A slight relief

I found the boy who abused me as a kid, on facebook, a few days ago or so. Or maybe it was a week ago. It was ridiculously easy to find him there as I did have his full name and a school photo of him as a child. Strange what kind of stuff I keep around in old diaries. No I haven't contacted him and I don't think I will. Yes, I'm absolutely sure that it's him. Rare surname, looks eerily familiar (also compared to the childhood photo), and is friends with some of my former classmates from the same school we went to as kids.

Well obviously he's an adult now, 26 years old. But still looks very similar except from the natural ageing of the past 19 years. I mean same sporty clothing style, same blonde buzz-cut. He's gotten some tattoos though, and in some of his most recent pictures on his profile he's holding a very young child. So maybe he's a father too. Not that I worry about that child's safety, cause somehow I doubt that he ever repeated what he did to me, and somehow I don't think he would repeat that on his own child, if it even is his child. Me not being friends with him on facebook makes me not being able to see his full profile.

I don't think I would want to befriend him there either, although I can't say that I would be against it. I don't blame him for what he did, other than that I hope he's at least aware of that he fucked up. I know he was just a kid at the time, so I know he most likely didn't realise the possible consequences of his violent actions. However I am curious about him, I admit that. And actually for some reason I hope his actions didn't ruin him, that he was able to move on. By the looks of it it seems that way, but there's so much that a bunch of selfies can't reflect about a person's life.

I know his life is none of my business, and that's why I have no intention of prying more than what's acceptable, meaning watching the parts of his facebook profile that he has chosen to make public. I'm not doing anything wrong with that, however I'm aware it could come off as creepy, but I don't care if anyone considers me creepy. That's not a crime, as far as I'm aware, and I have no wish to pretend to be something I am not. I'm not against some slight online stalking as long as I'm being considerate about it and don't go too far.

However if he would for some reason contact me, I'm sure I'd tell him everything. For some reason I want for him to know, the consequences of his actions, but I wouldn't consider taking the first step towards that. Maybe that is a little bit of the light I'm still holding onto: I don't want to fuck up his life by revealing that shit, but at the same time I do somehow think that I, as the victim, do have some kind of rights over him. Just as my victim in my eyes, has the same kind of rights over me. I'm not hypocritical, I'm being consistent with my logic on this. What applies to him does apply to me too, and everyone else in similar situations. Though I'm sure that my own logic isn't infallible just because it's consistent.

I don't always lurk at his profile, just casually looking around there every once in a while. Look at the recent photos of him. I don't feel much doing so, but a vague dizzying feeling, a faint mix of sadness, frustration and curiosity. Like very weak and slightly bitter lemonade that mostly just tastes like water. It's too vague for me to find it reasonable to act upon. However I'm aware that the feelings may increase over time, but perhaps that's not so likely.

I was a bit relieved when I found him. At least I could find one of my past abusers. Compared to the guy who raped me, who has been significantly more difficult to try to find. I've been searching for him for many years now, but have literally gotten nowhere at all. Sometimes I give up, but I always find myself being back at looking for him again, more desperately than the last time. So, that I was able to find my childhood abuser with literally just a mouse click on my computer, did give me some sense of relief, although far from a sufficient amount of it.

But yeah, he's still around, looks pretty much the same and it seems like his life isn't completely horrible, although I never thought that it would be. At least not because of what we shared in the past.