Noble Grasses

Story Sent in by Allie:

Charles and I had a decent first date. He wasn't all that exciting, but what was of note occurred at the end of our time together. He walked me back to my car and asked me, "Want to see a neat trick?"

I said, "Sure," and he hugged me goodnight, then ran off for his own car.

It was a strange deed, but I just chalked it up to his eccentricity. The real shock came when I made it back home. He sat on my front stoop, waiting for me!

I stepped toward him, hesitantly. "What are you doing here?"

He smiled and stood. "Isn't this a neat trick?"

"How did you know where I live?"

He walked toward me and said, "That's the secret. I can't tell you."

I assumed that he had somehow found my address online. No matter, as long as his intentions were harmless. However, he walked up to me and said, "How about a kiss for me?"

I said, "Maybe next time," and slid past him.

"I just did an amazing trick!" he said as I fumbled with my keys, "I think I ought to have something to show for it!"

I made it inside and locked the door. When I woke up the next morning, there was a large black trash bag filled with torn grass right up against my front door. I checked my email and there was a message from him that read, "I spent the night filling a bag with your grass and left it at your door. Proof of the time I want to spend with you. Just come back to me."

I wrote him back: "Come to my house again and I'll call the police."

He wrote a rambling message in response, clearly upset, but also clearly insane. Most of his message, in fact, railed against public libraries, and how librarians were covert ops agents who kept meticulous records of what was checked out when and by whom.

The parts of the email that specifically referenced me were all to the effect of "come back to me" as if we had ever had a "thing" to come back to in the first place. I gave it the response it deserved: deletion.