Chapter Fifteen - Rude Awakenings from Sleeping Rough
Rude Awakenings from Sleeping Rough
I woke up in St. James Park this morning to find a man masturbating over me while I slept.
Bizarrely, my first reaction was "Thank God it's not a cop." The harsh reality of what I had woken to quickly became evident; but by that point the pervert had tucked himself back into his track-pants and was running away.
The incident didn't end there.
Realizing my day was starting at 3:50 a.m. I gathered myself together and was disgusted to find the top of my jeans and bottom of my shirt were damp with his pre-ejaculation discharge. The smell was easily masked with the aerosol deodorant in my rucksack, but the dampness and discomfort that came with it would have to wait for the sun to rise.
As I headed out of the park, I stopped at a rubbish bin to roll a cigarette. The pervert came out of nowhere to tell me to be careful because somebody had been wanking over me while I was sleeping, then scurried off again. He then turned around and started walking back to me, exposed penis in hand, pleasuring himself furiously and asking me if I liked it.
I was alarmed but not frightened. This wasn't the first disturbing incident I've faced since I found myself in the streets of London, and likely won't be the last. I have received self-defence lessons from my friends in the homeless community and can defend myself enough to buy time and run from a situation.
I grabbed my keys from my pocket and made a fist, slipping them between my fingers, ready to punch him in the eye if necessary. I swung my arm threateningly, shouting at him to "Get the fuck away from me now!" It was enough. He ran away again. He followed at a distance for a brief time, but once I was out of the park and on the street, he disappeared into the darkness and I didn't see him again.
Reflecting on the experience over the course of the day, I wasn't sure what disturbed me more: the incident itself or my reaction to it. I was alarmed; I was disturbed; but for the first time in facing one of the perilous situations that all rough sleepers regularly find themselves, I wasn't particularly frightened nor upset. That was a first, and I was concerned I was viewing the rude awakening as "par for the course" and becoming too hardened to life –a development that would affect not only my writing should I ever return to it, but my basic humanity.
I also had to ponder an issue that all rough sleepers find themselves wrestling with at some point: what to do about it. It is a fairly straightforward decision when you're comfortably ensconced in mainstream life; not so straightforward when you're not. There are issues and ramifications to take into consideration that aren't factors when you're able to return to the safety of your own home, lock the door, and gaze contemplatively at your navel imagining your response to a moral dilemma you will likely never face.
You have a responsibility to get the word out obviously. Other rough sleepers need to know. Forewarned is forearmed. However, that paves the way to vigilante justice that can quickly and violently get out of hand. A lesson I was yet to learn.
Informing the police –anonymously of course to avoid the dangerous reputation as a "grass" whatever the circumstances– is the obvious response. But it opens a problematic can of worms for others sleeping in the park: it is an illegal act. The relationship between the police and the homeless is problematic at best, aggressive and confrontational on a good day. Inviting the patrols such a report would bring also invites conflict and chaos that helps no-one. Even should the police turn a blind eye to their presence, some of your fellow rough sleepers will not react favourably to the increased vigilance –particularly if alcohol, drugs, mental illness, or outstanding arrest warrants are factors. Even my first reaction on waking was "Thank God it's not a cop." By ensuring the safety of your fellow rough sleepers you are opening the door to conflict, violence, and serious injury –including your own, as I was later to discover.
Walking to Trafalgar Square I remembered prior incidents similar not in specifics but in terms of personal safety –one that had occurred just four days previously in front of the National Gallery. I had been rolling a cigarette when a recent addition to the local homeless community demanded some tobacco. I said no. It is a daily exchange on the streets, leading to any number of reactions on a violence scale ranging from 0 to 100. Most times that reaction falls between 0 and 5. His reaction scored a 75 and scared the hell out of me, prompting an anxiety attack. He immediately grew verbally and physically abusive; grabbing my belongings and throwing them while screaming at me to "Fuck off back to my own country!"
Two security guards came by and I asked for help: visibly agitated and not at my most diplomatic. I colourfully asked for him to be removed. They denied the request saying it wasn't their responsibility. They are only there to protect the building. The other man made a lunging movement towards me, said something I don't remember, and I jumped. They all laughed.
Two National Gallery Security Guards laughed at a man suffering an anxiety attack –laughing with the man who caused it.
I went into the Gallery to file a formal written complaint, a process that ended up taking over two and a half hours. During this procedure I was again informed their duty was only to protect the building, not the people. When I asked for a photocopy of the complaint –pointing out I had been a journalist and am in the habit of keeping such documents for my own records, I was denied the request. I was also scoffed at by another Security Guard who recognized me as one of the local homeless community. "Oh come on; no you're not. I see you outside all the time." So I asked for another form and re-copied the complaint for my own records.
