Two

As we entered the emergency room, I could smell alcoholic based cleaning fluid and sterile, latex gloves. We made our way over to the counter. I was dragging my feet. When the woman at the reception desk asked me what was wrong I broke down. I couldn’t answer. Ami stepped in and whispered to the woman that I had been “sexually assaulted.” Paleness took the healthy glow from the woman’s face.

“Have the police been notified?”

“She is not interested in that.”

 The woman nodded in acceptance before going to get a nurse who escorted both Ami and me to an isolated room in the back. I was told to take a seat on the gurney and not to drink anything or even use the restroom that she would be right back with some paperwork for me.

I was quivering as I sat on the pristinely white sheeted gurney. I had no idea what to expect. Ami sat in a plastic, maroon chair over in the corner and looked at the cold, disinfected, tile floor. The sounds of beeping machines and ticking clock flooded my ears. The nurse knocked on the door and both Ami and I jumped. She handed me a clipboard with some paperwork on it that asked for the basics: name, date of birth, reason for being here, consent to treat, and so on and so forth. I filled it all out the best I could, my mind was lost in another galaxy. Besides, how was I supposed to know what year my father was born in and the phone number to my mother’s work? Once I finished, the nurse took the clipboard and exited the room once again.

            I looked over at Ami and wiped away some stagnant tears with the backside of my wrist, but she said nothing. The nurse came back in holding a white hospital band which she fastened to my left wrist. Then finally introduced herself to me as Katie.

She pulled up a round wheeled chair beside the gurney and took a seat, “I’m what’s known as a SANE nurse, a sexual assault nurse examiner and I’ll be caring for you,” she said as though it was practiced over and over in the mirror 10,000 times.

She told me that she was going to perform what was called an Evidence Collection Kit. It was to collect any DNA left by the suspect in case I wanted to press charges later on. I continued to tremble and shake so much it rocked the gurney and caused a tiny squeaking sound. I didn’t have any plans to press charges on John, so why do they need to collect DNA? Once I asked she responded as if the it was programmed into her, “It’s to be on the safe side, just in case you decide you want to once things have calmed down.”

            Ami stayed in the corner and twiddled her thumbs in a fast and swift manner. The nurse excused herself to go get the kit.
            When Katie returned, she asked me, “Would you like your friend to stay?”

            I looked up to Ami and she nodded yes.

“I’m going to have to ask you some questions, all right?

First, she asked me when my last menstrual period was: two weeks ago. If I had any known allergies: nope. Oh, and if I had engaged any sexual intercourse recently, not counting the assault: no. I answered all of it the best I could.

“Great can you tell me in detail, what happened to you today?”

            I inhaled deeply and then exhaled it slowly through puckered lips as my eyes closed. I told her everything. I started with the part about being home alone and John knocking on the door. I even told her what him and I talked about and how it seemed as though he was just flirting with me, but things changed and I didn’t know what to do. I said to her how he got himself, as well as me naked against my will then proceeded to put himself inside of me as I cried. She wrote it all down, every detail. She didn’t even seem disturbed or even the least bit fazed by what I told her. I, on the other hand was breathing heavily. I wanted to leave, not go home, but just get out of here, hospitals have always gave me the heebie-jeebies. That wasn’t going to happen though; Ami and Katie both insisted that I stay to make sure I was all right. I had no choice but to comply, besides I knew they were right.   

My clothes were then taken as evidence and samples were taken from various places on my body: mouth, hair, underneath my fingernails, etc. She even drew some blood to rule out the chance of drug or alcohol. She used a small pediatric butterfly needle with two teal wings on either side crawled beneath my skin. She said I was an easy poke, but why would I care about that? The blood ran through a clear line of tubing and splashed into a receiving tube with a purple cap.

            “Next part of the exam is a vaginal one and it is the most important,” Katie said.

I was so nervous that I felt as though I needed to vomit from fear. I had never even been to a gynecologist and had no idea what to expect this exam to be like. She asked me to scoot my bottom closer to the bottom edge of the gurney where then I she told me to spread apart my legs and place my heels into two stirrups that were on each side of the end of the gurney.
            “I’m going to take some cotton swabs and swab your inner thighs and between your labia.”         

She took the cotton swabs and with a swift and gentle motion, she took the samples. Next, she held up something that looked like a clear duckbill with a tube-like flashlight attached to it.
            “Now I’m going to slide a speculum into your vagina. You will feel a bit of pressure, but try to stay as still as possible.”

