Then there was Lina whose husband had withdrawn affection. She’d alleged having a secret affair with her former high school teacher, a man who would later be named the state’s Teacher of the Year. I would order toast and coffee and read the local paper. Mostly I would land somewhere like Medora, North Dakota. “To find these stories, I drove across the country six times. To protect their identities, she gave them aliases.
From thousands of hours of interviews, she found her way to the stories of three of her subjects. She had talked to dozens of women across the United States about sex and desire. Neesha Arter recently completed her memoir Controlled and contributes to the New York Observer and New York Magazine.She was reporting, but she wasn’t sure where it was going. I had to face the darkness so it could set me free. Every choice is a step, but it's up to each of us whether we make it a step forward or a step back.
I am now 22, and it took me years of therapy to finally accept that this assault was not my fault. For the rest of high school, I chose to push away the trauma, but I woke up years later still broken.Īvoiding reality almost destroyed me. I lost my trust in everyone and lived in fear. I spent the year in solitude with these disturbing memories. I was too ashamed to tell anyone, so I began to isolate myself. My friends never knew I had been to a rape clinic or that I had spoken with detectives. I became consumed by an obsession with calories, an obsession with making myself disappear. I just wanted to be like every other teenage girl again and go back to having crushes on boys and playing volleyball with my friends. I didn't think I could muster the strength to face everyone in court. Due to a lack of evidence, it turned into a classic case of he-said-she-said. Restricting my eating became my coping mechanism throughout the yearlong legal battle that never went to trial. The only way I found it was through food. That night took away my innocence, and I unraveled with the constant flashbacks. Two salty tears began to stream down my face.Īs this legal case became part of my daily life, I was constantly reminded of the events of that New Year's.
My blood was boiling, my skin sweating all of this seemed like a fever-induced hallucination.
Staring into the boys' eyes I thought were so beautiful just a few moments before, I wanted to be somewhere far, far away. I closed my lips and bit them as hard as I could. Their hands overpowered me and I couldn't break free. I used every bit of strength I had to pull myself away, but it wasn't enough. My body felt so heavy, my muscles so weak. I really need to go," and how those words carried no value. I have a vivid memory of myself in that cold room saying, "I need to go. Looking back, I remember shuddering, but most of all I remember the paralysis, the terror, the intrusion, and the pain. That night I was sexually assaulted by two boys I trusted. I could never have imagined that my dreams would soon be shattered, my mind poisoned, and my body violated. On that New Year's Eve, on one of those chilly Houston evenings, I secretly wished for smoldering looks. I was petite and pretty then, or at least I thought I was, with long, straight black hair and dark brown eyes set against my tanned Indian skin.
On my fourteenth New Year's Eve, the only desire I knew was the desperate longing that the boy I liked might touch my hand as he walked by.