Hi,
I don’t know you. But I’m sure you’ve heard about me. I’m the girl before you, I’m the one he was crying about in his bedroom to you, the one you bonded with him over. I don’t know what he’s told you, but I’m sure it doesn’t paint me in a very flattering light. He’s probabaly accused me of being a psycho, a liar, a slut. He said those things and far worse to my face, so I’m not upset he’s told you. I don’t know you. But I’m worried for you.
I want so desperately to find out who you are, to run up to you and grab you away from him. Because he’s not what he seems.
He is the perfect storybook villain, with a poisoned apple at the ready, and cutting words to slit your throat. He probabaly told you how crazy I am, without mentioning he used to gaslight me until I sobbed, convinced me I was weak, tiring person. He twisted my self image until I apologised for breathing, I cried more than I slept and I still swore he was a great guy. You understand this I’m sure, he has money and a charming smile and plays the vulnerable victim card really well, he fooled me into believeing he was the good guy that protects you.
He fooled me.
Where was that good guy when he took advantage of my unconscious body, pressing me into the mattress and leaving blood streaks in my underwear. Where was that guy when he shoved my face into the pillow as I drifted in and out of the reality and hurt me in ways I can’t forget.
That’s why I’m so worried for you, because yes it’s been a year since I finally ended things, over a year even, but I have a doctors appointment on Thursday to discuss the ongoing anxiety I feel when I see a car like his, the depression I sink into when I panic at a boys touch, the loneliness I feel inside my own skin.
I don’t know you. But you’re a person, and you don’t deserve to feel the way I did. I do. I bet you wouldn’t believe me, maybe not now, when his claws are only just deep enough to scratch your skin. His words still mostly sound like compliments, he hasn’t cut you off from speaking to your friends yet, he hasn’t told you what to wear, or drink, or to eat less because you’re looking a little chubby yet. He hasn’t done these things yet, and I’m sat here miles away from you crying over the opportunity he has to do them.
If I had gone through with telling the police, maybe you wouldn’t be there now, rubbing his shoulders like a king. If my friends had believed me, and not laughed in my face saying ‘he’s too nice though, are you sure that happened?’, maybe I wouldn’t feel a need to keep boys at an arms length. If my mum had believed me, believed that the boy who brought her flowers raped me so many times I didn’t know what actual consensual sex was, maybe I wouldn’t still be seeing a counsellor.
But anyway, I hope you never have to read this. I hope you never go on this website writing your own letter to that man and stumble across this letter intended for you as a warning, I really hope you don’t. As much as I will never be able to see him as anything but the scabby hands and yellow teeth in my nightmares, I hope he treats you well. Maybe instead of putting you down he will lift you up, he will just tuck you in bed after a night out, he will just keep his small penis to himself. But if you do read this, I’m so sorry I didn’t speak up sooner, I’m sorry I haven’t come to you in person, I’m sorry you fell for his act too.
If he treats you badly in any way once, call him out on it, if he does it twice? Leave.
God knows I should have done.
All my best,
A x
