Last month, I (18F) started my first job at a local toy store. The store is a small place crammed between a Chinese restaurant that I commonly get takeout from and a noisy Karate dojo. While inside, almost the entire store is visible from the singular counter I stood behind. Not many people stopped by. Usually just the students from the nearby middle school. That meant that during mornings and nights the store was practically empty. The pay wasn’t the best but, to be fair, all I did the majority of the time was sit around and chat with my coworker. There wasn’t much else to do anyway.
My first day included some brief training. My manager got my coworker, Ryan, to explain the basic rules of customer service and taught me how to use the cash register. Ryan and I got along quite well, we were both students and I was surprised I hadn’t seen him around before. It’s a small town, almost everybody knows each other— especially students studying at the local high school.
Ryan was extremely helpful and even let me watch him until I felt comfortable being able to handle the counter on my own. He watched me for a bit as a few customers stopped by before going off and doing some tasks in the back.
Other than that, my first few days were extremely uneventful. The only thing keeping me from dying of boredom was being able to complain with Ryan about school and our shitty teachers. His shifts usually ended a bit before mine so I was left alone until closing time later at night.
A week ago is when an off-putting customer started showing up. He always showed up while I was alone during my shifts. Being a woman, I already was armed with pepper spray at all times which helped calm my nerves slightly. The man was an older fellow— definitely not somebody you would see in a children’s toy store. His age wasn’t the only thing that set off red alarms in my brain though. It was the fact that he never bought anything. He would walk around the tiny store, clearly pretending to busy himself reading random toy brands and labels while occasionally glancing towards the backdoor nervously like he was making sure nobody else would come out. I, meanwhile, had my pepper spray bottle clenched in my right hand just beneath the counter, plastering a fake customer service smile on my face.
He showed up three more times before I discussed the strange man with my manager but he brushed it off as perhaps just an awkward man trying to buy a gift for his children yet not finding anything. As the manager and I looked at each other, it was incredibly clear everything he spouted from his mouth was utter BS, but he just waved his hand at me and told me not to scare off any potential customers.
The next day, earlier in our shift, I spoke to Ryan about the threatening situation. “That creep…,” he muttered quietly. There was an almost tangible feeling of rage radiating off of him and I was so thankful that somebody took my concerns seriously. He then questioned what the man looked like. It was a small town after all. Perhaps he would be able to confront the man about his behavior in a safer environment if he knew who was being dealt with.
Near the end of my shift, long after Ryan had left to go home, I saw the same man idly standing outside of the store, staring at me from outside. At this point, I was scared as hell. I frantically called Ryan, knowing full well that my situation was not going to be taken seriously by the police.
“Hello? Beth?” He picked up the phone, worry lacing his voice, “Is everything okay?”
I hesitantly glanced back to the man outside, confirming he was still standing there. “The man I told you about earlier is watching me from outside..,” I stated as calmly and quietly as I could.
“Shit, lock the door immediately. I’m on my way now.” I could hear Ryan rustling around looking for his keys. I clumsily grasped the store keys before rushing to the door and locking it as fast as I could. The man noticed and immediately beelined towards me, cursing to himself as he realized what I had done. He then backed away, apologizing excessively before speed walking away from the store.
“He just left,” I mustered the words through a tense jaw, my fist also aching from how hard I had clutched the key. I heard Ryan’s side go silent before he let out a sigh of relief.
“Thank god… I was so scared he was going to do something before I got to you,” he quietly said. I felt safer knowing I had at least one person I could rely on.
“I’m sorry I scared you,” I shakily whispered, every part of me still aching with stress, “I’ll be going to the police tomorrow morning once I’ve calmed down a bit..”
“Don’t go yet.. I think we should try to collect a bit more evidence first… We all know how the cops treat cases like these,” he suggested. I stayed silent, imagining having to see the man again and possibly him trying something far worse. As if reading my mind, Ryan continued, “I’ll stay after my shift to watch you. I promise nothing will happen to you.”
I agreed. Not because I liked the idea— but because I knew nothing would be done if we didn’t have extremely clear evidence that the man was intending to harm me. I gritted my teeth, extremely pissed at our town’s law enforcement. Hopefully, we would at least be able to capture footage of the man acting aggressively before Ryan intervened. The man was old and on the frailer side and Ryan assured me he would not let the man hurt me so I trusted him. I did not for a second, though, doubt the fact that I would run the moment anything went wrong.
Today started off normal enough. Ryan and I talked a bit about what we would tell the cops. He made sure all the security cameras were working and recording beforehand. When Ryan’s shift ended, he stayed behind. While I stood at the counter, he worked on cleaning up the store, specifically in a corner not easily seen from the door or windows. I stood there, nervously waiting for the man to appear. While waiting, I noticed something. Underneath the door, there was an orange sticky note attached to something else.
I cautiously walked to the door, staying alert as I bent down to pick up whatever was underneath the door. I read the sticky note first. The handwriting was messy, as if written urgently. Scrawled on the note were the words, ”YOU NEED TO LEAVE NOW”. I glanced outside, still nothing out of the ordinary in sight. I pulled the sticky note up to reveal a photo of myself, taken while I was alone at the counter, days ago. I felt my lunch churn in my stomach and had to suppress a gasp. That..fucking…CREEP, I angrily thought to myself.
“I’m going to go use the bathroom!” I called out to Ryan. I was in too much of a rage to explain to him what I had found. I NEEDED to see if the man was outside, possibly out of my view. I’ve had enough. If he was still outside, I was calling the cops no matter what Ryan said. I urgently rushed to the back and stopped at the cameras.
My blood ran cold. The cameras had been turned off. My eyes slowly drifted towards Ryan’s half-opened bag near the computer. Inside were dozens of more photos of me, all taken while I was on my previous shifts alone. Littered among the photos were sticky notes similar to the one I received but crumpled up. Some even aggressively ripped. A bit deeper in the bag I saw a glint of metal. My eyes widened and I stumbled back, almost forgetting how to breathe. While stepping backwards, I knocked something off of the desk. I froze.
Ryan nervously called out, “Hey, is everything alright back there?”
His quickly approaching footsteps brought me back to my senses and I sprinted to the closest door, the bathroom.
So, here I am now, hiding silently inside the bathroom as Ryan knocks on the door aggressively, asking me to open it. I called the cops but I don’t know how long it’ll take them to get here.
Until then, I’ve just got to hope this cheap wooden door will hold up.