A few years after graduating high school, I ran into a former classmate near a discount bin at Mervyn’s.

I recognized her immediately as the blow job girl.

In those perilous years of high school, when the No. 1 goal is not to be tagged “it”—the person most gossiped about—this woman had volunteered for a popularity suicide mission after ratting out a football player whom she claimed had assaulted her at a party.

Stories about her sexual impropriety soon spread fast and far.

But there she stood, a few years later, a diaper bag-sized purse and toddler on her hip. We didn’t discuss the rumors of years past—such things aren’t talked about at Mervyn’s—but I knew they weren’t true.

I internalized one lesson from her example: Don’t speak up. You will suffer way more than him.

In listening to the back-and-forth over Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh—who has been accused now by three women of sexual impropriety in high school and college—perhaps the most infuriating commentary centers on this farcical idea that the accuser (or her “loving parents”) would have gone to police if it were true.

I have no doubt that, if the attack on Dr. Ford was as bad as she says, charges would have been immediately filed with local Law Enforcement Authorities by either her or her loving parents. I ask that she bring those filings forward so that we can learn date, time, and place! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 21, 2018

No woman I know has gone to police. Not one told their parents. Women do sometimes talk about it, but usually only years or decades later.

And it happens more often than anyone thinks.

When the news broke about Dr. Christine Blasey Ford’s accusation, I thought of two events from my own life:

The first, in high school, I was at a party and was pushed into a closet by a college football player. It was dark, and I had been drinking, but I remember his name, what he was wearing, what I was wearing, and that there was an article of clothing in the closet made of rigid raincoat material because my face was pressed into it while his calloused hands smothered me.

I could not, however, tell you the date, the address of the home, nor anyone else who may have been there—except one friend, who flashed me sarcastically disapproving eyebrows when I stumbled from the closet. I laughed and played along.

The second: I was 19 and had landed an internship covering local sports, which was a huge deal in my small world. One of the coaches invited me to a pizza place with the team after a game, and after a few pitchers of beer, he offered to drive me home. He drove instead to the boys locker room, where he dropped his trousers, and … just stood there.

I stammered out something about needing to get home by curfew—it was true; I still had a curfew—so he zipped up and drove me home.

I told no one. I wasn’t going to endanger this dream job.

As Ford sits before the Senate Judiciary Committee today, I suspect many women will recall similar events from their own pasts. The majority of women I know—yes, the majority—have been subjected to drunken pranks, sexualized nicknames, or worse: rape, assault, ongoing harassment.

To be clear: Most men don’t act this way. But the ones who do tend to act this way a lot.

We know; we remember.

The question here, though, is do we speak up? There’s no reward in that—nothing to be gained.

I believe the women who’ve accused Kavanaugh.