Possibilities
Vida Young
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I remember the cherry tree in the very center of my back yard at Cinder road. We had a medium sized yard with beautiful green grass and a thick sidewalk that ran up the left/middle side towards our driveway where my father’s truck was always parked. The cherry tree was nearly as tall as my house and its branches were veiled pink blossoms; it was a favorite of this once-little girl. Later in the year, the tree produced beautiful red orbs, which, against their green leaves, resembled Christmas holly all out of proportion. All the time, the cherries would fall in grass and appear like spots of blood creeping up from the ground. Once in the grass, the ants would gnaw holes in the bright red hearts and they would brown in the sun before decaying.
When I was four, my father used to lift me up into the lowest nook of this cherry tree. I would sit there under his supervision until he would whisk me onto his shoulders and run circles around the yard.

While my father was at work, my mother would take me outside to sit at the base of the tree. She often plucked buttercup flowers to hold under my chin and told me that if my skin glowed yellow it meant I liked butter.
           
When I was ten we moved to a new home in the middle of the woods. We were surrounded by deep forests which I feared contained bandits. Our first Christmas there, I asked Santa for a knife to hide under my pillow to defend myself from midnight robbers coming through my window.
           
My parents treated me more like an adult at this home. I was allowed to buy a kitten I saved up for by myself. She’ll be ten this year. I was allowed to venture by myself into our back woods. Sometimes, my mother still came outside with me, but we used the time to pull up yellow dandelions instead of buttercups. I was suddenly too big for my father to lift, and as I approached thirteen the hand holding and hugs stopped completely.
           
I found refuge from the throes of puberty in a large Maple tree. Almost every day I climbed the tree to watch the ants and spiders crawling in between the bark. My mother chided me for climbing the tree in my school uniform. I never told her when I ripped it and sewed it myself instead. In the worst trick of nature, half of the Maple tree began to die compelling my father to have it removed. I didn’t forgive him for a month after it fell. 
           
Around sixteen, I began to bring boys home. My family had other interests besides hiking so I showed Chris the stream that led into a wide gorge with roots sticking out its dirt walls. I took Kevin to the small “island” covered in dozens of snakes that jumped into the water when we stomped nearby. Jonny dared me to poke a dead fish and I showed him how far I could skip a rock. Their reactions satisfied me, though I never wanted to kiss them at the end of the day the way they wanted to kiss me.
           
As I turned seventeen, then eighteen, I spent less time at my house. I’m sure this isn’t unique. I spent the majority of my time with my best friend, Katie, and at her house. We got drunk. First because we thought it was cool, then because we were bored. During these high school years, I lost interest in the outdoors and only went hiking when Katie begged.
           
One night when we were drinking, we invited boys over. It wasn’t meant to be romantic, only social. Katie and I were both “spoken for.”
           
We were already drunk when they arrived, but the boys had walked over in the beginning stage of their night. To be social or to “keep up,” I’m not really sure, we kept drinking until nothing seemed to matter anymore. That’s a point when you’re drinking, I think for everyone, when you don’t care anymore. 
           
I was stupid. Not in school or in conversation, but in caring for myself and the people around me. I had heard countless talks at school about rape and about how you shouldn’t leave parties with boys you don’t know. My all-girl, Catholic high school piped us full of sisterly affection and a concerned eye for each other’s safety.
           
Before I walked out of Katie’s house that night, “for a walk and to catch up,” he called it, Katie whispered in my ear asking whether or not I was okay. She asked if I thought it was a good idea. I said it was nothing, I didn’t care.
           
The boy kissed me—or I kissed the boy. At some point our lips touched and he asked me to marry him. I said yes. At some point, hands strayed to clothed areas. At some point, the boy laid me down by a tree in Katie’s yard. I looked at him, but it was dark and he was out of proportion. Once, I looked away, and saw headlights driving by, but they didn’t stop and neither did he. I suggested to him that “this shouldn’t be happening.” He agreed, but in a dirtier, different way.
           
I could feel the grass itching my back. I could hear Katie laughing from inside the house. I remember telling myself that nothing bad would happen to me when I was so close to a tree. I told myself it was sex and that was okay. I was confused.
           
Several things transpired in the next two hours. The boy and I walked back inside. Katie smiled at me and I smiled back. I poured myself another glass and walked back outside into the road with a hula hoop. When no one was paying attention I ran for the main road. The boy caught up to me and grabbed me tight into his arms. I hit him until he let go and I kept running.
           
I was a sham. I ran to the road and stood at the edge, toying the line with my foot. I don’t think I would have walked out even if they had let me alone. The boy’s friend caught up with me. Told me that he had been depressed once too. Told me I was still young and would get through it. He hinted that I shouldn’t press charges. “My friend is a good person,” he said. “He just messes up sometimes,” he said. He walked away to continue hitting on Katie. In unison, they told me that morning commuter traffic was beginning. We headed back to the house.
           
