The Last Day I Think of You

I was 10 years old, legs buried under sand shaped into a mermaid tail. Instead of thinking myself a magical, mythical creature, I thought I must look so huge. To my horror, my dad was already running back to our beach shelter to grab the camera to permanently capture my monstrous figure. I wiggled my legs until they broke through the packed sand grains, and when I saw my father standing there with the camera, out of breath, disappointed, I was filled with regret. And I regret how long my self-loathing survived, following me like a shadow, and how vulnerable it made me.

Vulnerability made me the perfect prey for a predator. Pity for me that I met you in first grade, defenses down, all innocent, not realizing you were the predator, disguised as a friend. You hid my toys from me in elementary school, asking if there’d be a reward if they were found, and then they’d magically turn up. You threatened to flush my things down the toilet if I sat with your second grade arch nemesis. Then in middle school, you’d tell me to wear my hair a certain way and bring me clothes, jewelry, and makeup to put on in the bathroom. I remember breaking down to my mother– this was when she still was a hairdresser– when she refused to braid my hair one morning, telling her what good it was that she went to beauty school and if she wouldn’t do her own daughter’s hair. I was so terrified of your wrath, of what would happen if I wasn’t good enough. 

And then in eighth grade, when you began ditching our friend group to be with more popular kids, only to beg for forgiveness later. That was the first time I realized you could wiggle your way into any friend group, into someone’s mind. You seduced my sister’s boyfriend in the same breath as you comforted her when she suspected he was cheating. Taught me how to count calories and keep a food journal, comparing our weight and how our clothes fit. Eighth grade, what an impressionable age. 

In high school, you became more ambitious. Still wiggling your way into the popular kids. Seducing more friends, more crushes. But now you’re turning people against each other. Spreading gossip and rumors. Then, I thought you were a social chameleon. Now I know you were a master manipulator. Moving people around like chess pieces to achieve whatever you wanted that week. I remember being thankful that I knew you for so many years, knowing you’d never betray me. Staying on your good side was the only way to survive. 

But you did betray me. How naive was I, to think you wouldn’t.

 Sophomore year of high school. You started the sleepover by telling our friend group– the same tight knit group from grade school, the four of us, the one you ditched every now and then for more popular people–  how you wished you could fool around with your friends. A casual friend with benefits. I see it all the time on Tumblr, you said.

I exchanged uneasy glances with my friends. Realizing we were being asked something unsaid. And then I began to put together the pieces.

 I remember when all four of us had talked about thinking we may be bisexual at cheer practice. It was hush hush in grade school– we went to a Catholic school from Kindergarten to eighth grade– and no one had ever talked about it before. But we all felt safe confiding in each other, even if we couldn’t admit it to ourselves. 

I remember when you told us you masturbated with your younger sister’s electric toothbrush.

I remember when you made us all watch porn because we didn’t know what it was. I remember ignoring your hand under the blanket, glad you kept it to yourself. Pretending I didn’t exist.

I remember seeing pictures of your camera roll of you on the scale.

I couldn’t understand it then, but I do now. You wanted control. Over your weight, friend group, popularity, peoples’ perceptions, sexuality. 

We all shot down your idea as soon as you suggested it, saying there was no way we’d be on board with that. I remember being nervous, you don’t like not getting your way. But all three of us pushed back, and you seemed to laugh it off. Like it was just a joke. 

You then pulled out your parents' vodka, pinnacle birthday cake. We all took sips. I had never drank alcohol before, but I couldn’t say no again.You disappeared upstairs with my sister to make mac n cheese, while I nervously sipped half the bottle. I didn’t find out until later that you tried to kiss my sister.

When you came back down, I was flushed, drunk. Let’s get more alcohol, you slurred your words, and I followed you in the back room of your basement. I knew what was going to happen in that room before I walked in. I think I knew all along, all those years ago when I befriended you, it would end this way. This was inevitable. 

I could barely stand so I plopped on the couch and you grabbed a bottle. Gave it to me to keep drinking, and then you gave me orders, and then I was doing things I had never thought of before. I remember feeling out of my body, once again pretending I didn’t exist. You always had the ability to make me feel like nothing. I lied to your face, doing whatever you asked, because what would happen to me if I didn’t? Eventually I excused myself after I couldn’t stand it anymore, saying I had to pee. 

I made my mom pick me up at the crack of dawn the next day. We stopped being friends a few months later, a stupid fight about another time you threw my friends and I under the bus for someone else. I told myself I was never bisexual in the first place, you confirmed it. 

Senior year of high school you told me that you were never drunk that night, only I was. I found out you began doing this to your other friends, girls and boys. I was the first victim. The first experiment to perfect your strategy. An easy target. You knew more than anyone how much I hated myself, because you were the one to teach me how to hate myself. 

Even after you were gone, you were there; in every mirror, every self-deprecating thought, every time I sipped vodka, every time I refused my body food. 

My biggest regret, though, is repressing that memory so hard for so long that my hands now shake when I talk about it. They trembled when I finally told my loved ones, my therapist, my journal. Pretending that it didn’t happen, that you didn’t happen, strengthened me, and admitting what happened made me feel vulnerable again, vulnerable as the day it happened. The first breath is painful, unnatural, after being underwater for so long.  

Junior year of college, present day. I’m learning to take the power back. and be in charge of myself for once. My hands still shake. I still cry at night. But I’m angry. Pissed how much you took from me, and I refuse to let you do that anymore, to make me feel guilty, ashamed, and insecure. Liking girls and deserving love can coexist with what you did to me. How lucky I am now to be so loved by my boyfriend, comfortable with my sexuality, and healing. 

While I will never apologize to you, I will apologize to me. I’m sorry that I put myself down before others did, restricted myself from fuel and love, told myself it was better to be worth nothing than something. I want to be a mermaid in the sand again, free from the weight of feeling buried. I want to love myself deeply. Be in all the pictures. Replace bad memories with good ones. Eat all the food, wear all the clothes, do all the things. While I’m still learning to accept my own apology, I feel comfort knowing that I put it out there for one day to accept. May that day be the last day I ever think of you.