If I told anyone I was *****, they wouldn’t believe me
I live in a world that preaches against hypothetical violence but when that **** comes into your life, everyone pushes it away.
I remember, no I don’t remember, I can barely remember his name.
I think it started with a “C”.
I think he was from Minnesota.
I think we were on a sixteen hour flight.
I think he smiled at me.
I think I smiled back, because why the **** wouldn’t I.
I think he took that as a green light.
I think I shut my eyes to try and sleep.
I think he took that as a green light.
I am fifteen.
I think too little of his advances and trust society enough for me to rest.
I know that was a mistake.
I know I woke up to a blanket around me that wasn’t there before.
I know I woke up to his palm pressed in my pants.
I know I woke up screaming.
I know I couldn’t open my mouth.
I know I was screaming.
I know my mother was on that same plane three rows back.
I was fifteen.

I told my friends and they never believed me.
I haven’t told a soul since.
Why did he walk away from that unscratched while I have been carrying it around like a dead animal for three years?
Why do men think they can own what they can see?
Let me tell you what I can see:
Five people who asked me why I didn’t fight back.
Four people that were sitting around me and claimed to see him putting the cover on me, yet did nothing.
Three of his friends I saw later on the trip who praised him for what he accomplished upon seeing what I looked like.
Two eyes in the mirror that cry almost everyday.
And one crack in that same mirror that will never go away.