Heretic

Here's the thing, see:

I don't believe it.

Wow, I hear you say. That's really totally insensitive, isn't it? I mean, obviously something really bad happened to her, and obviously she's totally traumatized by it; isn't it petty to be getting all persnickety about details??

And yeah--yeah it is. But some details are a little more crucial than others, aren't they?

Aren't they?

Details like these, for instance:

1. You claim that the first time you noticed anything wrong was after, you say, someone put something in your drink. Except...You're supposedly sober for two months. So what were you doing drinking? Well, see, it wasn't my fault...someone put their cup down, and it was Hennessy, and they put it right next to my Sprite, and I picked it up and took a drink by mistake. And when I get a taste of alcohol, even a little taste, then I can't stop. Well, I said. If that's the case, and you'll pardon my assholeness here? But you might wanna pay closer attention to which cups you're picking up-- BEFORE you drink out of them.

2. You were at the hospital...Did they call the police? No. It was like...they were all part of the plot. Some of them, I don't think were even hospital people at all. So nobody called the police. Okay...Did you tell them you were raped? Yeah. Did they do a rape kit? No....I told you, I don't think they were all hospital people! They said....(insert threats that make no sense). But they didn't do a rape kit or call the police, even though you told them you were raped. Right.

3. Things inside my OWN head: It's funny, isn't it, that these catastrophes always seem to arise when she's NOT at our house? When she's at her dad's, or about to leave to go to her dad's, or staying somewhere OTHER than my residence....suddenly there are men out there trying to rape her, or succeeding in raping her, or planning to rape her...

Look. I've been there too. I had two situations in my earlier life which could have been construed as date rape. I'm not comparing that to any more-violent situation--I realize that mine was a mild situation, barely deserving of the word. And I recognize that there ARE women who have experienced violent sexual victimization, and I am the last person in the world who would want to be seen as a doubter.

BUT.

There are words that demand attention. The first time your four-year-old says that word she heard Daddy say when he was fixing the sink and dropped the pipe-wrench on his head, she gets attention. Immediate, highly-focused attention.

The undereducated white guy driving down the street when he gets cut off by a black female driver--he has some words that get attention too. Depending on the woman, they also get him a jack-handle through the side-view mirror, but that, too, is attention.

And women...we have a word too. Women who say it about famous men...they get all types of attention. Media attention...legal attention...attention from other women. All kinds of attention--positive and negative.

That's when you're famous. When you're NOT famous, though...well, you can still use that word to get attention...even if it's just from your semi-boyfriend, who may or may not still be considering whether or not you're really in a RELATIONSHIP or whether it's just a fling.

Or, as she put it...

"I think he's even more thinking about it since THIS happened."

The "it" he's supposedly thinking about, should you wonder? Apparently the two of them, unbeknownst to me, have been for some time discussing the possibility of getting an apartment together, when the moving day comes. (I'd asked Tim as much the other day: "So have you considered getting an apartment with Squeaky?" I asked him. "We talked about it," he admitted. I tried to repress my joy. But it's another thing to discover that this may have been in the works for QUITE a while before this incident.)

Strange, isn't it? that This would happen when she's just trying to convince Tim to get a place with her?

I don't want to be petty. I don't want to be a doubter.

But I don't completely believe this story.