About two weeks ago, I pulled into a parking lot to park my car before I caught the bus to Port Authority. As I put my car in park, I felt a pair of eyes staring at me. I looked up, out the window of the empty passenger seat, and saw a man in his car, parked next to me, staring pointedly at me with a smile on his face. Needless to say, I quickly gathered my things and left the car, heading to my bus stop. I obviously was a little disturbed by this, seeing as a man was just watching me from his car. I walked to the bus stop, shaking the strange look off, when I heard someone say: “Hey!”

I looked up from my phone as I sat on the bus stop bench, to see the man from his car standing on the sidewalk, his phone in his hand. I stared at him, confused as to why a stranger was bothering me.

“I saw you parked your car in that parking lot. I wrote down your license plate. I’m going to have your car towed.”

Now, when I heard this I was a little confused. Admittedly, I was illegally parked in that parking lot, but no one had seemed to notice that I’d been parking there multiple times a week since August. And I was also baffled as to why a complete stranger, who was also parked there, was going to go out of his way to call the cops on me. And thirdly, why had this man been watching me in my car, and then proceeded to follow me to see where I was going in order to find out if he could have my car towed? This random man, on this Monday morning, was planning on calling the cops, and was also willing to wait for the cops to show up, to then file a report to have my car towed, and to then do whatever other things he’d have to do once the tow truck arrived. It was a very, very strange moment.

I looked at the man in confusion, and another man standing a few feet to my left, who was also waiting for the bus, also looked on with mild confusion. I didn’t know what to say, so for a minute I stared at him with my mouth open.

“I always park there,” was all I stupidly could think of to reply.

The man, stuttering and shaking his phone, said, “I-I don’t care. I wrote down your license plate. You’re getting towed.” And then he disappeared.

It was one thing to snitch on me and have my car towed, but it was another to follow me and tell me about it, as if he wanted me to know it was him who had done it. After the man had disappeared, I sat there for a minute, debating on whether or not I should just say, “Fuck it,” and continue waiting for the bus, considering I had a midterm in class and I couldn’t afford to be late.

But then my anger took over. I wasn’t going to let this guy cost me hundreds of dollars. So, I got up and went all the way back to my car to drive it all the way to my grandparents’ house, where it would be safe from all tow trucks everywhere.

For the rest of the day I had a gross taste in my mouth. I felt upset, a little unsettled. I didn’t understand why this man had watched me from my car and why he went out of his way to see where I was going to make sure I wasn’t planning on parking there all day. Was it because he had been smiling at me and I hadn’t smiled back? Why was he so angry when he approached me at the bus stop, as if I had spit in his face? Maybe if I had smiled back at him, he would’ve went on his merry way and not followed me all the way to the bus stop. I can’t know. But something deep within me told me this man wasn’t just trying to help out the cops; it felt personal, it felt aggressive.

So, the next time I had class, I parked in the parking lot. And then the next day, and the next day, and the next day. I figured, if after all these months (from August to April), the owners of the parking lot hadn’t complained, why would I let a random, creepy man tell me what to do? Secaucus, where I was commuting from, didn’t have a parking lot for people traveling to New York, and any other legal places to park had meters or a limit of two hours. It didn’t seem fair. There was nowhere I could park legally that also allowed for enough time, considering I’d be in Brooklyn all day in my classes, so what was I supposed to do? I was angry and acting defiantly, and even though technically that man was right, the way in which he went about it made my skin boil. He had watched me in my car and then followed me. The last thing I wanted to do was listen to him.

That was definitely a stupid decision on my part.

This week, on Wednesday, I got off the bus from New York, and I had a bad feeling in my stomach. I knew my car would be gone. I was just glad it was still light out and I wasn’t stranded in this parking lot in the middle of the night. I walked over and my intuition was right; my car was gone. I immediately knew who had called, especially since I had been parked far in the back, meaning it would’ve taken someone searching for my specific car with my license plate to know that it was me and that I’d been parked there longer than I was supposed to be.

I’d never had my car towed before. I didn’t know what the proper protocol was in this situation. My grandpa drove me to the police station to find out where my car was and what I should do next. Upon walking in, I saw two cops working behind the counter, one of them being a guy I went to high school with. I went over to the window and asked if they knew anything about a car that had gotten towed in that parking lot. They said yes, said they were sorry to hear my car had gotten towed and gave me a number to call to get it back.

“Do you guys know of any place where I can park without being towed?” I asked. “I commute to school during the week, so I need a place to park my car.”

The two fumbled for a place, pursing their lips and tapping their fingers on the counter between us. “Uh, not really, no. There’s the train station, but you have to pay for that every day. Sorry.”

After that, my mom took me to retrieve my car. Not only did it cost $220 (cash only) to get the car back, but the drive to the place where my car was towed took almost an hour. And, if we didn’t get the car back that day, we were going to be charged a daily $50. I felt as if I had become the victim of a trap. In a town where many people commute to the city, there are no parking spots where the commuters can legally park, and the only place where they can costs $10 a day. So, either you pay, or you illegally park (and in my case get followed by a strange man) and then have to pay more than $200. And then, you’ll somehow have to find a way to get your towed car back quickly, without a car to do so.

After I got my car, as I drove back home, I wondered what someone in a worse off situation would have done. What would someone without a second car have done? Take the bus to get it? What would someone without $220 in cash have done? Wait until they saved up? But then the interest would have just added on more and more. And if they were waiting to earn the money to get the car, how would they get to work in the meantime? It all made no sense to me. It was an evil trap to keep people with less money in a constant state of suffering.

I had finally been exposed to a side of adult life that I hadn’t seen before. I knew this was how things were—that the government wasn’t necessarily set up to help those in need, but to keep them needing. I had always known this, but I hadn’t ever experienced it firsthand until then. The tow companies and police made millions off the cars they towed and the people they unnecessarily ticketed. I also saw exactly how much a man with hurt feelings could do to mess with my life if I didn’t give him what he wanted. It was terrifying to finally be a part of this reality I’d heard so much about, and I couldn’t imagine what it would have been like to face these harsh realities without help. I was lucky to have the money and time to get my car back quickly, and I was lucky that the worst thing that man had done was follow me and have my car towed. Things definitely could've gone much worse in both situations, and for some, they definitely have.