Jury of One

8

Shelly was late for her class. Thoughts of Alex Baniewicz in detention, his life suddenly interrupted and steered in a different, uncertain direction, filled her as she walked into class.

No. Interrupted, steered were the wrong words. He was a good kid, but he’d been playing with fire. She had warned him. Damn it, she had warned him.

They were at the gym where Shelly worked out. Eleven women this week, ages ranging from nineteen to forty-seven, sat in chairs. Shelly did not know their backgrounds, did not even know their names, but she was relatively sure that many of them had been victims. That was why they were here, for a three-session seminar.

Shelly had changed into sweats in the locker room. She walked into the small room with nothing, stepped onto the gym mat in the front of the room. “My name is Shelly,” she told them. “Write my numbers down and use them whenever you need them. Whenever.” She listed her home, office, and cell phone numbers. Most of the women had brought pen and paper and wrote them down.

“Every minute of the day, every day of the year, a woman is sexually assaulted,” she said. “And that’s just rape. Add in muggings and break-ins, and the numbers go up exponentially.” She looked at the women but kept her eyes moving. She wasn’t going to confront anyone. Many of these women carried the secret deep within, something Shelly could certainly understand. “It’s okay if you’re afraid. I can’t keep that from happening. But what I can do is help you be prepared. For every ten women who are attacked, at least nine of those could have been prevented. If not all ten.”

A couple of the women nodded. Shelly always started with encouragement.

“Self-defense and protection starts with the three A’s. Awareness, attitude, and action. In that order.” She tapped her head. “It starts up here. It starts with being smart. Being aware. There’s a difference between paranoia and awareness. If you’re aware, you don’t have to be paranoid. Okay?”

Some answered audibly, others simply nodded. She needed to empower these women. She needed to fill them with confidence.

“Over these three evenings, I’ll teach you how to fight. Not like in the movies, and not for black belts, but in real life. And I’ll teach you how to think, if you’re attacked. But you only fight if the attacker is in a position to harm you. The key is never to allow that to happen. That’s what tonight is about. Awareness. Awareness in your home, awareness on the street, awareness in the car.” She paced, ticking off points in her hand.

“Someone in a uniform comes to the door and wants to use the phone, don’t let him in. Tell him you’ll make the call for him and he can wait outside. Don’t advertise your name, or your address, on anything you wear or carry. Check every part of your car-even the backseat and underneath-before you get in. If you’re at a bar, keep your drink with you, and if a stranger gives you a drink, don’t drink it.” She stopped. “We’ll cover all sorts of things like that tonight. I’ll teach you how to answer the phone. How to turn a corner. How to carry a bag. Nothing challenging. Nothing that’s hard to remember. Understand that attackers are looking for an easy target. If you make it tough for them, they’ll move on.”

She would cover other details tonight that hit closer to home. Don’t get drunk and lose control. Don’t go to a party where you don’t know anyone, in a city where you don’t know anyone. She would show them how to convert their fear and shame into discipline and focus and, later, solace and confidence. They would practice her tips until they were part of their lives, part of a routine, and someday, maybe, the cries that lay dormant deep within them, that haunted them in the still of the night, someday those cries might dissipate. Shelly would try to convince herself as much as them.