Speaker 1: Being a relatively young and shy person, I've started using
dating apps to help me meet more people and hopefully
find a lasting relationship. I struggle with putting myself out there,
especially in public with people i've never met, so apps
like Tinder are great for me to get comfortable talking
with someone before actually meeting them in person. For reference,
I'm a female in my early twenties and I've been
using Tinder for a little over a year at the time.
Most of my interactions up until this point had been fine,
usually either ending up dating for a couple months or
just becoming friends. All of the breakups had been mutual
and had no hard feelings anyway. This began a couple
months after my last relationship. I was talking to a
guy who while referred to as Peter, for about two
weeks on Tinder. From our back and forth texting, he
seemed like a nice, somewhat shy person, but part of
me like that because I was shy as well. Eventually,
he finally asked me out on a date and we
met up at a local restaurant later that week. Upon
meeting him in person, nothing seemed off at first.
Speaker 2: One of my.
Speaker 1: Biggest fears is that they'll look nothing like they did
in the pictures. But Peter didn't look any different, and
he was just as soft spoken as he was over text.
Our conversation at dinner that night was really awkward, though
he barely spoke and kept looking around. Me, not being
a big talker either, was trying really hard to get
him to open up a bit, but he would give simple,
one word answers.
Speaker 2: At one point, he.
Speaker 1: Even left the table, saying he forgot something in his
car and didn't come back for almost fifteen minutes, leaving
me there alone. So, of course, when dinner was done
with I kindly told him that I didn't feel a
great connection and didn't want to continue further in a
relationship with him. He stood quietly and nodded, then walked
to his car. I felt bad, but that's just how
it was. I got my car and headed home that night.
I thought about Peter a few times, feeling weird now
that I didn't have anyone to text, but I sat
down and turned on a movie to clear my mind.
It was nearly eleven PM when I heard soft footsteps
coming up to my front door and stopping. I muted
the TV and turned to face the door, still sitting
on the couch. I was tired, but I knew I
had heard someone. Thirty seconds of anticipation went by before
a few loud knocks banged on the door. It startled me,
even though I was half expecting it. I got up
and looked through the peepole, and to my surprise at
the time, Peter was standing there.
Speaker 2: I opened the door a crack and stuck my head out,
what are you doing here, Peter.
Speaker 1: Peter looked at me, then turned away for a moment
looking around. This made me feel really uneasy, and I
just shut the door and locked it, hoping he'd get
the hint to leave my property. After a few seconds,
I heard footsteps departing towards the driveway and a car
turning on and leaving. I checked the window to make
sure he was gone, then sat back on the couch.
I think I was just too tired to realize in
the shock of the moment, but it wasn't until I
sat back down that I realized that I had never
given Peter my address. A really bad feeling surged through
my body, and I went to check the window again
to be safe. I didn't necessarily feel in danger at
this point, but just worried that Peter may have something
wrong with him and had grown too attached to me.
I went to bed not long after and slept well
through the night. In the morning, I made coffee and breakfast,
and due to the cold, snowy weather, I stayed inside
most of the day. It wasn't until I was bringing
the trash out to the that I noticed a set
of footprints around the side of the house. Following them,
they went around both sides of the house and right
up to the gate to the backyard, then off to
the road. I tried to rethink what happened last night,
but I was sure I heard Peter only walk up
to the door and not around the house, so these
footprints had to have been from the middle of the
night while I was sleeping. Standing in my living room now,
I was getting extremely uncomfortable and nervous. I know it
sounds dumb, but my social anxiety was really trying to
look for every reason not to call nine one one
at that time. Though, I'm very thankful that my panic
overtook my anxiety and got me to call the police.
This decision is very likely what saved my life. Holding
my phone after talking to a dispatcher. I stared at
the ground and took deep breaths to keep my head straight.
I'd never dealt with something like this. My mind wasn't
prepared to handle the stress. But as I stood there
trying to calm my head, I heard footsteps in the
snow outside the living room window. I'm not sure what
else to describe how I felt, other than just completely scared.
The footsteps stopped outside the window, and I began to
back up, slowly, trying to get to the kitchen. Then
came a slight scraping sound, likely a knife being wedged
between the window trying to.
Speaker 2: Pry it open.
Speaker 1: It was an unfortunate reaction of mine to scream from
the terror of it. Immediately the footsteps ran around to
the side of the house, followed by the forceful sound
of the gate breaking open. I grabbed the first knife
I saw in the kitchen and sprinted upstairs, turning the corner.
Though I saw a glimpse of Peter outside the glass
back door, trying to force it open. I locked myself
in the bathroom, crying and clutching onto the kitchen knife
as I listened to the harsh banging scraping.
Speaker 2: And beating on the back door.