I grabbed hold of Ami’s hand and squeezed so tight that Ami let out a whelp of pain. It wasn’t just the discomfort from the pressure that I was feeling, but also how invaded I felt, too.

            “There we go, Daniella. How are you doing?”

            I managed to get out a tiny “ok” as she clicked opened the speculum stretching open my girl parts. I just looked up to the white plaster ceiling tiles feeling helpless and exposed as I waited for it to be over. After about five minutes of both swabbing and slowly removing the speculum from my body, I was told to relax. Katie left with the evidence that she had taken from various parts of my body and closed the door behind her.

Ami tried to smile at me; it took away some of the emotional discomfort, but not all of it. Then Katie came back in and said she had a few things to go over with me before I could leave. The first thing she brought up was Emergency Contraception, Plan B. She said that since I was not on birth control pill, that there was no condom or other form of prevention used, taking it would be in my favor.

Still, I was concerned, “What if he had HIV, AIDS, or some other STD’s?” Who knew what John could have had, God knows who he’s been with or who else he had done this to in the past. As always, she had a preprogrammed answer, “Well, I’m going to give you an antibiotic which will decrease the chance of you contracting a sexually transmitted infection.”

“What about AIDS?” Ami asked

“Unfortunately, she’ll have to be tested for that in three months; there is no preventive method for the HIV virus.” I know Ami asked this to be safe, but I wish she didn’t; I was scared shitless now.

The nurse handed me a prescription for penicillin, some baby-blue hospital pants, and a shirt. After I was dressed, I was handed some pamphlets with hotline numbers on them and some recovery information. I was then told that it was all right for me to leave. I slid myself off the gurney and onto the cold tiled floor. My legs shook underneath the weight of my anxiety stricken body as Ami and I made it back to the car.

She pressed a button on her keychain and popped open the trunk then sorted through her soccer bag to find me something to wear. She pulled out a pair of sweatpants that said “GO TEAM” and an old, ratty tank top and handed them to me,

            “I’m sorry; this is the best I have.”

            “That fine, Ami. You’ve done enough.”

 I got in the car slid off the blue scrubs and on the gray sweatpants. I could feel the material had been worn and washed several times to the point of it pilling up. I put on the tank top that smelt like an old gym sock.

            “Are you sure you’re going to be all right?”

            “I think so.” I lied.

            She grabbed my hand and gave it a firm squeeze before starting the car.

            We drove down the road, there was little traffic even with it being rush hour, and we arrived at my house quicker than it took to get to the hospital.

            “Are you sure you want to be at home? How about you stay at my place tonight instead?”

            “I have to tell my parents, but thanks,” I said before I closed the car door and walked to the front door of my house. What was I going to tell them? I knew my mother was going to be furious when I told her I let some boy into the house when both her and my father were out.

            I slowly turned the knob and opened the door. I had been out for nearly six hours and missed dinner. Am I ready for this? No! I had only taken two steps into the kitchen then BAM,

“Daniella Rose, where have you been? You missed supper,” my mom shouted.

            “I was out with Ami.”

            “You went out wearing that? You look like a damn slob!” My mother always had a nit to pick with me; and I mean always.

I took in a deep breath in and let out a rather large sigh, “Mom?” I can do this, I can tell her. I can do it.

            “Don’t give me that tone! Where the hell have you been?”

            I looked at her, then down at my feet and back up at her.

            “I was at the hospital, I was raped.”

            She was silent for a moment but then her jaw unhinged and opened wide enough to eat me whole. I was praying for a hug or some reassurance, but she just looked at me with her deep brown, almost black eyes, they looked emotionless.

            “How the hell did you get yourself in that position. What the hell were you doing?”

            “It wasn’t my fault,” I said, “There was a knock on it door and I answered it. Turns out John, a boy who I used to go to school with me was there. So, I asked him if he wanted to come in for a little while.”

            “Daniella Rose Lawson! You let a boy into the house while your parents were out! You’re f*****g kidding me, right?”

            “It is not what you think, it’s not my fault!”

            “Not your fault? You broke the rules and disobeyed me!”

            “I made a mistake!”

