It started with a simple note.
You looked beautiful yesterday.
Although only a handful of words, they were meticulously printed onto creamy white paper, and tucked into my mailbox with tender care – not a wrinkle or a crease in sight. I stared down at the note, unable to resist my slight smile. I know the letter would freak most people out, but honestly, it was just kind of nice to receive a compliment for once – no matter who it was from.
Still, I peered up and down the block, checking to see if anyone was lingering in the area. No one. Shrugging, I headed back inside.
“Anything for me?”
At the sound of Robert’s voice, I instinctually stepped back. I quietly closed the front door behind me, and threw the note – along with a few adverts – into the bin. Who knows? Maybe I should have told my boyfriend about the note immediately…but then, Robert wasn’t exactly famous for his reasonable reactions.
“Just spam, honey,” I said.
Perhaps if he had pressed me further, I would have shown him the note after all – but he didn’t. He went back to whatever sports match was causing that deep wrinkle in his forehead, and that was that.
Until the following Monday, at least.
This time, it was my co-worker Janice who discovered the note. Although I always leave the office late at night, specifically to avoid coming in early, Janice is the kind of eager beaver who shows up at seven in the morning with a smile on her face and a Starbucks in hand. So that’s why, when I sauntered into our shared cubicle at half-past eight and spotted nothing but a pout on her pretty face, I knew something had happened.
“Everything okay?” I prompted. “Don’t tell me they only had decaf.”
“Nothing quite as bad as that…but I found this. It’s for you.” Janice slid a creamy white sheet of paper over to me. As I unfolded it, she cleared her throat, her expression somewhat guilty. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to snoop. It was just – I couldn’t tell if the letter was on your side or mine.”
The bit about her not meaning to snoop might have been true, but if there was one thing I knew about Janice, it was that she certainly liked to snoop. Still. It was a moot point. And not what I should be focusing on right now. With her eyes burrowing holes into my skull, I turned my attention to the second letter.
It was a little bit longer this time, and a little bit more unnerving.
I wish I could save your smiles in a glass jar, Anna. Would they warm me?
“Creepy, right?”
“I’ve certainly heard better compliments. Did you see who left it?”
Janice shook her head. “It was there when I got in, and I was the first person here. Unless you count the janitors…”
“Or someone from one of the other floors,” I mused. “In any case, I don’t think that’s how smiles work.”
Shaking my head, I crumpled up the note again and threw it into the trashcan. As I booted up my work computer, Janice gaped at me.
“Is that all you’re going to say?” she demanded.
“I don’t know what else there is to say,” I said. “Except that whoever put this on my desk should probably invest in a winter jacket. And maybe a matching scarf.”
Janice didn’t laugh. “Anna, don’t you realize how messed up this is?”
“It’s weird,” I agreed. “But it’s probably just someone in the office pulling a prank on me – they’re probably the same person who left me the note in my mailbox the other day.”
“The note in your – excuse me?! Someone is full on stalking you, and you think it’s an office prank?”
I bit my lip. If Janice had been worried before, now I knew she wasn’t going to let this go. And to be fair, maybe I was acting a bit too passive about this whole situation. I couldn’t help it. It was a bit of a pattern in my life. I was like the proverbial frog in the boiling pot – as long as things escalated slowly, I tended to downplay them until something drastic happened.
And, as it turned out, something drastic was lurking not too far ahead. The very next day, I came back from my lunch break to find that a postman had delivered a large, beautiful bouquet of flowers to my cubicle. Attached: a creamy white note.
Although the flowers were gorgeous - colorful peonies, elegant lilies, all of my favorites - the note wasn’t so pretty. In grim, printed letters, it read: I don’t like it when you throw my notes into the garbage, Annie. It feels like you’re throwing me into the garbage. Is that how you want me to feel?
This time, none of my downplaying could sway Janice. She insisted we report the notes to our boss, and I dutifully let her take the lead. But, as I imagined, nothing came out of it. There were no cameras in the office, and because the notes didn’t technically contain a threat, there wasn’t much else our boss could do except remind everyone to stay out of each other’s private spaces.
Janice complained about the verdict, but what more could we do?
Over the next month, I received a total of twelve more notes. Some were attached to little gifts and things – boxes of chocolate, a bottle of champagne, more flowers – while others were simply left for me to find. Sometimes they were at work, sometimes they were left in my mailbox, and once, I found a note attached to my car window in the parking lot after work. Different locations, different gifts. All printed on the same creamy paper, and all escalating from the last…
Tattling to your boss? Real mature of you Annie. Grow up. I thought you would like the flowers. The way you can feel the life draining out of the stems…it’s beautiful, isn’t it?
I can tell you’re scared of me. I don’t see you smile that pretty red smile for me anymore. It makes me feel betrayed.
If I cut a smile into your face, you’d always be beautiful for me. Maybe I will.
I want you to be my girl. I want you bleeding on my bedroom floor, I want you to tell me you love me, and I need it to be true.
