We all make friends we were not supposed to.

Someone online, someone with adjacent view points to you, someone who puts you down to bring themselves up. It’s an undeniable truth, and while most people are kind and prevalent, life decides to be cruel to others.

My friend was a bully. He would pick on people he deemed annoying, or different, or below him. I became friends with him in order to avoid all this, because deep down I knew I was all of these things. All I had to do was hide them.

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Even though this is what I felt was the truth, the runt of the litter always gets picked off. Every day would be a new tease. A new slur. A new attempt plan. I’d laugh it off or shrug each time it happened, trying to joke about something else. Anything else. But no, he was adamant on making me feel small, the others dare not stop them for they might fall the same victim. I don't blame them, I would have done the same. I was reassured by TV and the internet this is what friends do, this is how they interact, this is how it was supposed to be.

I had other friends but I was forced to hang around with him the longest. I was horrified by their meetings since they would be what he deemed not up to his standards. He didn’t know I was friends with them but he knew I knew of them. Peer pressure kicked in. I said so many things I wish I could take back. So many things I hated myself for saying. An attempt was made.