I Choose Love

There must have been thousands standing in the rain that day. But none seemed to care. It was worth it. It had to be. She looked through the crowd and looked for familiar faces. There weren’t any. And while that might disappoint or frustrate her in almost any other situation, in this one it made her feel empowered. There was no way to discern who was with who, everyone was jammed together, standing shoulder to shoulder their eyes full of anger and hope, their smiles filled with excitement and determination, their bodies rigid in stance, relentless, never willing to back down. She smiled when her eyes met that of another woman. The woman smiled back and turned away.

“We choose love!” A random voice yelled from the crowd and others began to join. “We choose love! We choose love!”

She smiled as her voice joined thousands of others. She could feel tears form in her eyes. What a perfect phrase, she thought. It encompassed all of her current beliefs and hopes for the future. Surely things could only get better from here? They’d reached the worst of it, hadn’t they?

She continued shouting the words, chanting with the people around her. She could feel the strength, energy and love within and around her. She closed her eyes and pictured all of the voices like particles of dust, banding together to form the body of a fierce dragon, flying above them, protecting them from the evils they were tired of battling day in and day out.

She could recall each instance that brought her there. Each time her bosses, supervisors or coworkers would take her work on as their own, leaving her behind as they climbed the ladder to supposed success. The hundreds of times she’d been cat called like an object for simply walking down the street or entering a room. Or the times men had approached her to buy her a drink and the anger she’d faced when she declined. Or the times a few had followed her leaving the bar. Never home, thankfully, but long enough for her to feel scared and unsafe.

Somehow, despite her desire not to, she could dig down and still feel how it felt at the exact moments when she’d caught a man staring at her as though she were something to conquer, to own, to dominate - how uncomfortable it had made her, how she’d try to ignore them but turn to see them still staring several minutes, sometimes hours later. The queasiness, the sense of not feeling safe, the anxiety of what to say should he attempt to engage with her.

She could remember the time she’d walked down the street with her five year old daughter, innocently through the neighborhood, when they’d passed a home with a few male teenagers on the front step. She could hear the words, “Hey girls! Wanna see my dick?” as though it had just happened yesterday. His tone, the pitch of a not-quite-an-adult-yet voice, and the laughter from them all afterward. She could recall the feeling of wanting to confront him, call him on his bad behavior, to set a good example for her daughter. But what if he were to get angry? What if he were to attack her? What if he were to threaten her and say worse things? Was that in fact setting a good example for her daughter? What if she couldn’t protect her?

She could recall trying to leave her ex - how he had threatened her. How he would play the victim, threaten to commit suicide and others would judge her for breaking his heart. And so she’d stayed. He’d be “good” for a short while, but soon after the abuse would start again. Others would blame her, as though she was the bad one for not making him happy enough, for not fixing him and making him feel good.

She could recall when she’d been a teenager, she’d discovered she was pregnant and her boyfriend broke up with her. And then he’d told everyone she was faking the pregnancy to trap him. She could remember the feel of the paper gown on her naked skin, and the paper cover on the bed when the doctor examined her, and helped her deal with the matter. She could remember going home, alone, locking herself in her room and listening to music to try and drown out the pain, the hurt, the anger.

She could remember the time she told her boyfriend why she was nervous after their first time having sex; that she’d been raped when she was younger. And his anger and sense of betrayal because he hadn’t in fact been her first.

She could remember her boyfriend asking her for a blow job, which she’d never given before. She’d said no and he seemed respectful, but then broke up with her. Over the next few months, boys would stop her in the hallway and ask her for a blowjob and laugh as though it were a long running joke between friends.

She could remember making a pact with her best friend not to have sex until they were 18, but at a party things went too far with a boy and he fingered her. She hadn’t wanted to, but had been afraid to say no. When she’d told her friend, she’d called her a slut and stopped talking to her.

She could recall when she’d been in kindergarten and a certain boy would lie next to her every time it was quiet time. He’d made her feel unsafe and she’d told the teacher but the teacher chalked it up as the boy having a crush on her. It wasn’t too long before the boy started touching her in ways that made her feel worse, but she hadn’t known it was wrong. She couldn’t have even articulated what was happening to her, so she’d said nothing.

The tears rolled down her face as the chanting coming to a close: “We choose love!” She opened her eyes to all of the screaming faces, filled with hope, faith and confidence. She could feel herself absorbing the energy and relishing in it. It felt good to be among those who were as fed up and done with the way things were as she was. She was ready to be included, thought of, taken seriously, to matter, be worthy and loved.

“I choose love,” she whispered to herself as she wiped the tears from her face. She felt something in her hand and turned to see a strange woman’s hand in her own. She too had tears on her face. She smiled at her and squeezed her hand. “I choose love,” she repeated, and the woman let go, turning her attention away.

Ⓒ June 2019. Beki Lantos. All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, or transmitted in any form by any means without prior written permission of the author.