Catching a Predator: Exploring the Paradoxically Unassuming Nature of Emotional Predators

Author’s Note:

This is a story about a personal experience with an emotional predator while living in Paris.

In writing “emotional predator,” I speak of the individuals who manipulate their targets by emotionally preying on their vulnerabilities and insecurities as a means to get in.

This article takes a nontechnical, nonprofessional approach rather than a psycho-analytical perspective in order to highlight the challenge of identifying predators from a target’s point of view.

The aim is not to teach readers how to identify predatory behavior in individuals, though it could be helpful for readers to gain insight and become more knowledgeable about the subject, nor attempt to answer the question as to why it is only in retrospect that many targets are able to recognize their predator as such and view that individual’s behavior as exploitative.

My focus, rather, is simply to share a story about an experience with an emotional predator to reveal just how common this occurrence is and normalize any emotional distress that targets may experience in the aftermath of an incident of emotional manipulation.

Additionally, all of the claims within this article have been confirmed and are not simply speculations or false claims.

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When Satan knocks on your door, he does not appear with carbuncle eyes and horns or even cloven hooves or fiery wings.

No, he is beautiful. Bewitching and kind. Endearing and charming. And above all things, seductive.

He comes to you offering compassion and warmth. He looks into you tenderly and recognizes the things of which you have been deprived and identifies what you need most.

He speaks to your heart’s desires, like a siren, beckoning you to a ruinous shore.

In a similar fashion, emotional predators are not the unfamiliar shadows that stalk you from the darkness of the night.

The ones who activate your primal instincts.

They are the ones with kind eyes and charming smiles.

The authentic, vulnerable souls who make you feel that you are important and special.

They are not the individuals that your parents warn you about.

The ones who are outwardly abusive, intolerant, or condescending.

They are beguiling and disarming. Chivalrous and tender.

The genuine listeners who make you feel heard.

They are not the ones you are taught to fear nor the ones you learn to avoid.

They are the people you believe you know and the ones you let in.

They are not even the ones you least expect, rather, they are the ones that you don’t.

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I — “Qu’est-ce que tu lis?”

She first met him a couple of months into her stay as a language student in Paris; it was at a small, vegan cafe where he happened to work. Being vegan, she had few options as to where she could eat out. She made the decision to venture out of her comfort zone the day her schedule changed giving her four, instead of two, hours of free time before dinner. With Google Maps pulled up on her phone she charted the distance from school to the cafe: 1.7 kilometers. She decided that it would be worth a try and that if she didn’t end up liking it she didn’t have to go back.

As she approached the cafe, she could see through the glass that it was quite empty. She grabbed the door with the sleeve of her coat that was two sizes too big for her. Being from Southern California, she had forgotten how cold Europe could get in the wintertime and had not packed accordingly. After being nearly blown away by a strong gust of wind one evening, she was forced to thrift an old, navy blue duffle coat from a kilo shop. It was stiff and smelled slightly of what she could only guess was the scent of old Parisian mothballs. Some of the buttons were starting to pop off and the zipper was broken, but she slowly fell in love with it as it made her feel somewhat protected in the large city. The door made a plastic creaking sound as it opened. She stepped inside and shut the door behind her.

On her way to the counter she unknowingly passed the man who would cause a lot of problems for her later in the future. After placing her order, she scoured the room for a place to sit. Directly to her left was an empty table for two right next to the man she had passed on her way in. She politely asked him if she could sit down. He responded affirmatively and got up revealing a small, black name tag pinned on his left breast. It was then that she realized that he was actually an employee and had been on break when she walked in.

She took off her coat after realizing that the cafe didn’t exactly have an air conditioning system and instantly felt vulnerable. She sat down and pulled out her book as she waited for her food.

A few moments later, the man came back balancing the contents of what she had ordered in both of his hands. He brought her a set of utensils from the shelf even though it had a “self serve” sign above it and took the time to pour her a glass of water.

