Dying to Belong

I was tired. Somewhere in the back of my head, I reminded myself that I needed to get up, that I needed to get home somehow. I lifted the clear plastic cup up to my lips; it was half-full of the beer that this guy had handed to me. I sort of knew him; he lived in the same residence building, maybe on the second floor or the third. He had told me about the party the night before and told me that everyone who wasn’t a complete keener would be there, hands ready to take the cups full of drinks. There was a five-dollar cover charge for all the drinks I could ever want to swallow down, he had told me, but he would take care of it for me. I remember that I had told him that it was sweet of him and he gave me a kiss on the cheek.

The bitter aftertaste of warm beer filled my mouth and I looked down at the cup. There was something wrong with it. That was the first thing that came to mind as I looked down at it, something was at the bottom of it. But I couldn’t think of what as I dropped it. It barely made a noise with the pulsing music around me. Weaving my way through the couples that were gyrating their hips together, looking like they were having sex right there in front of everyone, I was trying to find the front door so I could just leave. I turned and suddenly I was faced with my roommate who had her tongue down the throat of our psychology TA.

So much for the rules and regulations against student-staff fraternizations.

He had his hands on her hips, she had her hands in his hair and all I could think about was the fact that he was really, really hot. They made an intense picture in my head with the way that his buttoned shirt was missing a few buttons, how his belt was loosened, how her skirt had been bunched up by his fingers and her black thong was on view for everyone to see. Her blouse had been opened and I could see the satin and lace material of… So that’s where that bra went. And here I had thought that the washing machine in the basement just ate it and never spat it back out.

A little more than disgusted over the realization of just where my clothing had been disappearing to, I turned so I no longer had to see my roommate and my TA practically having sex in front of the other students when I walked right into someone.

“Hey darling, I’ve been looking for you.”

The smooth voice could only belong to one person and I tilted my head up to look up at his eyes. He had a mop of brown hair that looked decent when he put a little effort into it, long eye lashes that invoked jealously and blue eyes that twinkled a little in the sunlight. But right now he was just holding onto both of my wrists with his hands, pulling me close to him as if I weighed nothing. I gave a token struggle and he laughed as he pressed his lips against mine.

There was something about the dizzy-feeling that should have warned me, something that should have told me that something wasn’t right. But I didn’t struggle or protest as he slipped his arm around my waist and herded me out of the living room, away from the sea of bodies, and up a flight of stairs. I remember thinking that this was the wrong way and that I just wanted to go back to my dorm room and get some sleep.

He murmured into my ear that I was beautiful and he was so very glad that I had finished that drink. I tried to tell him that I hadn’t, it had been warm so I just set it down somewhere. He led me into a bedroom. It was decorated with posters of popular bands, a teddy bear was surrounded by a pink comforter on the bed and he pushed me towards it. I remember shaking my head as he crawled onto the bed next to me and then…

“What happened next, Emma?”

Officer Stephens pulled me out of my memories, the nightmare that wasn’t just in my subconscious. I shake my head when he asked me the question.

“I remember waking up in the morning. My shirt was open, bra pushed up. My shoes were still on, my underwear was down by my ankles. My skirt was on the ground. I got up and I couldn’t find my purse so I put my clothes on and went downstairs to the living room. When I couldn’t find my cell phone, I used a cordless phone in the kitchen to call my friend for a ride. He drove me to the hospital.”

The doctor and nurses had been kind. They drew blood and used something that they called a rape kit. There hadn’t been any semen, no tearing, no bleeding. Other than my word, there was no evidence that I had sexual intercourse in the last twenty-four hours. And because I hadn’t gotten to a hospital until over twelve hours after I had consumed the beer he had handed me, there were no traces of drugs in my blood. It was my word against his, and he got his friends to give him an alibi.

“Thank you,” Stephens said as he pressed a button to turn off the digital recorder.

“He isn’t going to be charged with this, is he? He’s going to go free?”

I hated the way my voice sounded. Small and pitiful, like I needed him to reassure me that everything was going to be okay, that I was going to be okay, that everything would work out in the end.

“He isn’t going to be charged with your assault and yes, he will go free this time.”

“It isn’t fair.”

“It almost never is.”

Written September 29 2007.