The dismissive attitude throughout the process, simply because I had been recognized as one of the local homeless community, added to the humiliation of being laughed at. That night I received a templated email with the barest of modification essentially saying, "Sorry. Please come again." Case closed.
The next day there was a stabbing in Trafalgar Square in front of the National Gallery. (It was an exceptionally bad week, even by homeless standards.) A dispute between two members of the homeless community had grown violently out of hand –100 on the scale. Words were exchanged, punches thrown, a bottle broken and CHUNK! One friend stabbed another in the face. Just another "homeless thing", dismissed and forgotten within days. At least the building was safe. Again, case closed.
Finally, I was forced to reassess the reasons I was sleeping in the park in the first place –for I have been housed. The ‘charity approved’ accommodation I was forced into accepting was detrimental for a number of reasons: a primary one being the simple fact it is often as dangerous as the streets themselves.
Perhaps because I don't abuse alcohol or drugs myself, I fail to understand the reasoning behind housing alcoholics and drug dependants in the same home. It is, as I have seen first-hand, a recipe for enablement and further descent into addiction –and it can be hazardous, particularly when they are unsupervised.
One unfortunate gentleman with whom I share the house had been so ravaged by his addictions he suffered from psychotic episodes. He has seen ghosts and tried to drive them away by blasting his stereo 24 hours a day, or by leaving all the windows and doors open in the middle of winter. He has had many nights when he's lain in bed screaming at the demons that haunt him. He owned a cat when I first moved in; a lovely, affectionate –and well-cared for– companion. That cat sadly passed away . . . and remained in his room with him for almost two weeks, the smell of its decomposition slowly wafting through the other living quarters. I had smelled something sinister for a number of days but had attributed it to a dietary change in the tenant of Flat Four. Death. Defecation. You don’t think to differentiate between the two. They both smell foul.
That same gentleman had been hospitalized on more than one occasion for serious injuries and overdoses in the short time we were co-tenants. He had almost died during one of those visits. He had been waiting, and was eager, to be placed in a rehabilitation facility. He had twice been promised placement within a month, and his joy was heart-wrenching. For reasons unknown neither promise was kept. He was a kind, gentle, giving man when lucid, but a danger to himself and others when not; and he should have been placed in the supervised housing The Connection had previously tried to mislead me into accepting. I feared not so much for an assault by him –although that is always a possibility– but anything from kitchen appliances to a cigarette lighter was dangerous when he was suffering. He grew thinner and more haggard as his ordeal was allowed to continue.
(He was eventually moved into a rehabilitation facility after the original composition of this piece, and his ordeal finally came to an end. Tragically.)
He was not my only concern. There were five flats in our small two-storey house: five tenants. We were but two. The other three were equally damaged; and had all been placed there by an arrangement between the landlord and Crisis. All but one were chronic alcoholics. It was a hub of enablement, destruction, and chaos. My fears were re-confirmed less than a week after my misadventure in St. James Park had convinced me to give the flat another chance. I had managed a few nights undisturbed sleep indoors, but it was not to last. The dormant drunken violence came storming back with a vengeance.
I woke up around 1:30 a.m. to the sound of shouts coming from the street, loud enough to be heard word for word as they roused me from my slumber.
"Stay the fuck away from me! Fuck you! Show respect or I'll fuckin' cut ya!"
SMASH!
I heard the sound of glass breaking, followed by the high-pitched squeal of a car alarm. The shouts grew louder as he stormed closer.
"Fucking cunts! Fucking respect!"
CRASH!
I heard the razor-sharp sound of a key clattering against the front door. Unsurprisingly he was having difficulties getting his key into the lock, which only made him angrier. He began punching and kicking the door, each thump making me flinch. Eventually the key found its way home, and the door smashed against the wall as he entered.
"And if any of you cunts give me any fucking grief I'll fuckin' cut you too! All of you! Fucking respect! I've had it!"
The hall light came on, the illumination creeping under my door in a two-inch sliver that chilled me. The side table in the hall was thrown to the ground. A wall was thumped; then thumped again. He began to stomp up the stairs to his room on the floor above mine, cursing, raging and pounding the walls with each step. This actually provided a lifeline of hope.
It was, as Fagin croons, time for reviewing the situation.