The lighting in the cafe began to darken, and it was only then that she realized how much time had passed. The sky was a faded dark blue, and the clock read 17:34. She closed her book and pulled out her phone to search for the nearest metro. When she looked up the server was back standing in front of her table. He mumbled something to her in French but she couldn’t catch what it was. She nervously asked him to repeat himself feeling slightly embarrassed. He gestured to the book that was laying on the table and repeated the question: “Qu’est-ce que tu lis?” (What are you reading?) Taken by surprise at his interest in her choice of literature, she did not know how to respond. She gave him what she thought was a very poor synopsis of the book followed by asking if he had ever read it in an effort to shift the focus off of herself. He responded that he had not before letting her get up to pack her things. She pulled her duffle coat back on and hoisted her shoulder bag up and headed for the door. As she turned around to close the door behind her, she saw him staring back at her. He waved goodbye with a kindhearted smile gently lining his face.

II — “He’s really nice to you…like, really nice”

After that, every time she visited the cafe he would be there. Whether or not she went alone, he always paid special attention to her orders and waited on her with an enthusiasm that her friends noticed was exclusive to her.

“He is really nice to you…like, really nice,” a friend told her. Really? She wondered in disbelief. No one had ever been that nice to her before she admitted. Of course, there were people in her life who she knew loved her: family, close friends, etc. But no stranger had ever been that chivalrous for no reason.

Her friend suspected that he was most likely taking an interest in her before falling silent to eat. While her friend enjoyed the soup that they had ordered, our shy American wondered whether or not it was true. There was a part of her that was flattered by the idea, yet another that denied it. It wasn’t until she and the server found one another on Instagram that she felt sure of this suspicion.

III— “So, you found me?”

Scrolling through his Instagram she noticed how a lot of the women — friends or lovers she couldn’t quite tell — who seemed to make appearances on his feed were of Asian descent. Being Chinese American this seemed to scream “Asian fetish,” but she dismissed it as a simple, harmless preference.

— “So, you found me?” he messaged after receiving the new follow notification.

— “I guess so” she responded. She held her breath as she watched the “Typing…” icon dance at the bottom of her screen.

— “Well then :)” the screen read back. She smiled and turned her phone off.

After that, with every encounter they had at the cafe, he made sure to be the one to cover her orders, both taking and delivering them. Accustomed to being overlooked, she enjoyed the attention, and though they had never really spoken to one another, she felt as though he treated her like a friend. As dying cultural codes in the modern world, the chivalry and gallantry he demonstrated made a considerable impression on her. Slowly, she became particularly susceptible to his friendly gestures and would return the favor with a smile or two, which, as no surprise to her, he accepted graciously.

Every couple of weeks she would come in with a new book and, although he was never sure of the topic, he was always impressed. From this small character tell, he could sense that she was on the quieter more reserved side; a bit of an old soul and probably intelligent. He also noticed the side shave in her hair and took that as a sign that she valued uniqueness or individuality. Perhaps she wanted to give off a more alternative energy. He guessed that this was the answer because, on more than one occasion, she wore a farm animal sanctuary t-shirt. Coupling this with the sheer amount of times she had been back to this particular cafe, he concluded that she was a true vegan rather than just a diet trend follower. Additionally, he noticed her choice in fashion; it was always a black shirt and slim black jeans with Dr. Martens or Chelsea style boots. All black. He took this as a sign that she wanted to blend in or fall to the background. Maybe she even wanted to feel completely invisible. In addition, he was endlessly fascinated by her interest in pole dancing after he stumbled upon a video on her Instagram. Seeing this other more confident side of her, he wondered about its significance in her life. Perhaps she simply used it as a form of self-expression or maybe it meant she viewed herself as more sexually liberated. He even considered the possibility that this meant that she was interested in defying social norms about the expression of women’s sexual desires.

With no direct answers to these questions he became engrossed in the mysticism that she eluded. And so, wanting to decode this, he asked her out to dinner.