I’ve stopped dreaming about your smile. Now I dream about your insides. They’re both so red, red, red…
After the ‘dream about your insides’ note, Janice forced me to file a police report. Once again, I didn’t fight her. Although I was a master at denial, I knew the importance of documentation in cases like these, even if the police weren’t going to do shit about it. Stalkers, sexual harassment, domestic abuse…I had read enough statistics – had cried with too many friends – to know that the cops didn’t care until the coroner came calling.
And, just like I thought, after two hours of paperwork and waiting rooms and bored-looking cops, they jotted down a history of the notes, and sent us out the door with a “come back if he comes into physical contact with you.”
“Might as well be a ‘come back when someone dies’,” Janice shook her head. “This is so unfair! What do we do now, Annie? Should you come sleep over my place until we figure out what demented bastard is doing this to you?”
I squeezed Janice’s hand, surprised at the surge of gratitude I felt for her. Although I had always found Janice a little overbearing at the office, I had to admit: she had my back. And I appreciated it more than I could say.
“I should be okay at home,” I told her. “My boyfriend, Robert – he’s good with his fists. And he loves a fight. But still…” I hesitated, thinking it over. Then I flashed Janice a smile. “You know what? I haven’t had a girl’s night out in forever. Why don’t we grab drinks after work this Friday?”
My heart warmed even more when Janice’s eyes went cartoonishly large; she’d been trying to drag me out for Friday drinks for the past three years now, but I had always demurred – Robert had never been a fan of Janice for some reason, and I hadn’t wanted to rock the boat back home. But now that my boat was caught in a sea storm, I figured why the hell not?
I took advantage of casual Friday, showing up in jeans and a black blazer. I hadn’t been out in forever, and couldn’t resist the huge smile on my face. My stalker’s favorite, I thought to myself, suppressing a chuckle. It’s strange how you can find humor in the darkest situations.
Humming a small tune to myself, I popped into Janice and I’s cubicle – only to find her clutching yet another note. This time, it was simple:
You did this to yourself.
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” Janice whispered to me – as if the stalker could somehow hear her.
“I’m not sure,” I said. “But at least there’s no mentions of my insides this time.”
“Not funny, Annie.”
I shrugged. “He didn’t write much this time. So maybe they just means he – or she – is going to leave me alone now, and that’s what I brought on myself. They probably think they’re depriving me of their…unique…company.”
“You really believe that?”
“I have no idea,” I said. “I only know one thing – I’m ready to get fucked up tonight.”
And I wasn’t the only one. To get fucked up, I mean. It was a quarter past midnight when Janice and I stumbled out of a taxicab and staggered up the pavement to my front porch. Although I was hazy but functional, Janice looked like she was focusing on holding in a vat of vomit.
“I can – you don’t have to take careome,” Janice slurred. “I can go home…”
“Don’t even think about it. You’ve been doing nothing but taking care of me this past month! Besides,” I flashed a drunk smile at her. “It’s nice to have company on these kinds of nights.”
“Company,” Janice repeated, delighted. “We work at a company together, don’t we Annie? That’s a – that’s what you would call a coincidence, right? Company!”
Laughing at the absurdity, we stumbled inside, not caring how much noise we were making. Our laughter didn’t last for long; we had barely managed to make it into the foyer when Janice screamed. Robert was limp on the wooden floor, an opened box of cookies upended next to him. The crumbs still littered his mustache.
As Janice scrambled forward and checked for a pulse – there was none – I examined the area, and finally spotted that tell-tale, creamy white paper sticking out from underneath the couch where it must have fallen.
I could just make out the words: For Annie.
The next few hours passed in a blur. Janice’s screams had alerted the neighbors, who had called the cops, thinking someone was being murdered. Which was only partially true - a temporal technicality. Someone had been murdered.
By the time the cops showed up, Janice’s screams had died down. The two of us sat, leg-to-leg, on the loveseat. My expression mirrored Janice’s shock and terror. Only, I knew that now, for once, I had nothing to fear.
The police interrogated us both separately, but there was a clear picture of what had happened. As recorded by the police – and thoroughly documented by Janice, as well as others in our office – someone had been stalking me for more than a month. The police had chosen to do nothing despite the escalating threats, and the psychopath had snapped. While Janice and I were both out downing tequila shots, my stalker had delivered a batch of poisoned cookies to my doorstep. It was a crime of passion, and Robert had been caught in the middle.
If only he hadn’t ignored the note: For Annie. But then, Robert had never been good with boundaries. What was his was his, and what was mine was also his. That’s the way it had always been. But it wouldn’t be the way it would always be. Not anymore.
Of course, my stalker was still at large…and now that there was an actual body count attached, the police would be on the lookout. But they could look for as long as they wanted. As I returned home from the precinct, yawning and a bit hungover, I headed to the study room, opened the bottom drawer, and took out the last few pages of the fancy cream paper I had bought last month.
I shredded each one carefully, humming cheerfully to myself. I wouldn’t need these anymore. Not now – and hopefully never again.