We were alone in a hotel.
I tried creating energy that I needed space and didn’t want intimacy and it wasn't working. He was oblivious with only one thing on his mind. He had an hour before had to leave for his flight.
He had rented a hotel room for all of us to stay at for the day after the convention. I asked if I could stay for the night because my flight was the next day. I had no money and nowhere to stay for the night.
I was feeling pressure, guilt, and fear. He kept trying to encourage moments of connection. Initiating a pillow fight. Wanting to teach me to dance. He asked me if was ready to move on from the divorce. He was asking me several personal questions in the hopes that it could create an emotional connection. I had only been out of San Jose for two months.
He asked if he could kiss me.
I panicked. I felt trapped.
A familiar feeling.
I said yes.
I shut down, went numb.
It was the first time I had been touched in almost a year.
Then it happened. He started kissing me like the man who raped me.
I froze. I couldn’t move.
I was back in Florida, laying on a couch with a man hovering over me. Kissing me while I froze and telling me that it was part of the energy work. I remember pushing away and wanting it to stop. I remember him repeatedly telling me that it would help, but that he didn’t have to do it if I was uncomfortable.
And then I was back in the hotel again. He told me that we didn’t have to kiss. And I felt the frozen panic that I felt before. And then the same denial and drive. I continued and tried to force through the feeling in my body begging me to stop.
I should have said no. I should have stood up for myself and been honest.
I cried hard after he left. I wanted my ex-husband there. I wanted to be held by him again. I wanted to hear him say that he loved me. I wanted his comfort and his touch.