Looking Out For You
It’s been a week.
He is staring. He is following, stalking. He checks to see if he is being followed, looks around his dusty brown minivan for cameras and sound equipment. When he drives it is the speed limit every time, following every traffic law, using every kind gesture. He puts on his hazards at times to let people around him, just as you’d expect from any kind old man.
When he’s noticed my car I’ve noticed that he keeps away from the windows and props up a cardboard cut-out to make me go away. I keep a hood up to protect from the cameras in front of his house, I pretend to look into a random mailbox as if I’m doing something not involving him and then be on my way. Sometimes I just drive.
At eight-thirty every night, he hops into his minivan and drives to Sabrina’s house. He parks on the side of the road across from her place, and looks in knowing she’s a busy college student that’s still very much awake. I’ll notice a cheeseburger he’s shoving into his mouth, fries, soda. Sometimes I think of the Big Kahuna scene in Pulp Fiction and be tempted to hop into his car and steal his food, forcing him to watch me swallow it down. I’d love to stick it to him in this way.
As it is, I’m sat a block away from Sabrina’s, eyes directly onto the professor that’s unknowingly facing me. I think to myself that I can take him out. It’s the seventh night and Sabrina’s expecting a call. Tonight I brought my own cheeseburger and fries. I eat some as I watch and pull out my phone. It rings for her.
“Hey, what’s up?”
“He’s sat in front of your place again.” I smack my lips a bit without control.
“Oh my God.”
“He’s just sitting, not doing anything. It’s hard to see with my car off, though. I can tell he’s still and facing your house but that’s it.”
“I hate this. I hate this so much.”
“I know. I’m pulling out my camera and zooming in on him. I don’t know the law well but after a week of this we should have enough to go to the police, wouldn’t you think?”
“I have no idea,” Sabrina responded. “I don’t know what they’ll do, if anything, without a ‘crime.’ I hope it’s enough for a restraining order. I just want him to stop. I don’t want to keep having to worry about this.”
“I understand.” I get my camera rolling and set it on the dash. “I’ve got it fixated on him now. What a filthy man.”
“I want to go out there and key his car and smash his windows and slash his tires and terrify him into never coming back here.”
“I can work him up,” I tell her. “I have a flashlight in my glovebox, I could shine it on his car and honk my horn, get his blood pumping.”
“That’d be something,” she says, “but I don’t want anyone else annoyed. We’re all college students here.”
“Yes, but anyone would understand if we explained the situation. It’s not very late, for us it’s not, anyway, and I think getting the word out is the best thing to do.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right. This can’t keep happening. I cannot keep dealing with this with nothing done about him.”
“I know. Should I try to scare him?”
“Go ahead.” She paused. “Don’t film this part of scaring him.”
“How come?”
“I don’t want anything used against us if this gets any worse or any bigger than it is.”
“I’ve seen his minivan before; he has a dashcam. He’s going to be recording everything so it wouldn’t matter what we do. I think I should keep it going.”
“Alright.”
“Right.” The phone falls through my hands and I pick it back up and explain to Sabrina what the bit of noise was.
As I get it back to the setting I had it at before, I notice through the lens that he’s shifted and begun staring at my car. I see a phone set up to stare at me. Without warning I see him turn the key and ignite the car to life.
“Sabrina, he’s turning his car on.” I keep still and have a sudden thought to duck down, no longer thinking of pulling out a flashlight.
“Okay, okay. Tell me when he starts to move.”
“I will.”
Suddenly, the car does move. It comes toward me and I consider ducking again, but I don’t. I feel frozen. He moves slowly, but when he does come and pass my car, I involuntarily lock eyes with him. I see him look at me, into me. Maybe, for the first time, he knows it’s me that’s followed him for so long, a student. Maybe this means he’ll look for a restraining order against me, meaning I can’t act dumb in his class anymore. I can’t hide. I check my phone and Sabrina is still on the line.
“Hey, he just drove off.”
“Good,” she replies. “Thank God.”
“He looked at me,” I say. “We locked eyes for a moment when he passed. He has to know who I am now. The car, my face.”
“Oh, fuck. Look, thank you so much for everything and being here, but please be safe.”
“I am, I will be.”
“Do you have any weapons with you?”
“I have my switchblade and the pepper spray you gave me.”
“Okay. I want you to be safe, I really do. It should be me out there looking after myself. I’m sorry about all this trouble.”
“You’re fine,” I assure her. “It’s okay. I’m here to help, and that scared me, sure, but it’s the seventh night and there’s no way I don’t have enough footage to go toward a restraining order.”
“Yeah, that’s right. Just until nine, do you think you could move up to where he parked in case he comes back?”
“Of course.” I sit myself back into the seat and turn on the car. “Tomorrow when you’re paid you’ve got to get a Ring doorbell camera installed. Please don’t forget about that.”
“I won’t. How could I?”
I get the car moving once my seatbelt is fastened on. My drink stirs and shifts as I go.
“Those cameras are such good lifesavers, even our charming professor has one.”
As I say this, I notice a car ahead of me who goes a normal speed, but as I roll to the stop sign they begin to feel like they’re moving faster. Up and up. It’s a minivan, a brown-looking minivan with an out of state license. Wisconsin. The van zooms and it reminds me of the professor’s. It’s coming.
“Does he really?” Sabrina asks. “What a hypocrite!”
I hear her come through but I don’t listen. The van speeds more and more as it comes closer and closer, and as I watch I feel glued to the stop sign. It’s not until I realize this feeling that I let my foot off the break and continue forward. The minivan has the same four-way stop approaching but does not slow down.
“This guy’s going to speed past the stop sign,” I think out loud.
“Who?”
The van’s speed climaxes, and I expect it to continue in a rush past the stop sign and out of view. Without warning the van suddenly turns, and I am directly struck head on.