Apologize in advance for the post being too long. This happened 5 years ago but I remember it like it was yesterday. And I'm trying to get the whole thing off my chest.
I was at "TJ"s house that night for a party. TJ was this extremely popular kid in his senior year, involved in a lot of cultural exchange activities, who always threw a helluva party, and the crowd was always a good mix of domestic and international students in that college town. Being a foreigner myself, that was one venue where I got to really break all the cultural barriers and blend with people from everywhere . Like every other party I had been to at his place, on that night I got there a tad earlier with a 12 pack of my favorite beer, stacked them in his refrigerator and got busy helping him with the final bits of prep and arrangements.
At this point, I have to give you a quick description of this house. With just the single floor and an equally large basement , the stairs leading to the basement being outside and behind the house, and the backyard being fenced and reasonably large, this house was almost perfect for hosting parties. And why almost ? Since his housemates' rooms are off-limit during the parties, that left everyone with just one restroom. Which meant long waiting lines pretty much all the time.
Back to that night. People started joining in 1s, 2s and small groups and an hour into the party we had about 60 something people there. Everyone was having a good time. People who stuck to drinking and chatting mostly stayed upstairs while those who wanted to dance or play drunk games proceeded to the basement where the music system was playing loud party music. I always bounced between the basement and the kitchen upstairs, saying Hi to all the new faces I met and the familiar ones I knew. It was when I was grabbing may be my 4th beer (already had some jello shots inside of me) from the refrigerator that I saw "Summer" and "Bethany" in the hall. Both looked quite young and I guessed they must be freshmen that TJ met at some club meetings and invited to his party. Summer was kinda tall, lean and attractive but looked a little "cold" where as her friend was normal; pretty, but with the girl next door-ish kinda looks.
Let me take you through the next hour or two, real quick. Both these girls hadn't brought any liquor with them, being not of legal drinking age. I gave one of my beers to Beth, while Summer wanted something else, so I grabbed her a different one (TJ always kept a stock, though his parties are mostly BYOL). I moved on to conversing with other people, also going back and forth between the basement, kitchen and the hall. At some point I felt the need to relieve myself and that is when I got to the damn line. In front of me leaning against the wall stood this guy, shorter than me, wearing a black sweatshirt, blue jeans and a red cap turned backwards. He was talking to the girl in front of him and at first I couldn't see who it was because of his head being too close to her face, like he was whispering something in her ear. Then she shifted a little and I saw it was Beth.
With a concoction of different types of liquor in various ratios inside my system, I knew I was pretty wasted by then. But even to that me, Beth looked pretty hammered. I scoped around and saw Summer sitting on the couch in the hall actively chatting with a good looking dude who I had seen quite often and knew by name. But this mystery slim Shady trying to work his moves on Beth looked a little too shady. I tried my best to mind my own business and focus on how badly I needed to tinkle, when I heard him say "Let's get out of here". And he said that with a sort of pulling/tugging motion. It was Beth's response that caught my attention. Her eyes were hardly open, she didn't seem like she'd be able to stand if it wasn't for leaning against that wall, and she was saying something that was barely coherent. My immediate thought was that she must be sick so I tried to step in and ask her what was up. But this guy sorta blocked my way with his hand and said "She's alright. She's with me". I moved his hand out of my asking, "Does she look alright to you? " and held her shoulder and asked "Are you alright? Do you wanna sit?". I saw her eyes flinch open for just a second and she said "I want to throw up".
At this point the restroom was occupied and there were about 5 or 6 others ahead of Beth. I didn't think she would last that long so i walked with her, cutting the line, apologizing to all the fellow drunks, explaining to someone in the front what the emergency was. She politely let me take her place and after what felt like 30 seconds later, we got access to the restroom. I took her inside, kept the door open, asked someone if they can get a bottle of water, and get a hold of Summer for me. Beth by then was on her knees, puking in the toilet, and it was a mess and soon she crashed on the floor. I picked her up and the girl who had given up her space helped too. I rinsed her mouth and washed her face and asked the other girl to go ahead and use the loo, while I took Beth outside.
