I suppose I should be clear right away: this blog is not about my love for homeless people. If you want something like that, read this old blog post instead. Today’s blog post is actually about one homeless woman’s “love” for me and actually covers a rather negative experience that happened to me last night.
I was walking along in Bath and just enjoying the atmosphere of a city during the night time. I really love walking around cities at night. Something about the bright city lights contrasting against the darkness. I checked the time: 8:20 p.m. Anyway, I came around a corner and then I found a homeless woman standing in the middle of the path.
“‘scuse me, mate,” she said, “could you possibly give me a cigarette?”
“I’m afraid I don’t have one. Sorry,” I said and, of course, I didn’t have one. I don’t and have never smoked.
“Please, mate,” she said, sounding quite sad.
“I honestly don’t have one,” I said, apologetically.
“What do you have?” she asked.
“Well, I’d be happy to give you a pound,” I said, smiling and feeling pleased that she’d not be disappointed.
“Oh, thank you, mate,” she said. “I really appreciate it.”
She opened her arms to give me a hug, and while I am not the most physical person I considered that I’d had much more unappealing hugs in the past and this would only last for couple of seconds. So I gave her hug for a second and then tried to release. Except she didn’t let go of me.
“Well, I-” I said, hoping to say “Well, I should probably be going now” but she cut me off.
“I really appreciate this, mate,” she said and then I realised she was making a kissy mouth.
She kissed me on the cheek.
“Well, you are a very affectionate person,” I said, unsure of how to respond to that.
By this point, I should clarify; I wasn’t hugging her back at all. Just standing there, trapped in her arms and trying to pull back.
This is when she started a frenzy of kisses that went on for some time. She would occasionally stop to say something incoherent and I didn’t understand a lot of the things she said. I tried many times to say I had to go, but she always cut me off, so I had to endure it. My face was wet with her saliva quite quickly. It later took a while to get the taste off my lips.
Now, you might wonder “Why didn’t you push her away?” and I have two very good reasons. Firstly, I am an absolute pacifist and don’t ever like to use force on anyone, even if they are using force on me. Secondly, the pair of us had attracted the attention of a group of drunken lads on the other side of the road, who were shouting lots of things at me. Some of them were jokey in a derogatory kind of way (“Someone’s desperate!”) but others were more aggressive (“Oi, mate, leave her alone!”) and it soon became clear to me that they thought I was assaulting/taking advantage of her. I think they were probably keeping an eye on me to make sure I didn’t do anything too drastic, because they stayed and watched the whole time. Rather ironic, really! So even if I was comfortable with using force, had I done so, it likely would have made them think I had gone too far and perhaps the whole lot of them would have used force on me!
This isn’t actually the first time I’ve found myself trapped in a stranger’s embrace. Regular readers will remember I said that last time this happened to me I started shaking around like I was having a seizure, which made the woman let go in confusion, giving me time to run away. But this time, as I was dealing with someone who was very drunk and I didn’t think it would work. I couldn’t squirt her with my Trusty Water Bottle either, which is often a good defence, because her grip around me was so tight and I couldn’t reach it. So I was stuck; held in place to endure her relentless kisses.
Towards the end of it, she put her hand behind my head and started pushing it towards her own; it was clear that she was trying to make me kiss her. When it became clear that I wasn’t going to do that, she instead turned my head so that she could whisper something in my ear.
“I love you.”
“Well, that was very kind of you to say,” I said, “but I really-“
She then started kissing my ear and then moved back over to the rest of my face. I squirmed and I tried to object, but it was all in vain. Eventually, it did come to a stop and she told me that she lived in a nearby park. She wanted me to come and visit her there the next day. As I am sure you can imagine, I’m not particularly keen to do that.
“Well, I’ll certainly be keeping my eyes peeled for you in future,” I said, rather passive aggressively
She ended with one tight hug and a kiss on my chest. “Never forget that I love you.”
Finally, I was free to escape! I hurried on my way, hoping she’d not want to continue our interactions. How long had I been there? It felt like very long time. I thought I had better check the time, to make sure I didn’t miss my bus: 8:30 p.m. So I’d spent a whole ten minutes being kissed by a drunken homeless woman. At least it’s over now.
(Don’t miss today’s Finger Puppet Show!)
