My cousin who is like a girl…but better

My cousin had a girl tell him that once and he decided to take it as a compliment. Some people would have been offended, but it was a compliment and a very fitting one for him. He is one of those guys who can just hang out and talk for hours. He’s always been an excellent listener and seemed to be righteous (sans religious connotation). He was known for standing up to bullies and saving other kids from getting their lunch money stolen.

He and I were very close. I shared everything with him. I told him about Zac when I was 18. He was the second family member I told. My cousin who is like a girl but better, was fairly supportive and mostly just listened. He agreed that Zac was a terrible person, but that was it. He didn’t say anything to Zac or anyone else. I had asked him to let me tell our family in my own time in my own way when and if I was comfortable enough to do so, so I can understand his silence. What I never understood was his desire to continue hanging out with Zac after he knew. If he had told me that someone in our family molested and raped him, I would want nothing to do with that person. I would stay as far from them as I could and if they asked why I would have told them.

After I told the rest of the family, I told my cousin who is like a girl but better, that he was free to tell anyone and everyone, since silence only benefits the abuser. He agreed that made sense and again mentioned what a slime Zac was. He then proceeded to tell me that Zac had shown him kiddie porn and described what he liked and which age group was his favorite. We talked about how disgusting that was...but then I heard he was still hanging out with him. I decided to ignore it. For years I have waited for people to decide on their own that Zac wasn't worth their time. For years I waited in vain.

When Zac tried to molest me after my aunt died, it was this cousin who put his body between me and Zac and told him that if he ever touched me he would kill him. (Pedestals are Dangerous, People Tend to Fall Off of Them)

Eventually, this cousin developed a crush on one of Zac's girlfriends and when he found out that Zac was cheating on her he told her. He also threatened to go to the FBI about the kiddie porn. He then ended his friendship with Zac. Over a girl he had a crush on. That stung a little, but at least he was done with Zac and that was good for everyone. There was one instance, a year later, when he and his brother were living together and Zac came to their party, but my cousin said that was because Zac was friends with his brother and assured me he still hated that creep.

Fast forward a few years.

I moved back to the city from the country and am invited to my cousin's wedding. I couldn't be happier for him. When I get to the church I suddenly start to wonder if Zac would be there. My cousin hated him, but Zac was family and this was a wedding so I wasn't sure. I had brought a friend as my plus one and she promised to stay by my side if Zac appeared. He did appear....in the very front of the church. He was the best man.

How did this happen? My cousin chose this pedophile rapist over his own brother to be his best man? What happened to the hate? Apparently, when he got over his crush he also decided to forgive Zac and pretend to me that he still hated him. That's seriously messed up in my opinion. It lead me to believe that my cousin cared more about getting his dick wet than having actual principles...which sounded a lot like Zac to me, so maybe they should be besties.

Their friendship had been going on the whole time I was away in the country, but I knew nothing of it because I had blocked Zac on facebook and so I didn't see the comments or the pictures.

I didn't say anything to my cousin then. I didn't want to ruin his special day...and after...I wasn't really sure what to say. There was no explanation that he could give that would have made that ok to me. Then my cousin had a baby shower...thinking a baby shower was the last way Zac would want to spend his time, I didn't think he would be there until we were at the park and one of my aunts warned me that he was in fact coming. Why didn't my cousin warn me? Why didn't he care about my feelings? Why didn't he care that he was putting me in danger and at the very least triggering me? Why didn't he consider that I might not want my son around this monster who molested me as a child? Why didn't he warn me so that I could decide before hand how to handle it? I hate being invited to events that Zac is also invited to, but at least EVERYONE else tells me. It is heartbreaking that this cousin, with whom I was so close and actually saved me one night, didn't care enough to warn me. My feelings didn't enter his head at all, or if they did, he dismissed them as so unimportant that he couldn't even give me a simple heads up.

Then my cousin's daughter had a birthday party. I excitedly RSVPed yes immediately, and then got a text from my boyfriend. "I saw you RSVPed to your cousin's daughter's birthday party....is Zac going to be there?" I switched it from "going" to "interested" and decided to check back later. I would have to temporarily unblock Zac to see, so I waited until two weeks or so before the party and checked. He was going. This was the last straw for me and I posted on the event page, explaining why I couldn't come. This is standard practice and you see comments all the time about how people can't make it due to being out of town or whatever, so I decided to let everyone know why I couldn't make it. I warned my cousin first, I told him I was going to post something that would potentially upset him and that it was about Zac. He told me to "do whatcha gotta do". So I did.

As I mentioned in my post: Everyone Has a Story...Too Many Are Like Mine, all that came of it was an argument with his wife about how I ruined their daughter's birthday (by posting my RSVP on a Facebook event page the child couldn't read weeks before the party) and that I should have talked to her privately (which I would have done if I had known my cousin hadn't already warned her about how dangerous Zac was - that is something I feel a husband should do, especially if his wife was also a rape victim and he was bringing a rapist around her and their daughter...a rapist who was also a pedophile).

I wanted to announce the reason I wasn't coming publicly for two reasons: Keeping rape private supports the rapist. I wanted everyone at that party to know who he was and what he did to me. I wanted them to know both because I am sick of him getting to live his life like he didn't molest and rape me for 13 years and also because it was a child's birthday party for Christ's sake. It is dangerous to invite a pedophile to a child's birthday and not warn the other parents.

Then my cousin's wife followed it up with that status update (you can read it in the other post mentioned above) about how she wasn't being ignorant or wrong and just trying to survive because she had also been raped in her past. That makes no sense to me. I believe that if you have been raped you wouldn't tell another rape victim to keep it private and you wouldn't choose to keep associating with her rapist. Unfortunately, a lot of rape victims aren't quite as self aware or as mature as I am, so she chose to support my rapist and he supported her by liking her post about how she wasn't a bad person for wanting him around. I still don't understand how it is "survival" for a rape victim to want to be around another rapist and keep his actions a secret...sounds like the opposite of survival to me unless he was threatening to kill her otherwise.

I've tried to talk to my cousin since then, both privately and publicly, and he refuses to say anything on the matter except that I am pissing him off. I am pissing HIM off. I don't know whether to laugh or cry. He likes to get on my facebook page and argue with me about politics as a way to poke at me passive-aggressively, but refuses to speak to me about his choice to support my rapist....but like I said before....there is really nothing he can say to make me understand. There are two options as I see it. Either he has such low self-esteem that he will be friends with anyone who gives him the time of day...or he just really truly doesn't give a shit about anything except for what makes him happy in that moment...Both of which explain why he is not only friends with my rapist, but also another abuser who hurt someone else he claimed to love.