03/05/2026
I was adept at watching. I wasn’t just there, I was scanning the room.
My survival depended on it: watching, learning, mimicking, and most importantly, not getting laughed at, pulled up, or pushed out.
Social acceptance was everything.
I’d learned early what it meant to be wrong.
The sting of those cackles, never laugh-alongs, always mockery. Loud, sharp, summoning others in. Look at her. See the fool.
I never wanted to feel that again.
I tried to shut it down, lock it away.
But I still wanted to be liked. To be loved.
So I told myself: try harder.
Others could do it, why couldn’t I?
So, I worked at being liked. And with many, it worked, I was included, even welcomed.
But I never quite fitted.
I hovered at the edges, never able to settle, never able to stay.
So, I tried harder. It had to be me.
And still, I missed things.
Like the time I thought I’d won over the cruellest boy. We spent all morning together, he was kind, funny, interested. Maybe he even loved me. That afternoon he invited me over, said I could bring a friend. Only then did I realise it wasn’t for me. It was for her. I sat on his bed, listening to them laughing together in the next room.
Or the time the popular boy in drama seemed to like me. He asked questions, laughed, so I gave more. I had barely left the lesson when I heard the cackle again, his friends, all of them. It ended with a shove into the lockers.
I learned quickly, don’t be too much, don’t be wrong.
Don’t get it wrong.
So I watched. I copied. I adjusted.
I tried to become someone no one could laugh at.
I would spend many years, in rooms where no one was laughing, scanning, just in case it was me.
And maybe I succeeded. Success being other peoples acceptance.
Meanwhile, I disappeared.
For the girls who were overlooked because they were so “doing well.”
The ones who internalised the struggle.
The ones who tried harder, and still felt like they were falling short.
Could Try Harder available to pre order now.
Published 14 May 2026
