We Believe You: Survivors of Campus Sexual Assault Speak Out
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* * *
I had such a clarity once. A deep understanding of my own self. I loved that little girl, bright and strong and complicated as she was. Strange, but sure. So very sure.
She is in a coma, now, and I do not know if she will ever wake up.
I do not say that she is dead—not yet. There is enough of her, still, for me to be ashamed of the fact that she and I are not the same. Some mornings, she smiles in her sleep. Some weeks, I can’t find her.
* * *
The cocktail of flaws and features that I once possessed was one I was proud to call my own. I was proud to be who I was. Now, even when I demonstrate qualities that I value, I am not proud to see them in me. They are still not enough. There is not a moment of my life that goes by unblemished by shame.
* * *
I have become someone who no one knows. I do not even know who it is that I have become; I can only imitate the girl I was. I can only fall short.
Even my body has become alien. My generous breasts became grotesque. Permanently larger as a side effect of postrape prophylaxis, those symbols of my sensuality are now little more than a reminder. My body swelled. Ten pounds. Twenty. Twenty-five. Fifty. Fat and frustrated, fearful of my own naked body and unable to trust, I lost all outlets for my lust.
I exude false exuberance.
My own strength is an insult to me. I have grown strong because I’ve had to. I demonstrate strength because it is what other people need to see. I do not feel strong.
Tennis Was My Life
ELLY FRYBERGER
When I was little I wanted to be a pro tennis player, but I started too late. Most people start when they’re four or five or six years old, go to all the tennis academies, and spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on training. I started when I was ten, and I’m twenty now, so tennis has been part of me for half my life.
I graduated from high school at seventeen and took a year to go to the Weil Tennis Academy. Then I went to the University of Kansas my freshman year; I got recruited there for tennis.
I’d visited Kansas, and I liked it. My major was going to be architecture. Then right before school started the coach who recruited me got fired. And I was still struggling with an injury I got at Weil, so Kansas tennis didn’t work out. I started looking at other schools and ended up visiting Arkansas, where I could still study architecture and play tennis.
The Arkansas coach was super nice, said, “We’ll take it slow, get you healthy.” Talked to my parents for two hours. The facilities were really nice. I expected to play tennis there and get my degree. That was that. That was the fall after my freshman year.
Then some stuff happened. I was supposed to travel to regionals over fall break, in October. Everybody does. I texted my counselor to make sure all my tutors were canceled. She said to check with the coach to make sure I was traveling. And he said, “No, you’re not.” I said, “Why? Because of my ranking?” Which was low, because I hadn’t played any matches. And he said yeah. I found out later it wasn’t because of my ranking; it was because of my grades. So the coach lied to me. And that was weird.
That weekend I didn’t play, and the following Monday I was raped.
* * *
I had hooked up with him one time in August, and he hit me up again. He kept wanting to hang out late at night. I would say no. Finally, over fall break, he wanted to hang out, and I felt bad I had kept blowing him off, so I said, “We’re not going to hook up, but we can be friends.” He said, “Okay, I can do that.” I was in my dorm room getting ready to settle in for the night as I had early practice the next day. He came over and I was in my pajamas with wet hair. He was super drunk. But I’ve hung out with drunk people before and it had been fine.
I was watching TV and he locked the door. I didn’t know he had locked the door until afterward; that’s when I realized it was premeditated. He pulled me to him and tried to kiss me and I said, “No, we talked about this, it’s not gonna happen.” He said, “Oh, but I really like you,” and I said, “If you really like me then eventually it could happen but not tonight.”
He got more forceful. He pulled my wrists, put me on the ground. I tried so hard to hold on to my pajama pants. He got those off. Then he said, “If you do this, and this, then I will leave.” So I did, and he didn’t leave. I kept saying no, over and over. I’ve never said no more in my life. For some people, I feel like you’re lucky if you were drugged or drunk or don’t remember it. But I was upright sober, and I feel like that was the worst. I can’t get what happened out of my head. He was really drunk, so he had trouble getting hard. About thirty minutes later he finally quit.
* * *
I feel like you’re lucky if you were drugged or drunk or don’t remember it. But I was upright sober, and I feel like that was the worst. I can’t get what happened out of my head.
* * *
After he left I called a guy friend in D.C. (he also knew the perpetrator), and he said, “You need to report this.” I said, “I don’t want to go through all that stuff.”
The morning after, I texted my trainer and said I can’t practice. I told her what had happened and said I didn’t know how to tell Coach. She said, “Don’t tell Coach, come to the facility and I will take care of it.”
She said, “Hey, just meet with the Title IX people.” They suggested I go to the hospital and get a rape kit done, so I did. It took four hours. I hadn’t taken a shower but I had changed clothes. I gave them my clothes. I had some bruises on my inner thigh.
