Have you ever had to fight for your very life?
I have.
It was late late spring, early evening I'd gotten home from my regular office job type job, changed into comfy toweling shorts and a baggy tee and was barefoot, sunk in my computer chair looking forward to the weekend. I'd just been told my job was finishing up, I was facing unemployment in the midst of an economic crisis.
My 15 year old son was stashed in his room, my 6 year old daughter and her friend playing in her bedroom, having just come in from the backyard. My de facto wife and teenage daughter were out picking up some last minute supplies for an international school trip she was flying out later that night.
I'd heard the back-door open and close quickly, and then a man's voice babbling incoherently. A shirtless stranger that had just burst into my house through the door my daughter and her friend had come through just a minute or so before.
We lived in a fairly upper middle class neighbourhood, in an effort to get the kids into better schools we'd found one of those worst house on the best street type deals a year or so before, we hadn't seen much in the way of crime in that entire time. This was all highly irregular.
Our house which hadn't so much been designed as simply evolved had an unusual layout, the front door was impossible to lock and so was barricaded shut. The “back” room was actually a long enclosed veranda that spanned the back of the house and incorporated the lounge and dining room, in the middle of one long edge of the room was the back door to the yard, off centre in the opposite wall was the passage to the rest of the house. The computer was set up against one short end of the room, and the ONLY other door out of the house leading to the driveway down the side of the place was against the other short edge, next to the door to my son's room.
It's not important to really understand the layout of the house except for this: The man who had just burst into our house, half naked and stark raving mad, was between me and all the exits, he was also between my son and I. The girls, who were at this stage oblivious were trapped in the house.
I stood up, my eyes aren't good and it was dark inside so I wanted to get closer look, make sure it wasn't someone I knew. I picked up a brass vase with a long neck and cautiously approached the man.
- Help me man, they're after me
- Who are you? What are you doing in my house?
- They're coming, they've got guns. They're going to kill me.
- Who's coming?
- My girl's family man, they're trying to kill me.
- Where are they?
- They're chasing me.
- Well you can't stay here, you've got to leave.
- You've got to help me.
- I'm sorry you've got to get out of here, you can't bring this shit to my house.
- Help me
- Do you need me to call the cops?
- Aww c'mon man help me
- Do you want me to call the police?
- They're going to kill me
- Well you can't stay here, my family live here, there are children here
I was standing perhaps 10 feet from him, my hand holding the vase was down by my side. At this stage I didn't doubt him, he was clearly distressed and dripping with sweat, I was genuinely more worried about who might be following him. The thought of armed men chasing this person into my house was a terrifying prospect.
- Look, you can't stay here, (pointing to the side door) keep running but you can't stay here
- Help me
- I'm trying to help you mate, you can keep running, go through that door and run, I'll call the cops for you if you want
Motioning to the side door again he actually began to make his way toward it. By now I was starting to notice the twitchiness, the wild restless darting eyes, he wasn't just scared he was psychotic.
We spoke a bit more, he disclosed he was really high, he'd been on a bender for days, he stunk of cigarettes and sweat. He wasn't threatening, just scared and clearly unsettled.
The solid door was open to let in the evening breeze. His hand reached for the security screen door, this door was locked, with his mental state I was worried how he might react when he tried the door and found it locked.
He looked at me as I watched his hand hovering over the handle, he was going to leave...
...and then his eyes wandered from my face, down my arm, to the metal vase I was holding by my side.
His expression changed, the fear dropped away, replaced by a smirk and he shifted position...
He's going to attack me.
...and he lunged at me with a feral snarl.
I took a step back to swing and smashed the vase into the side of his head as hard as I could. He staggered back into a dining table chair, then he recovered and stepped to me again.
I swung again, another solid hit to the temple, this time a piece of the vase broke off. Again he staggered back, gathered himself and attacked.
The third time he came at me I hit him so hard the brass vase shattered. He was beyond pain and reason. I dropped what was left of the vase and prepared to defend myself with my bare hands.
Now I'm not a small man and I'm trained in some self defence but I hadn't been in a real fight since I was about 14 years old.
This guy was a little shorter than me but younger, lean and muscular and in much better shape.
And, as I was quickly beginning to realise, completely berserk, in the grip of meth induced psychosis, inured to pain and tireless.
On our feet, face to face I wasn't sure I could come out of this. Worse his sudden transformation in attitude had made me realise this lunatic was capable of anything. What would he do to my children if he overpowered me?
He swung punches at me, I don't know if the head injuries were making him slow or if the situation has granted me some supernatural dad powers now that my family were under threat, but I saw the hits coming and blocked them as before they landed. When he got in close I grabbed him by the arms and pulled him to the ground.
It was touch and go for a few desperate minutes, book shelves collapsed on us as we both desperately tried to be the one who ended up on top. My mind, so often racing with thoughts and internal debate was gripped with a crystalline clarity of purpose.
I must not lose.
