Latest / Shallow Nights: Scary Bedtime Stories / Echoes in the Dark: Stories of Stalking and Resilience

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Echoes in the Dark: Stories of Stalking and Resilience · Shallow Nights: Scary Bedtime Stories

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I started my first job at Tim horton's when I was 16 and
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worked there for many years throughout high school and
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university. I could probably add about 10
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stories here about inappropriate regulars, but this is one that's
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still really haunts me. I was about 17 or 18 at the time
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and worked at a location that was 10 minutes down the street
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from my parents house. A neighbor, Alex, lived roughly
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8 houses down, started coming in regularly for coffee and small
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talk with me. Alex was at least 45 to 50 and
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it turns out he used to work with my dad and has lived in the
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neighborhood for years. Nothing about our conversation
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seemed weird or alarming to me. After a few months of completely
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normal interactions, he found me on Facebook.
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I accepted because I was young and had no social media
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boundaries at the time. This was when things started to
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get weird. He would DM me about things I
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was posting instead of commenting publicly.
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He would offer me rides to work or class and would make comments
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about my hair, makeup, and curves.
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I found out that he was married and as a son a few years younger
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than me. I started ignoring his messages
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and eventually removed him as a friend.
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When he came in for his coffee after this, he would ask for my
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number, wouldn't take no for an answer and just generally made
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me uncomfortable. I started asking Co workers to
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serve him. My manager at the time refused
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to ban him from the store. I also learned that he used to
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send a past employee flowers and do the same things to her.
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Fast forward a few months, Alex seemed to have gotten the hint
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and stopped asking for me when he came into my workplace one
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evening. I was walking my dog around my
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subdivision and smoking some weed as I did most nights before
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bed. I walked the same routine each
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night, which unfortunately meant I had to pass by his home on my
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way back. This night I saw him out of the
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corner of my eye coming out of his house with a baseball bat.
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He stood in his front yard for a few minutes and then I could
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hear him starting to walk behind me and I panicked.
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I was also high and unsure if I should be as alarmed.
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Is this the time to panic? Some kids in the duplex across
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the street started banging on the window and making a bunch of
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noise. I was too scared to even look up
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at them. My dog started getting agitated
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and I decided to start running. Since I was only two minutes
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from home, I figured I can make it inside and lock the door.
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Alex must have been spooked by the noise and stopped following
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me. I'm very thankful for those kids
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who knew that the situation did not look right and tried to warn
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me. It worries me to think about
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what would have happened if they didn't.
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The story happened when my best friend and I were about 15 years
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old. We had to take an important exam
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at the end of the year, so we attended some private sessions
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in order to prepare. Because of this, we could only
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hang out on Saturdays after 5:00 PM.
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We were at the mall and after a bit of window shopping, she
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asked me to come outside in the park so she could smoke a
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cigarette. She took it from her mother, but
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I didn't smoke. I've never liked it.
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I accepted as I was used to her requirement.
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So we were in the mall's park walking while she was smoking
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that damn cigarette. It was like 6:00 PM, but it was
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already dark outside. As this happened in the winter,
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let me describe to you the place where we were.
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This was a large park full of trees and big rectangular shaped
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bushes. On the side aisle there were
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some restaurants, a full 10m gap, an exit to a dark St. into
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the parking lot, another big space and a place for skating.
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We thought that we were 100% safe as we were still walking on
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the mall's property. We arrived near the strange exit
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when a 5 foot nine man approaches us and asks for a
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cigarette. My friend tells him that she
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doesn't have any other cigarettes because she got it
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from someone else too. He seemed to be in his late 40s,
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was unshaven and wearing a red hood which almost covered his
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eyes. I tell him that we have to go,
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to which he responds with some incoherent words.
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We both knew that something was off, so we started to back up.
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Why are you scared I won't do anything to you?
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He said as he was approaching. We didn't answer.
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Don't worry, I've met a lot of girls like you, He said.
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Then he started to mumble other words I couldn't understand.
