Day Two
There are things that can't be handled in writing, things that shouldn't exist in print
Tom asks: 'So do you imagine ceasing the correspondence after this week?'
The question is laced with fear. Our correspondence has been an important stepping stone for both of us. It spans eight years of failed relationships, lifestyle changes, college degrees, jobs, child rearing, joy, and sorrow. In a way, we've accompanied each other through all these places, even though they were never the topic of our conversation
We smile at each other. All of a sudden, it's back. The old surge, the magnetic pull between us. My body identifies him as the source of pleasure, pain, and everything in between. The discovery shoots through me like an electric current, and suddenly I feel incredibly naive for not having foreseen this. Of course. I should've known there might be an attraction, even after everything we've been through
we made love.
It didn't hurt at all, to my surprise. It was just ... wonderful. Respectful, intimate, and beautiful, born of passion and free will. A dedicated frame around which a first love could bloom.
Later on, the memory of that night would haunt me like a recurring nightmare. How could the same man be gentle and yet so unfeeling? How could he make tender love to me one night and rape me the next? Why did he decide to rob me of something I'd given him freely before?
This incomprehensible contradiction left me rendered defenseless when it came to trusting people for years to come
The whole point of forgiveness is letting go of the burdens, not passing them onto another person, even if it was theirs to carry in the first place. It'd be meaningless if the rock only changed hands and continued to nurture a vicious circle
Day Three
Tom - I don't doubt I will reach a point whereby I will get some perspective, some insight into my choices. But ... I can't promise you I'll cleanly or quickly find my way through this, and wouldn't dare to. I know this is not what you are asking me for. But in saying this communication could 'bring closure to both of us', I'm caution of it being tied in part to me freeing myself, and you assisting me with this
Tom - I can see I'm also uncomfortable with the strength I read in your emails, and the vulnerability I display in mine. As uncomfortable as that is to say, it's apparent. As I'm sitting here pondering, I believe that is due to me wanting to divulge all I can, apologize endlessly and pour out the shame that I feel in the hope that that might make amends. But you don't need or want for that. You're stronger than that, and on some unsettling level, I have an issue with that.
I feel uneasy after communicating that. It reads like I need for some part of you to remain vulnerable. Or like I'm 'needed' on some level for your recovery, as if you require my help
But had I never contacted Tom again, a part of me would have been beset with relentless questions. I'd wonder whether he realized what he'd done. If he cared. If he was sorry. If he'd done it again to someone else. It would've eaten away at the oxygen around me like an open flame. Whether I'd like to admit it or not, his regret was as soothing as aloe vera on a burn wound
I've always wondered what it was that shaped the 18-year-old who violated me. What was his past like? What was it like to subsequently grow up in the shadow of his own wrongdoing? All these years, I've only had one piece of the puzzle, and I've held it for so long that it's become worn around the edges. I'm hungry for the full picture
During our childhood, when our problems were weighing down on us, I came to the conclusion that I was the only sibling who was close to 'normal', if there is such a thing. I aspired to never add to my family's worries and to—if possible—make up for their trials. So when I was in first grade and my sister started skipping school, my childish logic told me that I could somehow make up for it by striving to get straight As, which led to me becoming valedictorian in every school I ever attended. My brother's facial deformity led to my obsession with being 'pretty'. By the age of eleven, I had developed an eating disorder that haunted me for the next decade [...] Don't get me wrong. These expectations didn't come from anybody but me. I was loved. I was cuddled and had storybooks read to me every night. I received compliments for things I did well, and encouragement to do whatever I wanted. Most days, I was happy. My parents were good people who did their best. More than their best. I could always turn to them with my problems. I just decided not to. I was under the impression that it was for the best. No more worries on my family's already full plate
Thordis - You know, people are always apologizing without even noticing. We bump into someone at the supermarket—we're sorry. We step on someone's toes in the elevator—we're sorry.
Tom - Yes, but 'sorry' and 'forgive me' aren't really the same thing, are they? I'd say that 'sorry' carries a lot less weight
Thordis - One day, I interviewed an 84-year-old woman who radically changed my outlook when she claimed that people only forgive when they have to.
