I don't know where to begin, and I certainly don't know where to end. I struggle with defining my experience, and I struggle with not defining it. When it comes to sexuality, I have not always been dealt a fair hand. I have had to deal with far too many repercussions due to a lack of consent and a lack of respect. I was always responsible and intellectual and openly a feminist, and at my high school this meant that I was placed very low on the social ladder. I was targeted and provoked and ignored, and every time that I was excluded from a dance circle or people giggled about me I felt uglier and uglier. I came to Tufts with no sexual confidence and very little sexual knowledge. So when I met one of the most attractive young men I had ever seen, knew that he would be just like all the others and not even deign to give me the time of day. To my absolute surprise he started seeming interested and we would make out together in our beds, which was an utter novelty for me. (This is when he told me that I was a bad kisser and that he needed to teach me.) I thought that he was interested in me as a human being. I constructed stories in my head, about our future. I could finally go prove to my sister that I wasn’t horribly socially inept. This was my chance to be normal, here at Tufts. All of those little moments, like when he pretended to involve me in decision-making or used language that he knew to which I would relate, like professing his insecurity or emphasizing the fact that he didn’t drink either. One day after he “helped” me do something like close my window, I gave him the obligatory thank you, and he told me that I would pay him back later. Wink wink. So I knew that he wanted to have sex, and I knew that I was ready to have sex, but I kept putting it off with him. I thought that he wanted to be in a relationship and only until right before was I informed otherwise. Finally one day, and with a bit of dread, I decided that he shouldn't have to wait anymore. I was in pain, and every time he moved I tried to hold on for just a little bit longer. I finally said something like, a little laughingly, ʺYou can stop now.ʺ He wanted to ʺfinish.ʺ I can't remember what I said next, but to be precautious I always say that I said something like a reluctant ʺyeah.ʺ A vessel is the word that I would use to describe myself at this point. A hollow object, existing for him. But when it was finally over I had no clue, even as he threw me a towel, that he had just taken advantage of me. I had just had sex with one of the most attractive guys on campus! What a feat! But there is no ending, and this is not happy. I watched as he subsequently visited young women in the rooms on either side of mine, I heard stories about his many exploits, and I slowly began to think that he had tricked and manipulated me. Then he started sexually harassing me, making jokes about my supposed sexual preferences and shaving my legs. Almost every time that I encountered him he would try to turn any conversation towards me, and sex. Nobody else stepped in. I knew that he wanted power now. I knew that he thought that I was used. So I did what I had had to do before: I ʺhandledʺʺthe sexual harassment and I went to speak to the OEO. This January I realized that I might call what he had done rape. I slowly became angrier and angrier, about everything. The anger can be so fathomless that its origin is indiscernible. I realized that he had had almost all of the power, and that he had played with all of my insecurity and hope and fear. His laughing presence, when I experience it, and when I don't, suffocates me. I often feel trapped within pain and inaction, trapped within Tufts, trapped without a voice. For a while, almost everything at Tufts became a reminder of him. All of my negative sexual experiences began to fit together like puzzle pieces. The last night before I left for spring break, I kneeled on my bed and did not know at all how to handle my overwhelming despair. My orange scissors were sitting beside me. I looked at them. Since society was refusing to acknowledge my pain, refusing to let me address it, I could show it to everyone. Physical signs would be noticed. I looked at my scissors again. I threw them back in my bag. None of this is easy, and I do not know if I will ever be free, from any of my torment, not just that inflicted by him. It is a dismal prospect. I doubt myself every day. I want the world to feel my pain and wail with me. I want to retain my voice so that that can happen. The one thing I know now is that I will continue.