The Sad Girl Saga

Almost Girl - My original 2018 version.

Trigger Warning: SH, CSA, SA, DV, MH

Do you think I was any less raped because he forced his fingers inside me instead of his dick?

I was almost raped by my second cousin. At least I think that’s what happened. Sometimes I remember it differently. Sometimes he’s on top of me. He’s pulling down my pants, and I’m not exactly sure what he’s shoving inside me. Other times I’m lying on my back, head resting in his lap, eyes locked on his as he sticks his hand down my pants without asking. I think the second one is real, but it’s hard to pull one thread from a blanket without unraveling the entire thing. Either way, I still don’t like going into my little brother’s old playroom. That’s where it happened. My mom turned the play room into a guest room a couple of years ago and threw away the futon he and I had cuddled on that night. It made me sad. Our relationship was almost illegal; he had three years on me. I was fifteen and a freshman in high school. He was seventeen and my second cousin. Our relationship was almost inappropriate, but it’s not like we were first cousins. It’s completely legal to marry your second cousin. Our relationship was almost manipulative. He threatened suicide if I didn’t love him, if I wouldn’t marry him one day—but dating was my idea and I kissed him first.

My stepdad molested me when I was six. But I almost don’t remember any of it. I was always sleeping. Maybe it didn’t even happen. The brain can do that, you know? Create false memories in the mind of a child. My mom worked nights, and he put me to bed. He put me to bed in the princess sheets he bought me next to the dolls that he had braided the hair of and picked out the outfits for while I was at school. He liked to dress me up and braid my hair, too. One time I put a tack in front of the doorway of my room, pointy side up, to keep him out. Only my aunt accidentally received the blow. I didn’t know she would be flying into town that night and getting in late to stay with us for the week.

I hate when the bones of my knees touch when I sleep. I always have. My biological dad bought me a teddy bear named Big Paw as a gift for moving from a crib to a big-girl bed. He liked to tell me the story of how he walked by the toy store every day to make sure it was still in the window until he had enough money to buy it for me. I slept with Big Paw between my knees every night. My stepdad always yelled at me for going to sleep with the stuffed animal tucked between my knees. He used to lick me. In front of everyone. My face and eyes and ears and neck. It was a game. I can still remember the salty taste of his gooey eyelid scraping against my tongue in retaliation to his attack. He called women’s private parts “the cat.” He thought it was funny to try to tickle me and my mother there. It was funny. My mom thought it was anyway.

But I don’t remember the nights. I can’t clearly see him coming into my room. I can’t feel his hand on the inside of my leg. It’s more like a blurry photograph or a video recording of the floor with the action going on just out of range of the lens. Kind of like the picture I found of him holding me against him. He was smiling, looking directly at the camera. I had my mouth wide open, and I was trying to squirm away. I could’ve been laughing, but I think I was screaming. My stepdad almost touched me, almost abused me, yelled almost every night, force fed me—but only once. I was eight years old, and I didn’t like the parmesan chicken; I tried it and I really didn’t like it. But he wouldn’t let me leave the table until every bite was gone. It was almost my stepdad who broke things and knocked down walls and beat the dolls against the floor until they broke and slapped my mom in the face and pushed her to the ground and cried so hard vomit spewed out of his mouth—all over my things, all over my room, all over the house. But after every “episode” he would say, “That wasn’t me, that was Richard.” He was referring to his middle name.

My mom almost abused me. After my stepdad left, I had reached the age where hips widen and chests swell. I was becoming the image of my mother before her second baby caused the fat to stick to her bones. She was often displeased with me, and she often pointed out how much my ass was starting to fill out the pockets of my jeans. She liked me best when I wore makeup and straightened my hair that puberty had caused to curl if left unwashed for even a day. It reminded me of the way she insisted the landscaping around the house be impeccable—even though inside there were piles of dirty clothes on the floor, dirty dishes in the sink, and garbage that needed to be thrown out. We went to the salon a lot where she paid women to pluck out the stray hairs on my eyebrows and try to rid my face of the bright pink pimples that erupted in my transition from a girl to a woman. She got mad at me a lot and screamed at me a lot. She called me names and made death threats and pulled my hair and threw things in my direction. She didn’t miss very often, and I was never quite sure what I had done.

