You just took my parking space!” If you don’t believe in fate you probably believe in chance. Sometimes it’s good, sometimes not, as any Monopoly player will testify. So it plays out as I’m walking away from the car when the voice repeats, “Oi – you took my fucking parking space!”
I realise that the bloke in his early 20s, girlfriend in tow, is addressing me and I go full-on middle England peacemaker, “Sorry. I didn’t see you, but you’ve got a space, OK?” looking towards his car.
With hindsight, I was a bit thick. My 20-year-old Audi had recently been sold and replaced with a newer, sporty soft top, which, although 12 years old and a lot less costly than shouty boy’s hatchback, shines like a beacon for the envious. I’d noticed people were less accommodating in traffic than when I’m in my Volvo, but nothing prepared me for what happens next.
I walk past him towards my appointment with a tin of Eating Room Red paint in the DIY store but as I do so he grabs my shoulder, spinning me violently using his superior weight and height.
I’ve never really been in an adult fight despite years of karate with the kids. I remember the martial arts teacher making clear early on that karate is largely about not fighting. It’s more the art of running away with menaces – reacting only to aggression and seeking as few blows/actions as possible to disable your opponent so you can run away. You seek to avoid a fight because you know it is likely to end in hospital or court.
This reflects the fact that, despite being a fun family activity for a Saturday morning, karate is an all-in and very vicious martial art. Other than a minor scuffle with a drunk at work, I’ve never been close to using it, but do so now, in the car park, with surprising calmness.
Using the momentum he’s created in spinning me and deflecting the fist coming towards my glasses, I carry his momentum through to hit him in the side of the neck rather harder than I may have intended, which was very hard.
Down he goes, silently and, to me, rather surprisingly. Then the really frightening bit happens. My calmness vanishes. Seeing him lying there, I’m overcome by possibly the greatest rage I’ve ever felt. I want to follow him down to the ground with fists and feet and really hurt him.
Luckily for him, but even more so for me, and for the kids, his girlfriend starts screaming, “You’ve killed him, he’s fucking dead,” over his still-inert form. It’s like she’s thrown an ice bucket over me and, far from running away, I stick around to check he’s OK. It’s a dicey decision, as it could all have kicked off, but the situation is defused by his girlfriend, who proves yet again that nothing is predictable in relationships. She starts shouting again but this time at her now groaning beau.
“You arsehole, you picked that fight and got what you deserve. You were already parked. Wanker!”
He is clearly OK physically, but under a siege of a different sort, so I say goodbye and leave.
Afterwards, I’m a bit shaky about the whole thing. Not only does it show how things can turn in a second – he could have knifed me – but also that the level of anger I felt was crazy. What might have happened had this man’s girlfriend not brought me to my senses bodes badly – the last thing the kids need is me in prison for ABH or worse.
How much more extreme would my reaction have been had Millie and Matt been under threat? I’m hopeful it won’t happen again and feel I’ve crossed another milestone of understanding – my seething anger was all about the injustice of such a first-class tosser even being alive when Helen isn’t. I may have needed it to happen some time, and it is, hopefully, done.
It emphasises that I really need the counselling I’ve signed up to. I’ve been very lucky that this time my Chance card read, “Get out of jail free”.
Adam Golightly is a pseudonym
