Breast Defense

I'm not certain how I can account for the disturbingly broad patch of deep red broken blood vessels appearing on the top swell of my right breast. What the heck did I do to myself yesterday? I went swimming for about a half hour -- I was going for an hour but I started getting foot cramps and had to get out -- and my bathing suit is pretty strenuously tight up on my upper torso due to the whole big boobadge issue but when I took the suit off to shower there wasn't any bruising as far as I could see. After the shower I rubbed them with baby powder and I still saw no bruising. I went to work, did my usual thing, no discomfort of any kind, and when I take off my clothes at the end of the night -- WHOA NELLIE! I mean it's BIG. Big honkin' rash bruise broken blood vessel-y thing. And it doesn't hurt, but ho lordy it's a might unsightly. I mean it looks like someone pummeled me. In the ta-tas. What could possibly cause something like that, I have to ask? How could I not notice someone coming up and giving me a swift kick in the yobs while I'm busy going about my day? Or maybe, perhaps... brushing up against them?

For some reason I am reminded of one of the more stranger incidents involving my breasts that I can remember in recent years. Something that I admit still embarrasses me to this day.

Pretty much anyone who knows me in the flesh knows that I'm more than I tad endowed. However I'm not one to draw attention to them in public and have spent most of my adolescent through adult life trying to de-emphasize them through modest clothing, heavy coats and high-collared shirts. I definitely wasn't calling attention to them that one night back around 1995 or so back at the Nsect Club, this nightclub/music venue where Joe used to book and DJ. It was around 2:00 am and the band The Paper Tulips had just finished playing and the club had closed. With the exception of maybe 5 or 6 stragglers the club had cleared out of customers, and the Tulips were breaking down their set and getting ready to come back home with Joe and I to spend the night at our place. Anyway, I remember having something in my hands that I wanted to go put out into my car so I headed out the front door to the parking lot directly out in the front of the building.

My car was parked to the left side of the relatively small parking lot, with another car parked directly next to it. Other than that the parking lot was completely deserted of cars and people. With the exception, that is, of a single male individual pacing nervously around in circles out in the dead center of the lot, all by himself.

He appeared to be in his 20's, very tall with sandy blonde hair, and a sort of rich-boy preppie dress, with his hands in his pockets, meandering aimlessly with a slight fidgety air. As I exited the building and began heading to my car he immediately looked up at my direction and without hesitation began walking straight towards me. At first I thought that maybe he was going to pass me and head back into the building, but his eyes were glued straight to my face, and his look was vaguely menacing. He was walking fast and purposefully, and it became more evident the closer he came that he was attempting to make some kind of physical contact with me. If I didn't know any better, from the speed and momentum of his gait, I'd say he was actually trying to collide right into me.

I managed to dodge him at the last second and walk around him, making it to the passenger side of my car. I was a bit shaken up by that almost-confrontation, until I suddenly realized that the guy had turned right around and was heading back towards me over at my car. Striding purposefully, with that same menacing look on his face, eyes boring right into mine as if to say, "Yeah, I'm assaulting you. Make no mistake, missy." I have been in assault situations before, but it's been years since I've had to defend myself, and like any potential attack you never know what you're dealing with beforehand. Yet a part of me still held out hope that the car parked next to mine was his and he was just walking to his own car. But that other car was parked next to my driver's side and I was standing on the passenger side, so it was when he finally came around to where I was standing it was immediately evident that he wasn't getting into his own car. He came nearly 3 feet in front of me before I dodged him again and started walking briskly back towards the building again.

Strangely, the guy wasn't reaching out to grab me or anything. Twice he could have done that easily, but didn't. I couldn't figure out what his game was, but I was definitely in no mood for playing.

At this point the front door of the club opened, and out walked Joe and Bill, one of the bouncers and a friend of ours, and the members of The Paper Tulips and the opening band, all together and getting ready to leave to meet us back at our house. With relief I ran to catch up with them, trying not to look like I had been panicking. As I caught up with their stride I suddenly noticed that the guy had caught up with us also, and was walking swiftly with the rest of the bands as they turned the corner of the club to where their van was parked over in the loading zone behind the venue. Suddenly I felt a slight twinge of relief, thinking that maybe this guy was either with one of the bands or was associated with the bands in some way, just the way he quickly assimilated with the group and headed off around the corner with them. Still, he didn't quite look like someone you'd expect to be in a punk band. I already knew Greg and Toast from The Paper Tulips pretty well from a few years previously, but I didn't recognize this guy at all. Then again The Paper Tulips have gone through more drummers than Spinal Tap so for all I knew he could have been a new members that I hadn't met the first time around, so I quickly -- and admittedly quite eagerly -- chalked it up to that and let myself relax again. Probably all he was doing was following me around because he knew his band was coming home with me and they were going to follow my car anyway, so uh... maybe he was just hanging out with me? Being... erm, creepy? Invading my personal space? Um, oh well. It was all over now. Right?

Wrong. As the band turned the corner Joe and Bill and I stopped for a few minutes out in front of the club and chatted a bit. Bill, although not very tall, is exceptionally well built. Does a lot of weightlifting and is all bulging biceps and bodacious pecs. Tats up and down his arms and legs, Henry Rollins style. Black mohawk. And as chief of security, openly carrying a gun. Plus Joe was standing there, too. Either way, I felt fully relaxed and safe in their presence, and just kicked back a minute while Bill told Joe and amusing story about something or another, and I just stood there casually rocking on my heels, listening and laughing along, my back about a foot away from the outer wall of the building.