She slapped me in front of my best friend once. My best friend had slept over that night, and we were waiting for my mom to come and drive her home. It was really cold outside with maybe an inch of snow on the ground. My mom lost her car keys. I don’t remember where she had gotten back from, probably the grocery store, but she was pretty certain I had lost her keys. After thirty minutes of not being able to recover them because I had no idea where she had lost her keys, she slapped me. My best friend stared, and I went in the bathroom and cried. My best friend and I never talked about it again. My mom found her keys in the snow shortly afterwards. She had dropped them on her way into the house. She never apologized. I still flinch away when she tries to hug me now, and I feel weird when she tells me what a good daughter I am. But I never went to school blue and bruised with unexplained broken bones and blood dripping from my nose.

I was almost anorexic. I have weighed less than one hundred pounds, counted calories of every single bite. I’ve given half of my lunch away even when I was starving from a long school day. I walked miles and miles with no particular destination in mind until my thighs burned and my calves ached. I just wanted to put on a pair of jeans and get ready to leave the house without the scrutiny of my mother. But I have never been able to see my ribs through my shirt or fit my bicep into the small circle that the touching of my middle finger and thumb creates. My collar bones have never protruded through my skin creating hollowed out basins deep enough to carry water. It’s the will power that always got me, the will power I almost had. I could skip meals for days only to be defeated by my mom’s red rice or a piece of chocolate cake.

I almost got help once. In eighth grade someone squealed about the red scratches across my arm. I still don’t know who told. But secrets and twelve years olds go together about as well as oil and water. I had spent weeks bragging about the cuts I had started making on my arms and showing my friends how I unwound the end of a spiral notebook in order to create the red lines. It was bound to reach adult ears eventually. Maybe I wanted the attention. My name wasn’t called over the intercom; that’s how I knew it was bad. One of the office secretaries came to my classroom and handed my teacher a little piece of paper. I assumed it had my name on it, but I never got to read it. The principal sat me down in his office with the female secretary present and asked me to lift up my sleeves. My heart stopped and I was frozen in that moment. Then I didn’t hide anything; I lifted up the exact sleeve that covered my secrets. I didn’t even go for the clean arm first. I wish my mind had been older than my body in that moment. I had so many options—simply the power to say no—but I was so scared I didn’t use any of them. I just followed instructions like a sheep being herded into their pen. When the school called my mom, she was furious. The second we got home she made me strip off all of my clothes, trying to find all of the places I had made my mark. She told me I was an embarrassment.

I was almost happy that she sent me with my dad for the night. But he took me to Popeyes and made jokes about how I couldn’t be crazy because crazy people did things like pick at the air and talk to walls. The whole thing resulted in six weeks of mandatory therapy. Six weeks of me swearing to Wanita that I only tried it because Demi Lovato did it and she was my idol. Wanita started letting me leave my appointments early after week three.

I was almost a cutter until my junior year of high school. My best friend pointed out how the tears I made in my skin never left any scars. She had made a friend at her new high school who had thick red and pink scars up and down both arms. The tweezers, safety scissors, and unfolded paper clips had never done me any real damage; they only scratched the surface. But something had to be real. Something had to be truly my experience. So I went to Walgreens and bought a pack of razor blades. The bite of the blade was different than the sting of scissors or tweezers. The sharp, straight edge didn’t rip the skin, it cut. The blood didn’t bubble out of the opening, it rushed. There was something comforting about coming back from the bathroom with my sleeve tucked tightly over fresh cuts soaking the blood into the fabric. Everyone says it’s a phase, but I still miss everything about it, I only stopped because if it’s hard to get a job covered in tattoos, cuts are probably worse.

