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I wish it felt more like the truth.
I didn’t feel like this after my run-in with Dylan. I felt sick and disgusted, of course, but I didn’t feel his presence hanging around me like Silvan’s fucking fur around my shoulders.
I didn’t feelhaunted.
Not like this anyway.
Not byhim.
It isn’t what happened to me keeping me from sleep tonight. It’s fear of the man who did it. It’s a feeling that he won’t go away as easily as Dylan did.
The thought passes through my mind that maybe I should go to the police.
I didn’t with Dylan. It was hard to even be sure he’d done anything wrong that night as I left, unable to focus and with trembling hands. I knew how I felt, but I didn’t know if maybe it was somehow my fault. If I couldn’t even fully believe what had happened to me and I’d been there, why would strangers?
I shouldn’t have gone there that night.
Rationally, I know I should be able to go anywhere I want with the expectation of safety, especially when I’m there with a friend. He certainly could rely on being safe with me.
I should have been physically stronger, fought him with more force so I wouldn’t have been in such a vulnerable position.
Rationally, I know I shouldn’t have to physically fight someone off to avoid something I don’t want from happening. Not wanting it should have been enough.
But it was hard to see it all clearly the moment after it happened, when I was freshly traumatized and my brain couldn’t comprehend what myfriendhad done to me.
After all, don’t most people feel a sense of denial when someone they like does something truly horrible? They don’t want to believe it when they hear about it, and I didn’t, either, after experiencing it firsthand.
I had the same initial impulse that all our friends had after it happened when they decided to believe him and vilify me.
The difference is, I wouldn’t have done that tothem.
I like to think if a male friend of mine started cagily generating the story that a female friend of ours had beentotally into itwhen they were hooking up, but then she changed her story later, I would at leasttalk to herinstead of automatically believing him.
After all, only one of us had a possible motive there. Only one of us needed to get out of trouble, and it sure wasn’t me.
I hadn’t done anything wrong.
It took me some time to accept that, but I finally got there.
It freed me of some of the burden I carried, freed me from him completely.
Sure, I still have symptoms.
I still can’t stand to be touched, and my sense of trust in men is all but gone. The ability to feel safe with them is utterly obliterated…
I frown, thinking back to earlier this evening when, ironically, I felt safe with Silvan’s strong arms wrapped around me.
He had just kissed me, and I hadn’t wanted him to, but when I panicked, he didn’t get turned off and leave because of my strange reaction. He pulled me into his chest and held me. He calmed and reassured me, and even if it was just so he could lure me into his own trap…
It worked.
Granted, I’ve never let a mantryto calm me down when I’ve felt panicked since everything with Dylan. Since then, if my fears get triggered, I flee the scene and avoid the situation going forward.
Silvan didn’t let me.
He made me stay through the swell of panic, and sure, I may have been lulled into a false sense of safety thinking him responding to my panic with comfort meant he wouldn’t push me any further, but even if the safety was a lie, I felt it. It’s the first time I’ve felt safe in a man’s arms… well, ever.
That’s a jolting realization.
