autobio: 2011

2011: The Worst

That fateful year of 2011 I could call was my first “trial” in life. It wasn’t until 2011 that I started to become who I am today. As Kehlani said in her intro on You Should Be Here, “…God gives his toughest battles to his strongest soldiers.” I wouldn’t have expected what happened to me could happen to someone like me. You always read about it in some serious crimes, hear about it on the news, and speak on the topic in elementary school by the topic of “Good Touch, Bad Touch”. But yeah, it happened to someone like me. It happened to a young black boy. So yes, here I am owning it publicly in this autobiography. I am a victim of sexual assault.

Like I spoke on in the last chapter, the summer of 2010 was the first summer I spent with my dad. I really felt it was going to be an annual event, but after this chapter, you will understand why.

School ended the last Friday of May, meaning I was going with my day the next day. His birthday is June 12^th, so he was turning twenty-nine in about two to three weeks. This year he moved out of my grandparents’ basement and moved into a house my uncle previously stayed in with my cousins. This time though it was just us two. However, that didn’t last long because I called Devan this summer and persuaded him to come stay with me for the summer again.

We didn’t have cable there so we were just watching old hood DVDs and eating fried chicken and white bread every night. No, we weren’t eating that every night because we were poor, we were just hungry and that kept us full for the night. At the beginning of June, TJ came back for the summer from Virginia and all the cousins/siblings (TJ, Montasia, Moochie, Devan, and I) were all back together. It was a Tuesday and just like the previous year, Skate Country had $2 Tuesdays and we all went skating that night, having fun and bonding as a family like we should as first cousins. Just like last year though, soon enough, Devan kept threatening to leave because we were annoying him and although I was ten years old, I was a bold, blunt child. So, I said “Okay leave then, no one is begging you to stay.” And homeboy left.

Before he left, my dad’s birthday came around and I don’t really remember what we did for his twenty-ninth birthday. I believe we went to a restaurant with EB and my little sister, Ontarriah. Everything was going so well!

Monday, June 27, 2011.

My dad had a couple friends over, maybe like four to five. One of his friend’s son, DJ, came by too. DJ and I were cool because we knew each other from the previous summer, so we were just cool because of our parents. By this time, I just finished fourth grade and DJ just finished sixth, therefore the difference in age was iffy to start with. As all of my dad’s friends were playing pool…Nah, that’s too much. If you haven’t noticed, it’s still hard to completely talk about in full because it’s so vulgar and so personal to me. Let’s just end that it was the first time.

Tuesday, June 28, 2011.

Now, I went to sleep early. The next morning around seven o’ clock, my dad woke me up saying he was going to class at Gadsden State. Then, I saw DJ laying on the opposite couch and the first thing I think of is, “What is he doing here?” Seeing him after the previous night made me highly uncomfortable. But I responded to my dad and he left.

Throughout the day, I tried to keep my distance from him. As a kid, you see male-female relationships but with the vibes I was getting as a ten-year-old, that wasn’t the case for him and I was apparently caught in the crosshairs. I really didn’t know what to do at that point. I didn’t like what was going on and I was having no peace in that house my father called home. I wrote a letter to him stating what DJ did to me and how I wanted to go home, then I hid it under the sofa. Ultimately DJ found it and chased me around with a “super-sized” knife my dad had under the sofa as well. At this point, I was truly fearing for my life. He is literally chasing me around the house, asking me why was I going to tell. Third time where I felt I was going to lose my life.

After some time, I got him to put the knife down and had to lie that I was just putting my thoughts down on paper. I know he knew I was faking the funk, but I had to say whatever to just get through the day. That’s when he sexually assaulted me for the second time, and even tried to force me to suck his dick. By the gracious hand of God, I talked myself out of that one too. Luckily, at roughly 9:00 pm, my dad came back home and took him back home. For the few minutes I was left alone, I wrote another letter almost identical to the first one and I didn’t know how much that letter would save my life.

Wednesday, June 29, 2011.

That next morning, I woke up way earlier than I usually did: 5:30 am. I was watching one of my dad’s hood movies and numerous thoughts were running through my mind. A lightbulb popped off in my head at that point: I need to tell someone. One thing about me is that ever since I can remember, I never wanted to make a stereotype true for be a statistic. During our class-wide counseling sessions at school for “Good Touch, Bad Touch,” reports stated that only one-fifth of kids who are sexually assaulted tells someone. Because of that, I snuck into my dad’s room, called my mom, and told her everything. Throughout my tears and her surprise that something like that could happen, she instructed me to pack my clothes because I was leaving that day.

After we hung up and I put the phone back, I got my suitcase and packed up all my clothes and just waited for my mom to pull up outside. Then, my dad jumps up and looks at me with a face of “what the f**k?” And then I catch what’s going on: he’s on the phone with Marquita.

To this day, Ontarrius and I have never had a sit-down conversation about me being sexually assaulted. Hell, never did my mom and me. Looking back, I really don’t know how he felt back then. From my standpoint, he wasn’t a father. He did not protect me. His actions, such as leaving me at home all day and not wondering what I was doing on multiple occasions, led me to being sexually assaulted. If he was there like he should have been, maybe this wouldn’t have happened to me. But it did. My mom even kept me away from my dad until Christmas 2012 and wouldn’t even let me give him my new phone number. It took her some time to forgive him as well.