My friend from D.C. ended up flying out to Arkansas. He told my parents because I didn’t want to. I don’t know how you tell your parents something like that.
They flew out the following weekend. Eight weeks later, my dad helped me move out of the dorm. I couldn’t stand to be there.
The whole time I was in the hospital, I was on the phone talking to my friend in D.C., who said, “He’s gonna do this again if you don’t report him.” (Later we found out the perpetrator should have been off campus a long time ago.) So I went to the campus police, and from then on all my time was spent dealing with Title IX and all the paperwork I had to do to make sure I got a hearing at school and to make sure the hearing happened before the end of the semester. The police gave my case to the district attorney and I had to keep up with responding to all the things the police and the district attorney were asking me for, but, in the end, the district attorney said there wasn’t enough evidence to go to court.
Dealing with Title IX was hard; I had to hire an advocate. The Title IX people made me email my teachers, find accommodations for my work. I also had an advocate through the school and she was nice, but she also worked for the school, which was dragging its feet about literally everything. So I was concerned.
If I hadn’t had Laura, the advocate I hired, and who helped me get the accommodations I was entitled to under Title IX, I don’t think I would have gotten anything taken care of. She helped me prepare for the Title IX hearing. She was in there with me.
The hearing went really well. There was a panel of three judges, faculty and staff, two women and a man. They interviewed him first, for over two hours. They had to push my meeting back so I wouldn’t run into him.
HBO recorded my whole part of the hearing. Someone had told HBO about my case and they asked me if I would wear a wire to my hearing, for the Vice episode “Campus Cover-up,” which was about how colleges handle sexual assault cases, and I said yes, I would. I knew it was going to be fine: I usually don’t get too nervous. Tennis matches, I don’t get nervous.
I was in there for forty-five minutes. Laura helped me form a statement, which included where I’m from, why I came to Arkansas, what happened, and what I thought the ideal punishment would be. The worst the school could do was expel him.
The panel asked me some offensive questions, like “Why didn’t you have more bruising?” and “Did you feel pressured by him?” Really?
Within twenty-four hours, they found him responsible and expelled him.
When I first got the letter, I was crying because I was so happy. It was a huge relief.
He appealed the decision before winter break, apologizing for his actions and saying he just wanted to get his degree. He was supposed to graduate in December. And the hearing was in December.
The school had thirty days to respond to the appeal. They said they had to wait until winter break was over. On January 30, 2015, they responded to his appeal and I got a link to an email from student affairs. It said he had to do x amount of community service and x amount of work with a therapist, and then he could get his degree and then be expelled, on May 10, which was after graduation.
I was like, “What?” I honestly didn’t understand it. It was all legal language. I sent it to Laura, my advocate, and she sent a book-length letter to the school that asked, basically, “What are you doing?” They responded twice, defending their decision. An Arkansas news reporter heard about what happened and did a story on it. My assailant was named in the reporter’s news coverage.
* * *
He had to do x hours of community service and x amount of work with a therapist, and then he could get his degree.
* * *
The day after the story ran, I got a third email saying, “Oh, disregard the previous email. He was expelled December twelfth.” The journalist did some research and called the chancellor’s office, and the chancellor said that the first email to me from student affairs had been a mistake.
The Vice segment aired in June. Obviously I can’t tell the story without tearing up, but the HBO people were really nice. They made me feel comfortable.
One of the main reasons I hadn’t wanted to go through with reporting the rape at school was because he was an athlete. He was in the Olympics, all-American for track, a star athlete, and an asset. Just like Jameis Winston. You get special treatment on all levels when you’re an athlete. Everybody knows they get let off the hook for stuff that if normal people did, they’d get in trouble. The University of Arkansas is known for track. They’ve won over forty championships. It doesn’t look good for the school to have an athlete known for this kind of thing.
So that fall I received incompletes in two of my classes, and I had to drop my economics class because the professor wouldn’t work with me on my attendance and grade. One professor was nice and let me take a test at home and send it to her. I’d had Bs and I started getting Fs.
I went back in the spring. I thought I was gonna be okay; I had gotten an emotional support dog and an apartment off campus. But I ended up dropping all my classes except for one, history. I got an A in that. But I needed to be around family more. So once the semester was over, I moved back to Denver. Got a place here. I’m not going back to Arkansas.
I lost twenty-five pounds in three months. I was able to sleep, but I wouldn’t go to bed until almost morning. Then I would sleep during the day and still be exhausted. I still have nightmares. I’m still depressed.
I initially got a full-time job teaching tennis, but I took on way too much. I wasn’t ready. Shit got really bad. I almost committed suicide. It was everything; all of it. I called one of my friends and he came over. If it wasn’t for him …
After that I started seeing a therapist. My dog helps. I’m not ever alone-alone. Denver helps. Denver has such a good vibe to it. Being around my family and friends helps. I’ve started eating again.
