Scared

Why am I scared to shower?

Why don't I feel safe around anyone?

What's wrong with me?

Did I cause this?

Was it all a dream?

Or did something happen,

something terrible?

What if it was someone I trusted,

my mom,

or my uncle,

or my stepdad.

What if it's someone I still trust to this day.

What if what my stepdad did,

the words he said to me,

really weren't that serious.

The sexual jokes,

the comments on my boobs,

what if he really was just joking?

What if I'm punishing him for nothing?

Keeping him away,

away from his own home,

when he's done nothing but joke...

But then again I was only 14 and 15…

what if he did more when I was younger,

I've always been scared of men,

what if it's his fault?

Or what if it's one of my uncles,

one I trust and love with my whole heart?

And why, oh why,

is my mom with a man who said such awful things about me?

Why would she stay with a potential predator,

with someone who makes sexual comments about her daughter?

What if somehow she's in on this,

what if she is part of the reason why I'm so scared…

what if the reason she had me hang out with her while she took showers

up until I was 10 or 11,

wasn't because she loved me?

But because she had some sick fantasy?

What if everyone I know is in on this?

What if I become betrayed again...

but then again it's probably all in my head.

Those sexual dreams I had when I was too young,

too young to know what sex was,

maybe it's nothing.

Maybe I just was an imaginative little girl.

Maybe that's all.

And truly,

most of all,

my biggest fear is that I'll never know the truth.