whatever you do, don't get raped.

there will be repercussions.

The night before it happens, remember to throw out the skimpy outfit you were excited to try on all week. Against your will, wear a lighter shade of lipstick, and better yet, little to no makeup. Make sure you don’t appear too appealing. It might be a trigger.

Carry a pack (or two) of pepper spray with you and keep the taser secured to your buckle like a keychain. Memorise the self-defence routine you bookmarked two months ago, the one you absentmindedly practised on a mannequin because you doubted its usefulness someday.

Oh, baby. I know you’d never hurt a fly, but this fly would love to hurt you.

When you get into the ride, be polite. Take the compliments with grace, even the uncomfortable ones. Laugh at their jokes hard enough and sprinkle a few of your own. While at it, keep one hand firmly, but surreptitiously, gripping the door handle, just because. Don’t make them angry in the course of the conversation. Respond positively to any advances, they hate rejection.

But when it happens, know that it’ll change you.

The next morning will be another workday for them. They’ll go out there, pursue their dreams and carry on as though nothing changed. You’ll likely be a loud-laugh table discussion of five over after-work beer. A statistic worth boasting to colleagues about.

People will ask what you were wearing, why you went there, why you trusted them, why you didn’t speak up earlier. They’ll tell you that you played a part by showing an ounce of fake interest at some point, just out of fear. Maybe it was the joke you cracked. Perhaps the lipstick shade was darker than you thought. You knew it was the lipstick!

Make sure they aren’t popular, successful or admired, else the day you speak up will be the day you’ll be labelled many things. A ploy, an opportunist, a jeopardy to a rising, smooth-sailing career, one you could only ever dream of. The one who came at the wrong time to destroy everything they’ve laboured to build.

They’ll continue to be the talk of glorified tabloids. Their talents will keep being highly celebrated, their achievements, highlighted. Those same platforms praising their brilliance will shame your trauma. You will feel disposable, irrelevant, ashamed.

They’ll privately attempt to silence you with money and publicly twist your words until you begin questioning your own memory. They’ll consciously manipulate you, call you disillusioned and recount their version of events so confidently that, for a moment, you may wonder if you imagined your own pain.

Eventually, people will forget. Your only consolation prize will be becoming a bulletin that appears on television every now and then, a story people reference when they want to discuss awareness. Occasionally, someone will stop you to tell you how strong you are. That’ll barely move you. The unsettled outrage will still dwell in you.

After a decade, the guilt will not consume them as you hoped it would. They will get married and raise sheltered kids in sunny green backyards, while you wallow in self-disdain every passing day. The world will find something more pressing to discuss other than…this.

You’ll ponder an unhealthy amount over every decision you made that night. Above all would be the inescapable thought. Maybe you should’ve stayed home.

Things would’ve been better that way.

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