You must've been the one to call me a Dime In A Dozen

   I saw my fists thrust themselves up into his nose before I had even noted that my fingers were clenched up.

   What do I do? What do I do? I remember hearing my nerves chant as they searched for an answer. I needed to find a way out. I needed to escape this and go home. The problem was that I didn't know how.

   Luckily, my hands had already caught onto what my instincts were pitching. They wrapped my fingers tightly around the idea just as it was being thrown through the muscles of my right arm, straight to the truth-telling point in the middle of his face.

   While I was just as stunned as he was, the rest of my body understood the plan of attack must be followed through with now that it had been successfully started so my left arm repeated the right's action. In a separate and typical circumstance, I’d have expected it have taken less of an effect than the right. This time, thankfully, the aggression was well communicated through the violent caress and he staggered back, faltering for a moment in the gyrate of the the kiss before stilling his body.

   Not wanting his eyes and mind to follow the steadying suit, my legs jumped in, sending my knee into his groin. The sudden and fierce contact made him lurch forward, forcing my fist to greet his face once again. (He was just so close! So within reach!)

   Each time our bones came together on my initiative, he made a loud grunting noise. They were all similar in sound, but different in pitches. It was as though his body were an instrument and I was merely playing its rough sound out as a sort of brutal song. His vocals, along with bruising skin, crunching cartilage, and some of my own humming harmonies, created an uncommon genre of hurt and determined revenge.

   I spent some seconds after to perform a couple more techniques on the song before the belligerent creativity began to run dry. A sense of Flight, it seemed, poured in as Fight fled the scene. I ran after it, but never found it again that night. Instead, I found myself at home, dressing the wounds he gave me and the ones I acquired from returning them.

   The vagueness of visual recollection rarely ever compares to the accuracy of muscle memory; somehow though, my mind was able to replay everything perfectly  if even just once. As my cuts were being rinsed with rubbing alcohol by my roommate, the recollection gave me access to go back to figure out exactly what had happened.

   I went with a group of friends to some random music gig to avoid spending a Friday night at home. After a couple of songs, I had lost interest in the band that was playing and checked my phone as a quick form of entertainment. The odd part, I noted right away, was that I had several missed calls from my sister. Normally, she would call once, maybe twice if I didn't answer. Always just to talk. She would never leave a voicemail if I didn't answer, just send a text telling me to call her back, please. The combination of an abundant amount of missed calls and no text made me uneasy with what her current state may be like. What if something was wrong? I walked out of the venue thinking about how funny and natural it was to quickly worry about disturbances in a person's regular behavior. I left the noisy, musky atmosphere for the crisp mid-night air, thinking it to be a more appropriate setting to contact my sister in.

      I was unlocking my phone when he pulled me into the world’s blind spot.

  My scalp, having always been acutely sensitive to any kind of prodding, immediately picked up on the touch that tugged at the strands of my hair. As a response to the excessive and spontaneous soreness, I dropped my phone and used my hands to hold onto the spots of my head where the chunks of hair were being yanked by a forceful, directing grip.

    In the same moment, I had let out a yelp that had both addressed and questioned the newly inflicted affliction. It seemed only natural for it to be muted by the sticking slap of a hefty hand.

   As I reflected over being dragged deeper into the darkness, I began to wish I hadn't doubted the creeping opportunities of present dangers in the late night I had walked into. A brand of panic and rage had filled my eyes up during the experience so I was kept me from forming any actual thought. I could only feel and feel and feel. The feelings tainted my vision with anger and disbelief causing it trouble in adjusting to the dinginess of the alley. It kept me from accepting what was happening, which in turn separated me from a solution to the situation. My mind, still stuck on its original plan, wondered about my sister. I pictured her as the small child she once was; the sticky and righteous girl who took on the role as my best friend and mentor.

   The image of her wearing a plastic crown and muddy sneakers half a size too large for her growing feet evaporated as my eyes began to well up even more. At this point, he had spun me around so that we were facing each other. The places where he touched me, aggressive and affectionately, branded my skin so that not even the nostalgic plea to be a child again and in my sister’s warm presence was enough to divert my attention away from the burning sensation. When I started struggling to fight him off, he would open his mouth wide and chomp down on whatever part of me was closest to his mouth. Later, I would find several bite marks on my arms, neck, and shoulders. At first, my efforts of self defense were barely considered technical  or effective  as I could only manage to discharge light smacks at his hands and wrists. Every time I would aim for his face, his reflexes would catch my swing and hold my arm in place as he would begin to kiss my neck and face again until I could find some way to twist the limbs out of his grasp. Whenever I did, though, he would jerk at another grip of my hair again. It seemed as though every way out that I found was actually just granting him permission to a new way in.

    I became exhausted. I began to lose hope. I began to give up.

   He made sure to misspend no more time once he realized I was just about done fighting. He tugged at my shirt, tearing it open and the freshly exposed skin was immediately attacked by his rough and rushed approached. He groped my breasts, then pinched at the tips as he kissed and nipped at more of my flesh.

   What do I do? What do I do? The thought didn’t come slowly, but instead was an instant exclamation. It was the response that had been there from the beginning, only now it was being addressed. Right when I was about to admit that I don’t know, my whole being   excluding my actual mind   answered and I made the escape.

Reviews

[Chris]

I can't say I've experienced fighting in quite that way, but we are all different in our view and understandings of the passage of time during stress. I did feel your depiction was a good one and followed a fine and timed script.