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Innocence
My innocence was taken at the age of twelve. I still have nightmares about that night. I can smell his breath, mint and cherries; I see his face, leaning in, his eyes searching for some glimmer that I might want this as much as him; I hear his ragged voice telling me “shh…it’s all going to be ok…only a few minutes…that’s all I’m asking for.” My heart is racing. I know exactly what is happening yet I cannot stop him. He’s bigger, stronger, more desperate then I had ever been. He tells me he will be gentle if I don’t cry out. Even if I had something to say, my dry mouth would not permit me uttering a single word. It was dark and I couldn’t quite make out his face, but those eyes…something familier. He slipped his hands underneath my shirt. I cringed away but he held my arms fast and steady. He undid my clasp. Everything was slipping away under his touch. I was sweating, but I grew cold as the seconds passed. The cold air chilled me to the bone. He threw off my shoes and socks. Nothing seemed to stop his hurried, determined persistence. I stiffened as he dropped each garment into a pile of my clothing next to us. He stroked my cheek in what he must have thought was a soothing manner, tipped my head back and began to kiss my neck.
He left me lying there. He did not bother to re-cloth me, not that it really mattered. I had gone numb to the cold ground, numb to the entirety of my surroundings. My body felt as if it no longer belonged to me. I looked at my fingers. They moved. Was I doing that or was it of their own accord? No matter. Me, or what was left of me, dragged its aching limbs up into a standing position. The clothes next to me were soiled. I was no longer the girl who had worn them minutes before. I looked around once more, remembering the pain, the anger, the sorrow this place had just inflicted upon me.
I walked back to my brother’s car. He must be off with some of his friends. Thankfully, his keys were left in the ignition. It was unlike him to be quite so careless. I stood there staring at the car. Was I worthy of trying to step back into my old place of being? A large bolt of lightning made the decision for me and I slowly made my way into the passenger seat. There was a blanket in the back seat and I swaddled my aching body into its soft folds. Sleep over came me and the next thing I remember was Jonah throwing open his car door with a burst of laughter from his friends. He glanced at me in the backseat nervously, probably thinking I was still asleep. He said his goodbyes, which usually consisted of a lot of back smacking, knuckle punches, and finally inched his way into the driver ’s seat.
As his car pulled away from the curb, I sat up and looked at him. In the rear - view mirror, all I could make out were his eyes.
“Jonah. I know it was you.”
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This article has 43 comments.
Wow. Very intense article. You have a lovely, very thoughtful writing style. Construction-wise, there were a few grammatical issues, the first being the beginning sentence that talks about his breath, his eyes, and his voice. It's one long run on sentence; I only recommend you separate the three subjects. Directly after that, you change from past-tense to present-tense and then back again. Watch out for those discrepancies, they're very easy mistakes to make ( it happens to me all the time).
Content-wise, I can't decide if the speaker has too much emotion, or isn't emotional enough. If you want it to feel like she's completely numb, go even farther with it. Make it so she's completely separated with the outside world, you know? If you feel she should be having an emotional break down, make her hysterical! When things very traumatic happen, people don't often have a happy medium.
My last question to you is: why does she get in the car with her brother and confront him? Shouldn't she be terrified?
Overall, I really did like this article though, and applaud you for tackling a subject so intense and relevant to today's society.
My face was literally ":O" in the end. This is amazing! I really can not describe how blown away I was, the writing is so insightful and not impersonal at all, just as if I was their witnessing everything but not having the power to stop it. Incredible! Loved it!
*favourite*
simon cowel feedback--you asked for it!
This was absolutely incredible. I was blown away--I mean like triple rocket/grenade launcher-atomic bombed into the stone age blown to pieces by the first few paragraphs.
Then the rest of it took the pieces that I had been blown to, and then put them back together again so that I could be blown to pieces again.
I don't even know if the language is good or bad or whatever. Frankly I can't get over the shock of the story--how the whole thing was so revolting (which I assume was the desired effect) and so shocking. So well written!
When I started reading this I was like oh **** someone's getting raped! Then I thought about how disgusting that is--it's a perversion of something that should be done with consent or not at all.
Then when the chick is walking to her brother's car, I thought about how mad I would be if someone did that to my little sister--I would go Samuel L. Jackson in A Time to Kill on that SOB.
Then I saw how the narrator viewed her brother and it reminded me of how my sister views me, being a goofy football player. It kind of made me laugh... until the end, when I realized that her brother was the one who did that horrible stuff, and I nearly threw up--literally.
So I guess I'm going to have to favorite this story because it's so good--even though the emotions that it spurred in me weren't happy emotions the degree of power at which the emotions that were spurred was absolutely incredible.
Please get this published somewhere--like a magazine that pays you or something. I truly think it's that good--and I'm sorry if you found my feedback laudatory but I really really did think this story was that good.
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Favorite Quote:
It's not what you look at that matters, it's what you see. -David Henry Thoreau