Hook Shot (Hoops 3)

“It was my father who hurt me,” she says, and even though it’s not much above a whisper, it reverberates in the basement like a gong. “Do you have any idea how long it took me to say that? To admit it?”

I turn from the steps and stare at her, waiting for more. Needing to know someone got past this and could maybe give me a blueprint to do the same.

“It has taken my whole life,” she says, and I see some of the weariness in her eyes behind the strength. “For a long time, I didn’t even remember. They say God doesn’t put more on you than you can bear. Sometimes, neither does your mind. That’s self-preservation. The mind says, oh, she’s not ready for this, and hides it from us.”

She stacks the food and paper products neatly to the side on the table and sits in one of the chairs pulled into a small circle.

“But we can only hide or run for so long before the shit starts to show.” She laughs lightly. “Pardon my French in church, but somehow, I think God will excuse me. The things our minds do to protect us from unspeakable trauma may work for a long time, for years in some cases, and then one day, they just stop working. We deal or don’t. And if we don’t . . .”

Her words carry a warning—an urging to choose deal instead of don’t.

I remember huddling in Chase’s shower sobbing after perfectly good sex. I see my body curled into a ball, fetal, at the base of a hand-drawn tree in my closet. I smell the hair burning, the smoke curling around my memories. My peace of mind, up in flames.

Are you leaking, Lo?

Drip. Drip. Drip.

“I don’t know why now,” I say, sudden and without any context, but she seems to understand. “I’ve been fine. For years, I’ve been fine.”

“I was fine, too,” she says. “I’m Marsha, by the way.”

“Lotus,” I offer.

“Nice to meet you, Lotus. I’m a survivor, but also a licensed therapist. I run this support group for survivors of childhood sexual abuse,” she says. “So what brought you here tonight?”

“I‘ve been having some, uh . . . issues with sex. Things I’ve never dealt with before.”

“That’s not surprising. It’s where the injury took place, so for many of us, for most of us, our sexuality is affected. It is the thing that was deeply violated.”

“I thought I’d escaped all that. I’ve had sex for years and been okay. I mean, I put sex in a category, but I enjoyed it.”

“What was this category?” she asks, eyeing me closely. “Articulate it for me.”

“Sex was for my pleasure,” I say, swallowing hard, my mouth suddenly dry. “Do you mind if I . . .” I wave my hand at a line of water bottles on the table.

“Sure.” Marsha nods to one of the chairs in the small circle. “Have a seat, too.”

I hesitate. We’re talking, but I still feel like I could make my escape if I need to. Sitting down indicates we might be here for a while. And I’m not sure I want to be here much longer, but I grab a water and sit down. When I take the seat, Marsha smiles, but does a decent job hiding her satisfaction.

“So sex was for your pleasure,” Marsha says, picking up where I left off. “Sounds good so far.”

“It was.” I laugh, but

it holds no real humor. “I know a lot of survivors have trouble with sex, but I’ve always enjoyed it.”

“Good for you, and yes. You’re right. I, for example, didn’t have my first orgasm until I was thirty-three.”

My mouth is hanging open, and I know it’s rude and insensitive, but damn. I can’t imagine. “Not even . . . touching yourself?”

“Masturbation was a big part of my recovery,” she says, her eyes never wavering while she shares such sensitive information. “I couldn’t experience pleasure with someone else’s hand. I had to feel safe with my own first.”

She tilts her head and winks. “Don’t worry. With a lot of therapy, hard work, and a very patient partner, things are much better in that department now,” she says. “A lot of relationships don’t survive the recovery process because we need so much control, and our partners can’t take it. Control related to our triggers, to the effects of our trauma. Sex requires a lot of trust. We forget how much sometimes—forget the magnitude of sharing ourselves that way.”

“I never had trouble trusting someone else with my body,” I say, frowning, wondering if something is wrong with me, with the way I processed everything. “But I could never trust them with anything else. No real . . . intimacy, I guess. I made sure they knew it was just sex. I’ve never allowed myself to feel anything else, but lately, that hasn’t been satisfying.”

“Part of healthy sexuality is knowing you are loveable and worthy even if you don’t offer yourself sexually,” Marsha says. “There can’t be real intimacy without some love or affection. If you blocked those completely, sex may have started to feel . . . transactional or purely a physical release.”

Marsha offers a one-sided grin. “If we have some time together, I’m sure we can dig around and figure out what you’ve done to survive. That’s all any of us do. We find ways to regain, or at least, to feel that we regain the control that was taken from us. We were helpless and are constantly looking for ways to make sure we’re not in that position again. Some people become hypersexual. Some can’t have sex at all.”