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We didn't know what to do. We didn't know if he had any
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weapons. Behind us was a huge Bush, in
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front of us was him. If we chose to run in different
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directions, you would be able to catch at least one of us and
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probably take her with him. There weren't many people, but
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the ones who were passing by didn't seem to care about our
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terrified looks. My friend started to repeat that
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she was sorry, but she couldn't help him, and I think that one
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of the passers hurt her. Fortunately, a man, maybe 6-3,
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who looked a lot more younger and stronger than the creep,
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stopped and asked why he was bothering us, but he wasn't
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given any response. My friend took the chance,
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crushed her cigarette with her foot as quickly as possible and
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started running. I as a complete idiot remained
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frozen a few more seconds and looked in our savior's eyes then
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started sprinting. I'm not sure how to translate
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it, but the six foot three man said in a slang language
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something across the lines fly already.
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While I started to depart. We didn't stop running until we
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were sure that they couldn't see us anymore.
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Both of them left and we got back into the mall safely and we
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never told anyone about this encounter.
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Never have I ever thought and have to worry about someone
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stalking me. This is from a couple of years
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back so it's hard to get every detail but I'm sorry it's not
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perfect. From a young age I've always
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been told about stranger danger and such.
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I actually had a Facebook at a really young age because my
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parents knew I was aware. I only really got on there for a
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game called Yeovil. Anyways, I created an Instagram
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and grew a significant amount of followers.
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It's kind of scary not knowing who follows you, but I modeled
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and it never crossed my mind that someone was watching.
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It all started when I was going on a trip and received a
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Snapchat from a user named Hot Daddy.
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OK, nothing to it, right? Sent a picture of his private
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parts. Weird, but it was nothing new to
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many girls. I did not reply and went on to
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my day. I wasn't paying much to my phone
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because I was at the zoo so every now and then I look on my
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phone and to reply to friends and such.
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I looked at another message and notice that hot daddy again
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texted me saying you opened my snap.
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I wouldn't ever think you'd reply.
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Do you still live on inserts? My old address.
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Obviously I was shocked. I wasn't going to say I moved so
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I said yes I did. He explained that he has seen my
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Instagram pictures and me being around town he knew the
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locations. I didn't know his name but he
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named a street that was right by me so I knew he must have lived
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down there somewhere. He then replied I've been seeing
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you around for years and I was so nervous to talk to you.
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I was a little confused to think it was a joke for my friends.
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I mean who would actually stalk? He just said a bunch of weird
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things that I couldn't wrap my head around.
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I asked if he stalked me or something.
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This wasn't a friend I knew, but a part of me wish it was.
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I was always skeptical of the old house after my dad passed
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away. It wasn't the nicest
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neighborhood and a lot of scary things happened when we lived
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there. It was only my mom, my 15 year
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old brother, and 17 year old me. Hot daddy replied I've only seen
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you walking around. I never stalked you, but I can
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if you want me to. He also insisted to pick me up
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to take me to McDonald's. Mind you, he thinks I still live
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there. I wanted to make sure it wasn't
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one of my friends playing a joke, so I asked him to send a
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picture. It was a man.
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I blocked him. I didn't know his name, I didn't
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know if he still followed me. I don't know if it was a joke,
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but one of my friends actually lives on the road and she opened
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the door one day to a white man asking to mow the lawn.
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He examined her and pushed the door open a little bit until she
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replied no. He got on her snap as well so I
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know he knew what she looked like.
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He was an easy target to spot because the majority of people
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who live down that road were not white.
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He was also a construction worker so it was an easy
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spotting. This was two years back.
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So hot daddy, whoever the hell you are, I hope he never me.
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This all started a year ago. I, 23 and female, live on the
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second floor of an apartment complex and I've lived here my
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entire life. The building is mostly comprised
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of families with young children and married couples.
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A lot of the families have lived here as long as my family has,
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so everyone knows each other pretty well.
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There is only one apartment unit that isn't occupied by a family,
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but rather by a pair of brothers who keep to themselves.
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One day, one of their sons around my age appeared out of
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the blue. He was strange off the bat.
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He would always wear a sweatshirt with the hood up and
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would run through the apartment complex to get to his apartment.
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I'm not sure what his face looks like because he always had the
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hood over his face. He lived on the 1st floor on the
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backside of the complex and would often get into his place
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by jumping through the window. He basically did everything in
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his power to avoid any interaction.
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I didn't mind him because I never saw him due to my busy
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schedule. However, one day he started
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sitting on top of the staircase that leads to my apartment.
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This was strange because his apartment unit was on the other
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side of the complex and on the 1st floor.
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I brushed it off at first, but it started happening every day.
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When I would come home from school, he was there.
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When my boyfriend at the time would drop me off at night,
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typically around 10:30 or 11:00, he would be there.