Standing outside I had no idea where to go or what to do with her. I could see that the creepy guy had been watching us all this time and standing there, I could also see Summer in the exact place she was, the last time I saw her. Either nobody went to fetch her, or the person who did go didn't know her or the worst, she didn't bother to come. Anyway I needed to do something about this. So I walked her into TJ's bedroom that was right next to me and laid Beth on his bed and covered her chest-high with a blanket/sheet. Then I went outside to go fetch Summer and if possible, TJ. Mr. Black Sweats had taken this opportunity to sneak into that room and I happened to see it out of the corner of my eye (or I had a feeling he would, I don't remember which one was it, exactly). I decided to double time, went to Summer and said "Beth's not feeling so hot. I need you, Now ! " . I think my tone was a little rough because she didn't look too happy, but there was concern on her face all the same. I wanted to head back to the room right away so I asked a friend I saw to go fetch TJ for me.
We walked towards the room and when I got there first and Summer was right behind me, we saw the dude sitting on the bed right next to Beth. He was holding her hand and watching her and only turned when he heard/saw us come in. Beth looked like she had completely passed out and by then I kinda lost it, so I asked him to piss off. Summer looked confused cause she didn't know why I said that or how that guy was even in the picture or what to do next. At that point TJ came to the room and asked us what's up. So I told him how Beth had passed out and how I didn't feel too comfortable leaving her there alone (the guy was standing just outside the door but as soon as TJ got there, he left. I assumed he went back to the party). TJ didn't think she could crash there and Summer didn't seem to know how to handle this, so I asked her where Beth lived. She told us that Beth and her lived in the same residence hall (Don't know if they were roommates or not). That was a good 10 minutes walk from TJ's place and there was not any designated driver lurking at that party. So I told TJ that I could carry her to the dorm if Summer would come along. It was well into midnight by then and Summer seemed to have made peace with the fact that for her, the party was over.
So we got out of the house, me carrying Beth and Summer walking beside me. When we reached the main street, I remember thinking that I should probably let her down and have her walk with just an arm around my shoulder, so that we don't get stopped by a patrolling cop car, or by the campus police (Underage, drunk, in a bad shape). But I was too drunk to act on that thought, kept walking, crossed the street entering the campus and walked across the field heading in the direction of her dorm. When we finally got there, Summer used her key card to open the door of the residence hall, I asked her if she was ok to take it from there and she nodded, so I left Beth with Summer, said goodnight and walked back to TJ's place. I updated TJ on everything, grabbed another beer from the fridge, noticed the black hoodie still there this time hitting on another girl, saw that a few of my friends had already left. Less than 10 minutes later I started feeling the exhaustion, decided to call it a night, and left for my apartment.
The next day I looked up Summer on TJ's friends' list on facebook, sent her a message checking on Beth (and herself) and she replied they were fine. I never saw Beth after that day. I ran into Summer many months later at the library but I don't think she even recognized me. To this day, I don't think Beth knows what could have happened that night or Summer knows what was happening that night.
That is where the story ends..
WHY NOW ?
The whole Stanford case blowing up on the internet and on reddit, got my attention. I came across various comments and the links in them took me to other subreddits where I saw threads posted by victims of various forms of sexual assult. I knew these subreddits existed but I never spoke nor lurked in them. But after seeing certain posts in the last month or so, my mind started wandering back to that night. And though in the last 5 years it didn't occur to me, the thought that this girl Beth may have been drugged that night, has been running through my mind, incessantly. I'm sure seeing a lot of threads on reddit where a girl/guy was drugged before being taken advantage of sexually, may have influenced that thought but I can't seem to shake it off. She seemed that messed up.
May be you see the title of this post, a bit of a stretch. May be you find it a click-bait. May be you think I am not giving that guy the benefit of doubt, that he may not have raped this girl, he was simply looking to get laid. But does it matter ? I didn't know that guy or the girl before that night. But I knew he was about to take her away from the party and that she was in no shape to give him consent for anything. And I have been repeatedly seeing on reddit that 'any sexual act, be it touching or groping or whatever, when done without consent, is equivalent to rape'. If so, for that girl's sake, I'm glad that on that night, I was there at that party.
Submitted June 23, 2016 at 01:03PM by asc0614 http://ift.tt/28XfGOy offmychest
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