The Day Everything Changed

I’m not a very good writer but I feel I need to share my story. When I was in high school I was dealing with a lot of problems at home, my parents were fighting a lot and my older sister and I had to take care of our five younger siblings while for two to three years learned to love each other again. My dad was emotionally broken and my mom was lost. One day I went on OKcupid, for those who don’t know it’s a dating website and I found a guy let’s call him John. He was extremely handsome and sweet and after a while of talking I decided to go meet him. We met at a park, I brought my pittbull along with me for safety and he was just sweet and gave me butterflies. The problem was he was 21 and I was I think 15 or 16. I lied and said I was 18. The next day I told him the truth and we went our separate ways. After a year I meet my true love, my senior year; we start having relationship problems and John messages me out of nowhere and the feelings I had for him come rushing back, we start exchanging nude photos and stuff like that then I stopped talking to him after telling my boyfriend what happened and John and I decide to be just friends. John misses seeing me so he keeps on insisting that we hang out at his place and after a while of thinking and blowing him off with different excuses I talk to my wonderful boyfriend and I tell John I can come hang out but only for like 20 minutes and we can just watch netflix until I need to go. When he gets there he parks down the road from my house and as soon as I get in a get this horrible feeling of dread that I NEED to get out of the car, I texted my friends and told them how I felt and they told me to get out but I foolishly ignore my feelings, the drive there John keeps flirting with me but I tell him we’re only hanging out with friends and I won’t be staying long. When we get to his place we enter his place through his garage, I walk in there and he starts closing the garage doors and that feeling of dread sweeps over me again. He smiles and we walk inside. I walk into his living room it’s beautiful and there’s a large tv down there so I sit down. “Oh, we’re going to be watching upstairs my roommate isn’t home”. I heard him say “my roommate isn’t home” but I didn’t really process what he meant by that. I start going upstairs excited to watch Netflix and he grabs my butt and starts wrapping his arms around me. I take his arms off and tell him to stop while secretly enjoying the attention from a guy I had wanted for a long time but I know in my heart I don’t want to hurt my boyfriend so I ignore it and walk upstairs. He leads me to his bedroom and I look inside to see an even bigger tv. ” Oh now I see why we are watching in here, bigger tv!! duh.” on the very left of the tv is his bed and in front of the tv is a computer chair, I sit down and grab the remote and instantly start turning on my favorite show at the time “American Dad’. “I’m going to go to the bathroom real quick” he says, I start hoping he’s not washing his junk so we can have sex and I just ignore and keep watching my show while giggling. He comes back in and sits on the bed, I can smell he just put cologne on, he’s wearing a gray v neck t shirt and designer jeans with a black belt. He sits down while watching me laugh at the show and says, ” come sit next to me” and I tell him i’m fine, I prefer to be sitting where I am. After he insists several times that I should sit on the bed I listen to him like an idiot. He starts telling me how amazing my butt is and how beautiful I look. He tells me to lay down and I reluctantly listen. As soon as I listen he starts running his hands all over my body, I tell him to stop and reach for my phone and turn on my location in case anything happened and I set my phone on the tv stand at the end of the bed. I felt so confused and excited. I wanted to sleep with him but I refused to let myself do that. Everything is a blur after but I’ll try to remember. he starts making me run my hands on his penis and forcing me to grab it, I keep telling him to stop. He starts licking my ears and I let out a little moan because it’s something my boyfriend does and I enjoy it. He continues to do what he’s doing while i’m repeatedly telling him to stop and pushing him off. He kept telling me to kiss him but I refused. Kiss me and i’ll take you home”. All I wanted was to go home so I listened and kissed him, he smelled of sweat and his mouth tasted disgusting but tasted just a hint like my boyfriend. All my life I said ” If anyone ever tries to sexually assault me I don’t care what happens, I’ll fight him off even if it kills me” While all this was happening I just remember the reoccurring thought of “what have I done?” “I don’t want to hurt my boyfriend” I was so shocked at what was happening that I just laid there repeatedly staying stop while just wanting this nightmare to end. He went from the sweetest guy ever to a man with soulless careless eyes. I was scared and felt so so guilty. He kept making comments like, “if I was your boyfriend I wouldn’t want you, you’re dirty. You’re here with me” I started crying a little and he threw me towards the end of the bed next to the tv stand and starts trying to take off my pants while i’m fighting him and making up all kinds of excuses to turn him off. He starts choking me and rubbing his body against me while hitting my arm against the tv stand repeatedly. I eventually get out from under him and grab my phone and call my boyfriend, softly crying asking for him to come get me. He tells me he’s on his way and while I’m on the phone John’s looks livid. So angry that I called someone. He snaps back to himself and says “sure i’ll take you”. I feel this instant relief sweep over me and as we’re heading downstairs in the kitchen he bends me over the kitchen table continuing to dry hump me and kiss my neck. I push him off and get in the car. He drops me off and when we get to KFC he forces me to kiss him. I get out and everything just feels so surreal. I see my boyfriend pull into the parking lot. I start to notice my messy hair and my ripped shirt and realize I couldn’t feel my right arm after continually having it hit into the tv stand. I get in the car and my boyfriend immediately sees something is wrong. I start sobbing and tell him that he assaulted me. I’m shaking, hysterical and sitting on the floor of the car just not wanting to be seen by anyone. My boyfriend wants to go back and beat the living heck out of him but I just want to get as far away from that place as possible. He pulls over and I tell him everything and I’ve never seen my boyfriend cry so hard in my life, he reaches to hug me but I just can’t be touched it would just me right back to John’s bedroom. I start ripping my clothes off just not wanting his smell all over me and my boyfriend and I just sit there and cry. He calls my friends not knowing what to do after I repeatedly beg him not to tell my family or call the cops. When we get back to our town and we’re having a blackout due to a storm. So he takes me back to his house because I just don’t want to go home and he makes me feel safe. He grabs a candle and leads me upstairs and puts me in his bed, I start shaking uncontrollably while sobbing because the dark is so scary and I can just see his face everywhere and hear his voice. My boyfriend crawls into bed with me and slowly reaches out to touch me I let out a gasp and after a few seconds scoot closer to him, he whispers to me “You’re safe now, I won’t let anyone hurt you, go to sleep” He starts singing me my favorite song, holding me tightly while I cry. That night was one of the scariest nights of my life, everything changed that night. I changed. I still live with the fact that I blame myself. John really effed with my mind and managed to make me feel bad for him for doing this to him. I told my family and I didn’t get the support I needed from them but a year later I feel okay. I’m not happy but i’m okay. I can visit his part of town without getting flashbacks and I can look at a photo of him without my skin crawling. It’s a slow progress but I’m a lot farther than before. Thank you for letting me share my story.

— Tyeisha Engman, age 18