I was sixteen years old in a club in Madrid. I was wearing my little black dress, towering heels, and was already several drinks in. I was standing at the bar when he caught my eye. He was tall, blond, with piercing blue eyes. He was way out of my league.
“That guy looks like a Calvin Klein model”, my friend whispered in my ear. I gigged and looked down at my feet.
A minute later, the man was standing next to me. He asked if he could buy me drink and I stammered a flattered “yes, of course”
His name was Neils. He bought me a Redbull-vodka. He told me about his home in Rotterdam and how his hockey team was training in Madrid. He bought me another Redbull-Vodka. He laughed at my stories and charmed me until there were practically little red hearts exploding out of my eyes. I was fucked up and I was hooked.
Neils asked me to come back to his place. The whole hockey team was there, he said. My friend tried to dissuade me, but I was drunk beyond reason. He was supporting me now, holding my weight off my weak ankles and wobbly knees. My friend followed us, but when we arrived at the apartment I was herded into one bedroom and she into another. I lost her.
The night becomes spotty here, either from alcohol or selective memory, maybe both. I was on my back on a bed. I was naked. The room was swimming around me. Four maybe five men stood over me. Neils wasn’t there. They were dressed, looking at my body, snickering, talking to each other in Dutch. I was unsure how to feel. Maybe this was cool? Maybe this was scary? I was too drunk to tell. They closed in on me. They played with my breasts, kissed me and bit me. They stuck their fingers in my mouth and made me suck on them. They poured beer into my mouth until I gagged and shoved the can away. They fingered me, laughed when I feebly tried to get them to stop, and then fingered me harder. I was losing consciousness.
Neils suddenly appeared, and the other guys left. He pulled a blanket over me then turned to leave the room. “Are you going to kiss me?” I whispered. “No.” He shut the door behind him.
In the morning I found my friend and we scurried back to our hotel, still wearing our tiny dresses and our teetering heels. Blood dripped into my underwear as I ran.
My friends laughed at my story as just another drunken night, and for a while I thought it was just that. Two years passed before I understood that what happened that night was wrong and before I acknowledged how deeply it wounded me.
Four years later, I have incredible guy friends and have had a few fulfilling relationships. When I find myself thinking about those snickering guys and their eager eyes, I make myself think instead of the men who have treated me well. I think of my friend who walks me home at night when it’s late or I’m drunk. I think of my ex-boyfriend who listened to this story and told me he’d always protect me. I think of the guy who smiled and said “ok, that’s totally chill” when I said I didn’t want to go any further. I think of my friend who hugs me tight when I’m sad, tells me I’m beautiful, and that I deserve more.
I do not want to live in a world defined by what happened to me. It does happen here, but so do friendship, love, and compassion, and that is what I try to think about each night when the nightmares creep in.