Shattered: Part 1

“Hey, faggot. You wanna suck my dick?”

You are never prepared when you are about to be attacked. There’s no ominous music or dramatic foreshadowing. It just happens suddenly, like an earthquake. It was just past dark when the two men approached me in the park. I had just come from Georgetown, where I had bought a rare import CD for a lot of money. I had seen the two of them swarming around the area when it was bright and sunny on my way to Georgetown, and they had given off a bad vibe, but it was easily to ignore when old blue-haired ladies walked their designer dogs and a pick-up game of basketball was taking place in the waning sunshine. I mostly avoided the park at night. But it was quickest way to the bus stop.


My survival instinct kicked in. I knew that they were up to no good. So I started to walk around them. They had become faceless obstacles I had to avoid, not human beings.

“Now, hold on son, I asked you a question.”

One of them circled behind me. I walked faster, but not before he could grab me. You know those old Batman series in the 60s, when fights would break out between the evil doers and the caped crusaders, that were punctuated with cartoon BAMs and ZINGs? That’s what it was like, being hit by the two of them. I might have been punched twice or ten times, I can’t be sure. White flashes, like blank thought bubbles, filled my vision. I don’t even think I realized I was being hit. When the pummeling was over, I was on the ground, looking up at their faces, the distant yellow streetlights, and the sky. I heard the swoosh of cars on street, cars that were too far away to see what had happened. The two guys leaned over me, inspecting their handiwork.

The gravity of the situation struck me. I remember thinking that I did not want be at their mercy, no matter what. I didn’t care whether I was hit or not; I just had to get away. I rolled away from them and started yelling, as loud as my voice would go. I somehow managed to stand up and started screaming like a banshee, and ran as fast as I could. Peripherally, I saw one of them start to follow me, but as I was in the open—and yelling--he must have stopped. I ran until all was blurred.

I had no idea of what those two guys were up to. Forced sex? Robbery? Or just the thrill of being vicious. It was only when I’d slowed down and overshot my bus stop that I realized that I was bleeding. My knee was banged up, my head throbbed, and my hand was gashed. And I started to feel stupid. Really, really stupid. I should have known better. I began to notice people walking on the street, looking at me. By this time, I had made it to Lambda Rising, on Connecticut Avenue.

I decided to go in, since it was a safe space, and call the police from there. And that’s when I cracked. Everything began to hurt. My hand stung. And the violation I had felt at the hands of strangers, the firsthand glimpse of evil. I’d been called ‘fag’ before. But this was different. There's an episode on the great HBO series, Six Feet Under, where David Fisher (Michael C. Hall) is terrorized by a hitchhiker who forces him to do terrible things, under a gun. David escapes, but the damage is done. He sees the hitchhiker in every stranger. I began to see the world as my enemy.

Before I stepped into Lambda Rising, I noticed that I was still holding the bag with import CD. I opened it up. The jewel case was shattered, the disc ruined.

Addendum: Please note that this event occurred a couple of years ago; part 2 will deal with how I managed to overcome the damage caused by the incident.