My brother started it. He would call me fat and stupid. He would say that I was an accident. He,would say that it was my fault that our parents got divorced. This was in third grade. I believed him. I actually became fat. Then kids at school started teasing me. Then people who used to be my friends would want me to play their dumb games but would always make me the bad guy. In 4th grade, I had a twelfth grade reading level. People said that I was a freak. I hated them.

In sixth grade I went to a private school. It was supposed to be better for me. It wasn't.

People bullied me for having glasses. They bullied me for my backpack. They bullied me for my shoes. The bullied me for my weight.

My first fight was in sixth grade. I had had to wear a pedometer for a PE project. This one boy who lived next door stole it and broke it.

I tried getting it back but he ground it into the ground. He picked up the pieces and threw them at me. They cut my face and scratched my glasses. Then he punched me. He punched me in the stomach and kicked my legs. His cronies held me.

Then let go of me and he said "HIT ME, I F*****G DARE YOU." My mom had let me box so I hit hard. I hit him in the nose once and he got a nosebleed. He started crying.

He ran away and I went to the nurse, saying I was sick. They called my parents but they were busy. I had to stay until he end of the day but I didn't have to go to class.

The next day, he told the teachers and I got suspended. I tried to show them the bruises on my legs and stomach but they didn't believe me.

I realised why. His mom worked for the school. That year I got into six fights. In seventh grade, I got into a fight where I was on the ground covered in blood and they blamed me. I had told my mom that I wouldn't fight back. I didn't fight back. My parents didn't care. My wrist was broken so I lied and said that I fell while roller skating.

That's when I started cutting. It made me feel better. Like I was paying for not being good enough.

I moved to a new school. I got into two fights that year at that school. The next year I got in three more.

I thought high school would be better. It wasn't. This girl asked me out in the third day and apparently it was just as a joke. They had paid her.

"They" we're people who I thought were my friends. For months after that, I didn't talk to anyone except the teachers. I would stay in my English teachers class for lunch or would eat in the ROTC room.

I kept cutting. My parents found out that I cut back in February. They made me go to a psychiatrist.

And I have something to say to bullies.

I know you probably think that it's all a game. But it's not. I know you think that words don't hurt. They do. You think that bones mend and bruises fade. We see them every day for the rest of our life. Every time they "go away", they really just hide from other people. We can still see them. They overlap and make our body look like we were painted black.

You were the painter.