And. . .

And what you don't see

is when you leave

you take a piece of me

Whether you walked away

Or that decision was left to me

So yes I'm guarded

And I may come off cold,

but you don't understand

that you've already touched my soul

If I've let you in to the point

that I'll share a morning,

you've taken a portion

without any fair warning

You've taken your cut

And think now I'll fit a mold.

The one that you premeditated

to enter into your soul

So you hand me a key

that's not meant to fit.

And you either back away slowly,

or give the lock shit

Meanwhile, 

I'm standing there

Heart in my hand,

And an intense primal fear

So I start to turn

I need a fast get away

And you either run from me

Or beg me to stay

But it's not black and white.

And something that's still a ghost to me,

is a whole gray area-

Where we both take a chance to create the right key.

The Truth I Denied Myself

I was raped.  There.  I said it.

A couple weeks after my 15th birthday. It was a night I'll never forget...

December 9, 2002.

It started with my best friend and I at her house.  It was a Saturday night, we were 15 and my friends parents were going to a party for the night.  I can't quite remember how, but we convinced her mom to let us drink alcohol which we were allowed to drink as long as we didn't leave the house or invite anyone over.

So there we were, two teenagers, 5 maybe 6pm on a Saturday, drinking as much as we could from a handle of Bacardi Limon.  We kept drinking and laughing.  We had finished drinking the neck of the bottle, down to where the label begun.  Right around then is when my friend got a call from her boyfriend.  Her older, already out of high school, drug dealer boyfriend.  

He asked if we wanted to come hang out at his house with him and a couple of our friends.  My friend called her mom and asked if that would be ok, and surprisingly, she said that it was.  He only lived down the street and they said that they could come pick us up on their way home.

20 minutes later my friends boyfriend shows up with his best friend.  They pick us up, and we drive to another girls house to pick her up.  See, this girl was a year older than us, and she was so pretty and so cool, and she was dating a friend of the boyfriend.  We waited at her house for what felt like forever, watching as she changed a thousand times until she had the perfect outfit.  But then came the makeup.  Don't forget, I'm 15 years old, and absolutely wasted.  In the midst of her changing, I started to get hot and dizzy and sweat.  I ran outside to get some fresh air, and started throwing up next to the car we got into not long after.

My friend(and I say this with a grain of salt), well she still wanted to hang out with her boyfriend and not have to go home.  So logically they all collected me, and got me into the car so that the five of us could go to the boyfriends house.

As soon as we got there, I threw up more. My friend took me upstairs to brush my teeth, and gave me water. I laid down on the boyfriends bed and passed out. I remember waking up at some point because the boyfriend was talking to me and he said something along the lines of "I know you think that -- is hot, and I hit him up so he's on his way over".

This guy will remain nameless.  But you should know, that he was older. Two years older. He was also the student-aid in my 3rd period science class.

So the next thing I remember, is briefly waking up and noticing that "The Beach" was playing on the television that was on the other side of the room, but it felt like it was a million miles away.

Then a hand, a hello. I looked around. My vision was blurry, like when you're taking a bath and lie back and shut your eyes as you slowly sink underwater, and then when you come up to open your eyes, you're just peering through wet eyelashes. I saw the trashcan sitting next to the bed, the one I had been throwing up in earlier. and I started to see a little more clear, but still not the full picture. I think I tried to wake up, but was failing miserably. So I sunk back into the bed, as I felt him sit next to me.  Within what felt like seconds, he was kissing me, my neck, putting his hands on my thighs and breasts. 

I don't remember much after that, just bits and pieces, but I'll try to walk you through what I do.

The movie kept playing, and I remember thinking "This is it? Isn't this supposed to be special?". I remember the horrible, sterile smell of the condom.  I looked to my left for a moment, and saw my friend there with her boyfriend, and the same thing was happening. The last thing I remember is just thinking "When will this be over? Please let this be over soon".

 And that was it.

That was it.

Then I was sore, and groggy, and I gathered all my strength and asked what time it was, and someone answered that it was around 11:40pm and they had to be home by 12.  I asked her to give me a ride home. So she took me home. We talked on the ride back to my house, and I couldn't remember if we talked about what had happened or not, but I'm thinking not.

I got home. I walked in the front door and my dad was still awake. FUCK. Not only was I supposed to be spending the night at my friends house, but I reeked of alcohol and vomit. I briefly said hi to my dad and told him I didn't feel like spending the night out anymore so I decided to get a ride home. He knew something was wrong, but let me make the trip upstairs by myself.  I immediately went to the bathroom and took off my clothes and sat in the shower and cried as the water poured over me for what felt like 2hours.  And it may have been, because I remember at some point my dad knocking on the door asking if I was ok.  I made up some quick lie about someone had been smoking and I didn't want to smell like cigarettes. He said that I had just been in there awhile, so I assured him I would be out soon.

I did not want to get out of that shower. Ever.







...This was really heavy for me to write, and something that only maybe a handful of people know about me.  I never took my time to grieve about it because my friend was high-fiving me about it the following Monday at school saying "yaa same bed same time".... God even typing that makes me feel disgusting and my skin crawl. 

I have decided though to let this go, and my writing about it is my process for that.


I may have more to say about this, but for now, I'm tapped.

Sometimes I'll Play the Villain...

Have you ever felt like sometimes it's easier to play the villain?  Have you ever just crawled inside of yourself and got swallowed up in the darkness? There have been times when I feel like I'm the bad guy, and I need to be the bad guy. It's one of those things you can't quite understand unless you've been there yourself.

When I start to spiral, and I mean really spiral, when I lose control of my emotions, I completely shut down.  I go away and get lost in a dark place, meanwhile there is an apathetic villain that stares back at me from the mirror. The person that is faceless and fearless.

Let me paint a picture for you so that maybe you'll really understand...

I let someone down. Let's call this person A- Someone that I care about, and someone that I thought cared about me.  

All I seemed to do was disappoint A. If my feelings got hurt and I spoke up about it, or said something about anything that made me uncomfortable, I would get a slew of words my way letting me know that I was a terrible person and how A's feelings were hurt too.  Only to be followed by 'I didn't mean that' or "I said that because I was upset'.

Every single negative remark A made about who I am or what I am cut, and cut me deep.  Don't get me wrong, I am no Saint, and I know that.  I also know when I am no good for someone. With A, weren't able to place enough understanding and respect behind the words that we spoke to one another.

A and I started giving the other anxiety, and we were hurting each other rapidly, like getting sucked up into a set of waves that continues to come crashing down and every time you come up for air you get struck by the next wave which seemed more mighty than the last because you haven't had the time to fully catch your breath so you gasp and gasp until you go right back under until you finally just get stuck under the water wondering if it's even worth it to come up to the surface.... And thus creates a villain.

We were going nowhere quickly, talking in circles and the cycle needed to end.  So I played the villain in A's life.  It was easier that way. It's a role I've played before and it was the role that A needed, so I thought.

It was easier to act apathetic towards A because then the fault could be placed on me. Sometimes I feel like I make the lives of people I care about more complicated, and the best way to make it less complicated is to take myself out of it. I do this by playing the villain, and do things to make this person walk away, leaving me to blame.

I don't know how many more times I can play the villain though.  It hurts, and makes the darkness that much more suffocating. But sometimes, I feel like that might be what I deserve. The emptiness. Because who's ever ok with playing the villain?