Nicola Griffith - Always

“Those fuckers,” said Suze.

“You have been trained to seek approval, to please, to not draw attention to yourselves. It’s powerful training. Don’t underestimate it. I can teach you to snap spines with your bare feet, to break free of a stranglehold, to fracture a larynx with the side of your hand, but if you’re too worried about a stranger’s disapproval to even tell him you want to sit by yourself on a park bench, you won’t be able to use any of it.”

“So what’s the goddamn point?”

“Remember the first class, hitting the bag?”

“Blam,” said Nina.

“It was a way to think around the programming. A mental trick. Therese, how many children do you have?”

“Children? Two. Twins, boy and girl. Six years old.”

“How would you have felt if you had seen that man, the one Sandra played last week, sitting on the bench next to your daughter?”

“I would have dragged her away fast, and maybe reported him to the police.”

“Why?”

“Because she’s a child!”

“But he was just talking about his dog.”

“No, he wasn’t. He was a creep and a liar.”

“How did you know this?”

“Because I could tell.”

“How?”

“The way he sat, the way he looked at me.”

“People who lie expertly with their words give themselves away with their bodies. And your body knows that. It’s a language clearer than English. If words and actions conflict, believe the body.” I would explain why another time. “You read him correctly, Therese. You were willing to act on that knowledge to protect your child, but not yourself. Why’s that?”

“Because it’s cool to go all mother lion if it’s your kid,” Kim said.

“Exactly. So next time you’re in a situation like that, ask yourself what you’d do if it was your daughter sitting there, or your frail, elderly mother. If you’d be willing to risk embarrassment for their sake, why not your own? And then ask yourself this: what’s the worst-case scenario if I act on my belief?”

“You’re totally wrong and end up feeling like a dork,” Christie said.

“Right. But then ask yourself: what’s the worst-case scenario if I don’t act on my belief?”

Silence, then “Huh,” said Pauletta.

I nodded. “Right. I end up dead.”

“You make it all sound so easy,” Katherine said, “like it was a… a…”

“Cost-benefit analysis,” Tonya said.

“That’s what it is. When you go home tonight, get out your list and add another column: feeling like a dork. Compare that to how it would feel to being dead, or being raped, or having both arms broken, or your cat tortured or your car stolen, and make some decisions.”

A couple of them looked thoughtful.

“For now, let’s move on to some physical tricks. Remember that MARTA station from last time? We’d just left a scared young woman about to be attacked. Who wants to play that part?” Christie stepped forward. “Do you remember how she was standing?”

Christie put her hands in her pockets and turned her head from us.

“I’m going to play the attacker. I won’t do anything to hurt you, so try to relax. Okay, the rest of you, how should I attack her?”

“Grab her from behind,” Nina said. “Like you’re going to drag her off into a dark corner.”

I wrapped my arms around Christie. “What can you do from there to escape?”

She struggled halfheartedly and subsided. “Not much.”

“See how having her hands trapped in her pockets means she’s lost one whole set of body weapons,” I said to the class.

“But even with her hands free she couldn’t do much with them from there,” Pauletta said.

I let go of Christie. “You grab me this time.” She did, gripping her own wrists and getting a solid base. “Okay, my arms are still trapped by my side but this time my hands are out of my pockets. My attacker’s expecting me to try to pull them free.” I made as if to do that and Christie tightened her grip obligingly. “But think about what I can reach if I move the other way.” I moved both hands easily to her inner thighs. “The groin’s very vulnerable from here, but he won’t be expecting me to go for it because he thinks I’ll be struggling to escape. Okay, what else can I reach? Think about the different body weapons.”

“Kick him,” Katherine, sounding excited. Kicking seemed to be her thing.

“Yes, right foot or left: a stamp straight down onto the top of his foot would hurt, especially if I was wearing heels. There are also lots of nerve endings in the shin. You could scrape”—I lifted my left foot and ran the bare heel gently down Christie’s shin—“or I could kick back, like a donkey. ” I demonstrated in slow motion. “What else?”

“Nails,” Kim said, with a ha! look. “ ’Specially in summer.”

“Yes, if his legs are bare you could get his thighs, maybe even behind his knees if he’s really tall. Lots of blood vessels behind the knees, and the hamstring. The femoral artery in the groin. Perhaps you could reach forward to get the back of his hands. Very sensitive there.” And a lot of tendons. “What else? What about his face?” Blank looks. “Think. Use your head, literally.” I did a slow-motion head butt. “It would depend on his height, but you could get his nose or chin or collarbone.” Break the collarbone just right and bone splinters would tear up the big blood vessels that lead up to the neck.

“Wouldn’t that hurt?” Jennifer said.

“The skull’s very thick at the back, near the top, and there aren’t many nerve endings. What else? What would he be expecting? Think about different dimensions.”

Silence, then “Downwards,” Nina said. “You could go down, to the floor. Wriggle out like a kid would. He wouldn’t expect that. Unless he had three-year -olds at home.”

“Good. Or if he’s trying to drag you off, you can go limp, like a child, make it really hard for him to carry you. Okay, thank you, Christie.”

She let go and I flexed my arms a couple of times.

“There are endless ways to deal with any situation. What I want you to do is find ways to use an attacker’s expectations against them. If they expect you to go forward, go back. If they think you’ll pull, push. You could do worse than remember Nina’s words: like a kid would. A very badly behaved kid. Be loud, be definite, be badly behaved, kick up a fuss: refuse to do as you’re told. Don’t be afraid to call attention to yourselves. Think in three dimensions. Be stubborn, be contrary, be totally self-absorbed. It doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks, especially your attacker. You don’t owe anyone an apology, or explanation, or information, or help, or even understanding. Be selfish. If you wouldn’t let it happen to your child or your parent, don’t let it happen to you.”

That would help only so much. Their training was bone deep. I wanted them to leave today with one thing, just one, that would make it permissible for them to hurt someone to protect themselves, a way for them to impersonalize the choice.

“Imagine it’s summer. You get a new grill that burns so clean you can’t see the flame, all you can see is the heat shimmering over it. You invite your neighbors, all adults, around for a barbecue, but you warn them, each and every one, about the grill—that it’s hot, they’re not to go near it—yet the woman next door sticks her hand in it and gets burnt. Whose fault is that?”

“Wouldn’t be mine,” said Pauletta. I looked at Katherine, who nodded, then Jennifer, who said, “The neighbor’s. Absolutely.”

“So, what?” Suze said. “We should set ourselves on fire?”

“Yes. In a way.” They gawped at me. “Split into two groups, one this side of the room, one that. Each group subdivides into a two and a three. The two face the three. I want the twos in the center facing out.” The room would be just about big enough. Nina and Tonya faced Pauletta, Katherine, and Kim. Suze and Christie faced Sandra, Jennifer, and Therese. Nina grinned and started to click her fingers: the Sharks versus the Jets. “So, Nina and Tonya, and Suze and Christie, you’re two friends out somewhere— where?”