Suddenly the guy come back from around the corner again. Hands in his pockets. Eyes boring into my face as he seems to be trying to walk in between myself and where Joe and Bill are standing, completely oblivious to his presence (like me, I think they assumed he was a member of the band, too). My alarms went off once more. But I thinking, noooo, he wouldn't dare try anything funny with me here, would he? Less than two feet away from two other guys? One muscle-bound, pistol-packin' punk rocker... and her boyfriend?

If he were really trying to pass us he was still walking a tad close for comfort towards me, so I backed up as far as I could, pressing my back flush with the wall behind me to give him as much room to pass as he may need. There is no way your normal, average everyday person would try to respectfully pass through our cluster without touching any of us from the wide amount of berth I was giving this man.

And then it happened: The guy walked towards me, turning his back to face me, and slowly brushed his back firmly across my breasts before continuing on.

When I turned to look at him, he was looking back over his shoulder towards me. The look in his eye was... challenging.

A look that punctuated that move in a way that I had never fully experienced or expected. I have had plenty of men "accidentally" brush up against me in public places and move on as if hoping I wouldn't notice. But his defiantly meeting my eyes afterward took me by complete surprise. As if to say, "Yeah, I did it. What are you gonna do about it?"

And what did I do about it?

Nothing.

Jesus Christ. I fucking did nothing.

At this point the front door opened again and a small group of about 5 or 6 male and female twentysomethings stumbled out, laughing and chatting and heading to their car, parked next to mine. And the guy followed them. It was then that I realized that he was with this group of people, who had been finishing up their drinks inside after Last Call. What had he been doing in the parking lot while his friends were inside? Pacing around nervously? Stalking girls to their cars? Rubbing up against their tits in front of people who could potentially crush his skull like a pinata?

Joe and I headed to my car, he getting in the driver's seat and me in the passenger seat. At this point the guy was standing next to his friends car, while they were milling about, completely unaware of the events that proceeded them. And as he stood, arms crossed over his chest, with a self-satisfied smirk on his face, his eyes never left mine. And mine never left his, until we pulled out of the parking lot and into the main road. And from that distance I could still see him glaring at me, unblinkingly defiant, until he was no longer in my line of vision.

So why did I not do anything? Say anything to anybody? I told Joe on the way home and he was angry that I didn't say anything as soon as it happened, that he and Bill could have made sure that the guy left the property immediately. But the guy was already leaving the property, as soon as the deed was done. Later that night Toast asked me why I didn't just deck the guy on the spot. And I had to really think about that for awhile. And the truth is, I don't know.

I wasn't angry that he touched my breasts. I'm not so phobic about them that I lose my shit if I guy touches them in some way. Heck, if a guy asked me nicely enough I probably would let him touch them (over the shirt and all). They're just a part of my body, like my arms and legs and head. When you got boobs as big as mine you get used to bumping into folks with them almost daily, and I've grown quite used to all that over the years. Doesn't phase me much anymore.

This accomplishment was obvious a very big deal for him. The fact that he seemed so satisfied with himself, that he went through all that trouble, chasing me, stalking me, pretending to be with my crowd, daring to do something in the face of potential beat-down or even a blast of pepper spray from my keychain -- all just to cop a quick, cheap feel, I was overwhelmed with a sudden pang of deep pity for the guy. It made me wonder what kind of everyday life this otherwise normal, innocuous-looking young man must lead to feel so desperate to chase a girl down in a deserted parking lot at 2 in the morning just to touch her breasts, and be so proud of it. For the briefest second, I almost wanted to cry for him.

Mostly I was completely consumed with rage. Rage that he would have the temerity to make a woman feel so threatened, so utterly terrified for my life, just to get what cheap thrill could for a few passing seconds of obviously unwanted physical contact. I wasn't wearing anything revealing. No low cut tank tops or tight sweaters. I was "advertising". And even if I was, what the fuck gives him the right to threaten my safety? But that's just it, isn't it? He knew it wasn't his right. That's what gave him so much satisfaction. If he had asked politely to touch my breasts, and I let him, the thrill probably wouldn't have been as sweet as it would have if he just took what he wanted instead.

But more than anything, I am thoroughly enraged with myself. For freezing in the headlights. For doubting what had happened, as if it still could have been a mistake. For being afraid. For being everything that he hoped I'd be; a weak, willing victim.

And it's not like I haven't defended myself before. When I was fourteen I was sexually assaulted by a boy that I've known all my life as a friend. Although I won't go into too much detail of the event itself (let's just say that a long-handled, two-prong barbecue fork came into play) I still managed to bite and scratch and scream and kick and claw my way to freedom, and to this day I am still proud of knowing what I can accomplish when an otherwise docile, mild-mannered chickie baby like myself gets her back up literally against the wall. But this guy... no, it wasn't a life-threatening experience like I had at fourteen. I didn't feel like my life and my virtue was at stake, so that fight-or-flight instinct never rose to the surface. It did when he was stalking me in the parking lot, definitely. But once he revealed his intentions, to just touch my breasts and walk away, I gotta tell ya, it was almost a relief. But I was still mad. Mad that he put me through all that absolute idiocy, made me relive all that shit from my past, just to brush up against a girl's breasts like an awkward teenage boy who'd never gotten laid. But why didn't I do anything? Why didn't I yell? Or at least say, "HEY!"? Or perhaps the real issue is... why do I keep encouraging myself to let people take advantage of me so often? Like I'm not worth defending?

I don't know why I'm suddenly thinking about all this right now. Maybe it's something I do need to think more about. It's not just about my breasts. There's something deeper within the skin's surface. Something I need to work on. Or to face head on. Or however.

Girls, how have you dealt with this kind of thing, when it happens to you? How often have to defended yourself? Or at all? I'm just curious.