When I talk about being 13 and all that happened , I feel like there are so many things that have never been said so many things that I don't know how to explain . There are so many parts and pieces that are just so hard to understand. So many things that were taken, that are indescribable. I have come so far trying to figure things out trying to get better trying to understand, but I feel like when it comes from that thirteen year old I have to start from ground zero. I want to have a clear picture and be able to understand but there are things I don't know and can't explain. There are so many things that I don't have a clear picture of, that I can't explain and I feel like I have to prove so much,
The first time that he came I was so excited when I first saw him, I had no idea why he knew my address but he did. I thought it was going to be any thing other than what it was. That warm kind smile was gone, that warmness , kindness was gone he was cold and I felt like he looked right through me. I knew quickly just how different that this night was going to be. He didn't see me he didn't hear me and he really didn't care. He pushed me into the living room , and the entire time, I was trying to talk to him but nothing I said mattered. I was trying so hard to understand how different he was. I was in shock, this was not supposed to happen to me anymore, he was a good guy. I did scream and fight, I tried so hard to talk to him tell him to stop, I told him to stop over and over and over I begged until his hand was over my face and I couldn't breathe and I just went away. There was nothing that I was going to say or do that was going to make a difference. When he was done that first time, He sat on the couch for some time when he was done, almost glaring, I don't know what he said, I can't remember. I just remember staring at the buttons on that huge Curtis Mathis TV. I was too afraid to move. My mind was spinning with reasons why and with accusations against myself for being so stupid. I answered the door, I kissed him that weekend, I danced in front of everyone, I somehow invited this.
Typing this my fingers feel heavy and I remember laying there on the floor, reminding myself about the things I should not have done, like let him in , like dance with him, I hated myself for the butterflies in my stomach when I saw him, this cute guy showing up at my house, for giving him a hug like he was a good guy. Then once again he was hurting me , I so screamed , I screamed so loud my ears rang and it was as if I didn't make a sound. He was more than rough, so violent I can see it and yet I am far away frozen . My mind was trying so hard to understand to find a reason why. There were so many thoughts and even today I am not sure I could single any one of them out, I was so overwhelmed. He did other things and what felt like a lifetime he didn't care what he did , I don't even remember the moment he left, I was still very far away, but still in the room. So I saw each and every violent act and just cowered in the corner, there were moments I wish I fought more. I can tell you that I more than hated myself for letting these things happen. This was my fault because I flirted and kissed him. I am not sure where my clothes went, I pulled a blanket off the couch to cover me , and I waited until I was sure he was gone. I don't even remember what I did, It was like ok get dressed and life back to normal. Nothing was normal and there was no before. My mind was spinning about what I did wrong . I don't know where my family was, I don't know anything really. I can remember thinking how gross and disgusting that I was. I think this was one of the first times I felt that and that became who I was. I wanted to die, I didn't want to live anymore. I didn't even have a name I was just gross and disgusting.
This was really the beginning of the end, because things were only going to get worse for me. Of coarse, this is just what happens to me. There were parts of me that thought its just sex stop fighting, its not a big deal. Clean up wash yourself off and pretend all is well with the world. This is just what happens and its not like it had not happened before. I was literally the walking dead, barely breathing. I was in 8th grade and doing everything on my own. School was more than hard, I couldn't focus, I felt so awful inside. I couldn't concentrate on numbers or English with visions of what was done on replay in my head . Sleep was impossible I was exhausted all the time and my thoughts were always when and if when I was going to see him. I never felt safe, never felt protected.
There are so many questions that I have that I can't answer. So many things that I feel like I should understand but I don't. There are things I can't explain, things I don't know and how does a person live with that. I don't know how many weeks it was until Don came back, but it was getting colder outside I know that.
I was in the shower listening to my music. He shut it off, I looked and there h was. As soon as I saw him , I was more than afraid. The butterflies were gone, there was no excitement I knew what he was capable of, or at least I thought. I can remember trying to grab a towel he grabbed it faster. I felt trapped in the shower he was between me and the door, where was I going to go, absolutely nowhere. I started crying right away, I tried to reason with him tell him we could talk he just had to let me get out and get dressed. Of coarse none of those things worked, he undressed. I can still hear his belt hitting the floor and I started crying. He got in the shower, I begged, and pleaded, tried to make him see me as a person tried to make him believe that its ok you can just leave and no one will know. He was awful, he didn't hear a word that I said. He ignored every scream every plea to stop. The things I remember, the cold shower wall, the sound of his belt, the water when he turned it oh so hot, I still don't understand why ? He was done and left the shower I cowered on the floor letting the water turn to freezing, to afraid to move. I was waiting for it to be safe, to give him time to leave to I don't even know . I grabbed the towel only to realize he was still there. I remembering feeling so confused like you got what you wanted why haven't you left yet ? I had no idea this would be the first assault of too many to count that day. He had no plans on going anywhere , his only plan was destroying me and getting his friends involved. I think that I still kept hoping that somehow that good guy that I knew was going to show back up and he was going to apologize and make everything ok. But the evilness in him only grew and he didn't care. He was there to ruin me and take all that he wanted. And he did ruin parts of me, there are parts of me I will never get back parts of me that are so far away I am not sure that I will ever reach them. This day seems to last forever in and out of my mind. I was there and then very far away for different parts of the day. There are pieces I remember like yesterday, there are memories that are crystal clear yet others clear as mud. There are other pieces that feel as if they are a nightmare that surely could not have happened the way that I remember. I could not count the number of times I was raped that day.
