MrBallen

And he, along with the rest of the group, had a wonderful night, eating and drinking and chatting.

After dinner was cleaned up, Alexia's father did go to bed, but everybody else stayed up.

And they all just continued having this nice time until around 11 p.m., when Alexia said it was really time for her and Jonathan to head home.

They both had early mornings ahead of them, Jonathan had some errands to run in the morning, and Alexia was hoping to get a workout in.

A few minutes later, on the drive home, Alexia sat in the passenger seat of Jonathan's car.

She'd left her own car at her parents' house because she'd been drinking, and she was planning to pick it up when they came back the next day.

Alexia and Jonathan's house was on a quiet residential street, only about a mile away from Alexia's parents' house.

And as they made their way down the road, Alexia glanced out the window at a particular house that was just up the street from where they lived.

And as she looked at it, she frowned.

The neighbor who lived in that house had an adult grandson who had been harassing Alexia all summer.

He'd been obsessed with her and would call and text her constantly to the point where Alexia didn't feel safe even going out for a jog around the block when she was by herself.

Now, fortunately, the harassment had stopped a couple of months ago, but

but only because the man had been committed to a mental hospital.

But Alexia didn't really know how long it would be until he got out again.

Or if he'd already been released, she didn't know.

So it just sort of felt like a reprieve, not a long-term solution.

But on this night at least, there was nobody peering out at her from the neighbor's window.

A minute later, their car pulled into their garage, and Alexia and Jonathan got out.

And as Alexia went from the garage into the main house, she passed by a treadmill in the corner of the garage, which had broken down a few weeks ago.

She asked Jonathan if he'd gotten around to fixing it yet, and he said no.