LIBERATE

A’s Story
A’s story begins in Europe, on a Duke sponsored research project last summer. She was
the only Duke undergraduate student there with their research team, which included
a doctor from Duke Medicine. During a cultural festival, A, the doctor, and a few other
friends went to participate in the festivities—everyone was drunk, and the crowds
were so big that A got separated from the people she went out with. As she were trying
to make her way back to their friends, two local men groped her. She was shaken and
afraid, and when she finally found everyone, she insisted on going home. When they
questioned her, she told them what happened. Her European project partner didn’t believe
her, saying that she was being overly sensitive and that the men hadn’t meant any
harm. However, the doctor from her team believed her and insisted that the group should
accompany her home. She was relieved and grateful for his support, and they went back
home. When the group began to drink more, she thought, “Fuck it,” and got really, really
drunk. She wanted an escape from what had happened earlier. She doesn’t remember
much from the rest of the night, but later on began to remember flashes of the doctor
kissing her on the forehead in a hotel room later that night —but she dismissed those
memories, shaking them off.
A week later, the doctor asked her to hang out. She said yes, remembering his kindness
during the festival and nervous-excited to date an older man. They began seeing each,
and things were shiny, new, bubbly in the way that new relationships are. They kept in
touch other even after returning to Duke, but as the relationship progressed, A noticed
some things about the doctor that made her uncomfortable: he was very pushy, physically.
As their relationship became more physically intimate, she began to feel as though he
was only interested in his own sexual satisfaction, and not in her as a person. They would
have sex, and then he would sleep on the floor, saying he couldn’t sleep next to people.
He began to go into depressive and full of rage, and she would urge him to consider his
mental health. But when she brought up her concerns, he claimed he knew what he was
doing. The age differential led her to accept what he said. One night, she told him she
was having a rough time, and he invited her over to his apartment. He rolled a joint, and
told her they would share it, but kept pushing it onto her, insisting she smoke more. She
got so high she couldn’t move, uncomfortably high. He ignored her discomfort for two
hours and then when she was falling asleep, the doctor took the opportunity to force
himself on her, violating her body in new and painful ways.
Afterwards, A began to distance herself from the doctor. He started gas-lighting her,
telling her that she would fail in her career, that he was sleeping with other people anyways,
that he was horrified by her and attracted to her at the same time. When she finally
told him she wasn’t interested in hanging out with him anymore over dinner, with no
explanation he dragged her to the rooftop of the building they were dining in, telling her
there that she would regret leaving him, that she was the vindictive and defensive one.
Even after she cut off contact, he kept texting her – to insult her, to demean her, and
most often, to ask where she was.