Prologue
There is a dangerous story we have been telling for generations.
We tell young girls that if a boy keeps showing up after she says no, it’s because he loves her.
We tell young men that persistence is romantic, that grand gestures can change someone’s mind, and that giving up means they didn’t love enough.
We celebrate the man who refuses to walk away.
We write songs about him.
We make films about him.
We applaud the chase.
Somewhere along the way, we stopped asking one very important question.
What if she never wanted to be chased?
There is a difference between being chosen and being pursued.
There is a difference between devotion and obsession.
There is a difference between love and control.
Love listens.
Love respects.
Love accepts that another person’s heart is not something to be won like a prize.
Obsession hears “no” as an obstacle.
Control mistakes persistence for affection.
Stalking disguises itself as romance until the fear becomes impossible to ignore.
The frightening part is that it rarely begins with violence.
It often begins with flowers.
With constant messages.
With unexpected gifts.
With promises.
With apologies.
With people saying,
“He’s trying so hard.”
“You’re lucky someone loves you this much.”
“Just give him a chance.”
By the time the behavior becomes frightening, everyone has already mistaken it for love.
This book is not a love story.
It is a story about boundaries.
About intuition.
About the quiet voice inside us that whispers, something isn’t right, long before we can explain why.
It is about what happens when that voice is ignored.
And what happens when someone else refuses to hear the word no.
As you turn these pages, I ask only one thing of you.
Forget everything you’ve been taught about persistence being romantic.
Listen instead to the person who is saying they are afraid.
Because no one should have to earn the right to be left alone.
Stalking is not love.
Love never asks permission to ignore your boundaries.
Love never recruits strangers to change your mind.
Love never makes you fear your own phone.
Love leaves when it is not invited to stay.
Everything else has another name.
And it is time we started calling it by that name.
