My head was pounding like a drill slowly powering through my skull. Everything was moving, vibrating and at the same time becoming darker, duller. Alert and yet completely senseless. I slumped forward onto my desk and it took everything to even move that much. The computer glare shone in my eye line: reminding me of what they're saying, what they're thinking, what I am.

I can't believe it!
I can, it's always been obvious- she's such a man!
I could turn her- she's just gagging for cock.
What an attention whore!

I slammed the laptop shut. It's only words- I said to myself quietly- it's only words. But words have a lot more power than adults will have you believe. Words have the power to confuse, persuade, manipulate, deceive or worse- reveal the truth. Or the half truths, part of the truth, the lies. Words can destroy you, can belittle you, can even mould you into something you're not. They change everything.

Everything felt empty- like all the colour had slowly been poured out of me. The sunshine yellows, the calm blues and the passionate reds, all slowly drained away until I'm an empty vessel, waiting to be filled. I couldn't even cry. Not one single tear.

A timid tap on the door distracted me from my thoughts. I rubbed my face and pinched my cheeks to add some life back into my face. Don't let her see.

The door gently opened and my Mum peeks her head around the corner of the doorframe. I sat up straighter and dragged a smile across my face. Don't let her see, don't let her see, she can't know, keep it together.

"Everything OK, sweetie?" She cooed from behind the doorframe, her smile's wide, but her eyes looked heavy, concerned.

"I'm fine, Mum, I've just got a lot of homework."

The smile dropped a little on her face, like the mask slipped slightly, but then, in an instant, it's back and stretched even further across her face.

"You haven't eaten with us in days, I just want to check you're OK."

She widened her eyes but her tears were brewing behind the surface. One wrong word and she'll be crying all over my bedroom floor. I can't take it. I drop my gaze for a moment. I can't take looking at that fake smile and those sad eyes. I can't tell her. I need to protect her; I am protecting her.

"Alyssa, love?"

"Honestly Mum, I'm just swamped with assignments- I won't be head girl if I don't keep up with my work," I made my smile bigger and raised my chin higher, mirroring my mother's own fake expression. Can't she see her own lies in my face? Isn't that kind of programmed into us, to see our own flaws in others? Or is it a kind of cruel irony that our own traits are the ones that trick us?

"OK beautiful" she coos, the fake smile dropping a little, "I'll bring you your dinner up here. Homework or not, you have to eat!"

I hate the way she says O-K, accentuating every vowel, as if to point out that I'm anything but O-K and at the same time telling me that I should be O-K.

She hovered a moment and pauses, but shakes her head and then closes the door gently once more.

I open the laptop again.

What a whore.
She did it- did you hear what she did?
She thinks she's so special! But really she's a pussy loving skank.
Slut!

Nothing. Nothing stirred in me: no tears, no anger, no pride, just emptiness. I'd do anything to feel.