It isn’t.
The hardest part is growing up afterward while everyone stares at you like they’re trying not to stare.
At school, nobody openly mocked me.
That almost would’ve been easier.
Instead, there were the whispers.
The double takes.
The quick sympathetic smiles people wear when they don’t know what else to do with your existence.
Over time, I learned how to pretend I didn’t notice.
By senior year, I’d become an expert at it.
So when prom season arrived, I told my mother I wasn’t going.
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