From the Other Side of My Bed

34. Always The Prey

People say I grew up stubborn since birth.
Never wanting to learn the old ways of life, so defiant and always questioning the order of things. They just didn't see what I saw. The main thing we Latino females see in our homes is the machismo. Whether it's the men in our homes that forge it, or the women behind them. Unfortunately, my mother was a victim of it.
She learned to fear and obey.
And even when she had set up the fires, she always tried to tame them down so he (my Dad) wouldn't raise a finger. She was the best at what she did. All day, every day, she was an unpaid therapist who consoled us children and nursed our wounds created by our father. She was an underappreciated mother who sacrificed her entire being, her identity, her safety, her dreams and goals and forgot all about her health for us and never had any help despite suffering from continuous unwanted pregnancies and postpartum. He made her a maid, because "God forbid my daughters are raised to be housewives to another man."
She only wanted my sister and brother and was forced to have my other sister and I, which possibly means we are creations of rape. Then she needed to be a saint, then a 24/7 baby machine, then a servant, always living to patch up his mistakes and fill in for his absence. So, he could be out there, living his wildest dreams.
"She chose to be a mother above all,"
Really? Because making her isn't an act of love but a crime of war.

Mama saw I had pure fire in my blood, same fire as him, so often she used me against him to protect herself from his sexual advances. When he would try to hug or kiss her, in fear but playing it off cool, she would scream my name and I often thought it was a game to go save her from him and get in the middle to protect her, in reality it was for her to get away from him.
When in our bedtime stories she would open us about the abuse my siblings and her went through with him, it hit my heart like a wrecking ball, and I promised myself to never bend my will to no man or entity. To never allow a man to raise his voice at me, and that I will die fighting a man who even tended to hurt me. With firsts and blood, I would take down anyone who dare to break me.
So, when Papa and I got into arguments, I stood tall and high, made myself terrifying and impossible to get through, so he would never ever think I was like Mama.
I never thought of Mama as weak, but a victim.
And I was no victim.
Madeline is a made survivor.
Victims have graves and I was pretty much alive.

Around the end of Fall, we all knew Winter was coming harsh and cold.
And tensions were growing higher and bitter between my dad and I. The situation was the same, him calling me "immature" because I wouldn't bend my will to him and accept my faith in here. And I, furious at him for even daring to think I would be living like this. At some point, we heard the news from The States that my two oldest siblings were fighting, and had refused to pay for utilities, making the gas and light company to remove services, and now the big bill which was the house tax was coming up and my dad worried that they would be so careless to not pay for it, meaning the possible foreclosure of his so dear house.

Socorro had taken me to drop off the outfits of that girl who was to become a nun. And while she fitted the daughter, I heard her and the mom talked excitedly about it, saying that her routine would be out four hours of pray, one hour for recreational stuff, bible study, two hours of praising in the abbey and then another three hours of prayer in their room.
I found this as a life sentence, which I began to envy.
I inquired, curiously, to the girl that if she was to see her parents every weekend.
"Mmmh, not really. They only allow you an hour's visit at the end of the month. Some girls don't even get to see their parents because it's very strict, but my parents are making donations to them, so I am allowed often visits which makes me happy!"
"So, you don't have to see your parents at all,"
"Some girl's reality."
"Oh."

I stayed quiet for a few days.
Going to sleep thinking about this.
Of finding a way to escape him, my dad.
And you know I was losing my sanity when I started considering this option.


Then one rainy day, my dad had the nerve to take me early morning to go pick up my cousins and uncle who were traveling to The States that very morning and take them to the airport. I was so furious.
I remained quiet the whole ride, my mind broiling about what was my next move.
After helping them out of the car and saying their goodbyes, Dad and I sat in the car for a moment, then started fighting.
"If you weren't so immature!"
I'm 15 in here.
"Immature, my balls! You think you're the only one losing and getting tired of this? Well shocking news, me too! I'm sick of you just as much as you're sick of me but guess what, this is it!"
"What's it!"
"This! I want to go to the nunnery Sulema is enrolling her daughter!"
He lost his words then. "What?"
"Yes, you heard me!" I punched the dashboard so hard; the cassette radio falls off.
"I want out!" I keep screaming and I try to say each syllable perfectly so he can hear it. "I would rather live in a bullshit ass nunnery, surrounded by fake ass martyrs than live a single more minute with you! Life in prayer and no possible future is better life than to be with a miserable man like you! At least in that way I'll escape you, something Mama never was able to!"
"I-"
"Or what? Are you going to beat me, muzzle me and throw the key away from my cage like you did to my mother! Am I my fucking mother!? SAY IT!"
Something in his eyes softened, and he gasped for air quietly before regaining composure and I turning to the window to avoid him.

-

I ran down the steps as fast as I could while puffing my hair up, with Socorro running after me, yelling that I should wash off whatever monstrosity I had done to my face if I don't want to scare people. But that's the point.
It's Halloween.