Back to the story however. I gave my dad the second letter. He read over it and appeared dumbfounded. He was just so naïve to the situation. He called his friend to bring DJ over because “there was something we needed to talk about.” They came over, and then my cousin Renalda pulled up with Dee. I went outside to talk to them and they said my Ma told them to come over while she was on the highway. But, my dad called me back inside and I went to finally get this situated. My dad gave his friend the letter and he read over it. Next, he gave DJ the letter. DJ then read over it and looked up at his dad. He then asked them, “DJ, what is that?” Out of fear and shame, he tried to lie about the situation but I was like “Really? Don’t.” Like really? Who would make this up?

Soon enough my mom showed up and said some explicit words to my dad as I gathered my belongings and headed to the car. As I looked out the window, I saw my dad sitting on the porch with his head on his hands as we went to the hospital for me to get checked out.

Skipping the hospital visit because I don’t want to reveal all that happened and that vulgarity, my mom took me to a surprise therapist in Anniston at that time. It didn’t really help. The only thing I remember from that visit is when we left and my mom told me not to tell anyone because it was so personal. Even to this day, I don’t think she knows how much conflict that caused inside of me.

For the first year or two after it happened, I didn’t know the full extremity of it. It was just something that my mom told me not to talk about. But as I began to do some research and delve into my thoughts, I realized in sixth grade there was a bigger problem at hand.

I was sexually assaulted.

From that moment, I became ashamed of myself. People at this time were calling me gay. Considering how I was sexually assaulted by a male, the name calling and questions made it all the worse. It felt like a personal attack against me. That's why I hate the word. Now I know it wasn’t my fault, but I became self-conscious about changing out during swim practice, people touching my butt (slapping butts were a fad at the time), and much more. Seventh grade got better, although I still wasn’t ready to talk about it. Then, in eighth grade (February 2015), I told the second person ever: Ky’zheyone J’mad Burton. You’ll realize why and the irony in a different chapter. Ky’zheyone really had my back then.

I thank him so much from the bottom of my heart. He was the first person I told since then. He knew before my family even knew. He kept it a secret for me as I began to come out of my slump and struggles with what happened to me. As I began to come to terms with it, he was there for me along the way. So thank you KJ, you were the bomb.

For the remainder of that year, I began to tell all my closest friends. Not because I wanted their sympathy, I needed to get it off my chest and it showed my friends that I was strong and even brave enough to talk about it. They saw something in me that I did not even see in myself at the time. Thank you to those countless friends as well. Especially Chancellor Lee-Parker because even though I was scared to tell you because you were so popular. Who knew what good things would come of that? Two years in the making since then.

Once I hit tenth grade however, I hit this real low point. It started when Andre hit my butt in practice. The unforgiveness and bitterness I thought I resolved against DJ hit my soul like a truck. People started calling me gay again after three years, and I couldn’t ignore them like usual. I began to feel self-conscious about myself again. When two people"“close friends turned brothers” Michael Daniels and Tyrone Williams (you will read them again)"told me their stories, it occurred to me that this was bigger than just myself.

Over the course of sophomore year, Michael and I became super duper close despite him being a year older than me. When he told me about his tumultuous childhood and his life before adoption, he was making me tear up. Yet, when he specifically told me about when his older female cousin repeatedly raped him at a young age, man oh man…the water works were serious. Tyrone (commonly called Ty) were close through his brother Prince, and because we were on the same team when he was a senior and I was a freshman. And one day Ty was texting me, trying to comfort me as I was “sapping” about the situation. As a surprise to me, he confessed how he was inappropriately touched by a male when he was younger. Now I don’t think he ever told his family what he told me; I almost gave up details to his brother Prince one day and I had to quickly derail the situation. Ty taught me that not everyone could muster that much confidence and strength to be as open to what happened to us as I was to others. From that point on, through all the heartache, unforgiveness, bitterness, hate I endured for those six years, I let it all go. I let the tears ago, this heavy weight lifted off of me. I forgave.

I know things like this have happened to other people. People around me. People I know, and they are struggling themselves. They don’t have the strength yet.

But I ought to continue my fight, not only for myself but for them as well. I will continue to possess strength for myself and those around me. I don’t mean to act a spokesperson for I’m not; however, this incident led me to full-fledged wisdom, open-mindedness, and peace that is inexpressible. I can personally say that the results of my circumstance have helped many of my friends through their own problems, no matter the significance or weight it bears. As I did some research, April is both Sexual Assault Awareness Month and National Child Abuse Prevention Month and I cannot wait for it. It will be the first time where I fully owned what happened to me, and not own it as someone I am.

To DJ though, I hope you are living a prosperous life and should know I forgive you. More importantly, I hope you have forgiven yourself for taken innocence from me.

 

You see you wouldn't ask why the rose that grew from the concrete

Had damaged petals. On the contrary, we would all celebrate its

Tenacity. We would all love it's will to reach the sun

Well, we are the roses - this is the concrete - and these are

My damaged petals. Don't ask me why, thank God n***a, ask me how!

-- “The Rose That Grew from Concrete” (2000)

Tupac Shakur

 

I was sexually assaulted. You read it right.