Update on Darkest Desires - TNRC: Call of Command

Hey All,

It’s been a while. I have updates for another post to help keep you in the loop coming soon.

Today I want to get into the anthology for charity Darkest Desires. Sure, I could have done this while it was for sale, however, now that it’s off of Amazon, I feel the need to get into the nitty gritty of the story I added to this particular selection.

If you truly know me past my creative titles, pen name alike, you’d have some understanding that my childhood to mid-twenties was a mess. There’s really no way to get around it without getting into it, however, so reader beware. This is a good place for you to remember yourself before getting in over your head.

This article’s content warnings (cw) are child abuse, child endangerment, narcissism, sexual abuse involving a minor, power dynamics, to name the top contenders.

While I didn’t stop to claim I was a victim, I can assure you becoming a survivor goes hand in hand with being vulnerable. Not weak. There’s a difference. Weakness, to me, was to be unable to continue forward. It meant that self pity was present and I was putting myself on hold. The “all is lost,” mindset wasn’t one that I could deal with having no one else to rely on back then. Being vulnerable, however, meant that I would have these moments of despair, but I had to be the one that changed these issues for myself. It was the only way out of whatever it was that happened. Believe me, there was a lot, and I wouldn’t be where I am now with my mental health if I didn’t decide to help myself.

Where did I start? Listen carefully as I am in no way knocking teen pregnancies. Weird to say, right? Well, when I was little, I didn’t know any better. I just thought a mommy and a daddy were together because they loved each other and that was that. I had no concept of age or how it applied to them or me, or even society, as many kids under five don’t. Even now, after all I’ve learned so far, if the couple has the right support system around them, anything is possible… I mean, my in-laws did it and their family turned out fine. Only, my parents, while they had a similar set up, they also had this huge social chip on their shoulder that someone, besides themselves, needed to pay for.

Guess who it was.

Me.

I’ll save you the sob story about all of the inner-workings of growing up within that narcissistic nightmare, but as we travel down the rabbit hole, I can tell you that the emotional trauma that I was put through as a kid continued to snowball with all types of people. It didn’t matter what their role was in my life or if I’d only see them once, the fact of the matter is, acting on impulse is self serving. My first encounter of this, outside of my home, was at a doctor’s office when I was five. Unfortunately, I can remember exactly what happened to the tee, despite how desperately my mind has worked to block the face of my first molester.

There have been so many ways I’ve tried to make sense of what happened over the years but the truth of the matter is there is no reason to (repetitively) thrust one’s finger into and out of a child. None. Unfortunately, those that fall within the disconnect of understanding what is unjust behavior, typically prey on those that are powerless. I was powerless. I didn’t have the support to know that I could turn to my mother who was holding me in place at the time, that speaking up for myself was allowed. Instead, I endured the punishment, the stimulation at the apex of my thighs and more than I could have imagined since. It was the build up and breakdown all in one, and somehow the release, because there was one, crashed through me. It stripped me of all sorts of things that I didn’t know could be mine, but the one thing it took, that hurt more than anything else, was my ability to trust.

From there, the school I was at had us watch a movie about sexual predators, and disturbingly, I felt no fear. Instead, I felt nothing at all, that is, until the children in class went outside, sat in a circle with their legs wide open and began touching each other. The next thing I lost were the friends I thought I had when I let an adult know. From there, I fully accepted that I would be a loner, even though I didn’t know the concept back then. I guess that’s the price you pay for trying to protect yourself, and others for that matter.

Our family moved a lot so I didn’t have to deal with people I outed for long. What I did have to deal with was manipulation within the family unit. If I wouldn’t comply, I got blamed for their decisions. I got to be the bad kid. The first time I was flashed, I thought there was a mutation growing on one of them. I had no idea it was a dick, and even then, how would I? I was six and a girl. Playing “Doctor” was yet another problem. I’d pump the brakes so hard, just to get away from people, but the position of power was to do as one pleased to my body and expect the same for theirs, no matter if they were related. Let’s just say, I spent a lot of time being beaten for not complying, but those simple, thoughtless touches, those were the worst.

