A panhandler followed me to my house...

I was walking home from work one day last summer, on my usual route which takes me through a town square. There are a bunch of shops and a couple of restaurants lining the square, and there are a few homeless people who hang out there as well. I always carry change for the homeless people I see along my way, because I feel like if I'm not comfortable enough to give them a cup of coffee or a meal, I can at least leave them something they can add to whatever else they get.<br><br>So I see this guy, sitting on the ground next to a lamppost, doing a bit of a slumped-over lean against it. He's got a ball cap pulled down over his face, and a tattered old sign that says something along the lines of "anything helps" scribbled on it in Sharpie. I stop and give him all my change, and he sort of grunts at me. I continue on my way.<br><br>I walk for a few minutes, and then I hear footsteps behind me. I turn to see a man with no shirt and a pair of shorts, a ball cap, and carrying a backpack. It's the panhandler from the square. I was a little surprised, but figured he was probably just going the same way I was and was it was a coincidence. He gets closer and I can see it's 100% him. He gets closer still, and I can smell the reek of body odor and stink and god knows what else. I cross the street, and he crosses the street.<br><br>At this point, I'm getting a little spooked. I'm a young-ish woman who lives alone in a ground-level apartment (a little background for you: I've been stalked before, and it ended supremely poorly, so I'm always on high alert when it comes to men I don't know), so I wasn't feeling great about this. I stressed-smoked a cigarette, then continue on my way. I see him a few times out of the corner of my eye, but I don't look directly at him. I get to the neighborhood my apartment is in, and I figure, "well, this is the last leg of my trip. I just have to go down this boulevard and then my apartment is on the left," so I speed up a bit.<br><br>He starts walking faster, and I start walking faster, and I can hear heavy breathing and footsteps getting closer to me. So I start running, and he starts running, and it's like we're racing or something. I get to my apartment complex, and I run up the stairs and I'm scrambling for my keys and I get inside and I lock the door behind me.<br><br>I spend the rest of the night looking over my shoulder, getting more and more paranoid. It's 100% possible this guy just happened to live in the same neighborhood/ direction I did, or that he saw me and tried his panhandling ruse in a different spot. It's 100% possible I was just being paranoid and letting my fear of being followed guide my reactions that night. I hope it was just that, because the alternative, that he was following me to my house specifically, is too terrifying to consider.<br><br>Guy who followed me home that day, let's not meet again.