Stalking by Numbers

Submitted by Sharon:

In my late twenties, I worked part time at a real estate office, answering phones and paging realtors on evenings and weekends.  I met some great people there.

One of the realtors named Alex was a really fun guy, and we always had great chats. One day he told me that he knew this guy, Charles, who was single, made a great living, and was decent looking – would I like him to set us up? 

Now, I’d made it this far without going on the dreaded “set-up” and wasn’t sure if I wanted to try it.  But I figured "What the hell – I’m not getting any younger." and agreed.  I told Alex to give Charles my phone number.

Charles called me a few days later, and we chatted several times before meeting up. I noticed on more than one occasion per call that he repeated several questions.  They were simple questions such as "Where did you grow up?" and "What is your nationality?"  At one point he asked me a question for the second or third time, I answered it, and he told me that wasn’t my answer before.  Hmmm.

I met him at a local pub.  I ordered a drink, he ordered tomato juice.  He stated that he didn’t risk drinking, as he needed his license to be able to work.  Okay, fair enough.

After a few appetizers and an okay conversation, the date was over by about 9pm.  He asked if I needed a ride home, I told him no, my girlfriends had texted me and they were down the street -  I would go meet them.  Overall, the conversation was okay, the date was okay, and I hadn’t noticed the things that I’d noticed on the phone.

We made plans to hit a bucket of balls on Sunday.  I told him very specifically that I liked to sleep in on weekends, and asked him not to call before ten.

He called me later that night at 11, 11:30, midnight, and finally left a message at 12:30 to say that he’d had a great time.

He called Saturday morning at 8, 8:15, 8:30... well, you get the picture.  I finally answered at NOON with a very rude “WHAT?”

He’d called to tell me a funny story – something funny that had “just” happened.

Then he called me at 1pm... to tell me a funny story.  The same story.

And he called again at 3, to tell me the same funny story.

I told him not to call me again.  He asked why.  I explained that he was obviously drunk or something, and I’d heard this story three times already, he had problems, and I was not willing to deal with them.

He said, "So, we’re not going golfing tomorrow?” Um, NO.

Suffice it to say that he “stalked” me on my cell phone for months!  Calling, then blocking his number and calling back, and then not blocking and calling, ONE RIGHT AFTER THE NEXT.

A couple of months after the “date”, I did finally answer – just to tell him off.  He called me a bitch and told me that I probably treated all men like shit, then begged me to go out with him again when I told him that I was going to hang up.

Lesson learned.  Don’t let someone set you up.  Don’t ever give out your home address (I thanked God every day I hadn’t made that mistake).  If you have call display, do not delete their number, as you may not recognize their number and accidentally answer.

I still have Charles’s number in my phone.  His name is saved as “Stalker-Charles.”  Seriously.