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The ONSU Guide To Stalking And Not Getting Arrested. |
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Who hasn’t stalked in their time? Be it the nonchalant walk by somebody’s house when you know they’re home, to the excuses to go near where they work, we’ve all been there, done that. I personally believe myself to be an accomplished stalker, just, you know, without the restraining orders and stuff.
I have had two major stalking victims in the past. The first, and by far worst, was for a guy called Craig, a sixth former (senior, I guess in US terms) in my school (I was in Year 9). Now my entire group loved this guy. He had really kicky brown hair, in Leo dC as Jack Dawson style, he played drums, and he was, as far as we were concerned, a GOD. Hot damn, he was cutie.
He used to live near Sarah and I, and we’d follow him home from school every darn day, walking about 100 yards behind him so as not to lose sight. We knew his house number and sent him long, sickly (and sometimes pornographic, and yes, I was 14 at the time) love letters. We ripped a photo of him from the school notice board (I still have this somewhere) and we left flowers and Barbie heads on his doorstep (no really, we did – we thought it was romantic), and we’d kick all the gravel from his drive and spell out “I love you, Ben” on the road, then ring his doorbell and run like crazy (how were we to know he actually lived next door?). The curb by his house still bears his and my initials and a squiggly heart written in permanent marker from one stalky reconnaissance.
We got hold of his phone number and called him at least twice a week (our code name was Darcy. Yeah, I dunno where that came from either) and professed our undying love. We arranged to meet him at school one time, and everyone went to meet him, but I bottled out and spent the entire lunch break hyper ventilating in the toilets. He told them all to leave him alone. So we did. Yeah, right…
Because he was a drummer, his band used to play at the variety nights our school used to run, so we always volunteered for them and ended up doing the most stupid comedy sketches ever, just so we could spend more time around him outside of school. He was in the band for another production, so we volunteered as Morris Dancers. MORRIS DANCERS, people. This is obsession in its rawest form. (FYI: Morris dancing is an Olde English dance form, where (usually) men dress up in white and tie bells on their knees and skip about with sticks, handkerchief’s and usually a bladder on a stick to the “tune” of an accordion. Just in case anyone didn’t know!!)
He was seeing a girl called Ruth (a fifth year) and we hated her with an unbridled passion. Even after Ben had left school for colleges new, we used to be evil to Ruth. We’d forcibly barge into her in the corridors, trip her up, and spread vicious rumours about her. We even hated her when we’d learned that they weren’t together anymore.
Worst part? His dad was an architect and I worked for a construction company (many years later). Our company had a corporate golf day to which his father was invited. I was chatting to the man and he mentioned that my name was familiar and then said, “Oh. Oh. Did you used to go to school with my son, Ben?” I said that he did and he gave me this really odd look – half reproachful and half-terrified, as if her were imagining what I’d do to his bunny. “Oh.”
You know, I didn’t realise how bad this was until I started writing it all down…
Damn, it’s fess up time, right?
The other and more recent “incident” was (okay, okay, IS) with my ex-boyfriend. Please understand while reading this that: I. Dumped. Him. I dumped his ass quicker that you can say bastard, ‘cause he knocked up some SEVENTEEN YEAR OLD HO’ while he was living with me (he’s 25). Bastard. Quicker’n that.
However….
Once we’d broken up I used to rent videos a lot (he had a second job at Blockbuster), I conned him into helping me move, I used to go to all the pubs we used to go to, including one way out in a whole different town (like 15 miles away, and dragged my friends there, without them realising I was stalking). I used to be really bad.
He’s now moved to my city, in fact, my area of the city and I have to walk past his house on my way home from work and always, ALWAYS have a look in the windows. I know his car and motorbike registration by heart so I always keep an eye out for that. It’s more passive stalking now – I don’t deliberately go out of my way to check up on him, just if I’m there, I’ll scout around. No really, it’s all very harmless…
Ahem.
Anyhoo, now you’ve heard my qualifications, let’s get down to the how you actually DO it.
Let’s presume you already know a fair amount about the object of you affection, as Dr. Lecter tells you, you always covet that which you see every day. So you should have the basics about where he or she lives/works/hangs out (general approximate areas are sufficient as it’s possible to stalk in a general area). If you know their telephone number even better, if not, check the Telephone Directory or www.192.com (this holds census information, gives addresses and even a useful map to the person’s house! Bargain!! The LATEST information might not be up there though, so use with caution).
Let’s get stalking!!
1) Drive by their house. Are there any lights on? They may be home. Slow your car down, although if it’s a busy street this may cause problems. If that’s the case, proceed to stage 2.
2) Park your car (or drive it home if you think they’ll recognise it), then walk past the house; to get a closer and longer look. If you can borrow somebody’s dog, this adds credibility to your look, rather than looking like a mugger or street hood, albeit a female and probably slightly hysterical one.
3) You should do this a couple more times, perhaps with a different dog each time. If any of your friends have babies, borrow one for a while and take it for a walk. Now is a good time to get into the habit of writing all this down in your diary. Don’t have a diary? Start one?
4) Continue watching from afar. After about a week, now if the time to phone him. Remember girls, 141 BEFORE you dial saves any embarrassment. No need to speak, just know that he’s there on the end of the phone. If you get his answer phone, this gives you the right to ring it repeatedly “just to hear his voice”.
5) Get pally with his friends and people who know him. They don’t need to know that you know him, so you need to cleverly work the conversation round to the person you love. Be sneaky. You’ll find out lots of important facts like whether they are seeing anybody else, if they’re going to such and such’s party, what pub they’re usually in.
6) Remember those places mentioned in conversations with his friends? GO THERE. NOW. Why are you still here? Haunt those places like Rentaghost, he could be there now, or any second, or at least sometime this week.
7) Has he got a girlfriend? Stalk her as well. Get as much information on her as you can. This gives you ammunition and background to base your groundless and vicious rumours about her penchant for sucking donkeys in.
8) When you see him, remain in the background. Stay away – remember, you don’t need him in your life, he’s a loser. Well, as long as HE thinks that.
9) If he approaches you to try and talk to you (unless it’s to ask whether you’ve been calling his house, in which case, deny all knowledge) act aloof and bored, like you’ve got way better things to do than talk to him. Memorise every word that he says. Tape record it if at all possible, to go over and over and over with your friends in the manner of “What do you think he meant by that?” “Do you think he still has feelings for me? His voice raised by an octave when he said that word and I read in this book once…”
10) You should now be about 12 weeks into your Stalk Cycle.
11) Send him things. DO NOT USE YOUR OWN HANDWRITING, FOR THE LOVE OF CHRIST. Type love letters, send him “presents” the weirder the better because they’ll stick in his mind. Then when you eavesdrop on a conversation between him and his buddies and he says “Dude, you’ll never guess what I got delivered to my house this morning. It was a Tiny Tears dolls head with all the hair cut off, the eyes poked out and the whole thing was stuffed with flower petals!” you can feel a certain sense of accomplishment and pride.
12) You’re still doing the drive by’s and walk by’s, aren’t you? Good. Keep ‘em up. This way you get to know his patterns. Add the places he hangs out (as derived from his friends) to you’re list of “just passing throughs”.
This is about as far as I’d usually go. See, you can only go so far before even the dumbest of dumbasses gets the point and you become ostracised by your peers. Besides which, this is usually about this time when you spot a new stalkee.
Heh heh heh heh.
You didn’t get this from me, right? |
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| © Indie | |