A lot had happened by the time I became nine; too much for the relevance of this post, but even a schoolmate of mine tried to coax me into letting him touch me. It wouldn’t have even happened if my mom wasn’t so desperate to have friends. Yes, that comes as a slap in the face, but hear me out. It’s one thing to have good friends, ones that have the same values as said person, but when desperation is involved, values were usually the first need booted from the list. The family she left us with lived in some duplex across town. They were friendly with the neighbors upstairs and watched the kid on the regular while the parents worked. Back then, playing house with the kids was an actual reality having access to a completely empty upstairs apartment. The boy played the father, the girl that lived below them played the daughter, leaving me as this role of a mother that I couldn’t quite understand. What I knew was not motherly and so I let the boy boss me around. It quickly turned from a game where we were playing with the other girl to where the boy had me pinned under him in his parent’s bed feeling me up like I was a goddamn teenager.

My surprise kept me still. I let him do whatever he was doing because by that time in my life, not only did I not have a voice or a backbone by then, but I started to accept that this was the only care I would be getting, where someone was forcing themselves upon me.

This behavior kept its pace until we moved, again.

While forceful molestation began to slow, keeping my secrets, not looking for help - because there wasn’t any for me specifically, and further narcissistic behaviors throughout my upbringing ramped up. I can only now determine that it was because my parents bought a house and skeletons were dangerous. The stories they made up were horrendous. It was harder still to watch them bend over backwards for legitimately anyone else for a chance to be on their “friends list” before even that was a thing. They had no problem taking me out at the knees, so to speak, but at the time, I took it. I figured it was all I was going to be afforded, which meant I could not possibly be worthy of anything else.

It caused a lot of pain quietly. As weird as it sounds, body language was taken into account. I became submissive from middle school through high school, only pressing my limits with the friends I made. They were good people, despite not having the reputations my parents wanted to be involved with. I didn’t pick people to be friends with that fit within their small spectrum, mostly because they saw no social gain. I wasn’t popular, I was nice. I didn’t have money, I had values. I didn’t live for drama, I was quiet… and people there didn’t want me for it. The people I did make friends with though, they were and still quietly are everything. Leave it to power to ruin that. I still lived with my parents through high school, and if I wanted a “better life” which didn’t resort to what I already knew they could do, I would ditch my friends. Breaking up with my best friend, the one that was with me through thick and thin, was the hardest thing for me to do.

Did it fix anything at home?

No.

It just gave them more power. Dating was a travesty. Magically, every sexual threat now came from the nervous temptress I was apparently. Boys were not to be trusted, but I was already climbing that mountain. I was so out of my element with understanding motives that if the date didn’t try something with me that I was somehow unwanted. I couldn’t understand simple requests to go out for coffee, or what a “hello” would entail in other cultures. I didn’t know that going out wasn’t hooking up, or when it should be. I basically just let people decide what to do with me and went on my way. That’s not to say I was the town whore either. I was so reserved that I wound up killing the mood before it got to develop.

Truthfully, this power struggle waged war on me far after I had even gotten married and had kids. It took me thirty years to allow myself to know that I deserved better. It took me thirty years to decide that I didn’t need to keep going through this, that I wasn’t alone, that people wanted to be there for me. It took me that long to know that I could work on letting it go.

…And what does any of this have to do with the story I submitted for the Darkest Desires anthology?

Everything, actually.

For the last three years, I’ve been working with online library apps. I’ve noticed the desire in how they want their novels written and with practice, have become better at the well developed novel which means the lengths of the stories can be on the heavier side. This anthology expected a certain word count, as they do for the rest of their projects, of which was a challenge for me. Usually, I have the ability to really flesh a story out. This time, I did not.

My story, Chain of Command, is just a glimpse into the above’s impulsive nature. The theme, while dark, also struggled with the concept of power struggles by use of sexual situations. There are plenty of reasons why the power struggle was brought into this equation but for the most part, I wanted the protagonist, Gemma, to realize herself, the way I couldn’t while going through said situations as they were. While I was not involved with a person of the same significance as the antagonists, Tristan is, a lot of the struggles for communication and emotional status through physical contact was something I truly wanted to bring to light here.

Now that the anthology has run its course and has been returned to all of the individual authors, I will be revisiting this to tell it the way I believe it should have been in the first place. These characters and their struggles will become a part of a new book that is currently being outlined for that will most likely be published with GoodNovel, to keep the (possible) series intact.

If you are at all interested in the book as it is, I only have one in print. I will be posting information about it on my TikTok as I get time to do so.

Also, if you did take time to read through some of my hardships and have made it to the end of this post, thank you for reading.

Until next time,

Colla Triti / LostInQueue