CHAPTER 1
I am attempting to sort it all out. When does three years seem like yesterday? How does it all start with a rape and bring me to where I am laying on a Physical Therapist's table wishing that he would take off my clothes and touch me?
I can't write about that night unless it is in poetry: A rape by a friend.

You wanted me
So you took me
Under a sky
Of a thousand sceaming stars
And the universe shattered
With the force of the
act
That lasted a lifetime
one too many
That night I ripped the grass
(scratching at your face)
and screamed for help
(my hands held behind my back)
but no one came.
And so you took me
and then again
until you were finished
and I lay there
and died.

I am married. Not in any real sense of the word, but I am still married. I have no children (thank God), and when people ask why, I laugh and I say, "Oh, maybe when the man can get pregnant," or "I hate children," but the truth is that my husband would not make a good father.
I have been celibate for nearly four years now, (married for about 8) but there was a time when I met a man and had an affair and I could imagine having his children. That was never the case with my husband.

The rape broke the last of the trust between us. He would not speak to me about it, or let me speak about it, and I gradually lost all desire for him. I needed him to be with me to make an "us".
An US was him and me against my fears and my enemies and the world.

Instead I got a man that would fall asleep when I would whisper at night, "talk to me, I'm scared." I got a man that would fall asleep while touching me, satisifed by his own climax, but not willing to see to mine.

Now I feel dead towards our relationship. There is a part of me that always wants to please, wants to help. That part of me will always be attached to my husband and there to serve him.

There is the rest of me. The rest of me that was laying on the physical therapist's table. Feeling that man's hands touch me, I felt absurdly grateful to be touched by anyone at all. I have a crush on him. It is not emotional, it is sexual. It is infatuation. I don't want love. I want someone to touch me. To feel me. To make my body feel the way it used to feel with a man. To fill that part of me that has been missing for so long. I could say it another way. I just want him to fuck me. Nothing more. He is married, but still I think about making it a reality. It is pathetic and desperate, but it is still there.

I have spoken to him and I am his type. Dark hair, light skin. I plot the things to say to subtly give him the message. I lean back on the therapist's table and look at him, straight faced and serious and ask, "What position do you think would be good for me? In bed?" He tells me to use a pillow between my legs to ease the tension on my back and I think about coming in next week and telling him, "You're right. It is better in bed with something between my legs. I used a pillow and it helped." I don't know if I have the guts to actually say that.

The last time I finished a session, he came over and said, " Okay, Princess, you're done," and the little affectionate name pulled my heart down to my toes. I thought about it again and again. I do think he is fond of me and we have taken at least one step out of the professional circle that is patient and therapist. I am determined to take another...and another.

I am home now, alone. In pain. Physical pain from my back. I am surrounded by my animals. My dogs...Kenny Coon (yes, a raccoon).

I feel like I will go crazy if I spend another day in this house, yet I feel like there is nowhere to go...and driving is fairly painful. I tend to "fill with food." I think a lot of people do, but this is my first step towards figuring myself out. It would be very easy to comfort myself with hot chocolate and a donut...but I don't want this type of comfort anymore, and I don't feel this is helpful in the long run. <> no drinking, no drugs...no fats and sweets. I also get lost in books. Is this my way of avoiding life? I could be so happy! Eating and reading! But I feel that this is not the answer.

I think I am rambling now. I need to focus.

CHAPTER 2

I am thinking back, about the past. It is not a fun place for me to be. Many people only visit with the help of some drug or alcohol.

If I could, I would constantly make myself over. I would start over again, fresh, every day, every minute, every second. I would correct those tiny mistakes that make me imperfect in other people's eyes, and that would allow to look back upon my past without all the shame and embarrassment that I feel.

I do not feel like I connect with people anymore. I remember what I was like and I can still be charming, witty, entertaining, sympathetic. People start to like me.

But this is no longer a 2 way street. This is all about what I can be, can do for them. They don't do much for me. I have the weight of something inside me now that makes me tired. I do not have the energy to keep it up and I dissapoint them. Or I avoid them. Perhaps today I feel tired and cranky. I have nothing to offer them. I am embarrased by this. Ashamed. I hide. I have misrepresented myself. I have played a wonderful part, but I am really a fraud. That was not me, that was my scripted part, and I only have the energy to perform once a month.

I wonder if this is what happened to my marriage, and I feel guilty. Did I reel him in with my seemingly cheerful, carefree personality? Allways smiling, allways joking, allways something interesting to say? Then that person changed. Became lost. I am stuck behind, in one particular night.

Pain changes you. Chronic physical or mental pain can twist you up like a piece of metal from a plane crash.

