I was on my way home on Wednesday, September 23, 2009, with my dinner in hand, and I swear I just wanted to sit down and eat but I knew the bus would show up the minute I did. I had intended to eat in the restaurant, but for some reason the counter person handed me my meal in a bag to go. Since my usual table was occupied, I sighed and left; the entire day had been off like that. I should have known the universe had it in for me.

When the bus arrived, I was the second to board and the first person stopped and pushed past me to get off again. That was when I noticed one of the passengers was beating the crap out of another. The bus driver had gotten up to try and do something about it, but that just drew the psycho’s attention to himself.

I had stepped off the bus and was looking for somewhere to set down my bag of food and my drink, because I’m not the kind of person who can stand around and watch something like this. None of the people standing around at the stop would do me the favor of holding onto my meal, so I shifted everything into one hand so I could reach in and pull the mad man off the bus driver.

I had no desire to get involved in this; I don’t get into fights. Still, I tried to get the guy’s attention, pulling him back and saying, “That’s enough. You need to step back and think about what you’re doing,” while he stared at me in disbelief and asked me if I wanted to die. “You’re attacking the bus driver,” I pointed out, adding, “Think about it!”

At that point, I let him go and stepped back to give him a chance to come to his senses.

I can see in his eyes how pissed he is at me for “disrespecting” him, and yet there I was treating him like a sane, mature, intelligent human being, giving him the chance to resume acting like one. Instead, he turns back to the bus driver and is joined by a young woman who has come forward to attack the bus driver too.

When the guy tries the grab the girl and pull her off the bus, I step back and hope this means that he, at least, has sobered up a bit. She keeps screaming, cursing and kicking the bus driver, while people around me cry out for someone to call 911. When the couple finally does step off the bus, the driver shuts the door on them at the suggestion of the other passengers. I was trying to back away from them, but I was caught between them and the crowd at the bus stop.

When the girl, who had tried to stick her foot in the door and got it stuck, pulled free, the couple bumped into me as I tried to get out of the way. The man turned around and grabbed me, shouting over and over in my face, “WTF! Do you want to die?”

I show him the drink and bag of food still in my hand, telling him calmly, “No. The only thing I want to do here is get home so I can eat my dinner.” He gives me this look of contempt and grabs the drink, crushing the plastic cup and trying to spill the contents on me with little success. Once the cup is empty, I let it go and try to step back with a disappointed shake of my head. After screaming something about disrespect, he hawks up a mouthful of spit.

I looked him straight in the eye and, still in a level voice, say, “Don’t. That’s assault, and I will defend myself.” I know the adrenaline had hit my system minutes ago, but all I felt was disappointment and resignation.

He spit on me, and I took one moment to let my disappointment show on my face, and since he still held me close, with one hand gripping my coat, I pounded him in the face. I think it was the first punch I have ever thrown, and I was amazed that I felt no pain even though I could feel and hear flesh and bone compact and crunch under the blow. He did not let go, so I hit him again, still looking at him with cold disappointment and resignation.

By the third punch, he was trying to jerk me off balance and his return blows began to land on the left side of my face. I had seen him go from person to person lashing out like a wild animal, and I wondered right then, Do I want to kill this guy? Will anything less stop him?

I was still amazed that I felt no anger, I was not seeing red after taking a few good punches. Not interested, I realized. I started to put him into an arm bind and headlock, and the girl suddenly jumped in, throwing punches, pulling on my hair and clothes, kicking and screaming, and I looked right at her and said, “No. I don’t want to hurt you,” as I pulled back the punch I threw instinctively in response to her attack.

She kept attacking, though, so I caught her up in my other arm, for a moment keeping both of them bent over and bound up in my arms. Their struggles threw us into the side of the bus, and one of them went for my leg, throwing me over and then things really got out of hand. The next few moments were a flurry of her tearing at my hair and jerking my head around and him raining my face with punches.

This is what it is to get beaten. I thought it would be more painful, but it was mostly a series of shocks and a lot of disorientation. I could not make sense out of things, which meant I was no longer able to fight. You need trained reflexes to fight when you can’t rely on your senses. So, I curled up, protecting my head and face and gave them my back. In a way, it was an enlightening moment.

I was beaten senseless, and yet I had the clarity of thought to note that while I lost the fight, I had won in the sense that I accomplished my objective of helping to protect the passenger and driver they had been attacking. I was a bit disappointed that I had not been able to defend myself, but the only thing I was really upset over was the destruction of my dinner. I was still hungry, and I really regretted that.

I finally have proof that physical pain just does not compare to the psychic pain I live with daily. The only thing that really bothered me was the twinge in my knee, which was twisted when they attacked that leg to bring me down. The broken nose bled like a faucet, and has been tender since; I suspect that it straightened my nose from when I broke it as a kid. The real problems have been the fact that I don’t have medical insurance; I could not let them take me to the emergency room and run up a massive ambulance and medical bill.

I had to take a couple days off work, which I really can’t afford. I might just have enough to pay rent and bills, but that will leave me with nothing to live off of for the next month—even assuming I don’t lose my job for being out injured without a doctor’s note.

I have been taking care of myself, giving my knee time to recover. I could not walk on it Thursday or Friday, but Saturday Evening I was able to walk to the nearest mini-mart for some Advil and ice cream. I was not able to focus on school work for a couple of days; I spent a while laid up in bed and even when I was able to get around my apartment, my knee made it impossible to sit at my desk for long.

In a way, I feel like my worst fear has come true, that I would get hurt and not be able to support myself while I am alone up here in Alaska. I was able to get some help from my apartment manager and one of the girls in my support group to get some food stocked up so I don’t starve, and if I am able to walk by Monday, I might still have a job. The problem is, I don’t know that I will have an income beyond this weekend, and that’s stressing me out more than the attack itself.

I have never been able to be myself, so I tried to just be the best person I could be, and yet when I truly do my best, I always seem to end up the worse for it. It really makes me wonder if there’s any point…