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Sometimes when I would leave and come back hours later, he would
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still be in the exact same spot as if he didn't move through the
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five plus hours I was gone. At this point I told my parents
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and boyfriend about it and they became very vigilant.
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My boyfriend would park his car and walk me to my door every
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night he dropped me off. Once he saw my boyfriend.
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He stopped sitting on the staircase and I thought it was
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over, but it wasn't. He started waiting for me at my
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bus stop. The bus I take home from school
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stops right across the street from my home so it's a short
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walk. One day when I was getting off,
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I saw him waiting at the bus stop.
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Once he saw me get off, he followed me into the complex and
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sat on the staircase. He also started following me
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when I would walk my dog. At this point my parents were
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upset. My mom started letting the
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neighbors know he was following me around.
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My neighbors started making sure he wasn't bothering me or if I
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was alone they would start a conversation with me until I got
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into my door. One day I got a friend request
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on Facebook from this guy. Mind you he had never spoken a
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word to me so how did he know my name let alone find me on
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Facebook? My mom tried talking to his
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father but they would never answer the door when my mom
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knocked on their door. So I'm thinking they can't
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possibly get any worse, right? He seemed harmless so I wasn't
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too worried I was wrong. One day when I returned from my
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boyfriend's house, my mom told me she had something to tell me
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but she didn't want me to get spooked.
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She proceeded to tell me that when she was walking towards the
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kitchen to get a glass of water was when she saw something in
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the tree move. Our kitchen has a huge window
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that takes up most of the wall. In front of the window, there's
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a huge tree. If someone were to climb the
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tree, you could see into our apartment.
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Well, guess what? When my mom took a closer look,
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she realized my neighbor was sitting in the tree looking
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straight into the apartment. My mom called my dad over and
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when my neighbor saw my dad, he jumped off the tree.
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At that moment, I felt my piece stolen from me.
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We filed a police report, but when the police went looking for
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him, he was gone. It turned out there were snack
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wrappers and a blanket hidden in between the leaves of the trees.
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The police think that wasn't the first time he was up on Jay
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Tree. I couldn't help but to wonder
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how many times he saw me walking around.
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I had no idea. It's been about six months and I
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haven't seen him since. His father still lives in the
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complex, but there's no sight of him.
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The police haven't been able to find him so I have no idea what
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happened to him. Hi everyone, so this happened
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about a year ago and it's still pretty freaky.
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For context, my friend and I are both 22 and female.
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My friend Anna and I were bored one weekend and decided to go to
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a popular beach to take some pictures and just mess around.
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So we took pictures and had a really lovely day.
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Then on the way back we were starving so we decided to stop
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at McDonald's in the beach town. This town is like really, really
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famous and nice. All the celebrities live there
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and it's beautiful. There's also a super famous
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restaurant right off the highway on the beach that's known for
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celebrities and rich people going.
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This McDonald's was directly across the street from that
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restaurant. Since so many famous people go
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to this restaurant and it's on a pretty busy Rd., most of them
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have drivers that take them, usually in black Escalades.
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Usually in big black Escalades, the drivers would usually hang
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out in the parking lot of that McDonald's while their bosses
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ate across the street. Anna and I didn't know this at
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the time, we just wanted a Mcflurry.
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So we go to the McDonald's and right when we get out of the car
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she starts acting really weird. She like triple checks that the
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car doors are locked and grabs her fancy camera to bring
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inside. I asked her what's up and she
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says there's a group of guys, the drivers, standing in front
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of McDonald's smoking and staring at us and it was giving
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her the creeps. I'm a pretty chill and trusting
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person so I don't think much of it.
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It's a busy place in a super nice town, I'm not worried.
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We go in and there are a few other people in there about our
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age. We get our food and sit at the
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table to eat. One of the drivers comes in and
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sits a few booths down with his back to the wall right where he
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can see us. My back is to him, but Anna gets
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really creeped out and wants to leave.
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This guy isn't eating nor anything, he's just staring at
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us. Again, This is a pretty crowd of
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McDonald's in one of the nicest towns in Southern California, so
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I feel pretty safe. Living in South Central, you get
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used to the odd creep. Still, Anna was freaked out so I
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agree to go. I just have to run to the
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bathroom first. It was one of those McDonald's
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where the counter in main dining room were in one big room, and
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then there was a sort of hallway off to the side of the counter
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with more seating in the bathroom at the end way in the
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back. There was also a door going
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outside right next to the bathrooms.
