Trigger Warning: This post deals pretty graphically and heavily with a rape that occurred a year ago. While it was very therapeutic for me to write – I understand that reading it may not be for others. Click the read more at your own discretion.
I thought he was my friend.
My roommate was out of town. He makes an annual trip out to Boston to visit with family. It was the first time I’ve really been alone in my apartment since I had moved in. I was nervous but excited. Living not with family was such a new experience to me still that this felt like just one more thing I needed to adjust to. And maybe use as testing for if I ever got my own place.
I remember spending that night with friends. We had laughed. Watched something silly on the television. We had a good night. I was happy. It had been such a good night. It was after midnight by the time I got home.
It was warm for a July night. My clothes stuck to my body as I entered the empty apartment. We had a pool. I kept thinking about just slipping into the pool.
He texted me around 12:45. It’d been a long time since I’d heard from him. It was nice, though would have been a lot more annoying if I hadn’t been awake already. We talked for a bit. I mentioned wanting to go for a swim cause the early mornings were when I liked to. And it was so hot.
He asked for my address. So I gave it to him. It didn’t click why he wanted it. I decided to just go to bed and leave the pool for another night. I changed into some shorts and a t-shirt out of the sticky dress. I put the fan on high and let it blast over me, laid down and closed my eyes.
My phone kept buzzing. He kept texting me.
At 2:15 in the morning, he called me. He was outside. He wanted to come in.
He was my friend.
I let him in.
I was so tired. I just wanted to sleep. He smelled so strongly of weed. But it’d been years since I saw him last.
We talked. He had gotten married since I saw him last. He mentioned how good I looked. I shrugged it off. He followed me into every room I walked into. At some point, we sat on the couch.
His hand moved and cupped my butt.
And I froze, unsure of what to do.
The conversation continued some more. And he leaned over and pushed his lips against mine.
And pushed me down so I was laying on my back.
And pulled my shorts down.
And then he was inside me.
I couldn’t move. I had been completely physically paralyzed
I stared up at the ceiling, internally screaming with each thrust.
Was this happening? He’s my friend. He would have asked.
He knows I’ve been raped before.
Why does he keep thrusting inside me?
I don’t want this.
Why won’t he stop?
What will my boyfriend say?
He finished. Or didn’t. I don’t know. All I know is eventually he stopped. Eventually, he pulled himself out of me and left me lying on the right side of my couch confused and still paralyzed.
At one point I got up and cleaned myself. Somewhere in there put my clothes back on. And felt the inside of my chest hallow out. He didn’t leave right away. He wanted to talk. It’d been so long since we saw each other last. We talked. He smoked a joint. I went through the motions, not sure what else to do. He kept finding reasons to touch me. Each touch pushed me farther and farther inside of myself. At some point, he asked me if I was alright.
It wasn’t until he asked to spend the night that I said no. He needed to go home.
And then he left.
I don’t remember what happened after I had relocked my door and was in the apartment alone again. I don’t remember getting back into bed but I know I spent another hour lying there trying to figure out if what had happened had really happened. I don’t remember falling asleep. But I know I woke up to a dull ache between my legs. I don’t remember getting into my car. But I remember breaking down outside the Glendale Police Department before driving away.
I remember telling my partner at the time what had happened. I remember the seething anger in his voice. And the confusion because I thought the anger was at me.
I remember going to the hospital that had taken care of me for most of my life and whispering to the security guards that I needed to see someone but I didn’t know who. I remember whispering that I needed a rape kit. Then being pointed towards the emergency room.
I remember the nurse implying it was my fault for freezing. For not being able to say no. I remember the doctor brushing me aside and telling me there was nothing they could do for me. They would need to call the police. I remember them leaving me in the room waiting while the emptiness in me grew. I remember being unable to stay in the bed and sit in the small, wobbly broken chair in a corner.
I remember being cold. But again unable to use my voice.
Did I do this? Was it my fault? I had given him my address. But I never invited him over. I said nothing when it happened. I did nothing. I just laid there and let it. Did I deserve this? Am I broken? Is my partner going to leave me now?
I don’t remember calling my best friend. But suddenly he was there.
When the police eventually came, they listened patiently to my haltering explanations. They told me they needed to take me someplace else in the valley but they wanted to see my apartment. They wanted to get the clothes I had been wearing when it happened. They put me in the back of their SUV and drove me home, abandoning my friend, my car keys, and my car.
I pointed the side of the couch to them. I handed them my clothes, which they put in a plastic bag. And I noticed that my home no longer felt like my home. It was foreign and strange and dangerous.
The nurse they had at the clinic was cold and precise. She laid me on my back and took photos of every angle of my vagina that she could. She stuck cotton swabs in me, a speculum, the camera. She said it was good I had not showered.
They asked me every sort of question they could about this. About the relationship that he and I had had in the past. We’d had fully consensual sex in the past – but never while either of us was in a relationship with someone else. He’d lived with me at some point, back when I still lived with my parents. I took screenshots of our texts that night. One of his face.
They kept asking why I didn’t say no.
No one seemed to hear that I couldn’t.
They told me they didn’t expect much to happen with this case. It was likely going to become “a he said she said” situation. But they’ll file the report. A detective would follow up with me within a week.
I got a list of counselors I would never call. A bag with a coloring book, some colored pencils and a rubber ball. And I was told I could go. I called my best friend, who came and rescued me. And spent the rest of the night with the people I am easily the closest to.
It’s been a year since then.
The case was dismissed. There was not enough evidence of wrongdoing.
His wife had called me and threatened me. I asked for this by inviting him over. Despite the fact that I never once invited him over.
I still have a hard time being in this apartment alone.
I still have an even harder time sitting on that side of the couch.
I blocked him on what social media I knew he had. I blocked his phone number and his wife’ phone number from being able to contact me.
I’ve tried so hard to move on.
It’s not the first time I’ve been assaulted. It is the first time I went to report it. It’s the first time I told anyone about what had happened before months or years had passed. It was so. Hard. Letting people know. Letting my family know. Letting my employer know because I had to go to the police station multiple times. Watching my friends keep a closer eye on me. Not being able to be in my apartment at all for a while. Knowing I was being too needy towards my partner but desperately needing to know I was safe.
I still don’t feel fully safe here. But I can’t afford to go anywhere else.
I know now it wasn’t my fault. What had happened was because of the choices someone else made. It both helps and doesn’t help. All I know is that it gets easier with more time passing. Though right now I’ve been a wreck.
I can only hope it’s going to continue to get easier.
Shpunkey 