(no subject)
If I was broken after Matt, then after Andrew I am hardened. In my mind, men have become the frightening, inescapable predators and females are the hapless victims of some cruel natural cycle.
I think it was Fiona Apple who said that, after being raped, for years she felt like a piece of bleeding meat in a sea of sharks. I haven't been raped, and I can't begin to empathize with the emotional damage of such an experience, but I can identify with a brute fear of men. It seems to me that even the kindest of boys have a leering creature inside of them, interested only in what lies beneath my neck and between my legs. The flowers, dinner dates and sweet words that come before are part of the trick, and the breakfasts, returned phone calls and murmuring of the L-word is the charade that ensures that sex will continue.
The other night I came home with the boy who's been fawning after me for months now. We broke into the neighborhood pool, our new routine after a night of bar-hopping, and alternated between jumping into the frigid water of the pool and hurrying, giggling, to the bubbling hot tub. We got to his house and changed into PJs, dried each other's hair with towels, and hopped into bed. I wasn't afraid of him when we were playing, but suddenly beneath his covers I felt like a mouse in a trap. The conversation died immediately and his arms wrapped me up tight. My breath caught in my throat when I felt his erection pressed against my back. My muscles involuntarily shied away from his groin, as if a spider were on the inside of my shirt. I felt like I was at gunpoint. And all I could think of was a special on CNN about a woodsman who was attacked by a bear. "Play dead," he repeated, as images of his gnarled skull flashed across the screen. "If you play dead, you'll make it out alive."
I think it was Fiona Apple who said that, after being raped, for years she felt like a piece of bleeding meat in a sea of sharks. I haven't been raped, and I can't begin to empathize with the emotional damage of such an experience, but I can identify with a brute fear of men. It seems to me that even the kindest of boys have a leering creature inside of them, interested only in what lies beneath my neck and between my legs. The flowers, dinner dates and sweet words that come before are part of the trick, and the breakfasts, returned phone calls and murmuring of the L-word is the charade that ensures that sex will continue.
The other night I came home with the boy who's been fawning after me for months now. We broke into the neighborhood pool, our new routine after a night of bar-hopping, and alternated between jumping into the frigid water of the pool and hurrying, giggling, to the bubbling hot tub. We got to his house and changed into PJs, dried each other's hair with towels, and hopped into bed. I wasn't afraid of him when we were playing, but suddenly beneath his covers I felt like a mouse in a trap. The conversation died immediately and his arms wrapped me up tight. My breath caught in my throat when I felt his erection pressed against my back. My muscles involuntarily shied away from his groin, as if a spider were on the inside of my shirt. I felt like I was at gunpoint. And all I could think of was a special on CNN about a woodsman who was attacked by a bear. "Play dead," he repeated, as images of his gnarled skull flashed across the screen. "If you play dead, you'll make it out alive."