Speaker 1: It sounded like a bear trying to claw and smash
its way inside. This went on for maybe two or
three minutes.
Speaker 2: Which felt like forever.
Speaker 1: I thought of all the horrible things he planned on
doing when he made his way inside, making me even
more emotional. But then a knock at the front door.
Overcame the sound of the banging at the back door,
which immediately stopped. An officer called out and I ran
straight to the front door. While Peter had run off.
They were able to find him pretty quickly, and he
admitted to his crimes, though he gave little reasoning.
Speaker 2: For doing them.
Speaker 1: He truly just seemed crazy and unstable. It's terrifying to
think how this happened from seemingly meeting up with a normal,
friendly guy. This whole thing has given me terrible trust issues,
and I stopped using dating apps. One of the scariest
things was that the back door was almost completely destroyed,
barely hanging on.
Speaker 2: By the latch.
Speaker 1: Likely, if the police had shown up just minutes later,
Peter would have made it inside, and who knows what
he would have done if he had gotten to me.
I broke things off of my ex a few years ago.
He became a reckless person, unable to hold a job
or any responsibilities.
Speaker 2: So it just didn't work out.
Speaker 1: Even being the person he was, though, I never thought
he would do.
Speaker 2: Something like this. The few months after.
Speaker 1: The breakup were quiet and peaceful. I was enjoying my
single life, just going.
Speaker 2: Through the days.
Speaker 1: One night, though, I was driving back home from work
later than usual, and as I pulled into the driveway,
I saw a man wearing all black standing outside a
window on the left side of my house as if
they were trying to look inside. This was obviously really creepy,
and I pulled back out of the driveway and parked
further down the road, calling the police.
Speaker 2: I waited for them to show.
Speaker 1: Up, then, once they informed me that whoever it was
had left, I was able to go inside. They asked
if I had any idea who it could have been,
but at the time I said no. Again, I never
thought of my ex as that kind of person, and
there was nobody else I thought it could be. The
next week went by without any problems as well, though
I made sure all the windows were locked every night.
One morning, though, I woke up to the sound of
movement outside my bedroom window. It sounded like an animal
moving around in a bush, though my immediate thought was
of that man I'd seen peering through the windows last week.
I jumped out of bed and put some clothes on.
The blinds were covering the windows, so I knew nobody
could see anything, but now I felt the need to
see for myself if somebody was there or not.
Speaker 2: I didn't want to call.
Speaker 1: The police again just because a squirrel was hanging out
in a bush, so I pulled the blinds open.
Speaker 2: Nothing. I leaned my head closer to.
Speaker 1: The window so I could see down the side of
the house, and still nobody was there. I sighed immediately,
feeling safer, and continued about my morning as usual, then
went off to work, getting home rather late again. I
was exhausted and cooked up a small dinner, then watched
a bit of TV before deciding to go to bed early.
I got up and walked down the hallway toward my bedroom,
but in the corner of my eye I saw something horrifying.
The window was open, just a small crack at the bottom,
but I knew I had kept it locked, so either
way someone had broken it. I walked over and looked
at it from up close, then pushed it shut. The
latch that was used to lock it was gone, as
if it had been ripped away. I felt trapped and scared,
like I wasn't even in my own home anymore. I
knew I had to call the police, but I began
to fear, making noise as the possibility of someone being
in my house became more prevalent in my mind. I
was just standing there for I don't know how long,
listening to the silence of the house, before the sharp,
sudden sound of my phone beeping made me shiver. I
pulled it out of my pocket quickly, and immediately my
stomach dropped. It was a text for my ex asking
how I was doing. I stared at it, just in
shock and trying to piece it together.
Speaker 2: In my mind.
Speaker 1: Was this just a huge coincidence or was it not
a coincidence at all? Was he watching me right now?
Fear was taking over my body. I looked around frantically,
shoving myself in a corner of the room so nobody
could sneak up behind me. Then another text came in.
Speaker 2: He said, we need to talk.
Speaker 1: I was trying to hold in my tears as I
turned my phone on silent. I started making my way
slowly to the front door. As I approached, I turned
the knob and tried to open it quietly, though it
made a rather loud creak. Immediately, a loud thump came
from behind the door to my bedroom. I threw the
front door open and sprinted outside and down the road.
I hit on the side of a neighbor's house and
called the police. They actually made it pretty quickly, and
I walked over to my driveway when they arrived. After
two officers went in, they came out a minute later,
holding my ex and dragging him into their car. He
was pleading, saying he just wanted to talk to me
and that he knew what he was doing was wrong,
but he wasn't going to do anything other than talk
to me. Unsurprisingly, though, he had a knife shoved in
his pocket.
Speaker 2: That was hopefully the.