I almost loved the person I lost my almost virginity to. I told everyone I was saving myself for marriage, which is kind of a joke if you think about it too hard. But, he was kind of dangerous. He told me my sadness was really pretty and that waiting until I got married wasn’t going to change anything because the reason I didn’t want to have sex now was still going to be the reason I didn’t want to have sex then. I knew what he wanted from me, but I sort of loved that he was asking and convincing instead of taking so I let him have it. I knew his words were for the sole purpose of being able to say he took the prude’s virginity, but he was right. I wasn’t saving myself because of religion or because I believed that sex was meant for marriage. I didn’t know what sex was. Or I thought I didn’t know what sex was until my second cousin put himself between my knees and then I realized I had known what sex was almost all of my life.

I almost have severe anxiety and manic depression or maybe some other mental illness. I have all the symptoms, or at least that’s what Google and WebMD have told me. Sometimes I can’t get out of bed because under the covers is the only thing that feels safe. Everything just hurts like my skin is made of open sores and the brush of my shirt or pants against the multiple wounds is too much. Sometimes something inside me breaks and I cry for hours. Sometimes I hate myself so intensely I want to rip my soul from my body and become something—anything—else. Sometimes anxiety burns my chest and constricts my lungs and trying to breathe feels like water is flooding my throat instead of air. And sometimes everything lights up. I can’t stop laughing at everything. I think I am the most hilarious person who has ever graced the planet. I spend hundreds of dollars on new pets to keep in my apartment that doesn’t allow pets. But, I don’t have a diagnosis. I cannot tell my professors or my boss why I didn’t show up, again. I have no doctor’s signature authorizing the chemicals in my brain to be unbalanced. I don’t have any orange bottles filled to the brim with little white pills to make me normal. To make me forget all the almosts that have sort of happened to me.

I’ve spent a lot of time daydreaming about tragedy. I’ve longed to be violated from the inside out in a way so concrete not a single question could be raised. I’ve walked through alleys at night and lingered at parties. I’ve drunk too much and slept over at strangers’ houses. I’ve spent years chasing a situation equal to the pain. I’ve obsessed over how to break the glass of the snow globe that contains the storm I can only watch. I want to feel the rain. I want to hear the thunder rock against my ear drums. I want the lightning to strike me down and force me to feel its power. Because I’ve done the math. I’ve tried to put all the almosts together and come up with something worth holding onto, but it’s like counting grains of dry sand while they slip between your fingers.

I was almost cheated on right after graduating high school, but I don’t think that really counted. It’s not like he had sex with the girl, from what I was told they just spent the day cuddling on the beach. I was almost emotionally abusive to my first real long-term boyfriend. He was sweet and innocent, and I thought that was what I needed. But after two years he still couldn’t put my pieces together, and that made me so angry that I left before I got too bad. I was almost a mother, but it didn’t work out. I almost watched someone I loved die, or rather I watched someone I love watch someone they almost loved die. I was almost good enough to become a ballet dancer, but I didn’t start young enough. I almost became a singer, but everyone said it’s one in a million. I almost majored in astronomy, but I’m not good at math. I almost became a surgeon, but cutting into skin that isn’t my own bothers me. I almost majored in horticulture, but I really don’t like bugs. I almost decided not to go to college at all, but I got scared of being a failure. I’ve almost held a job for longer than two months. I almost got straight A’s for more than one semester. Today I almost smiled, almost felt happy, almost felt loved, almost remembered something important, almost believed my hair looked okay, almost believed the twenty pounds I gained didn’t make me fat, almost figured out what I wanted to be when I grow up, almost felt like I mattered, almost felt like my reactions weren’t disproportionate to the situation, almost felt like I wasn’t being ridiculous, almost felt valid, almost felt like a person, almost broke the glass wall, almost felt alive.

I almost have severe anxiety and manic depression. I have all the symptoms, or at least that’s what Google and WebMD have told me. Sometimes I can’t get out of bed because under the covers is the only thing that feels safe. Everything just hurts like my skin is made of open sores and the brush of my shirt or pants against the multiple wounds is too much. Sometimes something inside me breaks and I cry for hours. Sometimes I hate myself so intensely I want to rip my soul from my body and become something—anything—else. Sometimes anxiety burns my chest and constricts my lungs and trying to breathe feels like water is flooding my throat instead of air.

Do you think I would know who I am if you gave me an answer to the first question?