My Own Skin

D tried to sleep with me once or twice more.

I always rejected him, but always in a calm way, a dulled reaction; it was like I was numb. I didn’t get angry or disgusted like in the past. It was like I was bleeding, like a battered woman who could only quietly say “no” when before she would have breathed fire.The scream had dulled when a couple weeks later, I was at a Take Back the Night rally. That’s when I heard D pledge, “No more to sexual assault.” My voice sounded weird when I said it shortly afterwards. The inner voice kept saying it was wrong for him to say that, to “pledge” that, but I kept beating it back. I didn’t make myself examine why. I had gotten used to this strangely numb feeling where I was never happy and always ignoring something.I was scared all the time. I was filled with rage. I was depressed. I had all these horrible thoughts in my head, these feelings of worthlessness, and these flashbacks to That Night that left me feeling sick - I would remember things that happened when I was making coffee, or trying to write up an annotated bibliography, or lifting a barbell. Eventually I couldn’t eat. I was scared all of the time too, and that just added to my confusion, and the confusion would heighten the fear. An endless circle, everywhere I went, all while I was trying to hold it together to get my final grades in.

I was always on guard for D, looking for him out of the corner of my eye, unless I forced myself not to. It’s not because I wanted to see him, but because I had to know if he was there, or else I couldn’t relax.

I had a certain class that was in a building with a lounge. The classroom was a “meeting room” of sorts - yay liberal arts colleges - with clear glass doors that faced this lounge. Many times D would sit in a chair in this lounge, around the time I would be going to class, and sometimes would still be there when the class got out. I started dreading this, and became hyperaware every class - that’s twice a week, by the way. Twice a week where I knew I would, more likely than not, see D. It made my heart pound. It would take a while to focus on the actual lesson - one of my favorite classes - and I often would try to find someone I knew to laugh with, talk with, anyone to focus on. And I knew every single time when I was in proximity to D; it was instinctive. It was not a good kind of awareness, either, but a kind that made my skin feel like it was too tight and all I wanted was to run away. I’m not a fearful person. I once traveled halfway across the world knowing no one. I write this entry well over 1,000 miles away from my family and closest friends. I’m not someone governed by fear. As a child, I dreaded hearing strange noises at night or using the restroom because it was all too easy to picture dementors or Voldemort around the corner, but I made myself get out of bed every time to investigate or to pee because I refused to let myself be afraid. But those weeks, that’s all that was in control. It certainly wasn’t me, scared to exist in my own skin.