Chapter 39: Becoming Numb, Part 2

I tried shifting a bit, pretending I was still asleep, praying that he would stop. Although my heart was racing, I tried to keep my breathing deep and even, to make him think that I was still asleep. I was terrified what he would do if I woke up. He could get violent, force me to do things that I didn't even want to contemplate doing. He could get violent despite my best efforts to keep him ignorant.

He kept on squeezing.

I'm not sure if I'm able to convey the terror of that moment. That sudden helplessness that happens when the person you've trusted for years is violating you in one of the most intimate ways possible. I realize that some women have had much worse things happen to them, but I'm not here to play my-assault-is-worse-than-your-assault. Violence is violence, even if it doesn't make a sound.

Eventually, he stopped. My efforts to jostle him away must have worked, or his liquor-addled mind cleared just enough to let the morality kick in. As I lay there on the couch, I tried