I used to be a cool girl, I used to laugh when my boyfriend made jokes, when he said "it's best to have sex with fat girls because they are more desperate, they will do anything," I used to be a cool girl, a cool girl who laughed when the boys snapped the waist band of my tights, I used to be a cool girl who rolled her eyes amiably when the boys made rape jokes, I used to be a cool girl, I used to. I used to be a good girl, who let the boys "protect" me, I used to be the girl the boys thought of as their little sister, I used to say I wouldn't have sex until marriage, I used to be a good girl who thought that girls who had sex with boys had low self esteem, I used to be a good girl, I used to believe that boys only wanted one thing, I used to be a good girl, I used to. I used to be a flirty girl, I used to pretend to blush when the boys said "I'm nervous to tell you this, but I had a sex dream about you," I used to bat my eyes and say "what was it about?," I used to shiver with pleasure when the boys took turns behind me softly touching my collar bone, I used to be a flirty girl who squealed when the random boy in the park grabbed me by my butt and lifted me up in the air, I used to be a flirty girl, I used to. I used to be an unattainable girl, I used to be pined for, I used to be an unattainable girl who told the boy she liked that she liked him and heard him say, "I just wouldn't want to hurt you. I care about you too much." I used to be an unattainable girl, so they told me, a girl who made herself unattainable, I used to lead boys on when I sat with them at lunch, I used to be a unattainable girl, I used to.
I used to be a cute girl, I used to be the girl boys picked up and threw into the pool, I used to be the girl boys loved to hug, I used to be the girl who looked so cute without makeup on, I used to be a cute girl, I used to wear a ruffled bikini with blue daisies, I used to be a cute girl whose soft stomach the boys liked to touch, I used to be a cute girl always with bows in my hair, I used to be a cute girl, I used to. I used to be a romantic girl, I used to long for the boy who sat across the table, I used to dream about what his hand would feel like on mine, I used to be a romantic girl who longed for the one I couldn't have, who believed that love wasn't love without pain, without conflict, I used to be a romantic girl who believed the boy would like me if I just waited long enough, a romantic girl who believed in passion, I used to be a romantic girl, I used to. I used to be an intimidating girl, people used to tell me, "the boys don't like you because they are scared of you," I used to hear people say, "you're too strong, the boys feel threatened," I used to be an intimidating girl, I used to be an intimidating girl, I used to be an emotional girl, the boys used to be afraid to tell me the truth because they didn't want me to cry, I used to be an emotional girl, I used to be a difficult girl- I used to? I used to have to call myself some kind of girl, I used to have to pick the kind of girl I could be, I used to have to define myself by their terms, I used to have to make myself easily understandable in order to feel understood, I used to fail at defining myself by their terms, I used to fail at being a cool girl, a good girl, a flirty girl, an unattainable girl, I could never sustain being the guys' girl, the cute girl, the romantic girl, I resented being the intimidating girl, the emotional girl, I resented being any type of girl at all. I used to know myself as a reflection of how they knew me, I used to look in the mirror and see myself being seen, I used to find joy in a glance or in a conquest. I used to. I used to want to be wanted until I learned to want for myself. I used to have boys flock around me, before the names fell away, I used to believe I was wanted, but as the names fell away, the boys fell away, when I failed to match their image of me I failed to earn their love, their attention, no one called me sexy anymore, no one even called me cute, I thought I had lost my sparkle until I realized that all along the sparkle had not been in their eyes but in mine. I used to be a cool girl, but that was what I used to be. Now I am not any kind of girl. I am no one's girl. I am my own girl. I used to be a frightened girl. My existence used to be conditional. I used to be theirs for the taking. I used to.
