As normal I ran errands due to the day. When I got back to the car, there was only half the parking lot full and everything looked to be in its place … until I saw it. Under my wiper was a folded piece of paper. The hurriedly folded paper made me want to almost dismiss it as a flyer or commercial.
I opened it and read the first paragraph and my heart started to speed. “They, I never knew it, told me they were inspecting your car.” I surveyed the parking lot. Was anyone still watching? I continued reading. The man had been scared away by two people, of whom I noticed that they thought the car belonged to them. They called security as well. I breathed, squeezed the note even more tightly, and set the gun aside.
Had I secured my doors? I questioned myself. Was that anything was missing? Then I had a terrible idea. What if he had been just watching? Had he been waiting for me to come back?
As I carefully inspected my car, I shook somewhat. There were no broken windows, and nothing looked destroyed with signs of forced entry. But the spooky feeling remained. I have an old vehicle that people take interest in my old vehicle. Now, as I was driving home, I was threatened by every shadow on the road. As I looked in the rearview mirror, I felt chills every time.
When I finally got home into my driveway, I was relieved. As I picked up the note, I looked at it more closely again. It was written in blue ink, and the writing had a somewhat shaky handwriting because it appeared the writer was in a hurry. They had written ‘Stay safe!’, at the bottom. but left their names out.
I was beginning to be curious. What were these people who did more than had enough to save me? Did they remain nearby? Had they glimpsed his face? Opening my front door, I stepped inside and my mind was trawling over with questions.
I couldn’t stop thinking about the incident the following morning. So, I was determined to get answers and so I visited the same location where I had seen the note. In other words, perhaps someone there might recognise the handwriting or be able to recall that things were acting suspicious. I went to hand the memo to the customer service agent when I arrived there.
“Do you know what this is?” I asked, hoping.
The clerk’s expression became a frown and she nodded. I’m sorry, ma’am. Recently, we have not gotten any reports out of the ordinary.
I was disappointed, but I wasn’t ready to rest so I squandered my way down the aisles to try and run into one of the ghostly people. I was passing near the coffee aisle by chance and noticed a man standing beside it, carefully examining the different beans from several brands. He had an air of familiarity. It was slacks and navy hoodie just like one of the Good Samaritans in the note.
I went up to him, as I was cautious, and touched his shoulder for a second. “I apologise,” I whispered. He looked at me startled but with a sympathetic glance. “Company that you instructed your driver to leave a note on a vehicle yesterday?”
An instant was all it took for the confusion to switch to realisation in his expression. “Oh! Right, the weirdo had been snooping around in your car. I was obviously there with my friend Lucia. The note was a way of not scaring you directly.
I was rushing with relief. I have to thank you two very much. You really saved me from any issues because of it.
He nodded slightly. “Anyone should do it.” By the way, my name is Ethan. I gave his hand a grateful shake and he held out his hand.
Just in our brief talk, Ethan had told me that he and Lucia often came here and saw odd things happening. They usually tried to fill in whenever they could without creating a scene, though. Their alertness really amazed me. Ethan promised before leaving to introduce me to Lucia.
Unexpected constants in my next few weeks were Ethan and Lucia. And we developed ourselves a natural friendship, having casual get-togethers, meals. These lessons were about being aware and trusting myself and, importantly, about getting helpful clan support. In return, I learnt more about their background and both had a very strong opinion about local safety initiative.
There was an unfortunate discovery one evening during dinner at Ethan’s house. According to Lucia, ladies who live alone have recently been targeted in break ins in our neighbourhood. All three of us were quite uncomfortable upon the discovery of this. They had come to me earlier, I was grateful, but fear returned.
We were set to do everything we could to succeed and became a small group to beef up local security measures. We got help from our neighbours doing business with increase in lighting, having patrols and using social media. The attention we received for our actions surprised us and others began to organise for collective defence.
However, for a day or two, things went smoothly until things took a sudden turn of events. Once I returned home from work one cold afternoon, I noticed police cruisers parked outside my building. Again my heart thumped with fear. When I rushed upstairs, police were questioning residents as they had a suspect in custody earlier in the day.
The person, caught trying to break into many vehicles, including mine, seemed to be the type of person witnesses had described for months. This resolution was much appreciated, as I knew those initial worries weren’t as paranoia as that they were real threats that were removed by quick decision making and teamwork.
Since I found that straightforward message, there had been some pretty significant decisions I made as I reflected on all that had occurred. Life has many times when completed strangers become allies, and remind us that good may come out of any situation. Though small acts of kindness may not change the life of the giver, it can very much change a lot of lives from the people you are trying to reach out to. All we have to do is follow our intuitive and act when we are vulnerable, and it becomes empowerment.
Closest to courage and danger can be. Moreover, we achieve the greatest resilience to conquer even the fiercest unforeseeable, when we nurture the relationships formed out of shared care.
And this concludes my story with a lesson: community, where people come together, is stronger than anything we will ever be on our own, be vigilant, and be compassionate. If you click on this tale, please do drop it. We should bring more awareness if not more optimism.