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The bathroom only had two stalls.
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I just walked into the first stall, not really paying
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attention to whether or not anyone else was in there.
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So I'm in there doing my thing, and then I hear the door open
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and I hear Anna Call My Name. At this point I'm very confused
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since she's supposed to be watching her stuff and I'm like,
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yeah, what's up? She asks.
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Are you OK? Yeah, just peeing.
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I reply. She was like, OK, and just
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stands there in the doorway. After a second I hear her leave
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and I'm thinking that's very weird so I walk out of the
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bathroom and see her waiting by the door with all our stuff in
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her hands. I ask her what's going on and
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why she came to the bathroom and she just looks at me really
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panicky and it's like we need to leave right now.
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At this point I'm still not afraid, just confused.
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We rush out to the car and she starts telling me what happened.
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Turns out when I walked into the bathroom the creeper driver
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followed me in a little while after.
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I don't remember hearing him come in, but maybe I did and
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just assumed someone had either been in the stall next to me and
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was leaving or had just come to check their makeup or something.
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I'll be honest, I really wasn't paying attention.
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I know for sure I wasn't aware that anyone had entered the
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stall next to me because he didn't close the stall door when
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he came in. She was on her phone so she
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didn't see him follow me either. A young guy noticed and went out
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to my friend asking if we knew the driver.
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Frantic, she told him we did not and ran to check on me.
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He was in the stall next to me with the stall door open.
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It was the large handicap stall not making a sound.
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She came in and didn't see him so she called my name to make
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sure I was still alive and he rushed out of the stall past
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her. She was in shock and didn't know
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what to do other than gather our things and prepare to run.
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When we went to her car he was sitting in his big black car
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with tinted windows next to us still staring.
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We speed off and when I got the story we called the McDonald's
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to let them know what happened. They didn't really care and then
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we called the non-emergency sheriff line to report it as
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well which was closed. Thank you Malibu for nothing.
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Eventually my mom went full on Mama bear and threatened to
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blast it all over social media that they didn't take my report
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seriously and got a hold of someone at corporate.
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From there they checked their cameras and they saw the guy
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follow me in. A police report was made so
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hopefully this never happens to anyone else again.
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Thank God nothing happened but it was really scary.
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The guy was sitting in his car staring at us when we left.
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Who knows what he was planning on doing.
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When I was 17 I started working at my local grocery store about
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3 weeks and I got transferred from the front baggers cashiers
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to produce. My first week in produce I met
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all the people in my department and all was going well.
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One night on my second week in produce I was closing alone when
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this girl comes in, my back turned to her.
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I hear you're new, when did you start?
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I turn around and we start to have a conversation while I put
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the last few things from my cart on the shelf.
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I had about 10 minutes left on my shift and was trying to go
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downstairs to crush my boxes but this girl continued to talk and
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took no social cues that I was trying to leave.
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I finally get tired of listening to her talk and start to pull my
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cart through the produce section as she slowly follows still
20:05
talking. Eventually we got to the doors
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employees only and I start to make my way through and she
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comes in right after me. I explained that unfortunately
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she can't come this way and she needs to just go check out as
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our store will be closing soon. She says Bayern leaves and I
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thought that was odd but maybe she's just a bit weird.
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Crush my boxes, go home and didn't think about it.
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Two days later I'm closing up again and the same thing
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happens. This time she starts asking for
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my phone number. I explained that I don't have a
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phone at this time, hence why I had a job so I could get one.
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OK well would you want to hang out when you get off?
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I kind of felt bad at this point as I thought she was just a bit
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odd and just looking for friends.
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I tell her maybe next time as my mom was picking me up every
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night I worked she would come in and just pick up 1 grapefruit
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and then walk around basically acting like she was either on
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the phone or pretending to shop and then casually stop by me.
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It got old really quick to the point of where I would hide in
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the hallway and watch her till she left.
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Eventually other people in my store heard about her and rumors
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went around that she was stalking me.
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The deli manager explained that she and her boyfriend you also
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worked in the deli, also had been stalked by her for a number
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of months. Eventually she stopped coming by
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at night as I was always hiding when she did come.
