Chapter 9: Found

To say I was shocked was and understatement, I was frozen in place staring at the computer screen. Memories of the night before came flooding back in a rush, remembering now that she had added me as friend on social media and therefore knew a lot more about me. This also meant she could contact me any time. Now you might think the simple solution would be to unfriend her, but in the messages she would go onto explain why that wasn't an option.

Message (2)

• “Did you forget you added me as a friend? Your little stunt as frustrating as it was means nothing, i'll find you again and again no matter how many times you get away.

Message (3)

• “Before you rush to remove me from your friends list, i'd like the opportunity to mention while I don't know where you live, I do however know where you work. If I was you I wouldn't share such information of my degrading work with anyone. But you seem to find it rewarding enough to make it public knowledge on your profile.”

Message (4)

• “That's fine by me though, because if you unfriend me I might be tempted to show up at your place of work. So here are your options, ignore me and i'll drop in for a surprise visit at work. Or you can choose to reply with your, Home Address, Phone number and Email, to which i'm sure we can organise a meeting that doesn't embarrass you in front of your co-workers”

To me this didn't sound like a fair choice, but rather an ultimatum. I was now stuck between a rock and a hard place. On one hand she threatened my professional life, my income and livelihood. However on the other hand she threatened my personal life. If I where to give in, i'd be spared the public humiliation of her finding me, but i'd be throwing away the only hiding place I had. The reality was though she would find out where I lived one way or the other. Either I gave it her now, or she'd show up and take it from me, no doubt making a scene at the same time.

Well I was left without a choice, I had to give her my details. But at least me doing that was still me doing it. Sure she was the one pulling the strings, but I was doing things her way on my terms.

My fingers poised over the keyboard, but I paused. Was I really doing this? Was I really about to give away such intimate information to someone I had only met and been bullied by on the Train only yesterday? I only wished I was still dreaming, I would take the nightmare of her again and again rather than the face the reality of her. Dreams couldn't hurt me, but she really could.

I let out a long sigh, this was it. I started typing information I rarely gave out. Once finished I had to fight myself to press enter, every fibre of my being screamed 'No!' But I managed to hit the enter key, my skin crawled as I saw the text box of my reply go through.

A few minutes ticked by, she was offline and I couldn't help but wait anxiously. However what I did realise during this time was her life was also open to mine. Against my better judgement I decided to explore and have a look of her profile. Surprising it was quite tame, nothing you'd say out of the ordinary. Funny cat pictures, some ranty posts and lots and lots of photos of her, either traveling or just plain old pictures. She knew she was beautiful and didn't seem to hide away from sharing it from her social circle.

Still waiting I searched further going into her family and relationships. She hadn't listed any family, but I did find one thing very interesting. She had marked down she was in a relationship, in fact she had linked her 'partner' as well. Encouraged to go further I looked up this guys as well, his profile however was extremely secretive. While I was on restricted access having not friended the guy there was an attempt to ensure no information was made public. What however did strike me was the information I could see. For one I noticed that they had both attended the same high school. The other thing I noticed was the profile picture, neither he or she had pictures of each other in their respective profile pictures. But what I did find odd about him was, he didn't seem very tall. The picture didn't give me much to work with, but he only looked about as tall as me, maybe a bit shorter, maybe a bit taller. There was no way I could be exactly sure.

While I was looking over all this information I had kept the chat box open on the screen still waiting her reply. During this time the green light next to her profile picture lit up and my message was marked as seen. What a useful tool the 'seen' was, I could now date and time the start of my demise.

The reply on facebook didn't come, but the landline did however ring, which jolted me to alert. I reached over for the phone and looked at the caller ID. Not one I recognised, coming up as 'private caller'. While most days I wouldn't answer the phone out of it being some robot asking me to pay a bill, I had a pretty fair idea of who was waiting on the other end of the line. I pressed answer and brought the phone to my ear, but I didn't dare say the first word.

“Is that you?” spoke the all to familiar voice on the other end. Sure it was muffled by the phone, but It wasn't a voice i'd forget and I could still make out clear enough. The tone however sounded like a routine call for someone, I was almost expecting her to be straight up assertive. At this point I realised I wasn't talking, not wanting to anger her I replied.

“Yes” I said, short and sweet I know, but I wasn't in the mood to talk

“Good” she spoke with a hint of delight “So you didn't give me a wrong number. You know if you followed instructions like you are now, you could be at my place right now”

“I don't want to think about it”

“Does my house seem that scary?” she joked on the other side

“It's not the house i'm afraid of” I said finally finding some voice, she simply laughed

“It's only natural, soon enough you'll learn to embrace me”

“Okay, you got what you wanted, can you please leave me alone for now. I need some time to recover.” Maybe being truthful with her would garner some small trust out of her, which I now had to rebuild.

“Did I rough you up to much?” She said laughing again “You'll adjust, besides that was only playing, wait until you see i'm serious” Even over the phone she couldn't help but antagonise

“Is there a reason you rang, other than to laugh at me?”

“Actually yes” She said “I'd like for formerly invite myself over for dinner tomorrow”

“Tomorrow!?”

“We'll I'd be over now but somebody sounds a little tired. I'll be over at 5:00pm and I expect Dinner at 6:00pm sharp”

“You can't be serious? I have to go shopping and I can't cook”

“Oh but I am, either way i'm turning up at Five so you'd better have something worth my time at the table by six, don't fret i'll try anything. Do be a good boy though and pick up some wine at the shops, and make sure that you serve me a good enough portion to sustain my appetite.”

“Anything else?” Knowing she would be true to her word and turn up regardless

“No, that's all. I'll see you then for our little dinner date”

She hung up, but I could tell in her voice she almost lost herself laughing trying to get the word date out.

To be fair I expected so much worse, but this sounded incredibly tame for her. I was half expecting her to be on her way over this second with things in mind other than dinner. Maybe if I just played along, made a good evening out of it, she'd behave herself, have dinner and then go on her way. If I made an effort to do everything right, surely she'd just leave at the end of the night?

It was 6:30pm now, she would be on my doorstep in under 24 hours. For the right now, I was far to awake from my nap to sleep, maybe I could clean and rearrange some furniture, that way cleaning the flat but also wearing myself out.

Picking myself off the couch, I decided cleaning would be a good thing for me to do right now. It'd help take my mind of things, but more importantly I needed to get everything to be perfect for tomorrow.