Pepper

My name is Pepper. P-E-P-P-E-R. Say it three times out loud. Whisper it to yourself. Make up a rhyme to remember it. I don’t care what you do. Call me Pepper, and nothing else. 

  Not Mason. Not Jennifer. Not Jenny, not Kate, not Kat, not Katie or Katy or however else you can manage to spell Katie. Especially don’t call me Katherine. 

  The name my parents gave me is Katherine Jennifer Mason. It’s not special, it’s not interesting, it doesn’t have a ring to it. 

  I hated it from the beggining, so, of course, I begged for a nickname. My mother had no cool name ideas, so I turned to my best friend (now ex-best friend) Georgia. 

  We spent hours trying to come up with nicknames. Our third grade selves sat in the treehouse in my backyard, making list after list of nicknames. No luck. My name was so boring it couldn’t produce even a remotely interesting nickname. 

  So, we moved on. Third graders don’t have long attention spans. We moved on to some other project, like building a rocket ship or becoming movie stars. No one was really sure what my name was, because Georgia called me something different every day. She would walk into the classroom and plop down in the chair beside me and say: “Hey, Katy!” and that would be my name for the day. 

  I hated every name she came up with, but I tolerated her until seventh grade. Four years of answering to every name anyone could think of; turning around whenever someone said Katy, Jennifer, Jen, Jenny, Mason, Kat, or Kay. The one thing Georgia never called me was Katherine, my full name. She knew I hated it. 

  So, gradually, everyone who had remembered my full name forgot, and each kid had a different nickname for me. I was cool with it. As long as no one ticked me off, they were safe. 

Everything changed in seventh grade. 

  My and Georgia had a fight. She had asked me why I was so sensitive, and why no one could touch me, and I got angry. There was a lot of yelling. And I threw pepper at her. 

  A lot of pepper. 

  She had a sneezing fit. 

  It was hilarious. 

  A lot of kids got it on video, and it went viral. 

  For the next week, Georgia walked into the classroom, plopped herself down next to me, and said “Hey, Pepper!” then, she would move seats and sit next to Madeline Shell. 

  At the end of the week, I slapped her and told her to stop calling me that. But it was too late. The name had stuck. 

  Suddenly, Georgia was my ex-best friend. Suddenly, my name was Pepper. Suddenly, there was a viral video of my best friend sneezing for a full minute. Suddenly, I was alone. 

  I watched the video over and over again. I did not laugh. At first, I was looking at Georgia’s face as she sneezed. Her cheeks were red. Her eyes were squeezed shut. Her arm was covering her mouth, and pepper was fluttering all around her. 

  But as I watched it for the seventh time, I saw something else: myself. 

  My head was cut out of the frame because I was so tall, but you could still see my skinny torso and my thin hair that reached a little past my shoulders. You could still see how I was laughing, my whole body shaking with laughter as I watched my best friend get humiliated in front of everyone. 

  My mom told me that people make mistakes. That I was angry at the time, and that Georgia was anything but innocent in all of this. That laughing at my (ex) best friend was okay, because I was human and things happen and a million other excuses. 

  I wanted to believe her. It was so easy to let it all go, to make Georgia the villian of the story. But I don’t like taking the easy way. 

  Instead, I stored the memory in a dark corner of my brain and forged ahead in life. 

  I never watched the video again. 

It’s been a long time since I talked to Georgia. I’m in highschool now. I’m not necessarily happy, but my life is good enough. I have good grades. I get headaches every day. The popular girls hate me. Most of my teachers love me. I’m good at art. People will pose for my photos. I don’t have many friends. 

  I have alliances, and that’s all I need.