Rachel's Story

When I first came to Rutgers, I hung out with an older guy friend of mine. Id known him for a while but hed been at Rutgers while I was still in high school so we hadnt seen each other much. When we finally saw each other, he kept pushing himself on me, saying things like, Youre cute and Youre so pretty. He kissed me once but I pushed him away and told him that I loved my boyfriend. I was kind of weirded out because he was my friend. All of my friends are guys and some of them have thought I was cute before. I thought it was just like that-I could say thanks for the compliment and move on. I thought that that was all that needed to be done, but I still had a weird feeling about this guy. A couple of weeks later he called & wanted to come over. I told him that I was busy, but he asked me to call him again at 11 p.m. I didnt call, but at 11 oclock exactly the phone rang and it was him. He said he would come over at one and I said sure because I didnt think he really would. At 1 oclock the phone rang again; he was calling from the phone outside my dorm. I let him in but explained that I had a lot of homework that I still had to do. He asked me to let him watch a movie in my room and promised he wouldnt bother me. I let him in, then sat at my computer and started working on my essay for Expos. He started talking to me but I tried to ignore him. Then he started kissing me on the neck. Stop, it tickles, I told him. Dont you like it? he asked. I said no and he finally stopped.

After a minute, he took my arm and pulled me on to the bed. I tried to get up, but he pushed me down and then he was on top of me, kissing me and biting me. I told him to stop but he said, You dont want me to stop. This is fun. He kept trying to take off my clothes but I was resisting him so he tried to put his head up inside of my sweatshirt. When that didnt work, he took off as many of my clothes as he could. He took off his shirt and put it over my face while he was on top of me. I cant breathe! I told him, but he said, I dont care if you live or die. This went on for two hours; he was kissing and touching me and doing all kinds of things. It was horrible. Even after he let me put my clothes on, he was still doing little things. I kept telling him that he had to leave, and finally he did. On the way out, he kissed me and said, Ill give you a call, maybe we can hang out again.

Everyone asks me why I didnt scream. In that situation, I was so scared that I couldnt think about screaming, I was just trying to say no loud enough for him to hear me. I wanted to be rescued, but I was scared that hed hurt me more if he was caught in the act.

I went to bed after he left and thought about what had happened all the next day. I told one of my friends some of it, and she said that it wasnt a big deal, but it felt like a big deal to me. I was scared to tell my boyfriend because I was afraid of how he would react. He kept asking me what was wrong, and finally it all came out. He was very angry and he wanted me to tell the police, but I wasnt ready yet. He called them for me, which made me mad. The police questioned me, but at first they couldnt find the guy. When they did, he denied everything and tried to make it look like I came on to him, asking and begging for what happened. I guess I knew that he would say that, but I was hoping he wouldnt.

The first week it hadnt hit me at all. I knew what had happened and that it was bad because people kept telling me that, but I was in deep denial. I was okay for a while and I think my boyfriend thought I would stay like that, but then I became a mess. I was crying all the time and I was attached to him; I always wanted to sleep over because I felt safer there. I would just assume that all guys had done bad things; when we passed guys on the street, I would think that one was looking at me strangely and thinking of sexually assaulting me.

This experience also changed my feelings about being intimate. My boyfriend could kiss me on the cheek, but no tongue. When we were hooking up I would get really scared and realize that I couldnt do this. Sometimes I still get scared, but I try to remember that this is my boyfriend and hes not going to hurt me. Its not just about sex, either; I didnt like people to touch me at all. After the assault happened, my mom wanted to hold me and hug me to make me feel better, but I couldnt do that.

The police had me call the guy and try to get an admission of guilt because the case was basically his word against mine otherwise. I asked him, Didnt you hear me say no? and he answered, I have bad hearing. You might have said no. That wasnt good enough, though, so Im still waiting to see whether the prosecutor will take my case. I want to go to court because it makes me so angry that he took advantage of me; he had no right to do that. Maybe hell do the same thing to someone else, or maybe he already has and she didnt have the guts to stop him, but even if Im the only person he needs to realize that what he did was wrong.

Last Modified 12/22/2005