I can not put words to some of the experiences. This was a time deeper than the depths of hell that tore at every cell of me. The were times that day I fought , tried to run and did everything I knew too try and get away. But I was 13 and they were 5 men, I was never going to win; but there were moments I so tried, I tried to fight with every bone in my body. Then there were others where I repeated their names over and over hoping that each turn would be their last. Don, Chris, Steve, Mike and Andy over and over and over under that fan. There was a lot of blackness that day where I was lost somewhere is this void space of nothing. There was very little life left and Don would make sure he was a little meaner, a little rougher , even more demeaning to make sure I know my place. I should have died but I did not. There are some days I wish that I had. There are days I don't understand how or why I survived. There are days that I still feel the intense weight of everything that was done to me that day. I believe there are pieces of that day that I will never recover from.
After he spit on me on the way out, I was all about making things clean fixing the fringe, straightening the pillows. I can remember how painful it was to even walk and I was trying to clean up and make everything look presentable so that no one would know the horror that had happened behind those 4 walls. And I sit here in a daze not believing how a girl survived that. How does a heart keep going. How does a girl continue to breathe when all she wants to do is stop. How can I remember and the next second not, Life was going through the motions barely surviving. I was so afraid all the time, there was no joy there was no happy. I was slowly dying trying to understand things that there is no explanation for.
I was physically healing. Some of the bruises were fading, some things were getting easier, the state that I was in is something I don't have words for I wasn't present for most of the time. I was floating above this life; I fear that being present would have sent me off a bridge. Then again on a cold February night , the night of the Valentine dance at school. There was a knock on the door and stupidly I went to the door. I completely froze. There was no fight, there was nothing left of me. I didn't say a word, I didn't plead, I didn't fight.
I undid my pants and laid down right there in the entryway. There was no feeling. I knew he was there to take what he wanted and I was going to give it to him. My body was still physically healing from the group of them, so I laid down and went away. I went far away and again he took what wasn't his and for the first time, he didn't know what to do, he tried to make things worse he tried, but there was no reaction no cries . I was cold and, lifeless. He had already killed a part of me and there was nothing left to take. I will forever be guilty that I didn't fight that there was a part of me that was resigned to him taking what he wanted. He showed up and I went away, I knew what was going to happen and I didn't stay around.
Words can't even begin to explain these few months of my life and the months that followed and the loss that came from that. It was hell and I wanted to die. Words fail to make me understand, to make any kind of peace with all that happened to a 13 year old. The absolute only thing that kept me going was that pelican on my balcony and those whales that following Summer. I just couldn't be hurt anymore, I was so tired of being assaulted and hurt and no one noticing that I was not even close to being ok. No one seeing through the smile of a girl crumbling underneath. In a years time everything was taken and everything was lost. Hell began at celebrate 88 and by the Summer of 89, I was heavy living a life where everyone took what they wanted and left me with the aftermath. I was alone in this world trying to survive on Pelicans and whales. I needed people to care. I needed someone to hold and care for my heart, I needed someone to take me to the Dr and get the medical help that I needed. And yet, life goes on, and I learned to keep going. Keep smiling. I learned people can't handle my pain and my sorrow so I pretended that I didn't have any. It was there but I learned to burry it deep and keep it far away. I know its there, always seeping through each and every experience of today. I have gotten stronger and am seeing things, talking about things but this is the hardest thing I will ever do. Going back there, saving that 13 year old girl who so desperately wanted to be heard and truly seen. I have a feeling the saying it gets worse before it gets better might be true. I am terrified of getting lost somewhere back there and never finding my way back. I am scared to face those truths that no adult could face back then. I am afraid that once again I won't be able to find my voice. I am afraid that my truth is too much and once again I will be left. I am afraid that I won't be able to find the proof of the unimaginable awfulness that was my life then. I am so very sad that today all these years later, I have nightmares like it was yesterday. I can still feel their hands and smell their cologne. After all these years I feel the destruction of all that they stole from me. I am a fighter, I always have been, but in this moment if feels like I am absolutely drowning.
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