The wind gusts were faster than usual that day. The bursts of mild air grew cold as they whooshed below the leaves of the already-swinging-low-sweet-willow-branches. That’s where it happened.
There at the crosswalk by the tree in the middle of the road that leads to home. The sound of children would normally fill the air but it was Saturday.
No school meant emptier than usual sidewalks.
The backpack on my shoulders felt light where it was excessively heavy just 30 minutes before. At that time it was filled with a collection of beautiful stones and gems I had spent my life gathering and it was such a hefty load my shoulders were sore from the walk I had taken to meet the buyer.
The lighter, less painful back pack had in it only a few pieces of paper. 22 pieces to be exact, all 100 dollar bills, symbolic of the past due bills I would finally be able to pay. The rent that would secure my home for another month, or two. The food that was to fill the empty pantry. The happiness it was to bring to my eleven year old.
All of the solutions were in those 100 dollar bills. I was walking briskly toward home, excited to finally bring relief to a stricken household when the nightmare that has been my life this year...got worse.
Nice back pack a young male said from the window of a piece of crap car whose make and model I didn’t take a mental note of. I wish I had notciced what car it was. The driver said some crude words and I could only hear Come on man, get that.
It was blurry then. I started walking faster almost running. The car door on the passenger side swung almost as violently as the hand that swung at the back of my head in that few seconds.
Pain surged to my shoulder and I escaped what felt like an attempt to pull me into the slowly moving vehicle.
I darted to the center of the road which was a roundabout - to my disadvantage. I stumbled and caught my balance then I felt hands grabbing me around my shoulders. Another hand was slicing with a tiny sharp object I now realize was a razor blade of some type. My purse flew into the gravel about 10 feet away but my attacker was ripping at my hair and grabbing me with only the intention of taking the backpack.
location bitch is what I think I heard the driver say.
The attacker slapped my head from the back with a sickening strength and I fell to the asphalt and on my way down my head hit the curb, and all I could do was lay there. Shocked and watching as my assailant rolls me forcefully to my stomach, my legs on the street and my upper body in the gravel. My backpack was snug to my shoulder and he struggled to remove the left strap.
I felt a foot in my shoulder blade and he stepped on me, with more weight than I could bare and I groaned. It was the first sound I made in 15 seconds.
The attacker had ripped my backpack off and was already in the car and they were driving away with the door open, and I sat up in the road. Just stunned.
I felt my arm, it was bleeding in a straight line - a razor slice. I touched my hair - it had prickly pieces of a dried desert bush from the ground tangled up in knots.
I cried loudly, sobbing as the fog lifted and reality sank in.
They stole my only solution. They stole from a mother whose child was only up the street at their home - just another 2-3 minutes walk.
The very same road my child walks to school on...I will never feel safe again.
I will lose all of the things I was saving that day.
This is what happened on my weekend.
Bad weekend. Bad year so far.
What keeps me from giving up on life is that I think they wanted to kill me. I think they wanted to put me in the car and Who knows what else would have happened.
Now I am scared to go outside to check the mail.
I have nothing left until ... until when ...
I sold my most precious belongings to get the money to pay the bills just in time to stop eviction. Just in time to prevent Water and electricity from being turned off.
Now, it’s all going away. I can’t believe it.