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A few weeks go by and I had just gotten off work early shift for
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a change and my friends were meeting me at work to hang out
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after two guys and one girl. So I head out to the parking lot
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and meet up with them when my stalker comes out of nowhere and
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hugs me. I haven't seen you at work in so
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long. Oh yeah.
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They switched to my hours so now I don't work late anymore.
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Well one thing leads to another. My friend female starts to talk
22:02
to her and basically invites her to hang out with us.
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She jumps on the opportunity after I explained to my friend
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that she was stalking me and so we all start walking back to my
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friend's house to hang in the backyard as it was a nice
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summer's night. The night wasn't bad, we all
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just hung out and I kind of avoided the stalker while my
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friend female kept her entertained.
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The night came on pretty fast and eventually it was 1:00 AM
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and my friend's mom came out and told us we had to leave.
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Me and my 2 male friends and stalker head out and we're
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waiting at the bus stop that my friend needed to catch when
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stalker explains that she can't go home this late and that she
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needed to stay over. So I begged my other friend to
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stay with me. When she agrees.
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We wait for the bus to pick up my other friend then head to my
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house. Things got super weird at this
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point. So basically the stalker refused
22:58
to sleep on the floor and only wanted to sleep in the bed with
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me. I eventually gave up and said OK
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while my friend slept on the floor.
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So I'm laying in bed and this girl stands up and just takes
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her bra and shirt off and then her pants and gets in bed with
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me. I had first was pretty
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dumbfounded and didn't know what to do so I acted like I didn't
23:19
notice and then she started trying to kiss me and have me
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grope her. At this point I realized this
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girl had issues. I don't know if they were mental
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or just social but I did not want to find out.
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I lightly push her off me and explain I'm trying to sleep.
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She wouldn't take the hint and kept insisting that we cuddle.
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I was getting fed up and so eventually I wake my friend up.
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Pretty sure he wasn't asleep at this point.
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Nathan you asleep? He sits up, No why?
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So she covers up with the blanket so he doesn't see her
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naked. And then I basically explained
23:57
that I wanted to go for a walk and so I have Nathan leave the
24:00
room and her get dressed so we could go for a walk.
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On our way out I tell Nathan to get his bike.
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We walk outside. At this point it's almost 3:30
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AM and Nathan walking with our bikes and the girl beside us.
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I'm thinking of ways we can get rid of this girl.
24:16
At first I suggested me and Nathan just take a walk in the
24:18
alley and go pee, but she says she's scared and wants to go
24:22
with us. Eventually while walking and
24:24
talking she says how she was on track in high school.
24:28
Oh you're on track? I bet that you can't beat us to
24:31
the end of the block at this point.
24:33
Nathan looks at me and smirks as he knows we're about to ditch
24:36
this girl. Hurt to be 3:30 AM.
24:39
This girl was excited as hell to go sprinting.
24:42
She takes off running for the end of the block and we take off
24:45
in the opposite direction back towards my house.
24:48
We rush back inside and hide our bikes in my house instead of on
24:52
the porch and go to the living room, making sure not to turn on
24:56
any lights. We sit in the living room
24:58
talking about how crazy this chick is when she starts banging
25:01
on my door. We stayed quiet for what seemed
25:04
like two or three hours of her just banging on the door,
25:07
talking to herself, banging on the door, then more talking to
25:10
herself. Eventually we heard the
25:12
downstairs door open and we watch her leave.
25:17
I lived on the second floor of an apartment building and my mom
25:20
was out of town. So the next few days I go to
25:23
work and don't see her which is good.
25:25
And then about a week later she comes in and she completely
25:28
ignores me. She gets her random grapefruit
25:30
and pretends to shop while me and a Co worker are talking.
25:34
She's wearing a backpack this time and she walks right in
25:37
between me and my Co worker. We were maybe 6 feet apart.
25:41
She turns to walk away and her backpack touches something on my
25:44
flat cart. She turns around and starts
25:46
screaming and throws all the boxes off my car.
25:49
Bunch of naked juices, some tomatoes, and a few other things
25:53
I don't recall. She starts saying I grabbed her
25:56
and that she wanted to talk to a manager.
25:58
And so my Co worker older guy in his 40s tells me to go
26:02
downstairs and just get away from the situation.
26:05
I head downstairs and sit in the break room.
26:08
About 10 minutes later I'm called up the hallway where my
26:11
store manager is talking to the girl.
26:13
I see from the door that she leaves and he comes in the
26:16
hallway to talk to me. So this girl says you grabbed
26:19
her and shoved her and that you were swearing at her.
