Essay by Zeynep Sert

I was no older than the joyous age of eleven when my mother started to make me wear jeans in the hot and dry days of summer that beamed through the blinds of our house. I couldn’t have been older than eleven when she pulled me and my older sister aside, eyes glowing in worry but masked with an insincere smile that I couldn’t yet recognize, and said; 

“I don’t want you wearing shorts outside anymore. We can go shopping for something more comfortable than jeans if you need it.” 

I felt violated. The freedom of wearing whatever I want whenever I please was taken by my own mother with no explanation in sight, dismissed with a smile or hands busy with the dinner for today. I felt violated. But my mother was happy. 

Happy? No. Relieved. 

Relieved that maybe only one man will look at my legs predatorily instead of five. 

I couldn’t have been older than the glorious age of eleven when one day of that endless summer that I had to suffer through in jeans and sweatpants that stuck to my legs in discomfort, my whole body burning with the exhaustion that the heat brang, I finally asked my mother why. Why so suddenly I had to cover up my legs, why couldn’t I wear the shorts that were dusting at the back of my closet, dreaming of day. I couldn’t have been older than eleven when I asked her why. 

Her face grew red in fury as my voice grew loud with impatience. A breaking point for mother and daughter; my sister never asked why and I was expected to follow. 

But how could I? 

“So that men won’t look at you, so that they won’t rape you like all the girls you see every day in the news! Are you happy now?” 

I wasn’t. I walked away anyway. 

I was no older than eleven. I didn’t know what the word ‘rape’ meant. It was spat into the conversation like a disease, shaky and repulsive, morphed into a word almost worse than any curse. Judging by the reaction, it couldn't be something good now, could it? It was an ugly word to hear in your own voice, so foreign, my ears were used to hearing it from the serious intense voice of news reporters every night but my mother? It was an ugly word to roll out your tongue, an ugly word to exist even though the borders of my mind couldn’t embrace the meaning of it just yet. 

I learnt what rape meant not much longer. I never asked anything about shorts and pants again. I never stared back at the man that looked at me from my back, I never made eye contact with men in public, I always sat with my legs closed on the bus, I always had my phone ready to dial

my friend, I always had my keys between my fingers, I always called my mom to pick me up when it was late. 

I wasn’t older than thirteen when I first saw a man recording me with his phone on the metro. 

I wasn’t older than fourteen when I walked in circles around my block to lose the man that followed me home from the bus station. 

I wasn’t older than fifteen when I realized that locking eyes with disgusting smiles and staring eyes, wondering where else I had to cover up to not get eaten up by the gaze of men was the norm. Has been. Since when? Since when was I old enough? 

Either way you’re always old enough. 

You never know if being an infant who can’t even speak will stop disgusting men from seeing you as a prey, you’d think being five would protect you, you’d think being twelve would protect you, you’d think being sixteen would protect you. 

You’d think your uncle would protect you when he led you away to a back room, you’d think your dad would protect you when you’re sold as a child bride, you’d think your mother would protect you when she asks what you were wearing that night. 

You’d think being eleven would protect you from men looking you up and down, your undeveloped body someone’s free porn for the night. 

I wore pants, I wore sweatshirts, I put my hood on, I glared down, my shorts got old at the back of my closet accompanying my freedom. 

Either way, you’re always old enough.