She was walking home

She was walking home.

Those four words have haunted me this week.

Social media has been filled with horror about the disappearance of Sarah Everard and those four words have appeared again and again.

Each time I’ve read them, the clock has turned back to 2001.

I am a 21-year-old student again and I am walking home on my own.

I know a man is following me because he’s been behind me ever since I left Cardiff University’s student union.

He was 10 steps behind me on the bridge over the railway. He was nine steps behind me on Senghennydd Road, he was seven steps behind me in Woodville Road and then six steps away in Wyeverne Road.

I walked faster. So did he. I followed every instinct I had. I stood up straighter, I walked as confidently as I could and I held my keys in my hand.

And then I heard his footsteps running behind me.

He ran into the road, around me and then stopped in the middle of the pavement in front of me.

He asked me the time.

As I looked down at my watch, he grabbed me.

With a vice like grip he clamped one hand over my mouth and pinned my arms down with his other as he dragged me into the doorway of a house.

He told me not to struggle and not to scream.

He was so much stronger than me that I didn’t even try. I became a rag doll in his arms. There was no fight in my body but my mind was racing at hyper speed.

He sexually assaulted me before taking his hand away from my mouth to get his keys to open the door.

At the top of my lungs I screamed fire. Over and over again. Fire, fire, fire, fire.

I’d read in Cosmopolitan magazine the word fire would draw more attention than shouting help. But no one came to my rescue.

Luckily, my distressed voice, echoing against the terraced houses was loud enough to frighten him off and he ran away.

He stopped to look back at me before disappearing into the night. I could see my street from where he attacked me. I was almost home.

I graduated and left Cardiff without knowing whether he had been caught. I wanted my life to move forward, I didn’t want to look back.

Almost 20 years have passed since the night I was attacked and after the headlines this week, I’ve realised my memories of the assault are not buried anywhere near as deeply as I thought.

I have not slept properly this week because of those four words. I’ve been wide awake from 3am to 5am staring into the darkness.

We all want to live in peace. We want our freedom. We don’t want our lives to be shrouded in fear. Life is for living, not hiding in the shadows, afraid.

I feel so deeply sorry for Sarah’s family and friends and I can hardly bear to think about poor Sarah herself.

I went to the university newspaper the next day to warn other women to be careful. The police told me my attacker had threatened another woman with a knife in the same spot only days earlier.

I told the Gair Rhydd that I was an independent woman and I wouldn’t let it stop me going out on my own. And I’ve stayed true to that.

But, even now in 2021, it has stopped me sleeping. That night took away my sense of safety.

I’m just thankful he didn’t succeed in dragging me inside the house because I know there’s a chance, if he had, I might not be here.

Twenty years down the line, at 40 years old, those terrifying minutes are as fresh in my memory as if it happened yesterday.

You can never forget. You just get on and hope for a future without the headlines we’ve seen this week.

Rest in peace Sarah. My heart is with you.