TW // sexual assault, child abuse

Do you ever reminisce back to your childhood memories? Ones that you wish you could experience again. Memories that you block from your mind, the second they pop back up. 

Well, Ismarai had a memory that will forever be engraved in her hippocampus. She was only 6 years old when that incident happened. She cannot recall what she was feeling on that bed. Her body was acting strange, out of the ordinary. His touches felt foreing to Ismarai. She didn’t know what he was doing to her body. Her parents only taught her stranger danger. Ismarai couldn’t find words to label it. Ismarai faced the door for help; her stubby legs took her to a place she felt most safe. Not the room where mami and papi were at. The very same room she was watching cartoons in before she went to his room. She was 6 years old when that incident happened. 

Ismarai couldn’t remember that year or the year after. Until in 5th grade, Ismarai was cornered by him again. He wanted to make a deal with Ismarai. If Ismarai let him kiss her, then she can play Minecraft on his Playstation. Oh poor Ismarai, naive and young enough to not understand what was wrong with the deal. She has thought it was ordinary because she had been brought up in the dark side of humanity. After the deal was done, Ismarai was finally left alone. 

When she began to mature, so did her body along with her mindset. Her mind decided to rewind that memory like a VHS tape.  “Why me? Why did it have to be me to fall prey to his hands? I only needed help with my homework. My clothes weren’t revealing for a little girl. I even had shorts under my skirt. How could he sexualize me when all I wanted was help with math. Yet he decided to take it, my innocence and my trust on boys.”, Ismarai mumbled under her breath. Ismarai’s body began to tremble; her hands unable to wipe her tears out of frustration. Somehow she found herself crying like the cry baby she was back then. Crying turned to sobbing. Sobbing turned into an anxiety attack. Her eyelids are barely able to stay open. Air escaping from her lungs. Her legs had failed to keep her standing. Before she could realize what happened, her mind had instantly turned blank. 

Upon waking up, she laid on an uncomfortable mattress. Bright, blinding lights being her sunrise for that morning. “Ismarai!” a voice shouted next to her ear. She looked to her right to see her dear mother, Maria. Ismarai felt her mom wrap herself on to her with clear, teary eyes. “Gracias a dios, que estas despierta mijita! Yo y tu padre, no sabíamos qué te pasó y entonces te llevamos aquí. A la sala de emergencias.”, Maria sighed in relief. She had put her hands on her chest as if her heart could finally go back to its original rhythm of heartbeat. Ismarai said nothing in return. She stayed silent with her head down.

Ismarai doesn’t see the need for a celebration. A part of her wished that she would have stayed asleep. Being asleep meant that she wouldn’t have to live with the fact that she had been sexually assaulted. Maria looked at Ismarai with a stern look at her face. “Que pasa mija? Si te sientes mal, I can call the doctor for you.” , Marai had gotten up to reach for the call button, until Ismarai shouted. “No!” Her mom looked at her with bewilderment. Her daughter had never raised her voice unless it was something serious. “Why not mija? You’ve been acting strange lately and we are trying to help you Marai. But you don’t come to us for help when you need it.”,  Maria said with a broken voice. 

“I need to tell you guys something.”, Ismarai said while playing with the dead skin on her fingernails. Maria without hesitation had pulled up her phone to dial Ismarai’s father to come back to the emergency room. “Gustavo! Ismarai is awake now and she wants to discuss an important matter with us.” You could hear how much the other end of the line cared, considering you could hear a man shouting to the person on the phone and a car engine starting. “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”, Gustavo had said before hanging up. Maria and Ismarai waited in silence. The air had thickened over time, only to be broken by Gustavo slamming the door upon entering. He hurried his way to pull Ismarai into a suffocating hug. Ismarai laid her head on her dad’s shoulder. Tears began to roll down her face and onto her dad’s shirt. They both stayed in each other's arms until Ismarai felt ready.

When Ismarai pulled away from the hug, the sentence she was waiting to say for years, had finally came out. “ — sexually assaulted me when I was younger”. Both of her parents took a minute to process what she had told them due to shock. “That son of a b*tch!” Gustavo had stormed out of the room. His heavy stomps echoing the hallway. “Mi amor, espera!” Maria hollered to Gustavo to come back but there was no stopping his tracks. Maria sat next to Ismarai, hugging her with all the energy she had. “We will be on your side mija. We are going to fight for the justice you need. What happened to you, wasn’t your fault. That motherf*cker shouldn’t had put his hands on you in the first place!”, Maria weeped. “I love you, mami.”,Ismarai breathed, soon following her mother’s weeping.

In the end, all Maria and Gustavo could do was cut off that side of their family. Gustavo made sure to make that person regret ever living again; making him feel the same pain his daughter felt throughout the years. Ismarai posted her survivor story on Facebook to let the world and her family know, the true nature of that person. Ismarai still remembers every single detail but she chooses to follow the path where she recovers and heals. For she cannot change her past, but choose how to live her future.