Vaughn….

April of 1998:

I performed in a musical. I was a ‘Neighbor Dancer.’

July of 2000:

I was in a bar and walking from the bathroom back to my friends when someone grabbed my arm. He told me he "knew me" and I thought it was some lame pick- up line. After trying to convince him that we did not know each other for a couple of minutes, he was still holding onto my arm. He started asking questions. He asked if I had danced. I said yes, but not for a couple of years. Then he asked if I acted. I gave him the same response. Then he asked if I had been involved in a production in 1998. I said yes, and then felt bad that I hadn’t recognized him (thinking he must have been in it too). But he hadn’t, and he was still holding my arm. I turned to walk away but his grip tightened. All of a sudden he said, "Jane, I know you." Again, trying to walk away I said, "No, you don’t." Then he said, "Yes, I do. You were a Neighbor Dancer and I saw you in the performance on April 18, 1998. I was sitting in Row X, Seat 26. I saw you in the first scene and I couldn’t keep my eyes off of you the entire time." I told him that was totally crazy and there was no way he could remember me from that experience, with stage make up and lights… besides, I was two years older. I looked entirely different. He went on to tell me that he knew we were meant to be together and that he would leave his girlfriend for me. I got freaked out, yanked my arm away and left the bar immediately.

December 2000:

I was at my church when I noticed a guy walk in and sit right behind me. He looked familiar but I couldn’t place why. After church I was walking when all of a sudden someone grabbed my arm. I instantly felt nervous and scared, but had no idea why. It was the oddest sensation. This guy asked me if I remembered him. Feeling bad, I told him that he looked familiar, but I couldn’t place why. He said, "Jane, it is me, Vaughn, from Canada Day." I just about had a heart attack. I started shaking. Again, he wouldn’t let go of my arm. I made some comment about it being a really weird coincidence that he happened to be at the same church as me. He told me it wasn’t a coincidence. Then he told me that he had found me. I tried to pull my arm away or grab someone’s attention, but he wasn’t letting go and no one was paying attention. I told him that I didn’t want to talk to him and that I had to go. He told me that we were going out for dinner on Thursday night of that week. I told him that I was not interested and if he contacted me again I would call the police. He ignored me and went on to ask me if I had ever held a gun. He said he was going to take me to the shooting range. He told me that the feeling of power you have when you hold a gun is like nothing else I would ever experience. At this point I started to cry. I told him that the only thing I wanted to talk to him about was how he found me. He told me that he would tell me on Tuesday night when he called to confirm our date for Thursday night. Finally he left.

On Tuesday night he called. With my parents as witnesses, I told him that I was not interested in seeing him or talking to him again. He wanted to keep talking and I kept asking him how he found me, how he had my number, and why he was going to all this trouble. He wasn’t giving me any information. When I was about to hang up he said he would tell me. He told me he saw me in the play, and then saw me over two years later in the bar and he got the same "feeling" that he had the first time he saw me. After I left the bar that night he went and talked to my friends, pretending he was an old friend who just noticed me leaving the bar and wanted to know what I was up to. They gave him a list of activities I was involved in and he started his search. One of the activities my friends told him I was involved in was church. He went to a different church every Sunday for 13 weeks, looking for people my age and asking them if they knew me and where I went to church. Finally he had succeeded. I told him that if I heard from him again I would put a restraining order on him and hung up the phone.

May 2001:

I had been on the radio promoting a charity event I was involved in. Part of the pitch was that we were looking for sponsorship money. I was getting a couple of letters a week with donations in them so when I received this one in particular, it didn’t seem like a big deal. I opened it and read the traditional support letter. But then, the last paragraph threw me for a loop. It said, "And on a personal note, I just wanted to let you know that our whole family was devastated when you turned down Vaughn’s invitation to go to the shooting range with him…" It went on to say that the entire family knew we were meant to be together and they all looked forward to the day when I realized that as well. It was signed by his mom.

I took the letter to the police. It wasn’t until that point that I realized there was no stamp on it — meaning it had been hand delivered.

Now, it is September 2005 — over four years since I received that letter. I have only seen Vaughn once again. He was in a parking lot as I walked to my car but he didn’t try to approach me. You hear stories of stalkers and you think that it doesn’t happen to real people. But it does. It happened to me. Even as I sit here putting it down on paper and reliving the events, it makes my skin crawl. There is something extremely invasive about someone knowing information about you and using it to watch you. The questions around the whole situation were never really answered. Why did he even care? What triggered this? How many times was he around that I didn’t see? Has he forgotten about me or will he show up again? It is extremely unsettling.

Yet, even with all the circumstances around it, I hesitated before going to the police. Everyone was pushing me to go but I couldn’t. Looking back now I realize that because it meant so much to me, I was scared to death that I would go to the police and they would tell me that it wasn’t a big deal. I was so worried about having my feelings invalidated that I almost overlooked my safety. When I went to the police, the officer on duty told me that my story was one of the creepiest ones he had heard in a long time. They gave Vaughn a formal warning and put me into a Victim Protection program for three months.

Trust your gut. If you are in a situation in your life that feels uncomfortable or not right, it most likely isn’t. The whole situation gave me a new sympathy and understanding of why girls who have been abused don’t always go to the police. Although I was never actually abused, the feelings you deal with when you feel like someone has come uninvited into your world leave you feeling extremely vulnerable. To know there is a chance that someone will tell you that your feelings are wrong, or that there is nothing they can do for you, is devastating.

That being said, please take this story as a reminder that your safety is in your hands. If there is something going on in your life or someone who needs to be held accountable for his or her actions, take a step to protect yourself and stop this person from causing any more harm to you or others.

Stories From Our Black Books is a compilation of 100 Canadian Women's relationship stories. We are pleased to present original stories, exclusive to Shebytches.com weekly. If you want your story published, submit it to submissions@silverlining.ws. You will be contacted if your story is chosen.

Check out www.storiesfromourblackbooks.com for more information on Stories From Our Black Books and www.silverlining.ws to learn more about the companythat published Black Books.

Carissa Reiniger, Executive Editor of Stories From Our Black Books, is the Founder and President of Silver Lining Ltd.
Among publishing books and running a company, she volunteers, sits on the Women Entrepreneurs of Canada board and participates in many other work related and social activities.

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