While walking home recently, very late at night, I was suddenly aware that I was being followed. That’s what it felt like, anyway. I turned a corner and heard the same pair of footsteps behind me. I raced across the street to catch the green pedestrian light, and the person behind me did the same. It seemed like whenever I sped up, he sped up. If I slowed my steps, his would match my pace. It was creepy.
The problem was, he was close enough that if I turned around, I would be admitting to both of us that I was creeped out. If it turned out, as was likely, that he was just another guy walking home on a dark night, by stopping and glancing back with a paranoid look, I would be creating a socially awkward situation and also, probably, a minor hate crime.
Whenever this kind of thing happens in the movies, and a cold, moonless night when a stranger is following you home on a dark street really feels like a movie, the hunted and the hunter suddenly break out into a sprint, weaving through traffic and backyards and alleyways, which is not an optimal outcome for a man of my age, carrying my iPad and a bag of books. But most of my time, these days, is spent trying to avoid any kind of brisk activity, let alone sprinting, so if the movie version of this scene involves running fast and a certain amount of parkour, the real-life version involves my running for about 10 seconds and then vomiting from exhaustion as my assassin approaches, screwing the silencer on to the barrel of his exotic pistol, and with an evil laugh he says: Well, well. Out of breath so soon? I would suggest that you spend a little more time in the gym, but alas, your time is up.
What I did was this: I took out my phone and began to have a loud and fake conversation with no one on the other end, because my theory was that it would create just enough uncertainty in my pursuer that he would pick some other defenseless geriatric to go after. Hi there! I trilled to no one. Just walking home from the library! I’ll be home in a few! Oh, so Madeleine and Steve and Douglas and Anastasia are there, too? And you’re all expecting me home any second? Great! Well, I should be able to meet those expectations without delay!
I went on and on until I suddenly realized that I live in one of the nicest, safest suburbs in the country — I looked it up a few moments ago, just to be sure — with a violent crime rate that is, statistically speaking, zero. The problem is that I recently moved here from Manhattan, where you learn to be on high alert at all times, and where every stranger is classified, at least initially, as a possible enemy combatant. The guy on the subway, the old lady on the sidewalk, the child in a Catholic school uniform — doesn’t matter, they are all guilty of violent and anti-social tendencies until my city-honed paranoia stands down and sounds the all-clear.
Mostly, though, since moving from Manhattan, I have lost that reflexive reaction. I often leave my front door unlocked, even when I’m gone for the day, and I usually leave my keys in the car when I dash into the UPS store or CVS. But every now and then, I regress back to my Manhattan state of constant alert and find myself walking home, talking loudly into my phone, interlacing my keys and my fingers into a makeshift, on-the-fly set of brass knuckles, preparing for a physical confrontation that I will surely lose.
I laughed to myself and was about to put my phone back into my pocket, but it slipped from my hand and hit the ground. I bent over to pick it up, but by the time I had retrieved it, my pursuer was a few feet away, carrying what smelled like Chinese food.
“You know where is number 18?” he asked, showing me his DoorDash order slip. Number 18, it turns out, is next door to me.
“I’m going to 20,” I said. “Walk with me.”
Those are three words I never said to a stranger when I lived on 11th Street.
Rob Long is a television writer and producer, including as a screenwriter and executive producer on Cheers, and the co-founder of Ricochet.com.
