We were total bitches. We lied to boys, to our peers, to teachers, to each other, to ourselves; we excluded people and made fun of them for being sad; we kicked people when they were down; we pretended to be nice to everyone except the people we didn’t like. We were twelve years old, middle schoolers, unsupervised, and let loose in our native Manhattan.

We were judgmental and two-faced, and not one teacher could have done anything about us. The core of the group each embodied a virtue that redeemed them either to the school, our peers, or boys – the only groups whose opinions we worried about. The group consisted of four: Emma, Eva, Ella, and Emerson. I wasn’t one of them. Yet. 

They may have been camp bunkmates for seven years, all had the same first initial, and belonged to the same supper club, but surely their shared history meant they sought new entries. This was clearly the place for me. The fact that the four, at times, halved off into pairs –  Emma and Emerson, Eva and Ella – was irrelevant to me. The barrier to entry was their own paired organization, and I was no fifth wheel. It was so clear to me: to become a core member, to be invited to out-of-school parties and added to Snapchat groupchats, I needed to destabilize the system. I needed to replace someone. 

How would I get them to notice me if I didn’t beat them at their own game?

My scheme of social alienation – punching downwards until something stuck – was supported by three of the four girls, and every time I joined them in a joke or judgmental statement, I dragged down the other people of the circle I was once proud to be in. I felt the distance between us dissipate. They were mean to people who had no one to stand up for them, mean to people who tried to call them mean, and mean to each other. I wanted to be liked by them so badly, not because I didn’t want to be bullied but because I wanted to be mean with them. I wanted them to think of me as funny, and funny to them was mean to everyone else. 

The first time Emma told me that I was, actually, really funny (despite being so quiet), I felt like there were sparks between us. We could be friends. If I could continue to be actually, really funny, and maybe just a little less quiet, I could be as perfect as Emma and her group. I could probably be her right-hand sixth grader. I could maybe even be her friend. I earned this compliment in an attempt to destabilize the pair of Emerson and Emma, the friendship which threatened my ability to be friends with Emma. 

The mania of the project consumed me. I realized I didn’t just want to be Emma’s friend, I wanted to be her best friend. I wanted to be her number one. I needed Emerson out. I needed to be friends with Emma. The exclusivity of the group meant internal politicking went deeply unsaid, confined to snide comments in shared bathroom stalls or changing rooms. When I was the fifth in the group, I was sometimes present, always welcome, rarely invited. 

When Emma confided tensions and irritation with Emerson, feeling hurt and bothered by Emerson’s brusqueness and a fight over the most beloved boy in sixth grade, I pounced. This was my chance to get Emerson out. 

Was it vindictive and deeply personal and ended up hurting three people and only helping one? Yes. Was it true? Partially. Was it worth it? 100%. 

I wanted to join the group because I wanted to have friends, to be cool, to fit in, to be seen as someone who was likable. Something inside of me prevented me from being happy, but when I was with Emma, it went away. She was mean and she made the people around her mean. I would take the cutting remarks and the peer pressure to be around her. Being recognized and liked in her presence made me feel like a person who was complete – my completion hinged on her acceptance, and I was willing to do anything to secure that acceptance. Stooping to her level of bitchiness and vindication felt like a step up from my pathetic and self-loathing stance on the outside.

Emerson, Eva, Ella, Emma, and I were crowded in a handicapped bathroom stall, Mango and Sweet Pea body mist swirling in the air. I was on tiptoe, Emma was crouched on the toilet seat, Emerson and Eva sat with their backs against the wall, and Eva was standing with her back to the door. We had taken a 45-minute sabbatical from sixth-grade social studies, a prime location for gossip and a perfect place to sabotage a social order. 

Eva peeked under the wall to ensure that no one else was in the bathroom. Ella and I made eye contact, confirming that we would back each other up. She had told me in confidence that she wanted Emerson out, too. 

I’d seen Emerson and Ben, the boy Emma had planned to hug after school once, talking to each other at Starbucks. Ella told me that the pair were closer than close, in a relationship potentially more important than dating – mutual #1 BFFs on Snapchat. 

“Guys. You’ll never guess who I saw yesterday,” I began. I watched Emma absently click her nails at Eva, maintaining constant attention from her. I was sweating, nervous, barely able to look at Emerson. “Eva and I were trying to find Ben and Elliot and literally we couldn’t find them anywhere.” Emerson slightly tensed at the mention of Ben’s name. The air thickened, anger and suspicion spilling out of Emma’s mouth and through the cracks in the stall door. Emma’s brow furrowed. 

“Don’t even mention him to me. We hugged like two weeks ago, and he hasn’t said a word to me since, basically,” she said. 

“We should probably use our nicknames for them, right? Like, in case someone comes in? I mean, I don’t think there’s really anything that is too bad in the story, but we should use the nicknames in case someone bad comes in.” Ella was nervous, wired, and antsy by nature. We referred to Ben, like every boy in our circle, with some form of nickname. He was Ravioli. Emma snapped. 

