Touch, what a lovely thing, such a
delicate word that kept us so close.
You used to be so close to me back then, a simple
shoulder that leaned against mine,
but all of that changed so
suddenly.

It was dark, cold, a chill that
went down my back so fast that I
could hardly breathe. “Kiss.” You said it
so harshly but so softly at the same time, a moment
that I didn’t understand yet, perhaps blocked by
my naive notion of true love.

It starts with a hand at the back of your head.
Simple as that, almost simpler than the word
“touch” itself, and you know what’s happening, but
you do nothing, you lie still, you do as you’re told.
You go through the motions, silently, except for his
ragged heavy breathing and the screaming in your head.

The pain collides with you, a gentle sweeping motion
that slowly takes you away from everything you
ever thought you were, a slow understanding of what violation is,
and you’re screaming and crying, but it seems so silent,
so slow, as if that’s all it is. Just one moment, when your eyes
locked. A first kiss filled with young passion leads to a
ill intending hand being placed on the back of the head. You’re breathing
in the scent of his pillow and you wish to see, but you know
you couldn’t stand the sight.

You go home that night, each footstep sounding
ten times louder than they ever have. Save the date,
you mutter to yourself, as if you could even begin to
understand the damage that’s been done. You strip off
the clothes you could never force yourself to wear again,
you breathe slowly, you sit in the shower
and turn the handle until it pours out the
hottest water you could stand.
Watching the steam twirling around you
with its subtle grace,
a kind of beauty you wish you had. You don’t ask why,
not at first. You just let the burning water lick your back,
as if his touch could ever be washed away.

There is no understanding, and no need to. Just
a desperate demand for escape, no matter what, an animalistic need
to run from danger. A chill enters your bones in the midst
of a hot shower, a chill that never leaves. The definition of
sexual assault whispers its way into your ears, but only for a
moment, before the water washes it away.