Speaker 1: Last time I'll ever see or hear from him again. Obviously,
I don't believe that he just wanted to talk, but
that was the story he stuck with, so I'll never
know what he was actually trying to do.
Speaker 2: But him waiting in my bedroom.
Speaker 1: Like that with a knife, I know I was lucky
to get out as safely as I did. A lot
of people have ex boyfriend or girlfriend's stories, but mine
was actually just a friend. I'm going to call him
Brian to keep everything private. We had met my junior
year of high school through a mutual friend and had
become pretty close relatively fast. We didn't go to the
same school, as he lived about a half hour away
from me, but we hung out every weekend, got food,
drove around and just talked. Sometimes we'd go to concerts
and parties together too. I'd say we were each other's
best friend for a really long time. He's always been
a bit weird, though. He'd text me all the time,
and I mean sometimes six or seven times in a
row if I didn't respond quick enough. But I knew
he had a lot going on in life, or so
I thought. Me and the mutual friend who introduced us
while call Holly, were talking one night, and she said
she thought he might have been lying about some pretty
serious stuff.
Speaker 2: He had told both of.
Speaker 1: Us when we first met that his sister had cancer,
but when him and Holly hung out and it was
brought up, his story was different. When Holly told me this,
we decided to look through his mom's Facebook, who I
just recently added, and she posts basically everything. We couldn't
find anything and something that big definitely would have been posted.
I've never met his sister since we never really hung
out at his house, but I didn't find that weird
because I didn't want anyone at my house either. While
talking about this, we both shared other things that seemed
a bit off to us, such as him saying that
he might have cancer, or that he was in the
hospital for a very serious reason but then would be
completely fine just a few hours later. After going through
everything with each other, we couldn't believe how much of
a liar he was. I felt heartbroken that someone I
called my best friend would lie about such awful things.
We agreed to talk to him about it, and afterwards
distance ourselves from him. I wanted to talk in person
about Holly had texted him first, and that's when I
was bombarded with messages. It all started with him saying
he had a seizure, which after everything, I obviously didn't
really believe him. He called me so many times while I.
Speaker 2: Was at work it got to be too much.
Speaker 1: I decided to call Holly and see what was happening,
and when I did, she said he also went crazy
on her. She ended up blocking his number.
Speaker 2: Because it got so bad.
Speaker 1: I didn't want to just ghost him, but this behavior
was honestly disturbing. I decided to text him that I
didn't want to be friends with someone who lies, especially
about such sensitive stuff. After that, I didn't text him anymore.
I didn't block him, though, I'm not sure why, but
I just couldn't do it. I muted his notifications and calls,
and that was that. A few more days went by
of more muted calls and texts, until my dad called me.
He sounded really worried, asking if I was okay. I
said yeah, calmly, asking why. He said that Brian called
him and was asking about me, and apparently Brian told
him that some pretty serious stuff.
Speaker 2: Happened to me.
Speaker 1: I told him to block his number and don't answer
him anymore after explaining everything. It's even weirder because I
don't know how how he got my dad's number. Not
long after that, my brother also told me that Brian
messaged him on Instagram saying he was going to hurt
himself if I didn't answer him. He also texted one
of my best friends all the same thing to make
everything so much worse. He said he was going to
end himself the same way that my oldest brother had done,
and he knew that that was the last straw for me,
and I decided to text him one more time all
of my thoughts and feelings, and then I immediately blocked
him after it was delivered, I thought that was the end,
and for months it was until one day while I
was working, I saw him walk in through the front doors.
My department was in the back of the store, so
I could see everything. I slipped in the back and
told my manager. If anyone should ask, say that I
do not work there anymore. Lo and behold, he did
actually ask my manager I was there. I had to
be escorted out by a coworker the rest of the week,
just to make sure he wasn't waiting in the parking
lot when I got out of work.
Speaker 2: There was one night about a month later where.
Speaker 1: His car was parked on the side of the street
by my house. When I got home from work, no
one else was home, so I went to a friend's
house for a few hours to be safe. I didn't
think he would actually hurt me. I just didn't want
to talk to him though. While I didn't think he
would hurt me, I also felt like I didn't really
know who he truly was, which was scary. After that incident,
I called his mother and told her everything. I didn't
want him to stop by my house or my work anymore,
and I didn't want to get the police involved. I
loved his family, which made the situation really difficult. To
this day, he makes fake accounts on sites to try
and talk to me or requests to follow me. It
happens maybe twice a year. I know he's not mentally there,
and I truly wish that he'd heal, but I want
to share my story and let others know that your
friends can be just as toxic as any intimate partner
can be, and when people show you their true colors,
try not to make excuses for them. Do what's best
for you and your mental health, and make sure to
keep yourself safe