The Taste of Fear.

Don't let anyone tell you that the taste of fear is merely a literary expression.

Fear tastes like tin.

Prolonged fear tastes like zinc, a little like the aftertaste of one of those herbal cold remedy lozenges. This is the fear you live when you honestly don't know if you are going to survive in your world. The odds are stacked against you. No one can help you but yourself, and although you are trying your best, it may not be enough in the end.

Instantaneous fear is more like adrenalised self preservation. It makes us act in the blink of an eye, giving us a rush of clarity.

Once in the deep dark time after 2am, I was returning home after a long evening barbecue, and stepped into the fluorescent light of the elevator in the foyer of my building. I was lugging a freshly washed party-size glass salad bowl in my denim bag.
Behind me, a police sketch and warning was taped to the mirror, depicting a fierce looking man with stubble and a woolen cap pulled over his eyes. I habitually glanced around the hallway before the doors closed, and saw a fleeting figure emerge from the shadows of the emergency stairs and quickly step into the lift, facing me.

Instantaneous fear. In less time than it took for the doors to slide shut, I recognized the passenger as the sketched rapist behind me, knew I would be trapped with him, and smacked him harder than I ever thought I would with my salad bowl.
He fell out backwards with surprise and I pushed past him and ran out of the building screaming obscenities. He came after me and I took off like a hunted rabbit, screaming at the top of my lungs to attract attention. Then, he suddenly stopped dead in his tracks. For some reason, I stopped too. Then he sauntered off away from me, sneering at me over his shoulder.
I stood ready to bolt.
My downstairs neighbor, an off-duty policeman, came careening down the staircase with his handgun ready and sprinted up the street. I stood there in the middle of the street, hugely magnified senses having stunned me into inaction. A few minutes later, my neighbor reappeared, weaving his way down the street and peering into the windows of parked cars. The knife-wielding man had vanished.
My neighbor's girlfriend appeared, took me by the hand, and led me upstairs to my apartment. The adrenaline was subsiding and I was shaking violently. She went downstairs quickly, returned with a blender, and did not leave until I had finished the banana milkshake she had made with kindness. I remember being light headed with grace and the feeling of escape.

The serial rapist was eventually caught after raping seven women in my neighborhood.
I identified him in a police line-up, respectfully avoiding the eyes of the women there who he had hurt badly.
He escaped from prison whilst awaiting trial.
My neighbor came over personally to tell me.
The taste of tin returned.