Creepy Ken

Main Entry: creepy
Pronunciation: \ˈkrē-pē\
: producing a nervous shivery apprehension, a creepy horror story; also : eerie
: of, relating to, or being a creep : annoyingly unpleasant

Main Entry: ap•pre•hen•sion
Pronunciation: \ˌa-pri-ˈhen(t)-shən\
: suspicion or fear especially of future evil : foreboding, an atmosphere of nervous apprehension.

Main Entry: 1fore•bod•ing
Pronunciation: \-ˈbō-diŋ\
: the act of one who forebodes; also : an omen, prediction, or presentiment especially of coming evil : portent

It's Thursday night swim practice and the team is waiting around by the pool. I had been looking forward to tonight for the social after practice. As we waited for practice to start a fellow swimmer struck up conversation with me. In the short minute or two that we talked I had told him that I was planning on going to the social but had to take the train to Alewife to get my car and drive back into Harvard Square so that I'd have my car ready when I wanted to leave.

Meanwhile, I had been working out a lot this week. On Monday I swam, ran, and did core work; on Tuesday I biked with the Rippers in the morning; and on Wednesday I swam. Now it's Thursday and I ran with Zion in the morning and here I was at swim practice that same day. Needless to say, I was tired. So, I jumped out of the pool after 40 minutes, which no one does because practice is always at least an hour. I start heading towards the showers to begin the process of retrieving my car. As I'm walking to the locker room I hear my name and Ken is right behind me. He stops me and offers to walk with me to get my car. I refuse saying, no, you don't have to do that encourage him to get back into the water. By association of the swim team I assume he's a normal guy, but I did think it was odd for him to jump out of the pool earlier then he probably intended to walk with me to my car. After going back and forth, I finally agree to let him come.

Upon acceptance, he says "great! I'll be ready in 5 minutes." I say, "I'll be ready in 15."

I'm by my locker having just gotten out of the shower and I hear Ken's voice echo into the locker room asking me I'm still there. I yell out yes. Knowing that he was waiting for me, I pop my head out of the locker room and let him know that I still had to dry my hair. Upon doing so, he pulls his head around the corner and says "is anyone in there?" My reaction was - "you can't come in here and yes there are people in here!" I turn around quickly and head back into the locker room and he says "you look nice."

I'm back at the hair dryer thinking... this guy is kind of weird. Why would he ask if anyone is in the locker room and why did he even think for one second that he could come in. People are in and out of the locker room all the time and changing. That's just weird. And why would he say I look nice when I'm clearly not ready yet and have soaking wet hair. Yuck.

I walk out of the locker room when I'm done. He offers me his jacket for the walk, which I gladly accept since the temperature had plummeted throughout the day from 6 and sunny to 50 degrees and misty. When he gestured to give me his jacket, he motions like he was going to put it on me for me. I say thank you and just grab the jacket, not letting him put it over my shoulders. In my head I think, this is too close for comfort and everything about this guy is skeezing me out.

As we walk over the JFK bridge I'm consciously aware that he's walking too close to me. My legs are completely bare since I had worn a short summer dress and flip flops that day. In the background, he's telling me what he does for work. His story doesn't make sense and he's talking in circles. He's explaining that his business is managing people's risk. So I ask some probing questions like - "so are you selling the service to talk with people about managing their risk, or are you a money manager? What exactly are you?" He doesn't really answer the question and talks in circles some more. After about 7 minutes of this I say, "if this is your business you should really be more clear about what you do." I'm turned off greatly by this. Being in sales, I have a keen ear for getting to the point and coming away from a conversation with clear answers.

As we wait for the train I'm sipping on my nuun water. He says "give me some of that." Reactively, I hand him the bottle. As soon as he sips it, I think "damn, now I can't have anymore and I'm going to have to throw that out."

We walk onto the train and I take a single seat, flanked by people on either side. He walks over and continues to ask me normal questions in a weird way. He asks "did you go to college?" Most people say "where did you go to college?" I found it both condescending and weird that he asked in that way. At the next stop he asked the person next to me to slide over so he could sit next to me. He sat with a wide stance so that his leg was uncomfortably close to mine and his bag was on his lap and both arms were crossed close to his chest. I felt a tapping on my side as he asked me questions. At the time, I wasn't sure if it was his bag, or his finger.
During the next two stops his talk got to be incomprehensible. He told me that "Boston is such a mind fuck. Everyone lives with all his history, like the Mayflower and Paul Revere." Confused, I asked "so how does that weigh you down?" He had no answer.

Over the next few minutes it became extremely clear that he was unable to communicate in a linear thought pattern. I'm thinking, great - rather than bringing someone with me who could make me feel safer, I'm bringing the weirdo with me.

Each stop we're getting closer and closer to Alewife Station where I had parked my car earlier in the day. The parking lot is large and there is no security. I know that soon I'll be in a unpopulated garage with him and alone. While I'm still in the train I'm getting everything organized so that I have my keys in hand. Here we are, the last stop. At this point, I'm on high alert. My heart is even paced, my adrenaline is ready to surge, and I'm pissed thinking ... if this kid tries to do anything I'm going to kick his ass.

As we ride up the escalator I'm a couple of stairs ahead of him and I feel the back of his finger rest on the back of my knee. I turn around and say "did you just touch me?!" He says "oh sorry, I didn't mean to." I step forward away from him and say in a strong and assertive voice "you're just saying some really weird things. I just met you and you're here about to drive with me and I want to make sure things are cool." He says "that's one way to look at it." As we ride up the second escalator, I motion for him to ride in front of me. I look back at the person behind me as if to say "help." I consider if I should ask him to walk me to my car, but then I think, WTF, this guy is going to get IN my car! I'm pissed but also focused.

We walk out to the car and I'm keeping my distance from him. Luckily, and perhaps it was his reaction from me verbalizing that it was not cool for him to touch me and that he was saying weird things, he seemed to keep completely to his side of the car. It was almost as if he recluded into the seat. I'm feeling more and more free the closer we get to Harvard. He continues to tell me stranger things like "he is intensely looking for a wife and to start his family."

Half way there he asks me "so, what is it that I said was weird?" I say, "I'm good, I really don't want to talk about it."

A few minutes later he says "I'm sorry for making you feel uncomfortable."

I don't answer.

We're almost to our destination and he says "maybe we can go out to dinner sometime and I can try not to be so strange."

Again, I don't answer.

We get to the parking lot, he gets out of my car and I lock it immediately. He asks if he can leave his bag in the car, and my response is "I would rather not."

We get into the bar and find others from the swim team. I'm talking to another guy, Ken is in the corner, and I feel someone touch my side. I whip around and see who it is, but no one had caused it. I turn back to my new friend and say "I'm just really paranoid right now." He says, "so you experienced it?" I look at him in the eye, and say, "yes." He's nodding his head like he knows.

He says, yea he's a real weirdo. Our coach has had to talk to him about it. He's stalked and been creepy to every girl on this team. He turns to the others to fill them in on our conversation and they unanimously agree that he's totally weird.

The validation from the others definitely made me feel better. My body was still on high alert and not relaxed yet. I was practically biting my nails, which I never do.
Later that night I informed my coach of everything that happened. He was definitely pissed. He wasn't there and said that if he was that he wouldn't have done that because he knows that he's onto him. He asked me to write up everything that happened so that he can document it and take action. He also advised to tell any other women on the team about it too.

A couple of days later, my blood pressure still rises writing about the experience. It was definitely strange experience and a good reminder to not trust people without reason and to follow your gut instinct, even it it means hurting some one's feelings.