Hair, Blood, Threat

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This is what happened that night: I intended to have a quick visit, as I hadn’t seen Barry in about two weeks. After I entered his room, I realized that he was extremely drunk. I didn’t want to stay and told him I was going to go back to my cabin.

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When I went to the door to leave, he grabbed the knives on his wall and threw himself against the door. Breathing heavily, staring intensely at me, gripping the knives tightly, I could feel his power and strength enveloping me in shaky, electric shocks.

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I tried to open the window to climb out but couldn’t open it. He then issued two ‘choices’: get on his bed and take my clothes off or let him cut me with the banana knives. He seemed a bit insane at this point. 

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I imagined my hair being pulled out. I imagined my blood on the floor. I imagined the pain I would feel. I knew how easily those knives cut through the banana tree branches, thick as telephone poles. So, I got on his bed and got undressed: how bad could it be, I thought. 

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I had no idea I would need a different word to describe what happened next. I had no idea my life would be changed forever. I had no idea I would henceforth have difficulty trusting men. I had no idea I was ‘choosing’ to be raped so that I wouldn’t be cut up and/or killed. I couldn’t, really, think beyond that moment. I wasn’t sure I would actually have any more moments to even think about.