Our relationship picked up quickly. You seemed like such a sweet guy. I was in a new city, a new state. It was my first time away from the small town I grew up, and I was terrified. When I found someone to be with me, I dove in. Blinders up.

As time went on it started to become clear that our relationship teetered on that thin line between heated and dangerous. Often you’d pick me up to prevent me from leaving the room during a fight, throwing me on the bed a little too roughly. Yelling at me a little too loudly. But you never “crossed the line.” Never slapped me or left a mark. You had a hard time handling your anger, I told myself, but you’d never hurt a fly.

Eventually it ended, but as these things often go, “ending it” is easier said than done. Our post-breakup existence was filled with accusatory texts, shouting matches on sidewalks, brief heated reunions followed by cold abandonments.

You picked me up at the train station the day after Thanksgiving and I told you it was truly, finally over. I cried, you cried, and oddly, there was a peaceful feeling that settled into the leather interior of your truck. You rolled into the parking lot outside my building and turned off the car. You looked at me and something in your eyes had darkened. “One more time. Let me be with you one more time.”

I adamantly refused. Deep in my heart I knew it was a terrible idea and I needed to walk away. But you were never good at accepting the word no. Your breathing picked up and you grabbed my wrist. “Get in the back of the car. You owe me this.”

I started crying and telling you no. I told you that you were scaring me. Suddenly your eyes turned to stone, and you roughly grabbed on to both my shoulders. You practically whispered the words I’d often heard during fights when you’d hold me down t keep me from leaving: Stop trying to fight it. You know I can overpower you. Don’t make me do that.

I felt my heart in my stomach, and my stomach in my throat.. I didn’t know what to do and completely froze as you pushed me toward the back seat. You weren’t inside me very long, but the whole time tears were streaming down my face. You moaned that you loved me as you finished. As soon as it was over, I got up quickly and left you behind. That was miserable, but it was over.

I didn’t tell anyone what happened. We had been in love, you just took things too far. But I couldn’t shake that sick feeling I felt anytime I bumped into you in town or heard someone mention your name. Almost a year later, I was sitting on the beach with a friend, and told you everything. He looked at me and slowly said “You know that’s rape, right? You were raped.”

I was raped. You raped me. Sort of.