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Dear Rapist

Herstry, January 24, 2024 issue

 

Tom,

Do you even remember me? I was nothing to you, a little conquest, a trifling diversion that for one brief evening made you feel powerful. Do you know how hard it has been for me to understand what happened that night? To remember how naïve I was, even at twenty-five, and not feel ashamed? To stop blaming myself for getting drunk on a few cups of sake, and for being unable to shove your six-foot-plus body off of me? Did you plan it, or was it merely a crime of opportunity, your secret safe because I was in town for only a few days?

 

For decades I kept the memory of that evening carefully buried. The #MeToo movement gave me the courage to uncover it and reconsider what happened the night we had dinner at the restaurant next to your luxurious office. When I arrived at Benihana's, I believed you when you said your wife Judy—the friend I wanted to see—was sick, which left just the two of us. But I should've been suspicious later in the evening when you told me about the coat Judy wanted to give me for my first winter in Boston, the one waiting for me in your office. Was my judgment clouded because you slipped something into my wine cup? Did Judy even know about the coat? Was she really sick that night? So many questions.

 

My part in the story, unlike yours, didn't end that night. And now, almost fifty years later, I want you to experience every step of my journey, because it should've been your journey, too.

 

To continue reading:

https://herstryblg.com/true/2023/01/24-dear-rapist