I am a twice-over rape survivor. My first act starred a cousin by marriage who swore with all his heart & soul that he loved me, wanted to be my first lover, true mate. I was 16 & in the summer between sophomore & junior year in high school, 1992. We were visiting family in Ohio where, as being the youngest girl, I was surrounded by male cousins... My knights & protectors; all whom I loved, adored & trusted completely. I was the tomboy who wanted to have the freedom the boys had & most often than not received it to a degree. During my time there, I played a little too hard & hurt my left knee. D was the cousin I was closest to, even though we lived far apart & only met during the summers. He was 2 yrs older & treated me like royalty, nicknaming me "Queenie". Everyone was outside talking, playing & relating. D picked me up, told anyone who was concerned that he was going to take me into the house & take care of me. The house was two levels with a basement. The largest bathroom was upstairs where the girls were sleeping (the boys were in the basement & the adults scattered throughout). He laid me on his parents' bed, then went to run a bath for me to soak in. I thanked him & told him that all I needed was for him to help me to the bathroom. He told me he was going to sit with me to make sure I was okay.Then he started asking questions... Did I have a boyfriend; What do I look for in a guy; Have I been kissed yet; Was I still a virgin... Thinking nothing of it, I answered his questions. As we were talking, he started undressing me. When I asked him to stop, he said he only wanted to help me prepare for the bath. Laughing, I started to brush his hands away. The next thing I was aware of... he was slowly pushing me down on the bed. He started telling me how he felt he was falling in love with me; that given the time & chance he'd prove to me that he was the right one for me. He had loved me from afar for the past couple of years, but due to my age felt he needed to wait for me. As he was talking, he was taking my clothes off & brushing aside my attempts to stop him. I started hitting him like he & my other cousins showed me but it didn't seem to affect him as much as it confused him. He backed off to remove his clothes & I backed up to the headboard. I was yelling & pleading. No one heard me, not even him.

The thing that hurt me most was his gentleness. He honestly believed in his love for me & thought that if he showed it to me by "making love" to me that I'd believe him & love him back. He wanted my first time to be special with someone who truly loved & respected me... He made me aware of my body sexually; made my body respond to his touch; made me climax with tears of shame on my face. Then he entered me when he thought I was ready. The pain of him inside of me was nothing compared to the pain in my heart & soul. He kept telling me how he loved me, how completed he felt, how special I was to him. He held me when he finished, wiped away the tears, then left to stop the water in the bath room. He brought back a washcloth to clean me, then helped me into the bathtub. The whole thing happened in the space it took to fill the tub with water... little less than ten minutes. In ten minutes, the girl I was ran away & an actress took over for three years. Three years of pretending I was okay; that I could still smile brightly & laugh freely; that I was still "Queenie". No one understood why I started drawing away from D though. He called, wrote letters, sent cards... all were returned unopened. I went away for college & he still kept trying to be in touch with me. I wanted to forget the summer, forget him, forget the betrayal of my body.

The second act occurred December, 1995. It was time for finals & Christmas vacation; time to go home again. I was a sophomore living on campus (a women only college) as a dorm advisor & so had a room to myself. This was my first year in the position & between classes, so I was pretty busy. The guy was the boyfriend of one of the girls on the hall. I've seen him around a bit so I knew him some. One of our dorm policies stated that when a male was in the residence hall, he had to be in the presence of one of the residents. They came to my room to chat for a bit. She left to go grab something from her room. I was uncomfortable being alone with a male, so I started to go stand by the door. He was in the path & got up to block me. So I turned around to open the window... The room felt too small & I needed to feel some kind of openness. When I turned, he grabbed me & held me. He said that I was cold enough without opening the window. He was there to warm me up a bit. Scenes from that summer started hitting me. I went numb, saying over & over "NO"... but I never yelled. I'd learned that yelling never got me help, never got him to stop. He threw me on the bed, tied my hands quickly above my head, shoved my sweater up & took my pants off. Panicking, I started getting louder. He silenced me by wrapping his hands around my throat & squeezing hard. He told me he made a bet with friends of his that he could thaw me out a bit. One of them was going to call his girlfriend & keep her busy for awhile. Then he opened his pants & raped me. This time it was different. He did it simply because he could. All I could remember was the weight on me; him forcing himself into me, moving in & out. Behind my closed eyes my cousin's face appeared. In the back of my mind was his voice saying he loved me. After about 10-15 minutes he was finished. Neither of us said anything. He fixed his clothes, then mine & untied me. Using my phone, he called his girlfriend & told her he had to leave for the night, wanting her to see him out. She was there in less than a minute & they left. I went on auto-pilot the rest of the month. I barely remember December. Somehow I passed my finals, managed to get home, share Christmas with my family, then was back at school. This time the actress that came out felt unclean all the time; smiled and laughed too easily; buried herself in school; kept to herself often; didn't like being touched by a man much less be alone with one (which was hard since most of my teachers were male). Triggers centered around my throat & wrists, being grabbed from behind, & being in a small room with a man.

I've never told anyone... until senior year. I was doing volunteer work at a women's shelter as part of a project for women's psychology class. We were trying to find out if there was a difference between spousal rape & stranger rape. In retrospect, I guess I was searching for a way to finally heal. Seeing & talking with these women made me realize that I wasn't alone. I stopped blaming myself for their actions; for not being able to stop them. I stopped hiding my feelings & put the actress to rest. I started taking back my life, my true smiles & laughter, MY BODY & SOUL. To this day, nobody knows in my family except my dear husband. He is my first love & lover, the one who showed me the meaning of Unity in Making Love.

This was a chapter of my life & one of the reasons why I call myself Ebony_Phoenixx. Much like the phoenix I have lived, died & was reborn twice after my rapes. In the future, I hope to have more control over my phoenix stages! But as a Scorpio, it's a part of my nature.