“Yeah. I mean, if you’re really so worried, maybe you should just go back to Social Studies.”  

“I didn’t – Ravioli, whatever, we saw him across from the Pick-a-Bagel. At Starbucks.” I was trying to speed things up. Emerson paled. Eva raised her eyebrows. The bathroom door swung open and heels tapped the linoleum. As the heels approached the handicapped stall, Emma started to cough and Eva went in for the kill. 

“Guess who was with him. At Starbucks. Starbucks… is for dates. No one would ever go to Starbucks if they weren’t trying to be dating. Ravioli, obviously, is Emma’s. Like… Girl code? We saw them hug.” Emma’s jaw dropped, her eyes filling with tears. “Emerson and Ravioli.” 

The feet outside stopped, the heels tapping, and Ella shot a nervous glance around the stall. She could have reached under the door and touched the heels. 

“Come out from the stall, girls.”

For having four people in one bathroom stall during a class period, and because our social studies teacher had emailed about our ‘outstanding absence’ from the class, we were called into the office together for questioning. Ella, Emma, and Eva were stone-faced and united against Emerson, who sat on the other side of the sectional in tears. Emma slid over on the couch, patting it and beckoning for me to sit – inviting me to replace Emerson.

Ella and Eva created a story of defense, blaming Emerson for distracting us, claiming we were working in the hall, and explaining that she was holding ‘us’ back. It wasn’t true. She didn’t do anything to us. She didn’t do anything to us. I almost mouthed the words to myself. I was in. 

Emerson got a call home and in-school-suspended. Emerson and Emma wouldn’t speak for the immediate four weeks. I was so happy. 

When my phone buzzed at the end of the school day, it told me that I was added to a chat and that Emerson had been removed. 

My role in the social landscape was, at its peak, that of a queen. 

I did not become the apex predator or captain of the food chain – that was Emma – but I was the beta, the second in command. I skirted accusations of bullying and provided immediate snide comments and judgments. I was the bitch for hire, a sharp tongue weaponized by the social pressure I felt. I needed to prove my worth, every day, to three of my peers. Teachers, boys, everyone else – they were nothing compared to the three pairs of Lululemon leggings I sat next to on the subway. 

 Once I was in the group, I fought to stay in and get closer to the top. This need evolved into an attempt to prove my worth to Emma alone. 

By the end of seventh grade, there was very little that I had to show for the years of social climbing and movement aside from a wardrobe exclusively holding two brands, the ability to french braid, and a feeling of isolation that clambered through my body like a coin through a pipe. The part of me that held some form of self-realization – helped me figure out my friendships, relationships, and dynamics with the group, made me into a person that I was about to be – was gone. Realization hung in the room with a heady weight, a burden that I thought would be lifted instead magnified. Duplicitous group chats shaped my grade into an ever-shifting social scene – there was a constant air of unease as to who was talking to who, who trusted who, and who knew what. There was something that only one person knew that weighed heavily on my conscience. 

It was in the middle of seventh grade. We were standing across from each other and the floor was sticky. My hands were shaking and Emma’s hands were shaking and there was a bat mitzvah montage playing in the background. Behind me, she aged – a gap-toothed third grader to a braces-clad sixth grader to the prettiest person that I had ever seen. She stepped closer and I looked at her. We made eye contact and the room felt empty – the two of us, standing, alone, together, shaking, locking eyes, locking lips. She kissed me and I kissed her. 

Later, I stood on a subway platform and waited to go home. Two weeks earlier, I experienced the best day of what I had understood my life to be. I scrolled and chatted and the social sphere seemed so open. Secret encounters and backstabbing were behind me – I knew that the people around me liked me. I worked into a friend group, earned the love of the peers that I cared about, and kept it. Nothing would take me out. Emma was the only person who could threaten me, and I knew, after her bat mitzvah, I would never have to worry about her. She and I were best friends. She and I were more than best friends. She had just texted me! 

“Your a fucking dyke and you obviously only talked to me bc u had a crush on me. Pls never talk to me.” (sic) 

I stepped back. What could she mean? How did she know? Why would she tell everyone? Could I not say the same about her? My phone shook with notifications – Emma hadn’t just texted this to me. My secret (our secret) was broadcast to the entire grade, to a groupchat with 127 members. People were liking the message. People were responding. I turned off my phone. Two weeks ago, two seconds ago, everything was under control. This was out of my hands and in hands that had once held me and told me everything would be okay, that I was normal, and that I would always be loved. Hands that held mine became hands closing in around my neck. She wanted me gone. There was nothing I could do. Everything was true. Rebuttal, refutal, telling the truth what happened would only hurt her. I didn’t want to hurt her. I only wanted a friend. I only wanted her to like me. What did I do wrong? 

The day after the accusation, my lack of action to clarify or deny the situation spoke volumes. I fell into a state of social obsolescence worse than the beginning of the year. I haven’t spoken to Emma since. 

She and Ravioli have been dating for the last five years.