Arn stuck his head in the kitchen. "Hawk! We need you!"
That's when I heard the yelling. The kids are normally loud in the gym, but the tone had shifted.
Hawk ran out the door and I ran after.
In a crisis, the brain is selective. It picks a few points it deems critical and then everything else is tuned out.
Who was yelling? Ki.
Who was he yelling at? Kids were on the court. No one else was posturing back. Maybe, Jay? They have history.
Who was on Ki? Hawk and Brown. A girl student, too, I think.
Time seems to crawl in those moments. The brain is in reaction mode and the first plan that pops up is usually the one it goes with.
Hawk was on the kid, so I positioned myself between the kid and the crowd further back. If I'm not in the crisis and my focus point has narrowed, that applies double for the kid. Too many voices and people closing in when the kid is already in anger/survival mode can a bad spiral.
Ki's keeps yelling and it's aggressive. It is about Jay, but Jay isn't making any moves to posture or leave the crowd.
Ki is trying to push and force his way past the people on him. I don't know if he's been pushing the whole time or if it just started. My brain's been in threat analysis the whole time and it only shifted to analytical after I dropped into a support position.
That changes.
Ki pushes his way and must do a football move to roll around Brown to get away from Hawk. The girl, Iya, is screaming, "Ki! NO!" and suddenly Ki's around the group and there will be violence if he gets to Jay.
I run up to Ki and block him.
My body knows what to do. He tries to push past me, but I set myself to lean into him and work for inside control. My hands are on his biceps and elbows are low.
My brain is only focused on two things:
1) Keep my face non-threatening. I try to look worried, surprised....anything but aggressive. I'm saying his name. I'm trying to say it calmly rather than shouting.
2) Keep my hands as low as possible and be non-threatening even as I'm trying to be a wall. Ki knows how to swing and has been in brawls before. In his heightened state, I don't want to force a reflex/defensive move to shift his aggression from Jay elsewhere. That means my hands aren't near my face to protect myself if he does swing and I'm well aware of it. It's why I keep my hands on the biceps rather than working for any other level of control. It seems to be the best balance of non-aggressive and affords some level of control.
The danger of stopping a fight is always getting caught in the fight.
Ki is roaring. His face is dripping sweat. Brown and the girl, Iya, are trying to hold Ki from the side and behind. Iya is yelling, "Let him go! Let him go!" the whole time as I'm saying something like, "Whoa! Whoa! It's okay!" and I have no idea if Brown is talking or not.
With them pushing too, we're suddenly against the gym wall. Ki is no longer going forward, but has squared his back against the wall. He sinks to the ground to sit. I start to fade as he's sitting.
Again, I'm thinking something about not overcrowding and causing a reaction. Iya is still yelling something about, "Let him go!" and I somehow have two thoughts simultaneous: "I am letting go, but I'm doing it safely!" and "I wonder what she's seen that is triggering her reactions?"
As this is happening, I notice that Ki is still really upset, but it's shifted. He's angry, but he's shuddering, and maybe crying. It's hard to tell with the all the sweat. Iya is almost hugging him as he sits on the floor.
I took a big step back. Then two.
Since I was the one who jumped in Ki's path, I figured it would be good to be the one to step back. Iya and Brown are still hovering over him and people normally can't hear more than one, maybe two voices when they're in crisis mode.
The room is calm aside from what just happened. I think it's Hawk that starts to clear the gym, so I shift to help with that. We shoo all the kids out the door. I go with the group and leave Hawk, Brown, and Iya with Ki.
The initial crisis had passed. It was time to see if there'd be any fallout as everyone processed what happened.
-Fin-
I ended the story there. I could go on, but I really wanted to write about the moment everything happened. It couldn't have been more than 30 seconds. One moment, three of us were in the kitchen talking (Hawk, Mo, and me). The next we were reacting and then it was done and our brains needed to catch back up.
I've been in these moments before, so I knew what to expect with the adrenaline and the focus. I find it interesting to see what my brain snaps on to after the fact, but other than "next time" there's never any going back for a 'do-over.' Wrestling has helped me by throwing me into those all-consuming moments before, but they're not exactly predictable.
The security guy, Arn, came into my room later and talked. He started trying to explain himself. That's when I realized I didn't remember him even being in the gym after he called for help. I'm sure he was there somewhere, but I have no recollection. He told me why he did what he did and how he was waiting for Hawk to signal him, because he didn't want to get on the radio and escalate things, etc. It sounded like he was processing his own reaction and felt guilty about how things went down. Or maybe he was trying to admonish me for getting involved? I think it was more the former and he worded it awkward. The last time we had a crisis moment was at the end of last year and I pulled a headlock off of him.
Either way, there's no judgement from me. It's sometimes hard to predict where your brain will go in those moments. I know I've stood by waiting for more information at times in my life when I should have acted. Other times, I've jumped into something before there was time to think.
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