There was a house party across the street when I was staying at my cousin's house. I was 17 years old. A guy five years older than me started a conversation, and he seemed nice enough. He charmed me with lines like "you're the prettiest girl here" and "I could've gotten with any of these girls, but I didn't," but to tell you the truth, the whole thing made me uncomfortable. I wasn't used to the attention. I didn't know how to say no. The alcohol I had barely masked my discomfort, but he didn't seem to notice. 

Ten minutes later, I was in his truck, his friend driving. His kisses felt strange. I felt no attraction to him at all, and all I could think about was that I was technically cheating on the only boyfriend I ever had in high school. I spoke up, finally, about my boyfriend. "He doesn't have to know." 

In the parking lot of his apartment, I told him I didn't want to do anything, and he said it was okay. I was afraid he would leave me stranded at 2 in the morning. I kept saying I didn't want to do anything, before he lifted me onto his bed, before he pulled my skirt up, before he peeled my ratty underwear off, before the haze in my memory in which I only remember feeling pain. I don't fully remember what happened in the seconds before my rape. It is the only memory I have successfully been able to block out of my mind. But I remember afterwards I stumbled over the bed, confused, and probably made a ruckus tripping over the guitar on the floor. I politely asked him to drive me back, and through the whole ride, he tried to convince me to change my mind by rubbing my thigh and touching me. I felt like I was less than a person. It was 4 am when I got back. I woke up three hours later emotionally numb with this weird tunnel vision, and stayed that way for a month. And even though everyone, including my boyfriend, told me it wasn't my fault that I had been violated, I felt like I shouldn't have been rebellious, I shouldn't have ended up at that party, I should've been more assertive, and all the "should haves" and "shouldn't haves" stayed in the back of my mind while I spent the entire summer before college wishing someone could've taken away the pain. Eventually, I stopped having spontaneous flashes of that memory. I covered it up, in a place that I try not to touch. Maybe one day I can forget the entire thing instead of just the few split seconds that I can no longer remember.