Tom - How?
Thordis - Imagine that you stop at a gas station, only to get shitty service from a rude clerk. What would you do the next time you need to take gas?
Tom - Go to a different gas station, I suppose.
Thordis - Exactly, because you have a choice. When people have a choice, most of them choose not to forgive. However, if it were the only gas station in town, you'd be forced to find a way to deal with this incident in order to keep getting gas, right?
Tom - Right.
Thordis - If a family member hurts you and you hold onto the anger, the atmosphere at home gradually becomes unbearable. That's why people usually find a way to forgive their loved ones, because the alternative comes at too high a cost. It's not as easy to change families as it is to change gas stations
I turn to Tom, who is squirming over this bleak recollection—treading the murky waters of shame with me watching him from the shore. It's a pattern I know all too well from our correspondence, and I'm not having it anymore. Yes, he needs to own up to the fact that he raped me, but there's nothing to be gained from dwelling on the drunken dramas that followed. The only purpose it serves is to feed Tom's self-pity, for which I have zero patience, and to tilt the power between us by placing him in the dirt and me up on a pedestal I've repeatedly tried to climb down from. And I think I know just the right story to break the cycle
Day Four
Thordis - Yet another reason why I love him. That, and how unimpressed he is with me.
Tom - Unimpressed?
Thordis - It's ... hard to explain. He loved me in this down-to-earth way that is ... unfazed by outside influences, somehow. Since our relationships began I've won a few awards and gotten media attention for some of my projects. He's happy for me but also somehow ... unaffected. He's as much of a loving rock for me to lean on whether I'm off winning victories or having a bad day.
Tom - He sounds like someone who knows himself well, who's comfortable in his own skin
For many years, I despised the girl I used to be—for having done something as futile as cutting herself—until I realized that the truly futile thing was to bash the broken teenager I once was by judging her reactions to being brutalized by someone she loved. That's when I apologized to her, took her in my arms, ran my hand across her dyed hair, pierced ears, and bandaged limbs, and forgave her with the words: you were alone in a hard situation and you did your best.
Now I'm sitting on a South African beach, discussing my scars like another part of my body, like your average tattoo. After all, tattoos are nothing but colored scar tissue
In the first email you sent me, along with confessing your deed, you said you wished I just hated you [...] To be honest, there were many moments where I did just that. In between loving memories, I found layers of scathing hot hate. But hate was a treacherous ally that always ended up turning on me. In the end, I hated my own guts for caring so deeply for someone who devastated me the way you did
Tom Stranger breaks my cycle of thought by mutters: 'This has got to be the most "touristy" thing I've ever done in my life.' Judging by his stories, I know his idea of a trip means hiking into the wilderness, bathing in creeks, sleeping under open skies, and surviving run-ins with wolves and bears. It certainly doesn't involve package deals, hotels, and—God forbid—a campy sightseeing bus
But somewhere deep inside, I suspect that this attitude stroked my ego; being the mature type who doesn't dwell on things. Who doesn't want to get her hands dirty with messy feelings and hurts. It's obviously a load of crap. And cowardly, to be honest. [...] It created a power dynamic between you and me that was in my favor. I got to sit up on a pedestal while you groveled in the dirt. But I'm sick of it. I want us to be on equal footing. In all our messy human glory
There's a fine line between feeling sorry for having made a mistake and feeling sorry for yourself for having made a mistake. In my opinion, Tom crossed this line a few times in our correspondence, which left me feeling pressured to take pity on him for being the horrible, unworthy, failure of a person he felt he was. Not only have I always found it ridiculous and out of place for me to pity Tom, but I also believe that if people settle into the idea that they're beyond salvation, it hinders them from doing constructive things with their lives. And I have zero interest in enabling either
I suppose I could refer to you as a 'rapist', at the very least 'my rapist'. But it wouldn't be true—hell, it wouldn't even cover a fraction of the truth about who you are. I've drunk myself into oblivious. That doesn't make me 'an alcoholic'. I have lied on occasion. That does not make me 'a liar'. I've been raped. That does not make me 'a victim'. People do good and bad things throughout their lives. My point is that I'm a person. Not a label. I cannot be reduced down to what happened that night. And neither can you
One night, when I had the knife to my wrist, I called the suicide line, but they told me they were closing and that I'd have to call back later. In a final attempt to get help, I tried to open up to my sociology teacher. When she realized what I was struggling to tell her, she promptly said that it was too much for her. She took me to her car, drove me to the office of a strange psychologist, and left me there. It did nothing but confirm my worst fear: that I was crazy. I couldn't utter a word for the fifty-minute session until the psychologist announce that the time was up, but I'd still have to pay. I gave her all my pocket money, cried hot tears of shame on the bus, and cut myself to bloody shreds when I got home
After a long silence, he says: 'I don't understand how you can even stand being in the same room as me. Or how you can even look at me.'
