"The Promise"
When I was a young teenager, my best friend at the time came to me and told me that her uncle was “doing things” to her he should not be doing. She made me promise not to tell anyone. She said it started when she was walking to the market to buy sweets when her uncle, who is around 50 years old, came up to her and offered to buy her candy. He then took her home and when her father was taking a shower and mother was cooking dinner he took advantage of the situation and grabbed and forced her to dark corners and touched her chest. When her parents were gone he showed her pornography and spoke to her sexually. This behavior of her uncle increased day by day. One day when no one else was at home, her uncle took this as an opportunity and sexually harassed her by holding her tight in the arms and not letting her go. Fortunately, she managed to escape. After listening to her I was scared about what had happened and didn’t know who to turn to. She made me promise not to tell anyone, but even at 14, I knew that was a promise I could not keep it to myself. That night when she told me her story at least a million times I have asked myself that question that hunted and terrified me, the question that lurked in every corner of my mind “Should I tell? Should I tell someone that one of my best friends is being abused her own uncle? Should I tell someone that he almost raped her? That question just brought more questions in my mind and I couldn’t sleep that night. As a young girl, my world was turned upside down because of what had been done to my friend. I then realized that telling my mom was the best thing I could do at that time. The next early morning I told my mother everything that my friend went through. My mother then confronted the man. One day when she was in the basement and he followed her down there. She screamed at the top of her lungs and her mother heard her. This brought to light about what was happening. After that he was taken to the police station and he never touched her again.