CHAPTER 3

Before I left my last PT appointment S. asked me to call him to let him know how my appointment with the surgeon had gone. To let him know if PT was still reccomended. Was I imagining that maybe his interest seemed other than professional? I don't think so. I am so careful to think the worst, never the best.

I didn't call him. My appointment was missed and rescheduled for 3 days later. This pleases me. I may be desperate, but I did not commit the desperate act of calling him immediately. My referring doctor is not reccomending that I continue PT if it is not a major help. It isn't. I am thinking about going back one more time.

I wear loose pants at PT which get pulled halfway down my rear end to where the pain is. I have been wearing the most provocative underwear I can find, and I wonder if he notices.

During my last session, I came in so early, there was no one else there and I saw a different side of S. He dropped his professional manor and just hung out. I teased him. He teased me back. He accused me of having a crush on my chiropractor. I am thinking of saying that I have a crush on him...that he gives better massages. I want to say, "that felt so good, I feel like purring."

Ah, practical matters. Where would we have sex? Not his house. Mine? I am not so sure about that. I love hotels, but a hotel may make it a little to real S, what he is actually doing.

In truth, I have another fantasy. I am attracted to S. because he is a perfect height and he wears comfortable, soft clothing. I want him to hold me. Just hold me and not let go and let me feel safe, somewhere. That fantasy leads me to sex. But this is my fantasy and I am alone. I wonder if sex is actually what I want from him...

#4

Dreams. I have to wonder how the physical feelings can be so genuine. This time, it happens at work. There is no clear, black night sky above me. In the way of dreams, the friend has become a stranger that I do not recognize. It is short and ugly and to the point. The emotions are the same. The physical sensations will not leave me after the dream is over. There is one thing that is the same in all the dreams as it was in real life. The battle is always a loss.

I always thought I was prepared for a would be attacker. I would use my teeth and bite without hesitation or fear. Then I would kick, claw, and shred. It came as a great surprise when I hurt my teeth trying to bite him. I could not even rip his skin. It is like suddenly finding out that the sword you have always carried to protect yourself is useless and dull.

He had my two hands pinned. His body was so heavy that I could not move enough to kick him. He was slobbering on my breasts, through my bra and ripped shirt.

Still, my head was clear. I have always been good in a crisis and this did not leave me so easily. Nothing was blurred. Time did not speed up or slow down. I can pinpoint the exact moment that I lost control, and started to scream. This was the moment I felt him push between my legs.

There is now, always the fear that my body is not my own. At any time, someone with the will and the strength can come and take it away from me.

March 12. A few days have passed and I think tonight may be a night where I will need to eat ice cream. I have to really pay attention to myself when it comes to things like ice cream. There are times where I need it and if I deny myself, I'll end up compensating in gallons what could've been avoided by one little cone. Gallons are always nice too :-)

I am working on remaking some of my habits. I'm realizing how easily I can be programmed. I eat chinese food and suddenly I need to have a Coke. I always have a Coke with Chinese food. It seems wrong not to. So I'm trying to drink lots and lots of green tea instead.

February 22

It has been months and now it seems like a lifetime has passed. At this moment the butterflies in my stomach and the ache inside of me are taking precedence over everything that has happened in the months past. Over everything that has ever happened. There is only now, and I feel excited and hopeful and hopeless and short of breath.

It's all so casual. I went back to school, this I have to tell you, and I started eating lunch with new girls from Physics class. They're older like me, and today was a good day for me. I was feeling goofy and confiding, and hormonal, and nothing bonds girls like talking about sex, sex, sex.

My hormones have been in overdrive, I just cannot find anyone to be with. Sydney invited me to hang out on campus. Thursday night is their drinking night. Not my idea of fun, but I miss having friends, having confidants, so I am going to go.

There is a baseball player in my Physics Lab. He's tall and young (so young!) and built. He wears soft clothes like sweat pants and soft tee shirts. I'm tall, but he is taller than me and I just want to fall into his arms, they way I would fall into an oversized, comfortable arm chair and have him hold me. I want to fell his body through those clothes.

Today, the sexual innuendos were carrying over from lunch, and my tall T was flirting too. I like to touch him, and I not a touchy feely person. I asked him if he wanted to hang out with us tonight, and he invited us to a party he's having at his place. I feel like there is this unwritten understanding that we're going to get together tonight. He'll be back from practice in 2 hours.

I am wearing make-up for the first time in a while. I can feel it on my face and I wonder if I look like a 5 year old that has put on too much of her mother's make-up. I want to relax. Too bad alcohol doesn't work for me.

So I am nervous. Getting along with girls can be harder than getting along with the guys. I can't impress them with my breasts. I have an hour and a half until T comes back from practice, so in the meantime, I'm hoping to relax. We'll see how it goes!