Even though I didn't know if they celebrated it in my country, I still wanted to dress up and I made my face into a scar face, bloody and so awfully weird, I loved it. As I turn to the right to the upcoming street, I am met with open arms my date for the night. Some boy I met at Peinado's barbershop which I had been spending way too much time in. He seemed so interested in knowing me beyond my beauty and I fell for it. He had arrived in this black spaceship, this gorgeous car with a skylight.
He twirls me in the air before putting me on the ground and taking a look at my face. "Still so beautiful, but scary."
"Perfect, you mean."
He laughs and tells me that I don't mind if his friend Ric comes with us, who's the one driving. I said of course not. Then while looking at me, he knocks on the window beside him and it opens, with Ric passing him a champagne bottle.
This night was glorious.
I remember we listened and sang along Calle 13 and Queen Ivy songs while Ric told us how where we were going, I was very on theme with the place, and I would laugh and tell him he was bullshitting me. We even took pictures while in the car, which were all blurry at the end, but it was fun using the flash and the champagne was getting warm and the cool air made my hair dance all over us.
"Aye Bebe,"
"Yeah?"
"You know about La Calle 10?"
"Never been."
"Stick out from the skylight, and discover it yourself, go, go,"

I look funny at my boy, and he encourages me, so I watch as the skylight opens, and I go through it. At first, I'm hit in the face furiously by the cool wind, but when I get used to it, it is the most beautiful moment in my life. We are surrounded by high blue glass buildings, each illuminating the street with a fantastic explosion of lights. The cars, the people, even the glass reflections, were all facing me.
Ric even rolls down the windows and turns up to the max the music for me to hear it. And I cannot stop smiling.
Oh, champagne, beautiful lights, myself, glittering the night.

-

Once again, I was reminded that I wasn't a God.
I was merely a broken thing.
Bound to be hurt.
I thought I was safe again. I had built from my ashes a new life in Guatemala, with a small community of people who loved me and found me amazing. And I felt I could trust them. I often hung out with Peinado and his barbershop because he was very kind and sweet and well, I sort of brought him a lot of clienteles by being there.
Men, boys, teens would come because they would see me, and they were enamored with my long conversations about U.S.A and my accent. But I guess they also enjoyed that I was naïve. It's very, very stupid for a young girl of 15 to be surrounded by men. And they knew it, but I didn't. But again, I had forgotten at that point the evil of men. I was soon to be reminded.

I was with Peinado, helping him clean off his blades when a group of his friends came, but I didn't care much until I saw this Adonis.
Oh, my.
He reminded me of Pauly D from Jersey Shore, grotesquely huge, muscle only guy. Tan to perfection, and his dark hair covered in a red ball cap. He wore a white sleeveless shirt, and some faded denim. I should I had been careful because since he approached me, he was a pushover. He was more straightforward them I was. But I mean, the muscles though...
I was dumb, okay?

He soon asks me if I wanted to go on a drive, which at that point I always accepted going to rides with men because all of them never had tried to do anything, they were decent people and I thought he was too. When I got to his red car, I started to feel my hair rising from my neck, but I ignored it to excitement.
I was naïve, I thought the max he wanted was a date.
We drove for a while around the neighborhood, and I stared out the window to make sense where we were going, until we crossed to the next neighborhood which Socorro always told me to never cross. I then started to nervously make conversation which he vaguely reply to. He just kept giving me this smile I couldn't figure out. Then we arrived at a street with dimmed lights. He parks then.
He then relaxed for a second, stretching his arm to around my neck.
I timidly smiled at him.
Then in a matter of seconds, literally, he unbuckled his pants, pull out his penis and got on top of me. He grabbed onto my neck while his other hand brusquely tried to rip down my leggings. I just froze and laid there, until I sense that he thought I would let this happen, when he least expected it, I hit him right on his penis with my knee and pushed him back to his seat, immediately turning to the door.
He screams at me, while I manage to open the door, falling onto the ground and then crawling out. I'm wobbly, I try to stand up and when I steady myself, I hear the car start. So, I ran as fast as I can. I don't even try to look back.
In my advantage, the dimmed lights and my dark clothes and hair made it hard for him to find me, because he followed me as I ran.
I eventually began to give up speed, so I ran to hid in a house which I saw the people there watching tv so entered their driveway and hid behind the trash cans. And watched as he looked for me.
I realized that no matter what I would do in this life, I'm always going to be the prey.

After that I froze and lost track of time, hugging myself and quietly telling myself it's over. I waited until I saw the sky turn bluish and then I ran home.

Socorro was furious.
"What in the world is wrong with you? You're lucky your dad went to see your uncle, if he would of not seen you home five hours ago-"
"They tried to rape me," I exhaled.
She covered her mouth in disbelief. Sighing, she rapidly wrapped her arms around me and tell me she was glad I was home now. "But who? - But- Mad- I-"
"It's over. Nothing happened, I ran away but he followed me, and I had to hid somewhere until he gave up and left."
"My dearest." She kept hugging me.
"I thought you would be safe in here."
"The only time I'll ever gonna be safe is in death, Socorro."