When It Happened To Me

Seventeen-year-old Mavis Green doesn’t believe in fresh starts. Not after what happened. Not after the friends who chose silence over her safety. When her family moves from her hostile hometown to the polished, wealthy streets of Camden, Mavis hopes distance will quiet the memories of the night that shattered her sense of control. Instead, Camden offers something more complicated: private-school perfection, racial isolation, relentless anxiety-and the uncomfortable truth that trauma doesn’t stay behind just because you change addresses. As Mavis navigates panic attacks, OCD, and the suffocating pressure to be ＂grateful,＂ she finds unexpected refuge in an unapologetically queer group of friends and in Shelby-her sharp-tongued, guarded neighbor who understands what it means to survive a difficult home. With Shelby, intimacy becomes something new: slow, consensual, chosen. But healing is never linear, and when the past resurfaces, Mavis must decide whether she believes she deserves safety, love, and a future shaped on her own terms.

When It Happened to Me is a raw, tender coming-of-age novel about surviving sexual assault, navigating mental illness, and reclaiming autonomy in a world that prefers victims to stay quiet. It is a story about queer love, chosen family, and the courage it takes to keep living when the universe has already ended once.