There was gossip about her. A whispered reputation that outshone her quiet nature and her shyness.  I didnt believe it. She and i had a common shame that made my opinion more generous than others.  I wanted so badly to ask her if hed done the same thing to her. How did she get through? Was there even a 'getting through'?  I wanted to steal peaks at her in the mirror to see if you could tell by looking. I should have wanted to befriend her. But i was sickened by the idea that someone within arms reach had been disgraced the same way as me. I was disgusted at the thought that we had a common miserly thread that if spoken of might always bind us together in our sorrow and i didnt want to share that thin spindle of horror with anyone or speak of it out loud because then it must have really happened. She and i were in the same dejected heap by no fault of our own. Each floating in our own seperate brine of humiliation.