The Hardest Part - For Those Yet to Tell

The telling of it was always the hardest part. More terrifying, more humiliating, more horrific than the situation itself, the telling of it was hardest because some things just don't have words.

And the things that do have words, well... the words are so benign. So clinical. So devoid of any real meaning to anyone else but me.

Except for others who have been there. THEY know. They know the inadequacy of the words, they know the stark humiliation in the telling. That's why hardly anyone ever tells.

Telling. Telling Bill to take me to the hospital, please, I'm bleeding for Chrissake and I'm hurt so bad. Him, staring straight ahead at the road, not daring to SEE me just the same way he had refused to HEAR me and now shaking his head and flatly saying no. No, no. I can't, can't you see I can't? They'll kill me.

Telling. Waking my mother to take me to the hospital because that coward wouldn't. Her shriek of horror when she turned on the light. Her tears. Her utter strength when she asked me if I knew what going to the hospital would mean, face carefully arranged in neutrality because she feared the answer I would give. Yes, Mommy. I know. Telling, I have to tell.

Telling. The Emergency Room thankfully empty save for a few sick souls, who feverishly stared at the blood still seeping through my clothing and from my face and head. The triage nurse, who composed her face into a mask of compassion, but wasn't able to hide the contempt in her eyes. Back then, medical personnel didn't have the protocol that they do now, but they had a "rape kit," and as they further poked and prodded at my torn, bloodied, and battered body they asked the same questions over and over: "At what point did this happen (poke)? At what point did this happen (prod)? At what point did this happen (bright light, spread, inspect)?" And with very few exceptions, my answer was always the same: "I don't know." And the doctor, exasperated, "Well, young lady, what DO you remember??" Telling, telling, telling, because I remember biting part of his nose clean off and that's when he hit me in the head with the lamp. I'm sorry, Doctor, after that things are a little hazy.

Telling. I am washed and clothed in a hospital gown, the cuts are sewn and the bones are set, I am given IV antibiotics for the bites and for the torn flesh in my nether region that can't easily be kept clean. The police arrive, a man and a woman, and the telling begins anew. "So, you snuck out of your house to go to this party?" Yes. "Was it planned that you would be the only girl at the party?" No. "Why did you choose that outfit?" I was already dressed. "Where did you get the alcohol?" I don't know where they got it, it was there when I got there. "How well do you know these boys?" I grew up with them. "What did you think was going to happen?" I thought I'd get high, watch some movies, play some pool, and have fun. "You said you felt strange and asked your friend to take you home prior to the incident. When he refused, why didn't you leave anyway?" Sobbing, I don't know, I don't know, I don't fucking know. "Where was your 'friend' while this was happening?" Telling, in barely a whisper at the end, because my bruised throat had swelled so much that I could barely breathe. I don't know. I guess he couldn't hear. "Is your friend going to tell us that you consented to sex with those boys?" He is too afraid of them to even bring me here, so my guess is yes. "Does he have any reason to be afraid?" Yes. And no. But I'm still telling.

Telling. Months later, over and over again because they won't combine the case into one and I give my testimony and am cross-examined in three seperate trials because they all pled not guilty. Telling what I know about each photograph of my body, stark white, red, swollen and purple under the hospital lights. Telling the timeline of the "incident," as everyone called it, with the lone exception of my lawyer. Telling, specifically, as long as I could, because there was a point where there were no faces, only hands and bone and voices and teeth and penetration and pain. Telling, telling, in excruciating detail, in "proper nomenclature," in such formal terms that no rawness could bleed through. Telling, through the judging eyes staring at me. Telling, through the cross-exam. Telling, through my mother's sobbing and through the shouting of one of their fathers. Telling, at sentencing, what I had lost, what I had gained, what was unrecoverable and what was salvaged. Telling, through the look of triumph on one attorney's face when I said that I don't want to hurt anyone, I don't want anyone to go to prison, I only want to know WHY.

Telling in counseling, because that was the sentence I asked for for all three of them. Waiting for them to tell, to give me something, ANYTHING, to make sense of it all, even though at this point it had been over a year. Telling, still so difficult, because there I was again: weak, alone, outnumbered, and hated for something that wasn't my doing at all. Telling, still so painful and still so pointless, because I was vulnerable again to their whim, to their solidarity, to their pack-strength, to their testosterone-filled reasoning.

Telling, with my head down and my voice weak, because the only thing I had really learned from "the incident" and all that came after was that the only shame in being gang-raped and beaten within an inch of my life by three boys I grew up with and had no reason not to trust was in the TELLING of it. Because back then it was still assumed that a woman had it coming by the way she dressed, or by the way she comported herself, or by the company she chose to keep. In my case, I had the fucking trifecta.

Telling my husband, knowing it would change our lives forever. He, oblivious to the brutal and carnal truth of it, insisted, and thus did the telling change our lives forever, not to mention his view of the world in general.

Telling, to our marriage counselor, after being prompted over and over to disclose all memories, big or small, that might be 'getting in the way of our intimacy" and my husband gesturing pointedly at me and stating, almost panicked, "she was gang-raped!" Alas, his hopes of being acquitted of all blame for our marital dysfunction due to my "frigidity and PTSD" were dashed when the counselor advised that I leave the marriage. Telling = shame, yet again.

Telling, again, because I was reminded by someone who was smart enough to keep it to herself until there was no other choice.

For those who have told, I salute your courage and know well the mud you crawled through to ensure justice was done. For those yet to tell, please know that rape investigations are no longer the journey into shame they once were and there are trained and compassionate professionals who can sincerely help you to heal yourself.

For the rest... I hope you never have to make the choice.