I Slept Next to Him

During the summer of ’16 I went out downtown like I always did.

I went out with two friends and I had been talking to this guy who kind of had an appearance of a “thug” but he was a genuine person. He talked to me for hours, we talked about intimate things and feelings as if we’d been friends for years almost.

I’ve written on here before but I honestly didn’t think it would happen again. I was on my guard, I was on high alert. I had a pocket knife, I had extra shoes to go home in, I had a quick call button to 911 on my phone, I even wore a panty liner to make him think I was on my period (as if that would matter to a rapist) and I knew where he lived and how far my house was from his.

I did all this, but it still happened.

I went to his house, I told him I didn’t feel like sleeping with him and that I was cool with just hanging out. I said this, loud and clear as day. We didn’t drink but I was already pretty buzzed. We talked about the news and about a mutual friend we saw out that night, we talked about my college program and about family. It seemed like hours passed by. Then he took out a bong and weed, before that night I don’t smoke, I just drank on occasion.

I’d never been high before, I took a hit from the bong once and it hit me hard, I coughed and thought I was choking. He offered me water and told me to lie down on the couch. I laid down while he took a few more hits from the bong and sat watching t.v for a bit. In a sort of daze of feeling high and drunk I started to feel heavy, like I was gonna fall asleep. I felt like my body wasn’t my own after this.

He helped me up and shook me to wake me up to walk to his bedroom. He laid me down, and the rest is vivid yet hazy, because I felt like I was floating outside of my body.

I saw him take a sheet, a pillow and something else from the other side of the bed. He put the pillow under my head, he put the sheet over my face and I thought he was going to kill me, I was wishing he would if he was going to rape me. Sure enough, he covered my mouth and I froze. All of those things I’d done to protect myself didn’t matter at that point.

He ripped my clothes off, but he took his time with what he was doing. He hurt me when he tried to put his fingers inside me, and i told him to stop once he tried to touch my breasts. He had both of his hands on me, he wasn’t covering my mouth anymore and I couldn’t scream. I tried to tell him to stop, I kept saying no, I tried my hardest to push him off me but he was so heavy he started to crush me. He put all his weight on me and he started grabbing my legs. He started to bite me all over my body, enough that it was painful, but not enough to leave any marks or bruises. I stopped fighting after he shoved my face into the pillow. I literally felt like everything had been stripped from me, all my energy and all my strength. Then he hit me once in the face, he thrusted a few times and as i was crying he grabbed me by my neck. I was hoping he would just kill me so I stopped struggling, as soon as I did he said “are you okay?!” “hey…” “wake up” “are you okay?” “what’s wrong?”

He stopped what he was doing, got up went to the bathroom, and he came back in the room and slept beside me. I passed out after.

I didn’t understand what happened when I woke up, I felt sore, I felt like my head was pounding and I felt like my legs were burning.

I got up, went to the bathroom and realized what happened, my memory started coming back and i realized he’d raped me. Violently enough to cause pain and redness ‘down there’ and to mark my face red, but not violently enough that he left bruises or scratches on me. I noticed they would appear later on in the week.

I went back to the bedroom, put on my underwear and checked my phone. I felt in a daze still, because I couldn’t process what had just happened. I cleaned myself up as best I could and laid down on the bed waiting for him to wake up. I woke up two hours later and knew I should leave, I should call the police, call an uber and go to the hospital, and I knew I should have done something to him. I thought about grabbing my pocket knife and killing him.

I didn’t do anything. As soon as he woke up, he said “I thought you’d left…” he looked disappointed so I got up, put the rest of my clothes on and started to leave. He grabbed my arm and said “wait…” and threw me on the bed again, i froze again, he put his hand down my underwear and said “never mind…you’re not wet enough”
He walked me to the door, called me an uber and I went home like nothing happened. I couldn’t say it happened again. I couldn’t be that statistic. It happened more than once in two years and I still don’t want to deal with it. I see him in my friends news feed, and I saw him once in a picture with my friends at a party, but I couldn’t say or do anything.

I just came home, took a shower, and put it in the back of my mind. I’ve never been believed before, so this isn’t new, I don’t really care if the police were to arrest him, I know there would be too much backlash and I don’t wanna go through court. I do want to kill him though, I want him to suffer…I want him to feel pain. I can’t get myself to stoop that low though, maybe some day, but not now. If I see him again I know I would snap.

— Survivor, age 21