If he gets the better of me for even a second he won't stop until I'm unconscious or dead.
My children, he cannot get to my children.
Right until the end it was never clear to me that I would win, he was relentless. I was just trying to control him, he was trying to tear at my face and bite my fingers. More than once I pulled my fingers from his mouth just before his teeth snapped shut.
After a few minutes I was able to get on top of him, straddling his waist on my knees. My hands gripped his wrists and I balanced my centre of gravity over his shoulders nullifying his superior strength with my size.
We'd ended up near the passage to the rest of the house. For a second I glanced up and saw the girls, huddled together watching us from the door of my daughter's room. Terrified.
I yelled for my son.
- Call the police!
I heard my son behind me call out that he was.
Even pinned my attacker wouldn't stopped struggling, if I tried anything with my hands he broke free and a furious struggle to regain control of his arms ensued.
I called to the girls.
- You have to get out. Quickly
-Without further coaxing they quickly climbed over us and the pile of debris that used to be our lounge room. A halo of planks and scattered books and spattered blood.
The girls got by us and ran to my son.
- Get them out of the house! Get out here!
My son shepherded the girls out the back door and they were gone.
I was only fighting for myself now, honestly, the relief and release of pressure was palpable.
It'd been maybe 10 minutes since this stranger burst through our door.
But it wasn't over. We were locked in a stalemate, I couldn't free up a hand without allowing him to do the same.
I felt a primal rage, the affront of having this violence thrust into my house uninvited, my children placed in jeopardy in some random arbitrary insanity.
- YOU FUCKING COME INTO MY HOUSE! WHERE MY FUCKING CHILDREN LIVE!
There was more but I cannot remember it. The period in which we were in the house alone lasted an eternity. Strange gasping verbal exchanges interspersed with desperate violent struggles.
I yelled at the top of my voice, appealing to the neighbourhood for someone to help.
He'd pissed himself and thought it was funny, I felt the warm wet spread across the seat of my pants and his erection pressing into me. He was laughing, then mooing like a cow. Trying to proposition me.
Then trying to claw out my eyes.
Then begging to suck my dick.
I began to doubt I could carry on much longer I was exhausted and he showed no sign of slowing down.
Maybe if I can incapacitate him?
If I can maybe choke him out I can restrain him while he's unconscious?
I took a chance and quickly released his wrists and grabbed him by the throat with both hands.
I was gripping his neck so hard I could feel the inner notches of his spine through his wind pipe with my thumbs, I knew in some cold clinical corner of my brain that I needed to close off the arteries not the windpipe but fighting for my life I was only capable of clumsy brutish movements, I couldn't make my thumbs do the slightly more nuanced action of seeking out the carotids.
All I could manage to do was squeeze as hard as I possibly could.
His fists flailed at the side of my head and his eyes bugged out staring at me.
Then his hands closed on my throat, we were both choking each other. We were both crushing each others throats hoping the other would pass our first.
Behind me – someone at the door – someone fumbling with the lock
My partner was home, she raced to my side.
- What can I do? What do you need?
- Take his hands, put your knees on his arms, all your weight, you need to control his arms.
Quickly she did as I asked. My hands were free.
Still gripped in a red mist of rage I smashed my elbow into his head opening a deep split that bled freely and prodigously.
- Stop it
My partner, warning me off, to control myself.
- Don't do anything stupid.
She was right.
The three of us settled in, he was neutralised and ceased to struggle. My partner talking calmly, asking his name, what had happened. His eyes began to clear a little, he seemed confused.
Five minutes later the first two police arrived, burst through the door.
Followed minutes later by the next two. And then the next. And the next.
The arrest was clumsy and brutal, they wrestled and punched, ramming his face into the ground repeatedly. In the end, when 8 police were unable control him, they called in paramedics. It took 20 minutes for them to arrive.
It took another 20 minutes to administer enough sedative to render him unconscious.
I'd long since staggered out of the house and collapsed against a tree on our front lawn, my breath was catching in my chest like I only had half a lung and I couldn't understand why. The street was lined with Police cars and a crowd were gathered across the street watching.
Our children, huddled together with the neighbour, apart from the crowd wide eyed. For half an hour they didn't know if their dad was alive or dead.
I was spattered in blood and my clothes were torn and hanging off me. Someone brought me a cup of tea and I accepted it gratefully but no one was willing to stay near me.
I was cloaked in a shroud of radiating violence that no one was game to approach. My family were wary of me for weeks afterwards even while they were relieved and proud.
Later as the adrenaline wore off I realised some ribs were broken. I don't know when that happened.
I learned afterwards that when the kids had piled over the fence to our neighbours house, the little girl's mother had called my partner.
- A man broke into your house and attacked your husband, you can't go home. The police are coming.
She'd raced straight home. When she arrived she ordered our older daughter to wait with the neighbours then pushed through the onlookers who tried vainly to stop her and ran to my aid.
I will never forget her courage and loyalty.
She'd saved me, she might have saved us both.