The Space Between

I lay on the floor exactly as I had fallen, trying to work out what damage had been done. My knee throbbed and my cheekbone rang like a struck cymbal. I should get up, I thought. But I didn’t. I lay for a moment longer while the adrenalin ebbed away. What an oblivious, diamond-wearing fool I was. Be aware of your surroundings. Isn’t that always the first tip in those ‘Safety Advice for Women’ articles? How had I not known he was behind me? How had I allowed this to happen?

*

Work had been on my mind. The tension of the office was still in my shoulders as I exited the tube, turning away from the thrum of Holland Park Avenue onto a leafy residential road.  In the daytime I would have admired the elegant, creamy villas and well-kept gardens, but the dark turned my thoughts inwards to the things I had left undone at work. Autopilot delivered me to our building. Home. The front door was a heavy Edwardian slab of a thing. My key slid easily into its lock and I leaned on the door to push it open. A weight - a body, collided with mine and shoved me roughly from behind into the dark entrance hall. For a brief moment indignation flared. I assumed a neighbour was pushing past me on their way into the building. Couldn’t they wait a second? But the body that shoved me followed through, using their bulk to push me up against the interior wall. A thickly gloved hand clamped down over my mouth and nose. 

“Where’s your bag?”, he demanded, in a low, hard voice. 

It had fallen from my shoulder. I tried to answer but the glove muffled my reply. I gestured but the movement was hampered by his body leaning against mine. He towered above me. I knew instinctively that he must have been more than 6’ 5”. A university flatmate of mine, David, was a similar height, a gentle giant.

“Where’s the bag?”, the stranger repeated impatiently.

There was nothing benign about him.

Our subconsciousness lags only milliseconds behind actual events. The lag being the time it takes to transfer stimuli to our conscious perception. But my mind had been oddly slow on the uptake, lurching from irritation to confusion. Now, it caught up and panic washed through me. I was beginning to struggle to breathe around the padded nylon glove covering my nose and mouth. It pressed my head painfully against the wall, keeping me still. I reached up and pulled at his hand,

“I can’t breathe.”

As he looked around for my bag, I yanked at his fingers. My breaths were shallow, irregular gasps. My lungs burned and the darkness around me thickened. 

“Can’t breathe.” 

The words seemed to die in the fabric of his glove, but he heard me and took his hand away.

“Quiet,” he warned. I nodded.

He bent down to rummage in my bag. I saw him pull out my wallet and felt relief. Maybe that’s what he wanted. Would he go now?

“Where’s your phone?”

My heart sank. I had forgotten to pack it, that morning. I wished suddenly for an abundance of thick gold chains and portable electric goods.

“I don’t have one. I mean...I left it at home.”

God. Why did I say that? He’ll make me go and get it. He’ll follow me into the flat.

“Where’s your fucking phone?”

“I, I, I don’t have it!”

He threw my bag down in frustration.

“Do you have jewellery? Show me your neck.” 

“I don’t have a necklace.”

He took my word for it. The unpredictability of what might happen next terrified me. He was still and quiet, considering his next move. He had a coiled energy and I could sense he was poised to run. He would leave soon. But he wanted more from me. I heard the muffled sound of Bob, the elderly man who lived in the basement flat clearing his throat. I saw that he heard it, too.

I thought of the small diamonds on my earlobes, hidden by my hair. A gift from my boyfriend. Walking around with them now seemed like the most ridiculous act of vanity. I felt foolish, like I had brought this on myself. The stupid things had screw backs and took minutes to take out or put in at the best of times. I would never be able to remove them quickly down here in the dark with adrenaline coursing through me. I had a vision of him tearing them out, leaving me with torn bloody pulp where my lobes had been. Or perhaps my inability to remove them quickly might frustrate him and precipitate more violence. For the first time, I worried that he might have a knife or a weapon. I needed to give him a different thought.

“I have these rings,” I said, holding my hand up. 

He grabbed my hand and pulled it nearer to his face so he could see it in the dark. He threw my hand down. My rings were plain and silver. Not what he wanted. 

This was drawing to a conclusion, but how? I held my breath - something I used to do as a child when someone was angry or if I was tickled, which I found unbearable. This physiological response to danger is designed to prevent errant movements which might draw the attention of a predator, but in the moment it felt like I could stop time. Prevent the next moment from arriving. In this space between breaths I imagined my death. The knife. The gloved hand at my throat. The blow to my head. For a moment, a swelling wave of black despair rinsed the fear from me.

I looked at my attacker trying to see him for the first time. He was wearing a dark waterproof, padded jacket with the hood up. The synthetic material rustled loudly as he shifted his weight. His face might have been covered under the hood because I could not see his features, only a small reflection of the streetlight glinting in his eyes. He was just a mass, a bulk, and he used that strength now to shove me again. Hard. 

I fell sideways down the flight of stairs that led to the basement. My foot caught on a step and my body twisted in space, wrenching my knee painfully and slamming it into another step. My head and the side of my face hit another step near the bottom of the flight. My body parts caught up with each other in a crumpled heap at the bottom of the stairwell. 

*

The front door banged shut. He had gone. 

*

The emergency waned. I felt hollow. Carved out. Accusatory questions rushed into the void. Why had I been so oblivious to my surroundings? Why hadn’t I shouted or called for help? Why had I not been able to get a better look at him? I was a victim and not even a useful one. As I lay there, my mind conjured up a moment I had not witnessed: him standing behind me as I put my key in the lock. Poised. A predator. Me, vulnerable, unsuspecting. Pathetic. In the weeks to come, it was this imagined image that continued to frighten me.

I wanted to walk the three flights to my flat and leave this grubby thing that had happened to me on the scruffed vinyl floor of the basement. I didn’t want to be a person who had been attacked. But I stood, testing my sore knee. My fingertips brushed the bruises on my cheek and head. Dry. No blood. I knew I was lucky. Shakily, I ascended the stairs to my home.  

~

I want to reach back through the years and tell myself that it wasn’t my fault. Even if I had been listening to music on my headphones, or checking messages on my phone, or if I had taken the less well-lit route, or if it had been later or if I had been drinking - it still would not have been my fault. For long after the attack I had dreams and false memories of the moment before he pushed me through the door of my building. The moment when he knew exactly what he was going to do, and I had no idea. The same thought accompanied the vision every time: “Stupid girl.” I know better now. The shame and embarrassment I felt have been replaced with anger. Anger that this man exploited my physical vulnerability. And anger at all the other times men have made me feel unsafe. To be a woman is to be prey.

I hope men read this.

Read something else >> Fred