On the morning of May 24, 2004, Brooke Wilberger, a beautiful blonde, blue-eyed coed who had just completed her freshman year at Brigham Young University, was washing lampposts in the Corvallis, Oregon apartment complex managed by her sister and brother-in-law. One moment she was there, the next moment, she was gone. She left behind her flip flops, a pail of sudsy water, and no witnesses to her disappearance. Only one man saw something. His name was Brian, and he called the police, saying he'd seen a green minivan driving erratically. Before he could explain further, the call was disconnected, and he never called back. On November 30, 2004, a foreign exchange student in New Mexico was grabbed at knifepoint and ordered into the back of a red two-door Honda with tinted windows. The assailant drove her to a deserted parking lot, and threatened to kill her unless she undressed and performed oral sex on him. He tied her ankles together with a shoelace, tied her wrists with a scarf, stuffed her panties into her mouth and pinned them there by tying another shoelace around her head. Clues in both cases led to a violent man with a long rap sheet who had no business being free. | “When No Wasn’t Enough…” I never had a boyfriend before Vic. We were in the marching band together and met in the summer of 2001. We became friends and soon started dating. Every day with him was a new experience for me. I fell in love. I was a girl who had chronic depression who finally found a feeling of love and acceptance. The poetry I normally wrote took a dramatic turn. Out of its once somber and morbid verses came words of love and dizzying happiness. It was a feeling that I would do anything to keep. I always told Vic that I would do anything for him. I told him I’d never stop loving him no matter what. I never thought he would take advantage of that. For four months we dated, and for four months I had a knot in my stomach. Vic was controlling. He didn’t like me being with my close friends, and he was always telling me to grow out my short spiky hair. For four months, I spent every weekend of my life with him. We were always at his house tucked away in his room. The few times we went out, it was because I planned something. I was blind. I didn’t see the way I caved in for him. My friends vanished, and my hair started to grow. I just wanted Vic to be happy with me. I wanted that feeling of being loved. I was obsessed with that feeling, and it blinded me to everything else. January 11, 2002, was a normal Friday. Midterms were to start the following Monday, so I was looking forward to a relaxing evening with my boyfriend before a weekend of cramming for exams. I was in between two medications for depression, and the combination was making me super-tired. I asked Vic if I could lie down for a while. He was doing his homework, so he didn’t mind. I woke up with a start a little while later. The room was dark, except for the glow of the television screen. I realized I had woken up because Vic was kissing my neck. I playfully tickled him to make him stop because that made me incredibly uncomfortable. He laughed a little, but he didn’t stop. Instead he grabbed my hands and climbed on top of me. I laughed at first, but I stopped quickly when I saw that his pants were unbuckled. I looked down and realized that he was working to pull mine away from my body. I pleaded with him to stop, but he told me that he was doing this for us and that I would thank him. I told him I didn’t want it, and he said that he could never fully love me unless he had all of me. I said no, but he told me to relax and that everything would be all right. I remember closing my eyes and squirming beneath him. I could hear his heavy breathing, so I tried to close my ears too. His kisses felt like acid on my lips, and no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t avoid feeling the sharp pain in my lower body. I kept whispering to him that he didn’t need to do this, that I didn’t want him to do this, but he didn’t listen to me. It never occurred to me to scream, or even to push him. I was frozen, and my mind went completely blank. I remember him shaking me after he finished because I had spaced out by then. All he said to me was, “You really didn’t want that, did you?” I was silent. I said nothing, and when he kissed me goodnight at my doorstep, I flinched. At the time, I didn’t understand the idea that rape was unwanted sexual contact in itself. I thought that because I didn’t try to scream or fight my boyfriend, it couldn’t be called rape. Now I know that it was rape the minute I said no. At the time all I knew was that I didn’t like what had happened, and three days later I broke up with Vic. I went back into therapy because after the break-up my depression level skyrocketed. When I finally explained to my therapist what had happened, she told me I had been raped. It took a while to sink in, but when it did, I got angry. When I saw Vic in class, I wouldn’t speak to him except to tell him I never wanted to see him again. He didn’t understand why we couldn’t be friends. I filed a police report, and he got a warning, but nothing really happened. Every day I would see him in band class, and it was like torture. When summer band camp started, things were awkward, but I told him we would have to be civil with each other. I couldn’t do it. Every time I saw him, I felt myself die all over again. I felt like there was nothing I could do to make the pain go away. Vic took every opportunity to remind me of it. Whenever he was in close range of me, he would jokingly throw a drum mallet at my butt, or grab me by the shoulders. One time, he even touched the side of my face to tell me how pretty my earrings were. By September, I had simply had enough. I filed for a protection from abuse order. I knew if I got the order, he would have to leave the band, and then I wouldn’t have to see him anymore. He perjured himself in court, telling the judge that he never raped me and saying that he was completely innocent. His attorney hurt me by making accusations I never thought possible, but the judge saw through it. The judge saw through the lies and granted me the order. I felt alive again. I won some of my freedom back because someone believed me. It hasn’t been an easy year. When I went back to school, everybody knew what had happened, and the boys were afraid of me. No one believed me. They started petitions to get me kicked out of the band, and they called me a slut when they saw me. They said that what happened to Vic wasn’t fair and that I deserved to pay. People were so quick to judge me. I told my story to my close friends and let everyone else believe what they wanted to believe. I lost a lot of people, but an experience like mine shows you who your true friends really are. I’ve always seen myself as a fighter. I used my public speaking ability to give a speech entitled “Rape: Hidden Epidemic” at high school speech and debate tournaments. I told my friends how they could stay safe and told them the most important thing I know: Always trust your intuition. Never do anything that makes you feel uneasy. I have spent my entire senior year of high school fighting for the one in four women and the one in six men who have experienced what I have experienced. I would not change the decisions I made, regardless of the people who now hate me. My respect for my beliefs and myself is far more important than my reputation. I urge you to follow your heart and trust your gut. As cliché as those things sound, they may one day save you from something terrible. Tomorrow I graduate from high school, and this time last year, I never would have believed that I could come this far. Always believe in yourself, fight for your rights, and trust your heart. |
