Main Street Manhattan (Part 3)

The next day was Monday. Day One of having a trace and tap on my phone. I was dying for Frank the Stalker to call. I couldn’t wait. I sat by the phone willing it to ring. Most people would hope the stalker would have stopped calling by now but not me. I wanted to know who it was. I wanted to see Psycho Cop go Rodney King on his ass. I wanted some peace of mind.

He didn’t call all day. I called out sick from work and everything. I guess most stalkers like to stalk at night. Cowards. Since I had the day off from work, I went out and bought a book about stalkers. If I had one, I should try to learn all about them. The one thing I took away from the book is that overly-friendly nice people get stalked. If you’re a total cranky bitch even stalkers aren’t interested. Cranky bitches really get all the advantages. If you’re not famous, then you know who your stalker is. It suggested to make a list of all the people who give you the creeps, or who you think might be “a little off.”

In NYC, with my overly-friendly ways, it was a pretty long list. I studied the list. Some of the guys seemed weird, but too lazy. You have to be motivated to stalk. Lazy guys don’t have enough enthusiasm to get the job done. You also need a guy that's committed. Let’s face it, in NYC that cut the list to only a few. One was actually one of the black belts who taught in the karate school below me. I made a mental note to be more of a bitch to him. The other was this limo driver who took me back and forth to the airport a few times. I thought he was strange, he kept asking me out even though he was a 100 years older than me, and it was weird I kept getting him. Then there was this guy in the deli, but I wasn’t sure if he was stalker material. My best guest was the karate guy, but how would I know for sure?

I became really good at locking my door the minute I walked into my apartment and waiting by my phone. Instead of waiting for a hottie to call I was waiting for someone mentally deranged. Where did it all go wrong? If anyone called I told them I couldn’t talk because I didn’t know if the trace or the tap would work with call waiting. I had friends on rotation staying over every night because that’s when I knew Frank the Stalker would call.

Everything was in place, but suddenly Frank the Stalker had given up on stalking. I wondered if his real life had conflicted with his secret, stalking life. It was all very confusing, and I was totally on edge. I was waiting for a friend to come over when my buzzer rang. Thinking it was my friend, I talked into the intercom to confirm it was him.

Nobody answered, but I heard someone come into the building. I ran and got my bat (I was sleeping with one under my bed) and waited at my door. I was staring out the peep hole, thinking thiswas it, when a short, skinny, little man started pounding on my door. Who the hell was this?

“I am Antoine! You called the police on me! You are a stupid, stupid, woman! Open up your door!”

It was Frenchie who lived above me. Was this guy on crack?

“&^%^&* you Antoine! I will not open the door and you have no idea why I called the police! And if you don’t stop pounding on my door I’m going to call the police again!”

He was knocking on my door so hard I thought it was going to break. It was so bad that the 55 black belts that I always hoped would help me in time of a crisis came flying up the stairs to see what was going on. Except for one. The creepy one conveniently was missing. When the black belts came up, Frenchie ran, and he proceeded to jump up and down on my ceiling like a lunatic. The owner of the karate school was concerned, but I didn’t even want to open my door for him. This was nuts, something had to give. I needed Frank the Stalker to stalk me again and end all of this madness.

Then HE called. The next night. I was being babysat, by this guy Ralphie who was driving me nuts. One of my friends couldn’t come, so she sent her cousin. He’d lost like 100 pounds doing The Zone Diet, and I had to listen to him give me a blow by blow of what he ate all day every day. I was sitting there eating a vat of Tasti-Delight frozen yogurt covered with peanut butter chips while listening to this guy tell me about the fat/protein/carbohydrate ratio of the 25 meals that he ate per day. Then I had to listen to his workout routine. When the phone rang I wasn’t even thinking about Frank the Stalker because I was trying to figure out how to get Ralphie out of my apartment. I picked up the phone...

“Hello.”

“Yeah, you know we’re still having a problem with our apartments...”

It was Frank the Stalker. Finally! If you can't even count on a stalker stalking what was this city coming to?

I said, “We're still having a problem? Good. Go fuck yourself.”

I hung up the phone and called the police, but he was stalking me from a cell phone that was untraceable. Psycho Cop and Gender Reassignment

Cop said if he always called from that phone there wasn’t much they could do.

Friends urged me to move, but there was no way I was going to leave Main Street. Nobody was pushing me out of my apartment. I changed my number, had it unlisted, and stopped being friendly to anyone I thought was a little off. I wasn’t going to totally change but there needed to be some adjustment. I knew I could take care of myself no matter what happened, so I stopped having someone with me all the time, and I put my faith back into Main Street Manhattan. The 55 black belts had helped when they thought I was in trouble. All of my friends had rallied. I had done everything I could. I knew I’d be fine.

Oh yeah, and I started dating Psycho Cop, and he practically lived in my building for awhile, so guess that helped too.

***I'd like to thank everyone who expressed concern for my safety after reading this story. I'm out of that building now, and I'm fine. Thanks for all the love!