'AITA for following someone home in my car after she cut me off? But wait, I'm her neighbor.'

"AITA for following the car that cut me off to their house? But wait, I’m their next door neighbor."

Just this afternoon I went to the grocery store because it’s my day off. It’s a Friday, and the store is pretty busy and finding a parking spot took a couple minutes of circling the parking lot. I go in, get my snacks and necessities, check out and load my bags into my trunk, and start driving home. Traffic is just as bad exiting the parking lot as it was getting in, and everything bottlenecks at a four way stop.

Now, the proper etiquette at four way stops is everyone takes turns. First one there has the right of way, if you get there at the same time as another driver, person to your right has the right of way, blah blah blah, same stuff you learn to get your driver’s license.

When it got to be my turn, the driver to my left who definitely did not have the right of way jumped ahead and pulled into the intersection. I had to slam on my breaks to avoid hitting them, so I honked my horn at her. Just a short “hey you almost caused an accident, pay attention ” kind of beep. She responded by raising her middle finger.

It’s at this time that I realize I know who this lady is. She’s my next door neighbor. I don’t know her name because they aren’t very friendly, but if she’s driving home, like I am with my groceries, I’ll be right behind her the whole way.

I don’t tailgate her, but I stick to her like glue. We live out in the country and the drive from the store to our neighborhood takes about 20 minutes. Dear reader, word of advice, If you ever think someone is following you, do not go straight home. Make some unnecessary turns to see if they are purposefully following you.

Go to the nearest police department or other public place where you can be safe and get help. I was prepared to stop following her if she tried any of these things and continue on my way home. I had ice cream that needed to get in the freezer so I didn’t want to waste time just to mess with my neighbor. Lucky for me, she took the most direct route to our neighborhood.

She definitely thought I was following her. She kept looking out the rear window of her SUV. When we turned onto our neighborhood she pulled out her phone and made a call. Excellent. This is the best case scenario for messing with her, I just had to play it cool.

Our street is at the back of the neighborhood, with lots of turns to get there. Still, she takes the most direct route, the one I would have taken anyways.

We get to our street and she pulls into her driveway and as I pull past her and pull into my own driveway, I can see that she is crying into her phone and keeps looking over at me in horror. I get out of my car, give a little wave and a smile and open my trunk, obviously so menacing.

Her husband comes out the front door of their house and he’s on his own phone and looking like he’s ready to fight. He’s wearing socks and slippers so he probably wasn’t actually ready for anything. I pull out my bags of groceries, say “hey man, what’s up? Is your wife ok? She’s like freaking out in her car.”

He looks at me. Recognizes me as his neighbor, holding ice cream and bags of potato chips, obviously so menacing. He sighed, “yeah, I’ll talk to her, she’s fine.” “Alright, let me know if you need anything.” I reply, and I go inside my place and start writing this post.

AITA? I didn’t actually do anything I wasn’t already doing. I just predicted how my unfriendly, bad driver neighbor would react to my normal driving route, and enjoyed watching her freak out thinking she was being followed by some road rage psycho because she cut them off and flipped them off.

I don’t think it should count as revenge, because I didn’t have to do anything, but technically, I could have been nice and pulled off for a minute before continuing to go home so I would not have been right behind her the whole way home.

What do you think? AITA? This is what commenters had to say:

softshoulder313 said:

NTA. It's common knowledge that if you think you are being followed you don't drive home. She could have made just one turn out of your path. She didn't. She did it to herself.

OP responded:

I know, right? That actually happened to me before. Back in my 20’s when I was a missionary for my church, this drunk guy started following us in his car. We pulled into a parking lot and told him to go home because he was driving drunk, and he got aggressive.

We got back in our car, called the police, and drove around for almost an hour until we were intercepted by the police. The guy was arrested for driving drunk and for assaulting the police after they pulled us over. We missed our dinner appointment.

He added:

...and now that I think of it, that’s not even the craziest thing that happened while I was doing that missionary stuff. I fought a raccoon. I had a gun pointed at my face on two occasions. Helped some lady steal drugs so her husband wouldn’t relapse. And I accidentally released an alpaca and had to go chase it down in the middle of the mountains.

SnooWords4839 said:

That must have had her sh!tting her pants! She knew she was wrong and then had 20 minutes to panic.

Odd-Mulberry-673 said:

NTA. Sweet sweet karma. The only thing that got her was her own head and one mother of a coincidence. If you want to really put the cherry on top, leave the page from the driver’s manual with rules for a 4-way stop on her windshield.

And rarkis said:

NTA. As you said, you did nothing.
It was all on her guilty conscience and lack of self preservation.