I scoffed. 'Come on. I don't find you repulsive. I've always help you in high regard.' Which is why your violence towards me hurt even worse
'I seduced you that summer because I wanted to break your heart,' I hear myself say.
He stops chewing, staring at me for a moment like he's never seen me before. 'Well, if that was your intention then yes, you succeeded.'
I look at him across the table, across the role we've played, across the perpetrator/survivor distinctions, across the years and miles we had to travel for this very discovery to take place: I took the power back. That's why the tension ran so high in the Westman Islands that everything boiled over. My mind locates the pedestal I built for myself, holding a burning torch to it. I wasn't above revenge.
My self-deception goes up in flames. I wasn't above revenge.
My last inkling of doubt about forgiving Tom goes up in smoke. Revenge healed no wounds and left nothing behind. Nothing but a broken memory I've evidently shied away from for half of my life
Day Four: From Tom's Diary
Now I know what I did ... and the why matters less
Day Five
Tom - How do you feel about searching your soul and asking me anything?
Thordis - Anything?
Tom - Even if you've asked it before. After all, posing a question in writing is very different from asking it face to face
Suddenly, Tom scoots away. 'I have to move away from you,' he interrupts, fumbling for words. 'It's ... my taste hasn't changed,' he said, rocking back and forth with unease.
Baffled, I shake my head.
'I just don't want to fuck this up. But my taste hasn't change, Thordis ... it's an aesthetic attraction.' The words seem to surprise him and he gasps in shock. 'Oh God ... I mean, you look the same. Shit. I just needed to say it because please trust me when I say I would never make a move towards you ... but in the same break I don't want to hurt you by moving back and creating a distance between us. Not when a connection is important for what we're here to do. I wouldn't dream of ... that would be the lowest thing I could imagine.'
Before I can utter a word, he hides his face in his hands, cowered in the grass.
I sit and stare at the human armadillo next to me. Why is he hiding? Is he crying? What am I supposed to do?
Tentatively, I hold my hand over his back before patting him lightly. 'Look at me.'
He doesn't move.
'Look at me, Tom.'
Finally, he reluctantly looks up, shamefaced. His hair is a mess and his cheeks are flushed.
Locking eyes with him, I ask: 'Don't you think I feel it as well?'
Suddenly, the lawn where we're kneeling opposite each other feels like an island, separating us from the vibrant flow of people on the Promenade. 'We used to be a couple, Tom. It's only normal for there to be attraction between us. But it doesn't mean anything and as a result, it doesn't matter. I'm glad it's been acknowledged though, to get the awkwardness out of it'
Taking on a big task is one thing, but being forced to let go and trust that everything will work out is an even bigger task. Tom and I may be treading some difficult waters, but the true hero in this story is Vidir
Sometimes I become aware of how easy it would be for me to shame you back into our familiar pattern—you wallowing in self-pity and contempt as the big bad rapist, and me in the role of the good-Samaritan free-therapist. But I'm really tired of that, Tom. I'm over it. And here's the thing: I'm not that different from you
I don't know what your reasons were for raping me that night, Tom. I'm guessing you were greedy and ignorant. You wanted something and you took it, regardless of how it'd affect me. Well, I've done that too. I've been greedy and put my own needs first. I may not have raped another person, but I surely know what it's like to be self-centered and egotistical and take from others. What you took was of great value to me and, in my subsequent anger, I tried my best to break the most valuable thing in your possession: your heart. Don't get me wrong, I'm not claiming that our actions carried the same weight, nor am I saying that I've rid myself of all negative emotions towards what happened. But I think I'm closer than ever to understanding it [...] A few years ago, we hit a rough spot in our correspondence when disagreed on the purpose of it. You said it was understanding, I said it was forgiveness. But now, I think we were both right. In the end, perhaps they're the same thing
'You're not the only one to have been violent with me.'
