One memory from growing up black that I still think about. I was in 6th grade and I was sitting at the lunch table next to my white friend just eating quietly when her cousin, who was sitting in front of her, suddenly turned and called me the n word. I didn’t say anything, I was just shocked and he mockingly said, “what? I have the pass” while laughing. Another black girl from my class, who I didn’t know, was sitting in front of me and heard him and she argued with him for a moment, telling him it was wrong. My white friend didn’t say anything. She lived in my neighborhood and I had been to her house multiple times before but after that she didn’t talk to me. It hurt. I got more help from a girl I had never spoken to before. I had seen her cousin before in passing but that was the first thing he ever said to me. I was always a quiet kid and I know that’s why he targeted me, just to get a reaction. I didn’t give him that but I really haven’t felt good about my life ever since.