When the boys left, my boyfriend picked me up. He drove me to an empty parking lot. I had begged him on the phone to “take me away.” Looking back on this I feel pathetic. I feel whiny. I cried on the car-ride and cried into his shoulder and cried on the ground of the gravel parking lot. I repeated between sobs, “he raped me,” over and over again. My boyfriend leaned against his car. Threatened to kill the guy. He was furious, he said, but not with me. I owe him so much for being so kind to me.
           
When I calmed down, around five am, he took me back to Katie’s. I snuck back in the house before her parents were awake. She tucked me in on the couch downstairs and I slept until the afternoon when I woke up still drunk. Still stupid.
           
I had red scratches across my back for a week and my neck was dotted with large hickeys. I applied very light concealer and dabbed on slightly darker powder and my parents didn’t notice. We continued eating dinners together. I played Mario Kart in the evenings with my brothers. I thought to myself, “This is good. They always say doing normal things is good when bad things happen.”  
           
During the week following that night, I told only one other friend, besides Katie, what had happened. I told her that I wasn’t sure if it was rape. I explained that I had been happy to kiss him. I explained that the part between the kissing and sex might have even been something I did willingly. Was it cheating?  Everything became convoluted. I felt guilty. The next day, I received a threatening text from the friend’s boyfriend saying that if I didn’t tell my boyfriend that I had cheated on him, he would. I met my boyfriend at a park later that day and told him I had kissed the boy that night—I had cheated on him.
           
My boyfriend stayed with me. That hurt the most. I knew his relationship before ours had ended poorly and I fucked up in an even worse way. At the end of the summer, I left for my freshman year of college and broke up with him over text. I told him that I felt too terrible to maintain a relationship after what had happened, but really I felt too guilty.
           
The year following, freshman year, I started experiencing panic attacks in the shower. I developed a notion that every male teacher could see through my shirt. I had nightmares and flashbacks when I started dating again and when I tried to be intimate with my new boyfriend.
           
I attempted going to the school counseling center, but they told me I had been raped. I went to victim services, and they told me that “because he knew it was wrong” it was rape. They asked me how I would feel if the same thing happened to my friend. “I’d feel bad,” I said, and faked an epiphany. They sent me back to counseling. I went to one anxiety filled session and quit. I searched desperately for someone else who would tell me the same thing my friend’s boyfriend had—that I was just a cheater. That’s what I felt I was. That’s what I still feel I am. I am my own prosecutor.
           
I even contacted the boy a year after it happened and when I angrily demanded, “You do realize that what you did is considered rape?” he said, “yes.”
           
I have the guarantees of counselors (trained professionals in the area of sexual misconduct) and saved texts of the boy admitting what he did, but I still don’t believe my own story. Despite the anxiety I feel when I’m in bed with my boyfriend and I can’t see his face to really know it’s him, despite the waves of depression that come frequently when I’m drunk, despite my new habit of crying in the middle of sex because I feel like the night is happening again, I cannot believe my own story because I know I kissed the boy under the tree.
           
I saw the boy in a mall last year. We stared at each other, wide-eyed, from across the food court until we navigated silently to an open table. I told him about school and that I was doing really well. We caught up. At the end we parted and he said to let him know if I wanted to hangout again. I walked to my car and had an anxiety attack.
           
Today, the details are almost completely gone. It happened so long ago that I’ve had to start imagining what the scene probably looked like. Truly, until I wrote this account, I imagined myself on the ground with a shirt on, but I realize that would have been impossible with the scratches I had on my back the day after.
           
I am in the process of attempting counseling for the third time and I feel more melodramatic each time I go. This time I picked a male counselor, hoping he’d take the boy’s side. I have yet to see what he thinks.
           
Sometimes I think that if high school had gone differently, if I hadn’t thrust myself away from my parents and into teen angst, it might not have happened. I suppose we’re not supposed to dwell on the past. I only know that when I look at my life from beginning to present day there’s a significant downward trend that I can’t ignore.
           
I’ve realized that no one will ever be able to tell me what I want to hear. At this point, I’m not even sure what it is I want to be told. My mental memory has become so detached from my physical memory that the situation seems like it cannot be reconciled. I’m not sure if this is the point where I give up. I don’t know if counseling will ever work. I feel like a liar, and maybe I am. I’m not ready to accept that maybe I’m not.

​I’m in Florida now. There aren’t trees here like there are in Maryland. There are trees, I suppose, but they aren’t the same green. They don’t have bumpy roots to sit between or branches to easily climb. When I’m at my worse I might find a palm tree, but I won’t be shaded. In many ways I feel like I ran away here even though Florida was a predetermined decision. Maybe being stuck in a place with no cover will be good for me. My only option is to sit at the base of a giant stick and look up at what is directly in front of me.
           

About the Author:
Vida Young is a student at the University of Central Florida studying Creative Writing. Her hometown is Baltimore, Maryland where she lives in the middle of the woods. It’s terrifying. Seriously. Do you know what kind of sounds come out of the woods in the middle of the night? 

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