His eyes widen and he sits up straight. Even the smoke from his cigarette seems to await my next word.
'You were, however, the first, clearing the road for those who came behind you. Who bent me until I broke. Scarring me inside and out.
His mouth opens in silent shock.
'Don't get me wrong, I'm not making your responsible for violence that other people carried out against me. The perpetrator is always the one responsible for every case. But to answer the question of how you affected my life, the answer is that you caused a chain reaction, Tom. After you spilled my blood, I discovered how many sharks there were in the water.'
He pulls his legs up, hugging his knees. He looks so miserable that I almost feel bad for him. Instead, I whisper: 'You wanted to know what I am really forgiving you. Now you know. Now you know the context'
I didn't want to write about this in our correspondence. I wanted to do it face to face and have the words ... dissolve, in the moment
Day Six
For the first few years, I was the one behind bars, so to speak. I blamed myself. I didn't see a point in respecting or loving myself when other people could treat me like trash, even the ones who claimed to love me. When you shouldered the blame, you let me out and took my place. That was a necessary step along the way. But the time of punishment is over. It's time to heal
I dated men who confirmed my fears and men who weren't fazed in the least. Some of them used it against me. If I didn't want to have sex with them, they'd said I was frigid because I'd been raped. Wanting to prove them wrong sometimes led me to having sex against my will. The emotional manipulation was worse, though. If I disagreed or questioned their behavior, they'd say my feelings couldn't be trusted because the rape had left me unstable and irrational
Day Seven
But you can rest assured that everyone has a place within where violence sleeps, Tom. I can imagine situations where I'd pull the trigger. The fact that you played that character well doesn't make you worse than anybody else, it just means that you're able to make a clear distinction between the violence part of you and the rest of you. Which, I'd say, is a good thing
It strikes me how even the most traumatizing event of my life is still a testament to my privilege. I've been able to publicly discuss my status as a rape survivor, without being ostracized from my community. I've been able to criticize men's violence against women, without being stoned. I've been supported by my family, not murdered to 'restore their honor'. I've received respect and recognition for something that my fellow survivors around the world are whipped, shamed, and killed for speaking up about. And here I am, having a voluntary meeting with my perpetrator, whom I wasn't forced to marry as a result of his violence towards me
Day Eight
As I sleepily open one eye on the morning of my last full day in South Africa, the amazement over my whereabouts has given way to worries about whether I've run out of toothpaste or not. That's life. In the end, the little things always win
Finally, he asks: 'Is there any part of you at all that feels like you've been unfaithful this week, Thordis?'
The question surprises me, and yet I understand where it comes from. The emotional processing of the last few days was the equivalent of many relationships, even though it was entirely platonic
Day Nine
He told me that self-blame was a pattern he'd grown addicted to. I battle that same addiction myself. Blaming oneself and taking responsibility for one's actions are two separate things. The former leads to self-flagellation that feeds the self-pitying ego; the latter looks beyond the self and acknowledges one's role in relation to others
Epilogue
I had hoped that after Cape Town, you [Tom] would shed the misconception that people couldn't possibly love you if they found out what you did. I say this because I had the same misconceptions. I thought if I told people about the rape, they would either be overwhelmed by it or render me down to it. I thought nobody could possibly have a normal relationships or friendship with me, if they knew.
I've never been as happy to be wrong
SOUTH OF FORGIVENESS: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/34859084-south-of-forgiveness
Photo by Christian Holzinger on Unsplash
Photo by Peri Stojnic on Unsplash