There may be nine million people in London, but no one would call it “the city that never sleeps”. Having moved here from Georgia, a small Eastern European country tucked away between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, I know why the British capital doesn’t have that nickname. Because when I used to leave my shared house on a quiet residential street in the suburb of Kingston at half past five every morning to go to work, most people in the neighbourhood were still asleep, so there would never be anybody around. Until that day.
As I stepped out of my home on that fateful morning, I spotted a man who, as soon as I was outside, started running up the pavement towards me. Since he was the only other person there, I obviously noticed him, though it didn’t occur to me that his presence had anything to do with me. So, I approached my car to unlock it, as usual.
Meanwhile, that man left the pavement and started running in the middle of the deserted road, heading straight towards me. He got closer and closer, leaving me baffled. As he approached, I got increasingly tense and apprehensive. But when he reached me, he just ran past.
“Weird,” I remember thinking. Because clearly, he intentionally tried to get close to me.
Just put yourself in his shoes. You are walking down a completely empty street. Then you spot someone leaving their home, so you pick up the pace and run towards them in the middle of the road only to pass them close by. Why would you do that?
Usually in that kind of situation, before sunrise in a big and often dangerous city, two strangers would keep their distance. In fact, if they happened to walk towards each other on the pavement in the dark, one or even both of them might be inclined to cross the road and continue their journey on the other side.
Perhaps one of them might have a reason to approach the other. “Excuse me, I’m lost – what’s the name of this road? How do I get to Kingston Station?”
But certainly, no one would go out of their way – never mind start running down the middle of the road – just to brush past the only other person in sight, without any intention to actually engage. Unless, of course, you are trying to find out something through close observation. Like getting a peek in the car, perhaps, to gather information.
But what kind of information could you possibly get from someone like me? I’m just an ordinary middle-aged man. I’ve never been in trouble with the law, I’m not politically active, and I am not a danger to society. I’m just trying to get by, like most people.
Did this guy want to steal my car once I returned from work? Well, in all honesty, it’s not the kind of vehicle that would prompt criminals to carry out reconnaissance in advance.
Whenever I left my little side street at 5.30 in the morning, I would not encounter any traffic until I reached the main road a bit further down. However, on this occasion, as soon as I set off, headlights somewhere behind me were switched on, and then a car pulled out of a parking space and followed me. Not just down to the main road, but all the way to my workplace in Acton, about eight miles away in West London.
Even at this early hour, the drive there took me at least thirty minutes, passing through many parts of this vast city and crossing various thoroughfares that led either into Central London, towards Heathrow Airport or straight onto the motorway. In other words, there countless opportunities to turn off, with innumerable potential destinations. So, what are the chances that someone departing from my quiet residential street at the same time as me before dawn would coincidentally drive to the same fairly distant place? You’d get better odds on winning the lottery! After all, it’s not like I was joining thousands of people in heading to a football match at Wembley Stadium or to see the New Year’s fireworks display at the London Eye – instead, I was driving to a relatively small, nondescript workplace in an anonymous part of town.
When I finished my shift that afternoon and drove back, the same thing happened again – except this time, it was a different vehicle that followed me all the way home.
“What the hell is going on?” I wondered, as I parked my car, quickly locked it and rushed into my shared flat, where I immediately closed the front door behind me. “Who are these people, and what do they want from me? Are they criminals or perhaps secret agents confusing me with somebody else? Do they use face recognition software that has mistakenly identified me as their target? Or have I maybe accidentally been in the wrong place at the wrong time somewhere without being aware of it, which is why they are now keeping tabs on me?”
Whatever the reason, it was clear that those men were following me. So, having woken up in the morning thinking that this would be just another ordinary day in my steady life, I suddenly felt very unsettled. London may not be “the city that never sleeps”. But that night, I remained wide-awake for fear of what might happen when darkness fell.
This true account is to be continued every other Friday.