This is a pretty old story, to me. It happened when I was 17, in the mid 2000’s.

I had a great girlfriend. She was younger than me, and as I was set to graduate high school that year, my girlfriend’s stepdad told us when we started dating that he would force a break up once I graduated. We continued dating during that school year, nonetheless. My girlfriend and I had a notebook that we would write to each other in and pass between classes. We were in a class together that would be going out of town for a few days and would be staying in a hotel. We briefly discussed losing our virginities to each other during the trip. However, I wanted to go to college and perhaps go to law school someday. I told her I didn’t want to have sex out of fear of getting her pregnant. She understood.

She went on a camping trip, and her stepdad went through her backpack and found a notebook entry she never gave me, which mentioned the idea of having sex during the trip. He called me, angrily, telling me that he confronted her about the notebook over the phone and she threatened to run away. I explained to him that I had already declined the idea, and he respected that. I agreed to talk her out of running away, which allowed him to pick her up. They had a good talk on the way home, and everything seemed to be okay.

My girlfriend later said even though I didn’t want to have intercourse, she still wanted to try other things. She wanted to make me have an orgasm, she said. So I agreed to let her try performing oral sex on me sometime. We weren’t sure how or when, as we weren’t ever really afforded time in private. We went to a movie one night, and my dad called and asked me to check on our dogs after the movie. We stopped at my house on the way home. And that’s when the act was attempted, briefly. With this being both of our first sexual experiences, we were already somewhat nervous and when we thought we saw headlights outside the house, we stopped. The fear of being caught ruined the mood, pretty much. I can’t say I really enjoyed it. But more about that in a bit.

Later that night, my phone rang. I let it go to voicemail. It was her stepdad, angry. He had gone through her messages and found out what happened. She was threatening to harm herself because he had decided to force the break up right then and there. I later spoke to him and asked to talk her down. He would not allow it and had her commited to a mental institution. She later told me they had her rape-kitted to make sure that sexual intercouse had not happened. He told me this is how he knew we had not had sex, but that he was sure I had enjoyed every minute of what I got. I found that statement to be quite perverse. I told him, no, I hadn’t enjoyed it. Or at least I think I did.

My girlfriend’s absence from school did not go unnoticed. As some people found out where she was, questions began to rise about what happened. Her friends, angry at me, took it upon themselves to answer those questions. The rumor was that I raped my girlfriend and she attempted suicide after. 2 of her friends went to the principal and said I was stalking them, as if they were my next targets. One of those girls, I rarely saw in school. The other girl (the one who hatched the plot to have me pinned as a rapist) used the fact that I usually walked past her as I went into the building for 2nd Period (I didn’t have a 1st Period) as evidence of her claim that I purposefully used that entrance so I could “stalk her”. The principal advised me to stay as far away from these girls as possible. I got the impression he did not believe I was the type of person they were saying I was, but he didn’t want to give them any more ammunition.

One day, the teacher of the class that was going out of town pulled me into his office and told me my girlfriend’s parents told them what we were planning to do in the hotel. I didn’t bother explaining that we had long decided against doing that. What was the point. Once my girlfriend returned to school, her parents had already spread the word to teachers and parents about me. My girlfriend did her best to kill the rape rumors. Her friends acted like nothing ever happened and attempted to be my friend again.

My girlfriend told me her parents had attempted to get a private investigator to pin some sort of charges on me. The private investigator said the messages themselves showed the act was consensual, and even though I would be 18 soon, age was not a factor in this case. The school officials were instructed by her parents to keep us apart. We were limited to text messages and were able to occasionally see each other when she went out with friends. Her stepdad found out about one of those visits, a date to the movies. He yelled at me over the phone he was going to come assault me at my place of work. He never showed up. He did contact my father, however. And that’s how I ended up briefly homeless, as my father could not believe I was still trying to see this girl despite all the trouble I nearly got in.

Anyways, even though I was mostly vindicated, the damage had already been done. I was denied an award that would have helped me get a better choice of college. I lost what could have been a good relationship. My now ex-girlfriend went through hell over something I probably should have said no thanks to, and I feel guilt for that. She is doing good now, and I’m glad this didn’t have any long lasting effects on her, personally.

The effects are still there for me, though, and I’m afraid. I have been wanting to finish my teaching degree for some time. I’m afraid that if I go for it, and try to get a teaching job, all this will resurface. Some people might try to say I think that guy raped a girl, or that I’m automatically perverted because I did engage in a sexual act with a girl younger than me (although I was a minor, myself). I have a girlfriend now, she’s 2 years younger than me, just like before. But we’re adults. Surely no one would judge that. Or would they.