Consent

Yes. 

Yes, you caught my eye February morning

            After swim practice, chlorine scented damp hair, eyes loaded with exhaustion. And fire.
It was incredibly hot, scorching.

Yes, I asked for your number on the same day.
Right when school ended and the last bell sounded, where I anxiously waited at the
school entrance where you parked your car.

Yes, we started dating, exactly a week after that encounter.
Where fireworks bloomed after you sent the first text and I replied, heart high on naivety
and some. We conversed hours in the night as stars tutted happily as they came and left.

Yes, I believed we were in love, downright enamored.
My cheeks numbed and teeth hurting, but my smile resisted until the very end because
you looked at me as I had looked at you. Laugh lines scarred on my dimples because I couldn’t
forget you chose me. 

Yes, I muttered on the first night.
Just you and me, us. The stars were even absent but the moon shone upon you,
illuminating the toned back of yours, catching scruffs of your hair in the moonbeam’s tracks. I
was falling all over again but you caught me before my breath did. 

Must you have gone any further than that?

No, I did not allow for a second time.
You offered me a drink when I came over, which I thought nothing of. And I thought of
nothing else as the most frightening wave of a cape of darkness expanded over my limp body.

No, not the third time either.
When you told me to wait by your car -- the same one I waited by in the past. And
instead of the apology, I was met with a bizarre impact to my temple before you did it, right
there. Right in your car.

No, that was not the last time.
Of the assaults I try so hard to erase, they started to blur into a creature so demonic, so
horrifying, so stupidly frightening before I realized, the monster was you.

No, my feminism is no longer for you to steal.

I revoke you of your privilege and I denounce your pleas of trust.

Yes, consent is only mine to give

Deanna Hu is 17 years old rising senior attending Del Norte High School in San Diego, California. When she is not writing, she enjoys swimming, tennis, and reading a good fantasy book. She is currently creating her writing portfolio for university.