One More Voice is Heard: Me Too, Too

Originally handwritten in diary: November 10^th, 2016/11:38pm

Typed/Edited for this blog: January 20^th, 2018/10:30ish pm

I never told my parents, my sister, my ex, or my own diary (until now) about the time I was sexually assaulted. I had been grabbed, groped, assaulted twice on the platform of 42^nd and Times Square before. I remember what I was wearing the first time: a short orange polo-looking tennis skirt with three plastic buttons down the middle and vertical pleats along the bottom; tucked into the skirt, my most-prized worn-out paper-thin black Guns N’ Roses shirt that had the band stenciled in white on the front and their name featured in an orange banner above them.

He just slid his hand up that orange skirt I loved to sport and disappeared in the crowd as I spun around to see if anyone else saw what happened to me. I remember standing on the platform full of nameless strangers, watching them blur away, further and further away from me.

That was in high school. Early 2000s. But back in October 2008, Halloween, my friend and her boyfriend took me to a party on the Island. My friend’s cousin came along for the festivities, too. I met my ex at that party and we hit it off instantly. Morally, Libraly. After hours of talking, sitting side by side, we kissed innocently, ultimately making our way to the bedroom, the bathroom, upstairs, where we…

When my friend, her boyfriend and cousin, and I were preparing to leave, my ex and I exchanged numbers. He said he would call. He did. We were together for two months.

On the way out, I stopped to say goodbye to some people I had met, smoked with, etc. This chubby guy dressed as Swamp Thing, blatantly still drinking and sloshing around like the slimy character he was portraying, was dancing in the strobe-light living room alone. I hugged him goodbye and he grabbed me by the small of my back. I pushed away. Having already been with my ex that night, nothing other than him was on my mind. But Swamp Thing leaned in for a kiss.

Back then, I found it hard to say no to kissing, being only 18 years old, hard to say no to some advances I got because they were far and few between. But as I kissed this guy, I felt something was not right. The feeling of two in one night was fleeting. Because I liked my ex and the power of monogamy was much stronger than my ego. But I also trusted people too much. Still do, unfortunately. So I kissed him back for a bit, a nagging sensation growing in the back of my head.

Once outside, I joined my crew, standing by the car smoking cigarettes. I was saying goodbye to my ex, well, more like see you later, when he told me he was serious about seeing me and wanted to make sure I was too. Wanted to make sure there was no one else. I was serious and there was no one else. So I said there was no one else, but for full disclosure, I explained the episode from just minutes earlier.

Visibly upset, my ex adopted a whole different tone to his voice. He was mad at me. As if the guy pinning himself to my chest could somehow be thwarted with the extra advantage of strength and weight. Even if I did kiss him back for a moment, there was nothing behind it. It was forced and it was taken. It was not given. But I can understand the upset. And even though ultimately it did not work out, and I hated him when it ended, my ex was a nice guy. The nicest of my exes if I am tallying it up.

After much explaining to, mind you, this stranger—albeit a stranger who I had been intimate with—he kissed me goodnight, making it very clear that he was a straightforward monogamous person, which was wholeheartedly my intention as well. He left and said we would talk soon.

My ex had turned the corner into the dark night, an image I still have engrained in my memory. As if his absence was now my friend's cousin's permission, he placed his hand between my thighs, kissing me. With my ex's words ringing in my ears like a melodramatic and foreboding moment in a movie, and with my own moral compass ticking, I said adamantly, “NO!” Pushing him away, I said, “STOP IT!” But he kept grabbing, kept shoving his dirty fingers, smiling. That smile I have engrained in my system, too. I pushed his hand away again, “Enough!” But he pushed further.

Before we all piled into the car I told my friend. Told her I was uncomfortable and that her cousin apparently did not know the definition of “No.” I know his English may not have been great, but “NO” is universal. She said, “No,” too. She said, “No, he wouldn’t do that!” And just like me, shoved the situation off of her.  She made other excuses for him that I cannot remember, which is for the best because I imagine they would be pretty painful.

The cousin sat in the passenger seat and I was directly behind him. All the way home, his hands were inside me. The whole time.

We stopped at a diner on the way back home. The cousin sat next to me in a booth opposite my friend and her boyfriend. And his fingers were inside me the whole time.

I remember feeling filthy the night I lost my virginity, because I had not realized I had and could not understand the lack of gratification from the build-up. After this, I felt numb. Numb enough that I did not even realize till much later that this was sexual abuse. And I was mad at myself for not saying “No” more definitively to Swamp Thing—even though I pushed away—mainly because of my ex's harsh and hurt reaction. A reaction that should have been harsh and hurt for my benefit not against me.

And I think my delay in the realization of this harassment was also because of my ex. In a good way though. Because I had a happy distraction for a few months, so could not properly process these occurrences for what they really were.

And I said, “No” to her cousin. Said it over and over. I pushed his hand away at the diner, probably looked at the waitress with pleading and wet eyes, which were most likely shrugged off as a horny drunk teenage girl, but he kept replacing his hand there like an arm being placed around a girl’s shoulder to keep her warm. But I did not feel warm.

This only made me dizzy.

This is why I never told my ex. How would he have reacted? He would have been pissed! But would it have been for the right reasons? Would he have been mad because another man(-child) did not hear the two simple letters escaping my lips? Would he have been mad at this person for not understanding the act of my pushing his arm away from and off of me? Or would he have been mad at me for not doing more? For me not defending myself more?

But I said, “No.” I pushed his hand away on several occasions. I spoke up to the one person who could be my ally in that moment. I did everything a victim should. And it did not prevent it from happening.

So I speak up now. Hoping maybe this could heal me, and help me heal others.

I speak up now for solidarity. Because, me too.