I wonder if they thought anything of it

If you're sensitive to sexual abuse issues, DO NOT READ THIS.













I know it wasn't my fault.  But sometimes I still feel as if it was.

The bartender (was it more than one?  it must have been; he'd never have given up so easily) in Philly who refused to serve me - the drinking age in PA was 21 even for beer and wine then; it wouldn't be raised in MD and NY for a couple more years - was there anything more on his mind than what would happen if he got caught serving a minor?  Could he have also been trying to spare me from what would happen if my defenses were impaired by alcohol?  Or did he have no concern at all about this man of almost 40 trying to buy a beer for the 17-year-old boy with him?  It isn't as if I've ever looked mature for my age.

Today there's another sexual abuse case reported, this one allegedly by a Syracuse assistant basketball coach.  It's good that this problem is getting the attention it should.  It isn't easy, but it's good.

How about later that weekend, when we went to NYC, where I could pass for old enough to drink, at least if the observer applied the proper filter to his vision?  Of course, we were in several gay bars over the course of the weekend, so the staff and patrons there may have had an inkling of what would be going on well before I did.  Without blaming "the community," I wonder if they just thought it was okay?

Later that night, we were in for the evening and my head was swimming with the buzz he intended.  I'll never forget how he emerged from the bathroom and he stood in front of me, in our room at the Y, stroking his little penis (is that cruel?), begging me to take mine out and let him see it.  I just knew that what he was asking me to do was wrong, no matter how much he insisted it was okay.  The thing is, I didn't even consider that part of the reason it was wrong because it was him.  I just had a deep sense that what he was asking me to do was wrong, in and of itself, even though he was telling me it wasn't and I trusted him.  He pointed out what we both knew: that he was only asking me to do in front of a witness what I often did in the privacy of my own company.  Of course, he intended all along to take it much further than that.

How long did he stand there before I complied, asking me while he rubbed himself, then stopping so he wouldn't complete his pleasure before getting what he wanted, giving me illusive hope that maybe he was going to give up, then starting back up again?  Repeatedly he begged me, pleaded with me.

"Please?"

"Let me see you."

"I just want to see you."

It wasn't long before my own body betrayed me, too.

"I can see you want to."

"You'll feel so much better if you do."  The biggest lie of all.

Was it just a few minutes?  It feels like an hour.

I know it's a trap, a misunderstanding of what happened, but even today I still wonder how different my life might have been if I'd just told him no, if I'd never dropped my pants and given in to what he wanted.  I was old enough to just tell him no.

I know what he did to me over the next eighteen months wasn't my fault, even though he manipulated the both of us into thinking I was his co-conspirator.  I know it wasn't my fault.  But I still - in the sense of both "nonetheless" and "after all this time and work" - feel as if it was.

Of course, just seeing me wasn't enough. He had to make sure that he was the one to provide the incredible rush of orgasm that he was chasing after at my expense. And he couldn't be a complete ogre, a rapist - he always had to make sure that I submitted with my will.

I'd learn in subsequent incidents that it was futile to try to force my way past him. But this first time, in this strange city far from home, where the occasional gunshot resounded outside the window, there was no consideration of that possibility. There was nowhere for me to go.  So ultimately, I yielded.  Ultimately, I would yield again and again.  A lifetime of yielding.

That first night, reason and boundaries overwhelmed by alcohol mingled with my continued arousal from the pleasure of this earlier release, I crawled into his bed to experience it again.

Will I ever be able to acknowledge that without hating myself for it?

I know it wasn't my fault.

But I always feel as if it was.

34 years next weekend.  Nothing especially significant about that number.  Not nearly the worst thing that ever happened to me, either, just the worst that was ever done to me by someone besides myself.