It's a rule in our school not to use names when gossiping. A rule that the teacher clung onto with her long nails, along with many others. She was an arrogant cockroach, and didn't care what the children had to say. So we didn't care what she had to say. Until she had enough. 

Many of us were too afraid to speak for the next two days. 

When we did manage to find the words, however, we found that we couldn't say the names of our peers. Even now, my bestie is The One With A Magic Pen, because she could draw anything with such detail, you'd thing you could just reach in and touch it. My real name still isn't //////, it's That Girl With A Bright Smile. Ironic, since I don't don't... smile. Not anymore. I'd rather protect my teeth.

It was all fun and games, until their names suddenly defined them.

Our true names were forgotten, no one knew us, not even our parents, not even the teachers. Soon we forgot each other.

We forgot ourselves.

But the teacher knew.

Pumpkin was a girl who now I remember. She never brought harm to any one, not even to the ones who teased her for her orange hair. She was the first to go.

Pumpkin was scalped.

The One Who Reflected? He still screams at me from mirrors.

The One With a Magic Pen drank ink.

We are the nameless. A walking masquerade. We drift like ghosts from nowhere to nowhere.

Maybe if you listen carefully after the stroke of midnight, you can hear us roaming. And maybe if you peak outside, for just a little while, you'll see a thousand masks in the mist.

The next morning, perhaps you might find a mirror, an inkwell, a mirror, and a mask. Choose an item, or get creative and add something. Or maybe wear a mask.

Or you can shut your eyes. Close them and cling onto your so called "safety". 

The same way our teacher clung to her rules.