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My Story
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He was beautiful. I was 19. He liked to ride fast motorcycles. I prefered to study at the local community college. We had been acquaintances for 3 1/2 years. But I knew nothing about him, and he thought he knew something about me. I was sitting at a coffeshop one day after school. I was looking at the bulletin boards looking for a room to rent. I was unhappy in my homelife and was wanting to step out on my own and learn to fly. It started out innocently enough, a motorcyle ride though the Santa Cruz mountains and dinner. We held hands and had a wonderful time. He dropped me off at my Church that evening. We exchanged phone numbers and departed as friends. I had been dumped by my fiance the previous year, so I didn't believe he'd actually call. The very next day he called. 3 times, in fact, but I was in finals and couldn't return the message. He asked me to a movie right across the street from the college. I was so flattered! I didn't know that it was the beginning of 2-month abusive relationship that would result physical, sexual, and mental assaults, my isolation and imprisonment, and his arrest on our two month anniversary May 26, 2001.
On our second date, he confessed his 'love' for me, how he'd watched me for 4 years, and how I was the reason why all of his previous relationships failed. Yes, this seemed a little suspicious. But I attributed it to his silver tongue, and wanted to believe that somebody could love me that much. I know now that is the line he uses on all of the other women he seeks to entrap. From that moment, we were inseparable. He went to work, I cleaned his house and built him a new driveway. He had been been involved in a lawsuit with his ex-fiance, Katie, regarding a driveway. I tried to remain neutral. He was adamant about all the wrongs she had done him. It was the first time I had noticed that he refused to admit any wrongdoing in his life. I started noticing how he refered to women as 'stupid f*ing bitches'. A fear crept into my heart that if I were to leave I would spent the rest on my life in litigation with him, as he had done to Katie.
School began again. I took paralegal courses at night and he picked me up to make sure that I was safe. I see now that my dependence on him started there. It was a wonderful feeling to have a protector in a big, bad scary world. I didn't see that he would be the one that I needed protection from.
In the first 2 weeks of spring quarter, I spent all my time at his house. I could easily see that his life was a mess. He claimed that his former roomates had up and left without paying the bills. Whether this was true or not, I won't know. But I was all too willing to help him out. There was no electricity and no food. I also noticed that he had no friends. I was dying to leave my mother's house, and I didn't care what the conditions were as long as I got out. Later that same drive would help me escape him.
Since he had no home, we moved into his van. Our first night in the van we spent at the parking lot of Capitol light rail station. In the morning, we were pulled out of the van by San Jose P.D. I remember standing in the pouring rain while refuting the officer's claim of me being raped or kidnapped or on drugs. We were just homeless. I couldn't conceive of the idea that he would ever rape me. I always thought one couldn't rape the willing. I didn't see it as a method for him to wield his power and control over me. Not yet.
When he hurt me, he did it out of anger, not sexual desire.
