Again. (Content Warning: Sexual Assault) in Phoenix

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Am I walking around with a neon sign over my head that says, “Go ahead, try to rape me!” or something?

(big sigh)

It happened again. Almost a exactly a month from the last time. Different friend, completely different situation, so much more horrible. I’m going to put this down in as much detail as I can, so please stop reading now if you think you might be triggered by it. I certainly was.

A friend, a guy I’ve known for 3 years and worked with a good portion of that time in various different restaurants, asks me out for a drink. Totally, yeah, why not? Meet for a drink, he’s already a bit past half drunk. I have one drink and eat about a pound of cheese curds and also drink a big glass of water. I was mildly buzzed. We decide to leave and I offer to follow him home because I’m concerned with him driving. He invites me to smoke some pot, so I go in. This is not the first time I’ve been in his house, I have been around him both very, very drunk and stone-cold sober, we’ve been pretty fucking good friends, right? I’m totally not uncomfortable at all at this point. He takes me out to his garage to show me his motorcycle blahblah. We go back in, I sit on the couch at one end. I do not take off my jacket or my purse that’s crossed over my chest. He sits near the middle of the couch. We smoke. We talk. He’s drunk and doing that drunken-repeat-the-same-shit-over-and-over thing. And he’s scooting closer to me on the couch.

I realized that I just really didn’t want to be there any more. Like, I can’t stand drunk people when I’m drunk. And I realized that in a profound way, sitting there on his couch. I don’t like hanging out with drunk people. It triggers me. It’s a thing. And, sorry not sorry, all drunk people are pretty much the same. The ones I’ve encountered, anyway, and it’s been more than enough to convince me.

I said I needed to get going because my kid was waiting for me. By this point, he’d scooted right next to me. He put his right arm around me and his left hand on my left thigh. He was half-turned sideways at me and I kept leaning back against the arm of the couch to keep a little distance. As I made to stand up and leave, he kissed me. Pulled me in with his right arm, put his left hand behind my head, and crammed his tongue in my mouth rather roughly. At first, I was startled and no exactly sure what I was feeling. Like, this was my friend and I have had thoughts of mild attraction to him in the past, but nothing I’ve expressed and it was just kind of shocking that this person was kissing me. And then I realized that I really didn’t like it much and pushed him back and said, again, that I had to leave.

He said, “Okay, okay, yeah, sure.”

Pulled me in again, his right arm locked around me tight, and started kissing me again while reaching over with his left hand and pulling my left leg towards him. He grabbed the inside of my left thigh roughly and then jerked my leg up and over his lap and started rubbing it on his erection, through his pants. I pushed him back again and said, fucking again, that I had to leave. Emphatically.

“Yeah, yeah, of course.”

And I’m able to stand. He lets me go and I am able to stand immediately. He also stands and staggers into hugging me and I thought, “Okay, okay, he’s cool, it’s fine. Get a hug and go.”

He hugged me for a couple of seconds and then turned me with him and sat back down on the couch while forcing my legs open so I was straddling him. He then held my thighs and hips and forced me to grind myself on him. I was in an awkward position, he was hurting me, and I couldn’t get up. I was freaking the fuck out. It was so surreal. I put my hands on his chest and he let go of my hips to shove my hands down to his lap and held them there, moving them. I was able to get my knees off the couch and my feet on the floor and made it a couple of feet towards the door before he grabbed me by the arm with one hand and by the crotch with the other. Very. Roughly. Spun me around and started kissing me again while groping me in a painful way.

I push and turn.

He catches me again and resumes the painful groping and forcible kissing. So grabby. It felt like he had more than two hands and all of them hurt wherever they touched me. He keeps saying, “Are you sure you have to go? Are you suuuuure?”

He catches me one last time, just as I’m reaching out for the screen door latch. He spins me around, pins me against the door frame, and starts trying to pull my pants up. I think he thought they were a skirt because they have very flowing, wide legs. He kept jamming one hand in my crotch and pulling on my pants with the other. I rolled around the edge of the door frame until I was against the screen door. Hit the latch with my elbow and basically fell backwards out of his house.

And the good people in my life, they ask, immediately, “Are you okay? Do you need the police?” Yes, I’m okay. No, I don’t need the police. I don’t need the questions and the looks and there’s no real evidence, you know? And there are the people here in this tiny little town who would look at me with doubt because they know him, too, and he’s a good guy who would never do a thing like that. One of them said to me today, “Everyone makes mistakes.”

Oh. Okay. Grabbing a woman by the vagina repeatedly is a “mistake.” Ooops. Sorry. Slipped and grabbed you by the pussy at least 5 times while you’re trying to get away from me. My mistake. A mistake that left me feeling physically and emotionally bruised and tender.

I’m painfully aware of the world I live in and how much value my life actually has in society. I have a vagina, so my value is lower than that of the men who have tried to rape me. They would say, “What were you wearing? How much did you have to drink? Why did you go to his house to begin with?” Yes, it’s a super shitty fucking thing that happened, and it is going to continue to affect me in many ways, most unforeseen, for a long goddamn time. It was a traumatic experience that I don’t need exacerbated by involving law enforcement.

I would end up punished somehow and the person who hurt me would very likely go free. I know my life is worth less to society than that of a white male.

More often than not, reporting ruins lives. Just not the right ones.

Last updated July 05, 2019