            “You’re damn right you made a mistake and I hope you learned from it!” She stormed out of the kitchen without saying another word. I went upstairs to the bathroom and turned on the shower. I stripped out of Ami’s clothes and stepped into the shower. The water was hot, but not hot enough to scorch off the nastiness I felt all over my body. I started to lather up and wash; hoping, just hoping, that some of the filth would come off. I scrubbed and scoured until my skin was raw, but I still felt so dirty. Was this really my fault? Did I really deserve this for not obeying my mother? No, I didn’t.

           

            I hated being alone, not to mention it was summer time but, unfortunately, Ami had to babysit her little cousins while her Aunt June was on a business trip. That left me at home alone, well, until my mother got home. Then that’s when all Hell would break loose.

Even after many days had gone by since my assault and my “disobeying” of the rules, my mother still couldn’t look at me. She would try to avoid contact with me the best she could, but living in the same house made it difficult. I mean really, we had to try to be at least semi civil to one another, well at least I thought that’s how it should. Nope, every time her, my father and I sat around the dinner table, she would ask me, knowing that my father would not say anything or interfere she would start up. I was asked what lesson I had learned, honestly, I didn’t learn a lesson; I didn’t feel like there was one to learn from this but, I lied, “I learned that I should have never let a boy into the house when you’re not home.”

“Exactly!” she huffed under her breath before snatching the plates off the dinner table and storming into the kitchen.

Everything else also began to fall downhill too. I started suffering from horrific flashbacks. They would happen pretty often, and I could see everything. It was like reliving the assault months after. During them I was unable to distinguish between the past and the present, it was all just one blur. I could see him, feel him inside me, and feel, as well as smell his putrid breath hitting my neck as he grunted. It was something I just couldn’t shake off once it started, like a video stuck on play. I couldn’t stop it and it would rewind itself as it pleased and play over again and again. It was pure torture.

 I would also have nightmares twice or more a week. I would wake up in a cold sweat and feel the need to shower off the nastiness that covered my body. I would scrub and scrub just as I did the night of the assault. My skin was constantly pink and it would burn from all the rubbing I would do.

Crying was a weekly, almost daily thing for me for the first few months. My emotions were going haywire and causing me to be happy one minute and then depressed and crying the next for no reason. At least not one I knew of.

            I would call Ami when things got so bad and I couldn’t stop crying. She always knew what to say. Sometimes a reassuring “I’m here for you” or “it going to take time.” That was usually all I needed, just she couldn’t completely take the heartache I was suffering from away.

If it wasn’t for her, I don’t know what I would have done. Even suicide crossed my mind a few times. I had those urges just to end it all. I even had the plan and everything all drawn out in my head; it was my little blue print or recovery method. I would attempt it with my mother’s sleeping pills; I knew she kept them in the downstairs bathroom. I would down the bottle, all of them, then just go back to my room, and wait. Eventually, the pills would lower my blood pressure and I would fall asleep. Then it would get my blood pressure so low I would slip into a coma or, better yet, die. I would have done whatever I could, I just wanted to make it all go away, but I was stronger than that, I wasn’t a wimp and was not going to take any p***y way out.

Rumors began to spread through the halls. Even though John didn’t go to the school anymore, he had friends who did, and from what I heard he told them was that he “got lucky” with me over the Summer. It basically turned school into a rollercoaster ride through hell. Some days went great and no one would be talking about triggering things like hospital or something stupid, but other days rape jokes were the entertainment of the lunchroom. I didn’t want people to know the real deal so it was not like I could react to what they were saying. I didn’t dare to speak the truth. I was too fearful that no one would believe me, or even worse, I would blamed. I was already called “s**t,” and “w***e.” If that wasn’t enough I was called to the guidance office to talk to me about sexual safety and teen pregnancy countless time. Therefore, I just let the stories wander around Allegan High School as I told myself every day to stay strong. For God’s sake, it was November of my senior year; I could handle six months of people’s s**t and stupid rumors. As long as I had Ami by my side supporting me I’d make it through my rollercoaster ride of recovery.  

Of course, there were times when Ami wasn’t at school  or she was doing her own thing and I had to fight for myself, or at least put up with everyone’s s**t on my own. Still, I made it through everything. From the college application processes to getting all the acceptance letters and deciding where to go, all the way to filling out the FASFA form for the school of my choice, Michigan State University. My dreams were coming true and my flashbacks of the assault and emotional seesaw stopped rocking. It looked as though my life had fallen back into place again and that I was finally all right.