What Happened in May 2005

For over a year now, I have put off writing this for many reasons. One reason is because it is still very painful to me. Another reason (and probably the main one) was I was afraid to lose more people. After this happened, I lost a lot of people who were my “friends.” I keep thinking of Elizabeth Taylor saying you never know who your real friends are until you’re involved in a scandal. It’s true. After all was said and done, I had significantly less people in my life. Some of these people pretended nothing had happened, but I got the looks. So as I sit here writing this, I am thinking of the people I may lose as a result of this.

It happened over a year ago. I met a girl while doing a play in Spring City. She was 15, I was 21. We began dating and soon were very close. I want to make this clear, I care about her very much (I still do). I was in love, or the closest I remember being. One day, we began fooling around. I’ll leave out the explicit details, but nothing really happened. In the end, we both walked away virgins. Now, I need to point out her 16th birthday was just one month away from these events. This is significant because if all of this had occurred after that, it would not have become what it did.

We were ignorant and got caught. Soon, the police became involved and I was arrested. I had to put up $10,000 bail (90% of which I got back after various fees were deducted). I got the best lawyer in town and left it up to him. The fact that nothing more than two people “fooling around” happened was probably what saved my ass. I was charged with statutory rape. A term which I hate because it was not rape in any form. That word has it’s own aura and it makes people think extremely negatively. And what she and I did was not at all a negative thing. We were both immature. Even though I was the older one and should have been in control, I wasn’t. I have lived a very sheltered life and I’d say in maturity level we were about the same age (or less).

I did not have to become part of the sex offender registry. This is the first question people ask when they find out. The only thing that happened was I was put on two years probation. After the two years, all of it will be taken off my record. This is a good thing, I know. The only down side is it will never be taken off my soul. I will forever be burdened down by this fact in my past. I have to explain it to any girlfriend I have in the interest of honesty. And any family member I mention a girl to inevitably asks, “How old is she?”

After everything happened and the police became involved, we were told to have no contact with one another. This meant that after all of this trauma we were not allowed to speak to each other. Here I am in the middle of this awful experience and the person I wanted to fall into most was off limits. This person I loved was taken away from me. Even now, it hurts to think about it all. Every now and then I see her out places and my breath is taken away and I am deeply depressed for several days.

The past few days I have been depressed, but for a different reason. I was watching television at work and this woman began talking about what females have to go through when they are given an “exam” to determine sexual activity. A woman said it was a traumatic experience, humiliating. That it was like being raped, she felt so violated. Then my mind went to my experience - this girl I had loved had to go through this. She had to be “examined.” This innocent person, this virgin, had to go through this because of me. If I’d had any sense, I would have known better. Because of my actions, I threw the humiliating, traumatic experience her way.

She would tell me how cruel her family was to her and how badly they’d treat her even when she hadn’t really done anything wrong. After the incident, my mind spent a lot of time wondering what they would do to her and how her life had changed because of it all.

After this happened, I drastically cut back my hours at the Cumberland County Playhouse; my aunt worked those hours for me. The few times I went and worked, I saw the looks. I saw how the people who would joke around with me and hug me were no longer hanging around me. I couldn’t really blame them, I suppose. They had children of their own, and from the gossip it all came down to me being a bad person who did a terrible thing. All they saw were the words “statutory rape.” There was much more to it. It could not possibly be defined by two words. I resigned from the Playhouse because I felt it was in the best interest of everyone.

The Playhouse is very bad for gossip. Things go around extremely quickly and then everyone knows. They all knew, but no one said anything. Strangely, that was one of the toughest things to deal with. That no one would approach me about it. I would have been open to speak about it. I would have welcomed the chance to clear my name somewhat, but I realize people read the words in the newspaper or hear the gossip and it’s given credence. My aunt said that a couple of people called her when they saw my name in the newspaper.

The only positive side to losing all those people is I was left with the people that mattered. Those that didn’t care what gossip was floating around. The ones who listened to me explain what happened. The ones who cared enough about me didn’t let me go. That’s a good thing. And, Elizabeth Taylor was right.