was strict gave a lot of work gave class time to talk about things we really wanted and needed to know about but at the same time she had a big heart and we felt that as a humanities teacher and person overall we couldn t ask for anything better 10th grade in my sophomore year of high school nothing changed much from 9th grade well the only thing that really changed was that the school got even crazier than it already was i can t say that i didn t like the craziness in my school because it was the reason why we went every day i just wish there was balance between work and the amount of time we got distracted because of 11th grade this grade was full of so much drama i never had drama in school or outside of school before of course i had certain people that i didn t like or vice versa but it never escalated to the point where everyone was expecting a fight between us every other day the girl that was my best friend of that year well just my closest friend from that page 15

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