His next move dictated mine. Would he simply pass out in a few minutes? Would he stay in his room? Or would he continue to rage through the house, looking for the first available person to unleash his anger? Sleep was obviously a lost cause at this point; the decision was whether or not to remain in my room for the night or return to the safety of the streets that this ‘charity approved’ housing was supposed to be an improvement on.
Again, the metallic click of a key unsuccessfully banging against a lock cut through the night as he tried to enter his room.
"Fuck! Fuck! FU-U-U-UCK!"
SMASH!
THUMP!
"FUCKING FUCK!"
Finally, success. The door smashed against the wall and he entered his room. The swearing and thumping continued for a few minutes until suddenly there was silence.
"Please-pass-out-please-pass-out-please-pass-out-please-pass-out." I lay in bed, shaking, my heart thumping as I prayed for his intoxication to push him into unconsciousness. "Please-pass-out-please-pass-out-please-pass-out-please-pass-out."
My prayers were denied.
He started screaming again, the verbal and physical violence returning with renewed strength, and he wasn't limiting his rage to the confines of his room. He made his way into the kitchen, the most well-stocked armoury in every home –knives, forks, plates, pots, pans all within easy reach. The time for reviewing the situation was over; it was time to get out.
I had a logistical advantage. He was in the kitchen in the floor above. It made slipping out much easier than it had been in the past; so long as he remained upstairs.
"FUCK!"
SMASH!
CLATTER!
That was the cutlery now scattered around the kitchen floor, potential weapons in easy reach. I took advantage of the noise to cover up the sound of my mattress groaning as I slowly slipped out of bed. I didn't dare turn on my light for fear it would shine under the door and reveal my presence, so I slowly, carefully, delicately dressed by the light of the two-inch screen on my cell-phone, making sure to keep the light facing away from the front of my room. It was a long, laborious process complicated by the fact I was shaking so hard. Despite that, I still took the extra time to ensure my socks matched –almost laughing at the absurdity of its sudden importance as a priority.
THUMP!
The kitchen door banged open and he stomped into the upstairs hall, cursing and punching the walls. I froze. If he came downstairs my only avenue of escape was cut off. I closed my eyes, held my breath, and silently prayed he would remain upstairs. "please-Please-PLEASE stay upstairs."
THUMP!
"FUCKING CUNTS! FUCKING RESPECT! FUCK!"
It was actually the answer I wanted: he had returned to his room. Fully dressed, and with my rucksack having been readied before I went to bed only two hours previously, I grabbed my keys from the wall and gently turned the deadbolt to ensure the 'click' didn't reverberate through the house. I slowly opened the door –grateful the clichéd creaks that accompany all doors in every horror movie ever made was not an issue. Entering the hall, I successfully closed the door in silence, and went to lock it . . .
. . . only to find I couldn't get my key into the slot because I was shaking so badly. "You have GOT to be kidding me," I thought as I stifled a nervous laugh. "Geez, mate; I feel your pain."
I was eventually successful and moved slowly through the hall to the front door, expertly avoiding the squeaky floorboard whose location I knew from previous escapes. I opened the door with the same care I had used before and made my way outside. I didn't bother closing it behind me. I quickly made my way to the street, turned left, and hurried away. I hadn't breathed once since opening the door to my room.
This was not a rare occurrence. I could ask to be relocated, but under the terms of the lease I was forced to accept –terms that were not disclosed despite my repeated attempts to ascertain them– I am at least one, if not two months in arrears to my landlord. If moved, I will still be responsible for those arrears, as well as the arrears of at least one month I would have to accept in the new lodgings. I would find myself deeper ensnared in a benefits system I fought tooth and nail to avoid, and deeper into a debt I had no need to incur that would keep me trapped in that system even longer.
So I continue to sleep in the streets and parks of London more often than in the “safety†of my ‘charity approved’ accommodation. Better to be splashed with the sperm of a stranger on a park bench than beaten by a charity-placed housemate in an enclosed space. At least you can run.
For as many have discovered after entering the Tribe of the Homeless, no place is safe. Not the streets, not the security patrolled public areas; not the shelters; and definitely not the housing. You are open to every kind of abuse in every locale from every segment of society. The streets simply provide the best option for the simple fact you are not trapped in an enclosed space. You take the necessary steps to defend yourself and you run like hell. If you're lucky you may receive the assistance of other rough sleepers close by, or your shouts may be heard by an unseen presence within earshot. You learn to trust no-one but a small, close-knit group of friends. But as I soon learned to my horror, you can’t even trust them.
For I had befriended a predator.
As the author of this work I do not authorize its use in whole or in part for any charity fund-raising or awareness raising campaigns.
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