Stalker with a Crush/Playing With

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


Basic Trope: A character stalks a person he/she loves.

  • Straight: Alice loves Bob, so she follows him, hoping for him to one day love her.
  • Exaggerated: Alice is a Yandere, and has folllowed Bob since grade school.
  • Justified: Alice is a teenager who just can't muster up the courage to actually talk to Bob.
  • Inverted: Alice is a Stalker Without a Crush, and it turns out Bob loves her.
  • Subverted: Alice appears to be stalking Bob out of love, but it turns out she's a Spy only using love as a fake justification for her keeping an eye on the time.
  • Double Subverted: Alice managed to fall in love with Bob for real while spying on him.
  • Parodied: Bob stalks Alice, but she instantly falls in love with him the moment Bob pretends he's a vampire while doing it.
    • Alice has stalked Bob all her life, at the same time Bob starts stalking a different girl and instantly gets shunned for it, as a stab at the Double Standards of this trope.
    • Alice and Bob are stalking each other, and end up sitting still for hours wondering why the other hasn't moved or put down his or her binoculars.
  • Deconstructed: Bob is disturbed by Alice's consistent stalking, and this not only destroys any chance of Bob and Alice having a relationship, but Bob also tries to avoid Alice as much as he can.
  • Reconstructed: Bob starts to miss Alice's stalkerish ways, even if they were a bit creepy.
  • Zig Zagged: Bob and Alice managed to stalk each other. But it turns out they were both spies of opposite organizations, meant to keep tabs on each other, using love as a ploy. When their cover starts to slip, they both start Becoming the Mask and falling in love with each other for real, but it tuns out they were both just faking that and they're really not in love with each other at all, without the other one knowing.
  • Averted: Alice does not stalk Bob at any point.
  • Enforced: The writer wants to show how Alice is emotionally attracted to Bob, so he/she has Alice stalk him.
  • Lampshaded:

Alice: You shall be mine, Bob! And "no" is NOT an answer!

  • Invoked:
  • Exploited: Bob finds out about it, and decides to have a bit of fun by messing with Alice, giving her Hope Spots, and making her do things for him.
  • Defied:
  • Discussed:

Bob: Now that I think of it, Alice has been stalking me.

  • Conversed: "Why do people in these shows always think stalking is a form of true love?"
  • Played For Laughs: Alice knows everything about Bob, his family, his favorite food, what color underwear he wears, and even his routine for getting up in the morning. And she can recite all of it from memory.
  • Played For Drama: Alice is stalking Bob, who has known for some time and has actually taken quite a shine to her. But his brother Charlie, who knows nothing of the situation, discovers her stalking him and attacks, killing her in the process. Bob, not realizing who did it, vows revenge for Alice...

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