26:22
I explained what happened to the manager.
26:24
He goes and finds my Co worker and then comes back to me.
26:27
After talking to my Co worker my manager comes in looks at me.
26:32
You need to sleep with her already.
26:34
We kind of chuckle and then he tells me don't worry about it
26:37
she's just crazy. Eventually she left me alone but
26:42
then my girlfriend started working with me and the girl
26:45
would come in to see me and my girlfriend and then go to her
26:48
line and to check out. Girlfriend was a cashier.
26:51
It was always really rude to my girlfriend.
26:55
Eventually she stopped coming around altogether and from the
26:58
looks of it, she's married to some 50 year old man on
27:01
Facebook. She's 24.
27:09
When I was 18 I was living in a small town.
27:11
I was friends with the ratty skaters around and they helped
27:14
me connect with this dude who sold weed.
27:17
He was 29 at the time and gave me pretty good deals and live
27:20
nearby. I wasn't driving at the time so
27:23
this was convenient for me. His name was Max Max has always
27:28
struck me as a weird dude, but I honestly quite liked his
27:31
weirdness. Not in a romantic way or
27:33
anything, but I like weird people.
27:36
We had normal weed buying interactions that never lasted
27:38
more than 10 minutes. Buy some weed, maybe smoke a
27:41
bowl, That's it. He'd often tell me he could drop
27:45
it off at my house, but I never let him because, as I said
27:48
before, he was weird. I wasn't afraid of him, but was
27:52
definitely aware that he and his offers to deliver were weird.
27:57
One day in May 2018, I was invited to a bonfire by the same
28:00
ratty skaters that introduced me to this guy.
28:03
I had no idea he'd be there, nor was it important to me at all.
28:07
I brought the guy I was dating at the time.
28:10
I said hey to everyone, including Max.
28:12
We stayed for a couple hours and some of them played some music
28:15
on their guitars. Nearing the time I was leaving
28:18
the bonfire around 11:00 PM, Max was getting upset about
28:22
something and threw his guitar on the bonfire.
28:25
I didn't know what he was angry or upset about and paid no mind
28:29
to it. This happened as I was leaving
28:31
with the guy I was dating. I went to bed and woke up to
28:35
paragraphs on paragraphs of crazy texts from Max ranging
28:39
from 1:00 AM to 5:00 AM. Like a constant stream of texts
28:43
stating things such as you know how much I loved you, you are a
28:47
cruel prick. You would go back and forth
28:49
saying I would give you the world if you'd let me and you
28:52
really do deserve them. Though he said really scary
28:55
things like you are a predator and should be snubbed out.
28:59
Just wait winky face and you are stuck.
29:03
I will either love you or hate you to the fullest extent.
29:06
My powers, behold, right now I pay the worst death on you and
29:11
that bitch. To top it all off, he said
29:14
losing you is like losing a mother to me and told me to tell
29:17
him I never loved him and that I wouldn't hear from him again if
29:20
I did. So that's what I did.
29:22
I said I never loved you, do not message me again, and left it at
29:26
that. I didn't get a response, nor did
29:29
I care to get one. Max had never expressed any
29:33
romantic interest, asked me out or anything.
29:36
This was all out of nowhere and he was 11 years older than me.
29:39
I was barely 18. That night he cut his long hair
29:43
off and posted photos naked on Facebook, curled up in the fetal
29:46
position talking about being a statue of shame.
29:50
It's as if he had a breakdown, but I had no intention of
29:53
causing that and didn't think I would even offend anyone by
29:56
bringing the guy I was seeing. Everyone else seemed to like the
29:59
guy I brought about. A week later, Max texted me
30:03
pretty late at night and asked if I had seen the flowers he
30:06
spread along my sidewalk, saying that he stole every flower in
30:09
the vicinity of my neighborhood that night.
30:12
I asked how he knew where I lived and said that I had never
30:15
seen the flowers so he must have had the wrong house.
30:18
I also told him he shouldn't do that as I never felt anything
30:22
for him and so on. He told me that he had heard I
30:25
lived on the same block as another one of the skater guys
30:28
we were both friends with and he wasn't wrong.
30:31
The skater guy I lived by was on the other side of the block and
30:35
I never walked that way so I never saw the flowers.
30:39
I blocked his number and didn't hear from him again for weeks.
