My Sharona

Okay, so I think it's about time I told you about my stalker. Now that she's stopped calling me and I have some distance from the situation, I can actually laugh at it rather than tremble with fear.

Let me take you back a while, to the end of July. I met this guy online and he seemed pretty nice. I decided to throw caution to the wind and meet him for drinks after work one Thursday night. We had margaritas at some Mexican place on the Upper East Side, which was his neighborhood. The conversation wasn't bad, and for being a Ukranian, his English was pretty good. The only think was that he spoke very softly, so I had a hard time hearing him. But it was interesting to learn about his culture.

At some point, he mentioned he was a bottom, and even though I was really tired and not horny, I had a physical reaction that resulted in me making the mistake of going back to his apartment and fucking him silly. He was actually pretty good (if teenily endowed), I'll admit it. Bad move, Peter.

Over the course of the evening, I had told him that I would be spending the weekend with my parents upstate, since they were visiting and I had that Friday off. He asked me at least three times, so he knew I was going away for the weekend. There's no cell reception at the family cabin, so I got home that Sunday night to three texts from this guy. "What are you doing this weekend?" "Why aren't you answering me?" Something else.

So on Monday, I sent him an email telling him that I had a nice time but I didn't feel any chemistry (read: you didn't listen to a word I said, overdid the texts, and are a bit clingy). He took it fairly well until a few days later when it finally hit him that I fucked him. He couldn't quite understand why I did that, and I told him the truth that I didn't know why either. Mistake number 2: answering him.

Flash forward a couple of weeks to me at work when my cell phone rings. The number came up as withheld, but for some assinine reason, I picked it up. Mistake #3. There was a woman on the other end with a heavy Eastern European accent claiming that I had gone out with her brother the weekend before. Granted, I knew who she was talking about, but I played the semantics game and told her I hadn't gone out with anyone. She proceeded to plead into the phone that her brother was crying and wouldn't stop and she didn't know what to do. I told her I didn't know who she was, please leave me alone. The phone cut out.

A few minutes later, my cell rang again. Withheld again. This time I didn't answer it. She left a message anyway, basically saying the same thing. Brother's crying, please call him. Please, Peter, please.

This was about at lunch time, so I went outside for a walk around the block and to call my friend Charlie, the only person who knew I had gone out with the Ukranian. I told him all about the calls from this woman, who says her name is Sharona. (You'd have to hear the messages to get the full effect of the voice and accent on her name.) As I'm talking to him? Four more calls. She left two messages, same thing.

The next day, she called me at the same time. That day, a Tuesday, I didn't answer the phone at all, and she left another 5 messages. In one of them she claimed to have tried to call my work but the receptionist wouldn't put her through. I asked the receptionist, but no one called for me. I don't think I ever told the Ukranian where I worked, either, so it kind of creeped me out.

Her last message that day included me last name. Well, a mangled version of my last name because it's nearly unpronouncable. I don't believe I ever told him my last name, so this gave me the shakes. I literally could not write because of it. Everyone at work--my desk is in a pod of eight cubicles with low walls--knew what was happening by this point (they didn't know I fucked him, though), so it became like a soap opera.

The next day Sharona called a few more times before one of my female coworkers decided that she was going to answer it, pretend to be my boss, and tell her to stop calling me. Sharona just called back and told my voicemail that "the bitch" better not answer my phone again. She always called between 12:30 and 2pm, so it's quite possible she was actually calling from the Ukraine, but I don't know how realistic that is.

After that, I didn't hear from her for a few days. The next week, it started again. I answered once to tell her that I would get the police involved if she didn't stop calling, and she did claim to be calling from Europe. During all of this, I had emailed the Ukrainian asking him to tell his sister to stop calling me, and he replied with a nasty email about how his sister was in the Ukraine and wouldn't call me. I asked him who Sharona was then, and he told me he wasn't my secretary, how was he supposed to know who's calling me. Of course, two days later he texted me to tell me to stop emailing him about nonsensical shit.

Kray-zee, with a capital KRAY.

At that point, I told myself it was all a big practical joke. But the phone calls kept coming, only more sporadically and fewer in number. Just when I thought it was over, she would call me again. One time, there was a series of calls in which she was drunk and wanted to have sex with me. She even faked an orgasm on my voicemail. Then called to apologize for being drunk and horny.

They started to only come once or twice a week, and now they've finally stopped, I think. Hopefully for good. I haven't heard from Sharona in two weeks, and I'd like to leave it that way.

So, moral of the story: You always wish you had a stalker until you actually get one; then it loses its fun very quickly.