The Stalked Intern

After college, I was interested in copyediting and layout, so I answered a Craigslist posting for a gig doing just that. It turns out that the guy was self-publishing (ha!) these two books he wrote, one about his travels fucking his way through Europe, the other about his time in jail for crack-related offenses. It was unpaid for now, but he promised monetary compensation once his other projects started bringing in cash. I was naive, had some money to live off of for a few months, and thought it was going to be OK.

The guy was clearly an ex-junkie, if it wasn’t obvious enough from his (not actually bad) book. He had a zillion ideas for making money, most of which sounded vaguely promising to a green kid. He was contacting other authors whose books were out of print, wanting to handle the reprinting of their books. He had designs for an eco-friendly business and entertainment directory in our city. It all seemed on the up and up, and I wanted to get behind the eco-friendly thing.

I would meet with him a few times a week to go over the revisions I suggested, and we’d discuss the book. When discussing the “fucking his way through Europe” book, he asked me about my sexual orientation. I told him I was a lesbian. He pressed for further confirmation, as if it was any of his business as a boss significantly older than his intern, to know. Weeks went on, his crazy stayed at a minimal level–he would try to give me clothes he found at Goodwill that didn’t fit me at all, he told me increasingly bizarre stories about his ex-wife etc. I just got more and more uncomfortable around him.

Eventually, after being privy to a long ridiculous tale about how his ex-wife destroyed his life, I stopped returning his emails. So he called me. I have blocked out most of the conversation, but in it, he told me that he never believed me when I said I was gay, that he was just trying to feel me out because he wanted to fuck me. He told me that I shouldn’t be surprised because all the girls in the “fucking around Europe” book were significantly younger than he. I told him that I was going to hang up the phone, after refusing to “start the conversation over”and did so. He called me back several times in the next half hour, and I silenced my phone every time. He tried me a few more times over the next few months, but I recognized his number. And then, eight months later, I answered an unknown number…which turned out to be him.

Now I’ve completely changed careers and am much happier. But still, there is a reason I don’t answer unknown numbers any more. Both numbers I have connected with him are under “DO NOT ANSWER” on my phone book. Since he was a freelance crazy, there was no HR to report him to. The whole experience is still a little hard to describe. On the bright side, even working with middle schoolers can’t be as bad as working for him.