30:44
Weeks later I woke up after a rough night and there were loads
30:47
of flowers on the sidewalk right outside my house along with a
30:51
little bouquet at the top of my walkway.
30:54
I was pissed, I wasn't scared yet and stupidly I unblocked his
30:58
number and texted him asking why the hell there were flowers
31:02
outside my house. This confirmed that this indeed
31:06
was where I lived. I still to this day feel so
31:09
stupid for texting him and making it known that after weeks
31:13
he had found my house. He responded saying hmm sounds
31:17
nice twas me. I bitched him out basically and
31:20
blocked his number again. About a week later I was out of
31:24
town and my roommate texted me a photo of a heart with a peace
31:27
sign inside of it and my name written under it drawn in chalk
31:30
outside our house. When I got back into town I went
31:35
to the courthouse and began the process of getting a stalking
31:37
order against him. When I left the courthouse I
31:40
went to Max's work and told him he needed to stop this behavior
31:44
and that he was stalking me. He looked me in the eyes with no
31:47
facial expression and said if you don't leave I'm calling the
31:50
cops. I got angry and said loudly call
31:54
the cops, I was just talking to them about you and left his work
31:58
in a rage. Soon after this I began driving
32:01
again. I once drive by him and he
32:04
noticed it was me. The next day I woke up with my
32:07
car covered in flowers. I presented my case to the judge
32:11
and she put the stalking order in place.
32:14
He was served with it by police officers and I thought that was
32:17
that and he wouldn't be bothering me again.
32:20
I was wrong. After the stalking order was
32:24
served, he wrote several other chalk messages on my sidewalk,
32:27
left random gifts for me like chalk, and beheaded My Little
32:30
Pony heads on beer bottles. I always brought these things to
32:34
the police station, but they said I needed to catch him doing
32:37
it, take a photo, or get a security camera.
32:40
So I got a security camera and really hoped I would catch him.
32:44
It turned out my security camera was stupid and I couldn't just
32:47
watch the videos it took but had to skip through second by second
32:50
by hand. It was an impossible task.
32:53
I was terrified of leaving my house at night.
32:55
At this point, I never had my curtains open anymore and I was
32:59
so frustrated that my livelihood was being taken away from me.
33:04
Ultimately I unblocked his number in hopes that he would
33:07
text me directly, violating the stalking order.
33:10
And after a few days it worked. He sent me a weird text saying
33:14
something like forgive me, we are charming, this is harming,
33:19
let us try again. By now it's September 2019 and
33:24
he finally goes to jail. He is facing up to a year in
33:27
jail and has to stay there until our court date.
33:30
I finally start calming down. I'm able to go outside at night,
33:34
even if just to get to my car. I let myself have my curtains
33:38
open sometimes. I'm starting to feel alive
33:41
again, right when I start feeling secure in my small town
33:45
life again. Someone posted bail and he was
33:47
released after only three months in jail and I went back to
33:50
living in fear. We still had court dates coming
33:54
up and I was optimistic that he would serve more time for
33:57
ruining my life for so long. His lawyer kept pushing the
34:01
court date back to gather evidence and after about six
34:05
months of pushing it back, the state decided he wouldn't do
34:08
anything more and close the case.
34:09
Basically I had moved out of town 3 plus hours away at this
34:14
point so we didn't actually have an option to continue this
34:17
behaviour. Living in this new place, I feel
34:21
safe, I can walk at night, don't have to have my curtains closed
34:26
all the time. It's been over a year since they
34:29
decided to close the case. About a month ago he began
34:35
responding to my friend's Instagram stories, friends that
34:38
live here in this new town, telling them how fond he is of
34:41
me, etcetera. I've always had them blocked,
34:44
but my Instagram isn't private so we must have found them that
34:47
way. I have since changed my account
34:49
to private and he hasn't messaged any more of friends of
34:52
mine. I refuse to be fearful of him
34:54
now the way I was then. You will never find where I live
35:00
or where I work. However, my life is forever
35:04
changed after this experience. I will always be more aware of
35:08
people and their weird energy. I will always close my curtains
35:11
early in the evening and make sure all the windows and doors
35:14
are locked. I will always live a little bit
35:17
in fear, maybe not of him, but of it happening again.
35:22
He ruined my life for a year and I truly wish he had gotten that
35:25
time in jail. He deserves it.
36:29
Yeah.