How do I spend my time now? I try to sleep. I work behind the front desk at a public tennis club. It’s nice that I’ve had time to relax. I haven’t had to be busy all the time, getting a workout in or whatever. But tennis was my life. I feel like I’m missing out. What am I supposed to do?
People You May Know
KEVIN KANTOR
When my rapist showed up under the
People You May Know tab on Facebook,
it felt like the closest
to investigating a crime scene
I’ve ever been.
That is, if I don’t count
the clockwork murder that I make
of my own memory every time
I drive down Colfax Avenue.
Still, I sit in my living room
& sift for clues:
Click
He is smiling
& I see myself caught
in his teeth. He is dancing
with his shirt off in a city
I’ve never been to //
Click
He is eating
sushi over a few beers with friends
& I am under his fingernails //
Click
I know that alley //
Click
I killed the memory
of that T-shirt //
Click
This is an old photograph.
It’s a baby picture.
There is also an older man,
presumably his father.
They are both round & bright,
& still
smiling //
Click
He is shirtless again
& I catch my reflection
in the weight room mirror.
Hashtag #BeastModeSelfie //
I call him The Wolf
when I write about him,
so as to make him as storybook as possible.
The Wolf,
when I write about him,
which is to say, when my memory
escapes the murder,
or when the Internet suggests it.
Facebook informs me that we have 3 mutual friends //
which is to say, he is
People You May Know
& I am
People You May Know.
& there are people that know
& people that don’t know
& people that don’t know
that I want to know,
but I am afraid to let know,
& probably people that know
him that know
of me that know //
the word No.
No.
No.
No was a flock of sleeping sheep
sitting in my mouth.
& now I know
The Wolf’s middle name
& what he listens to on Spotify
& the all too familiar company he keeps
& he can no longer be a wolf,
or the nameless grave
I dig for myself on bad days.
We have 3 mutual friends on Facebook
& now it feels as if they are holding the shovel.
64 people liked the shirtless gym pic,
4 people told me they’d rather I said nothing,
2 police officers told me that I must
give his act a name,
or it did not happen; that, obviously,
I could have fought back //
which is to say, no one comes
running for young boys who cry rape.
When I told my brother,
he also asked me why
I did not fight back.
Adam,
I am.
Right now
& always.
Every day I write a poem titled
Tomorrow.
It is a handwritten list
of the people I know
who love me
& I make sure to put
my own name at the top.
* * *
The Punishments
A Chorus
They gave him social probation and counseling: He was not allowed at events where there was alcohol. He had to have drug and alcohol counseling and relationship counseling.
They suspended him for a year.
My senior year, I was still running into him.
The school wouldn’t tell me his sanction due to privacy laws, but “Wink-wink, nudge-nudge, he’s not here” led me to believe he’d been expelled.
I wish he had plagiarized, because then they’d have kicked him out for sure.
They said he had to do x amount of community service,
x amount of work with a therapist; then he could get his degree and then be expelled.
We graduated the same year. He got one of the highest honors the school gives.
He graduated early.
The last time I spoke with the university’s police, they told me they’d reached a conclusion, even though they never did an investigation. My rapist went unpunished.
The subcommittee recommended probation. But the board decided to just admonish him, which is doing nothing.
* * *
Betrayals
ANDREA PINO
My first semester in college was a culture shock. After finding out I was from Miami, one of my classmates asked me if I “came to America on a boat.” I was completely taken aback by this question, since I expected that everyone at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill must have worked as hard as I had to get into college and had at least learned something about Latino culture. I had never seen myself as an “outsider.” It was then that I realized the Miami Latino community was a bubble. I grew up in a low-performing school district, most of my family doesn’t speak English, and my grandparents were Cuban immigrants, blue-collar workers who came to America in search of a better life. I had never experienced the life I saw in movies, that lovely suburban life with large backyards, white fences, and a sense of safety. My house was first broken into when I was ten years old. I thought my parents were joking at first; it wasn’t until I saw glass on the floor and our belongings flung everywhere that it hit me. I ran to my bedroom, worried that they had stolen my Game Boy, wanting this nightmare to end.
At the time, I expected the police to do something. After all, if there were police costumes next to superhero costumes, police must be superheroes, too. But at seven years old, I experienced betrayal for the first time. The police didn’t help us—not then, and not the three more times our home was broken into. They didn’t do anything even when we had photos, witnesses, and fingerprints. When I was seven, the police didn’t protect me in Little Havana, and I knew that at twenty years old, the police wouldn’t protect me after my assault. After I publicly came forward as a survivor, I learned that the biggest triggers aren’t actually the nightmares of my assault but the nightmares of the betrayals that I’ve had to survive.