Submitted by Carl:
Joan was the kind of easy going, free-spirited college girl I had a soft spot the size of Texas for. I played in an acoustic coffeehouse band, and she would often listen to us practice outside the dorms. It didn't take long to notice her attention was primarily focused on me, and having spoken a few times with her, we eventually arranged an official first date.
On the way to her dorm room to pick her up, I passed a really pissed off looking dude who was staring me down with all six and a half feet of his frame. Being the happy-go-lucky guy I was at the time, I shot him a reassuring, "Things can only get better, buddy."
His response was to get noticeably more irate and red in the face. Fuming would perfectly describe his mood at that moment.
Knocking on Joan's door, it sounded like she was undoing half a dozen locks. With the door open, she said, "I have to finish getting ready. Would you mind waiting on the couch?"
About a minute later, someone pounded on the door. Violently. In what seemed like a blur, in burst the pissed off looking guy from earlier, staring at me with this crazed, maniacal look that quite honestly scared the shit out of me.
He said, "Who the fuck are you? I'm not scared of you! Who the fuck do you think you are?"
He barked these three phrases, and variations thereof, at me for what seemed like a semester-long period of time. When I failed to answer him ("frozen with fear" would perfectly describe my mood at that moment), he moved on to physical threats.
This white guy said, "I gonna kill your white ass! I'mma beat the shit out of you, boy!"
As it was explained to me later, this guy was Joan's stalker. He'd learned that she'd taken a liking to me and was planning a date that night. Apparently he didn't know what I looked like, though, which may have saved my ass when I'd seen him earlier.
Luckily for me, his behavior was well known in Joan's dorm hall, and campus security was on the scene pretty much immediately. The guy had already been caught breaking into her room a number of times (thus the numerous locks), the last time being when she awoke to him standing over her. That incident had gotten him kicked out of school, so when they found him back on campus again they reported him to the regular police who arrested him for communicating threats and trespassing. A short time later I recognized him in a local news story as the guy who was holding up rush hour traffic on the interstate by threatening to jump off a bridge.
He didn't jump.
As for the rest of the evening... having been so shaken by the incident, Joan asked me if we could just stay in and talk since both her roommates and friends were at home for the weekend.
She proceeded to spill her guts about having had another stalker in the past. She ended up crying. Having abandoned any hope for a positive upturn in the course of the evening, I began spilling my guts about things that had affected my life, too... which lead to me sobbing. It ended up being very cathartic for the both of us, and despite it being an intense bonding experience, we never saw each other again.
I held off on dating for a while after that.
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Something going around?
This story is very brilliantly written, my favourite bit's definately "Joan was the kind of....a while after that". This surpasses bein a bad date to become a bad experience.
ReplyDeleteYour band is Dashboard Confessional, isn't it?
ReplyDelete"Imma beat the shit outta you boy!"
ReplyDeleteWhat an epic line. Well written story although I kinda wanted the intense experience to help the OP bond with his date rather than making him cry and never see her again.
@ Nikki: They haven't gotten violent....yet. By the way, I like what you are wearing today.....No, that isn't me in the bushes.
@12:30 PM - Heh.
ReplyDeleteI began spilling my guts about things that had affected my life, too... which lead to me sobbing.
ReplyDeleteBoohoo. My name is Carl and I don't have a spine.
This story is not, in fact, brilliantly written. It is not even well written. Please direct your attention to the worst sentence I have ever read on this blog:
ReplyDelete"He barked these three phrases, and variations thereof, at me for what seemed like a semester-long period of time."
"Carl," or whatever your name is, don't quit your day job, buddy. Please do quit your English major, though. Your writing is a stilted, parenthetical mess of silly metaphors and unnecessary clauses.
@3:29
ReplyDelete"Carl, or whatever your name is".. it clearly states that the submitter's name is Carl stupid. Take the story for what it is, just someone sharing a bad dating experience, which this was.
Aw, Architect, I was wondering why my cat was growling out the window more than usual. I just thought it was that damn hawk again. It was good to (not) see you! ;)
ReplyDelete@3:29 - I am almost certain that if I had the time/energy, I could go through this blog and find a sentence more awkwardly constructed and poorly-written. ...It would probably be from one of Jared's stories. Oh! Zing! ;P
@Nikki
ReplyDeleteI think that you're the most awkward construction that this site has ever attracted. :)
I enjoyed the story even though I think the guy is a pussy.
ReplyDeleteThe heck with the grammar police - this is a fun blog, lighten up folks.
"I began spilling my guts about things that had affected my life, too... which lead to me sobbing"
ReplyDeleteWell boo hoo!
No wonder you never saw each other again, who wants to date an emotional mess?
^ Stop it, he'll cry again.
ReplyDelete@JMG: Oh man, you have no idea. Wait til you see the third eye my parents had surgically installed when I was four. It really brings out the color in the other two. ;D
ReplyDeleteFor some reason when Nikki said "Wait til you see the third eye my parents...", I read "Wait til you see the third eye in my pants..."
ReplyDeleteThis site brings my mind to a low place sometimes. Perhaps it's all the rape posts.
^I have a fourth eye in my pants, but it was MY choice to have that added. But yeah...this place automatically makes one's mind go into the gutter. ;)
ReplyDelete"Carl," or whatever your name is, don't quit your day job, buddy. Please do quit your English major, though. Your writing is a stilted, parenthetical mess of silly metaphors and unnecessary clauses.
ReplyDeleteI shot it off in about twenty minutes, professor. Somebody else said it was brilliant, not me, so your beef is with them. Framing me as a self-serious writer just to say how bad of a writer I am is silly. You are obviously the writer, and no one can take that away from you.
Sharing an unflattering story about oneself will always invite criticism. I' m an adult, so calling me a pussy is a laugh compared to my actual concerns of bill paying and child rearing.
About a week later she said she was moving home because she didn't feel safe at school anymore. I think we would've dated if she hadn't left. We'd gotten along well up until the incident.
Thanks for reading.
^ Thanks for the update on the girl, Carl (or "Carl," for the paranoid). It's too bad that she felt so threatened by this guy (who really should have been locked up and been held to the requirements of a restraining order) that she had to leave school. I hope she got some help, and I hope her stalker is dead in a ditch somewhere.
ReplyDelete^ With cancer. And AIDS.
ReplyDelete