< Translator’s note: The original formatting of the stories has been preserved. The translations aim to remain as close as possible to each author's original wording and expression.

 

When I was 16, I had a complicated situation in my family, plus adolescence, and after a fight with my parents, I moved out to live on my own.

It was also a period when I was changing my social circle, and, it so happened, I was literally very lonely at that moment.

And so, at one event, I met a guy (spoiler: he was 24). We communicated really well, then texted some more, and after a while, I gathered a group of people from different events, and we met up to play board games. And then this guy invited us over to his place.

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We drank (I didn’t drink much, because I was afraid of getting drunk and losing control), and after that, everyone went to sleep, while the two of us stayed awake and talked until morning. I already perceived him as a friend, but then we lay down to sleep, and he kissed me, and then started to touch my genitals. Of course, without asking for consent, but at that time, I didn’t even know that I was supposed to be asked. That’s how my first kiss happened, and overall, I liked everything.

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After that, we saw each other from time to time, although I didn’t feel any romantic feelings, but I really needed an adult I could meet and talk to. I didn’t want sex. But he did, and he didn’t ask me. The fact that sometimes I would just lie there and not move didn’t stop him, nor did it stop him when I reminded him of my age; he behaved as if he had forgotten. And when I showed him photos I had taken with my friends, he compared me to a pornoactress. We didn’t have sex with penetration, because it was painful for me (later I spent several years thinking that something was wrong with me, and it turned out that everything is fine when I’m not under stress and when I am asked for consent).

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It all ended when, after six months, I repaired my relationship with my parents and stopped communicating with him. I didn’t find it in me to tell my parents anything back then.

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It took me 2 years to talk about this in therapy and finally come to the understanding that I am not guilty of the assault he caused me.

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Anonymous author, 19 years old; story shared in 2024 as part of the campaign “16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence.”