Personal Narrative-Effective Communication In Middle School

In sixth grade, I took the class “HOT”, or Hands on Technology as one of my fourth quarter electives. We were sat in Mrs. Enloe’s stuffy room by alphabetical order. I knew the boy who was assigned to sit next to me, flashes of elementary school memories filling my head when I heard his name coming out of the teacher’s mouth as she pointed at the desk to my right. Being the brat I was (and still am), I relentlessly, but jokingly, teased him. He retaliated with his own childish sixth grader rebuttals, and suddenly it was the end of the school year and he was akin to something like my brother. Our friends did not see the relationship as so familial and platonic, thus dubbing us “Colyssa”. The name followed us throughout middle school. It filled
His changing of the subject if I brought my boyfriend up or walking away when I was with my boyfriend didn’t raise any red flags. I was still too deep in my post-Washington D.C. haze of new friends and inside jokes to notice that the ratio between the texts I sent and his replies was unbalanced to the point of it being a few texts short of a one-sided conversation. It wasn’t until the end of what we called “a week long break to sort things out” that I realized something was very wrong. After a long conference call with my boyfriend and two close friends, I pressed send on a lengthy text that ultimately asked if we could talk. Unknowingly clinging to the last strands of a friendship I never thought I could lose, I was sure his answer would lead to us spending the next day fixing what I’d only just noticed was broken. As I read through phrases like “I don’t think there is any part of me that wants to fix this” and “it’s just not working right now”, oxygen was torn from my lungs with a force that could compare to a freight train. No matter how many panicked breaths I took, it wasn’t enough to soothe the burn in my chest. I became the embodiment of the word “pain”. None of these things matched the “if that’s what you need, then I respect that” I replied
But I had school the next day and first period sat me next to him, so I googled “how to reduce redness and puffiness after crying” and fell asleep with a cold, wet towel over my eyes.
Word travels fast and many friends walked up to comfort me the next day, obviously surprised by my bright smile and humor towards the situation. I could see the thought bubbles extending from everyone’s heads, the words “how is she okay?” clearly written. “Strong” was the adjective of the day, usually following the words “you’re so”. I spent 20 minutes on the phone that night, having the same not-a-conversation as before.
Following the end of our friendship, Cole turned into exactly the kind of guy I was known for loathing. He casually threw offensive terms into his everyday conversations and sent shirtless pictures to my best friends requesting for the topless favor to be repaid. The same boy who swore he’d kill anyone who hurt me was suddenly on the other end of the equation, or at least that’s what I heard from Megan who heard from Ralph who heard from Dawson that the word Cole had used to describe me started with a b and ended with an itch.
The things that would make me automatically hate a person were suddenly the characteristics of someone I loved, and, emotionally, I was beyond