IV — Dinner

While she was more than aware that he liked her, she was still taken by surprise at his proposal. She had never been on a date before and was somewhat anxious. She wasn’t sure if she wanted what they had together to go any further than what it was, and with such limited in-person interactions that they shared, the idea of sitting alone with him for more than an hour was unsettling.

Having known sexual abuse-related trauma in her past and seeing how much he seemed to like her in that way, she became fearful of his intentions. She wasn’t afraid of him per se, but she assumed that sex was something he wanted and knew that that was a line she did not want to cross. She also didn’t want to give him the wrong idea as she did not feel the same way about him as he did for her. In fact, she did not feel that way towards men in general. And she felt guilty for having let things get this far.

She decided to accept the proposal anyway because she thought that, as long as she was certain the date wasn’t romantic, she could trust that nothing would happen out of it. However, she was not prepared for the anxiety and discomfort that would saturate the entire meal.

Entering the dim-lit restaurant, she found it somewhat difficult to see. As a result, her other senses switched to high alert. She took her coat off and draped it on the back of the chair finding herself, once more, feeling instantly shy.

When they sat down at the table he immediately poured her a glass of water just like he did at the cafe. She found it endearing that he still waited on her even though, in this setting, she was no longer a customer of his.

Although she answered the questions he posed, he found her to be just as quiet here as in the cafe. Odd, he thought. Holy shit, she panicked. She felt it was going terribly. She felt so awkward and ill-prepared. Her body shook with adrenaline and she nervously fidgeted with her water glass. She wondered why she was freaking out so badly. He seemed nice and benevolent, but she couldn’t help herself. She tried taking some deep breaths to relax, but she couldn’t stop reading into everything that came out of his mouth.

— “You’re a lesbian? I didn’t ever think that you wouldn’t be attracted to men” he murmured from behind the napkin that he had just raised to his mouth. Fuck, he must have seen it on my Instagram she thought as she worriedly stabbed a mushroom onto her fork. She confirmed that she wasn’t interested in men, and he took that as a confession that she was experimenting with her sexuality. No, she thought to herself. She attempted to recount her coming out story and clarify that she was not experimenting and was rather certain that she was not attracted to men, but it didn’t seem to soak in. She let it go hoping it registered to give her an extra “nothing will happen out of this” cushion.

Throughout the dinner, she noticed him make some slightly odd offhanded comments that she would only later realize was his way of testing her boundaries. For one, when she mentioned her age — 18 — it didn’t seem to change anything. He continued to talk to her as if she hadn’t mentioned it at all. At one point he mentioned, for whatever reason, that he was a homebody and that one of his favorite places to be was his bedroom. She found that to be extremely sexually loaded making her heart beat even faster. He also mentioned how mysterious he found her to be and confessed that he wanted to decode this fact of hers. Decode, she thought, I don’t think so. She dismissed the thought not knowing how well he already had.

He backtracked and told her how his parents thought that he would be gay. He clarified that he was very much straight, though he “sometimes enjoys the pleasure of anal sex.” (Another alarm bell, but she dismissed it because many straight men aren’t as open to that, so who was she to judge?). He explained to her that growing up he always seemed rather feminine to those around him — a judgment that she agreed with. Looking at him you could see this difference. He had long hair and seemed much softer than most men, and there was a part of her that found this intriguing.

When they left the restaurant he asked her what she wanted to do. Completely panicked and having forgotten about the possibility that he would have wanted to do something else after the meal, she didn’t know what to say. She didn’t want to be rude but at the same time she was slowly reaching her breaking point and wanted to go home. She lied and said that she had class early the next day and couldn’t go out dancing — one of the few proposals he had made. Hearing so many stories about date rape, she didn’t want to go somewhere where alcohol would be involved. Moreover, she definitely did not want to be in a space with him where she would have to dance in front of a stranger. He offered to take her to a lesbian bar in Le Marais if that made her feel more comfortable. It seemed like a kind gesture at the time but she would later learn that it was actually an attempt at making her feel safe with him which was something that could have costed her heavily.

They walked together to the metro station that served the line that she needed to go home. Before entering, he asked if she had her Navigo pass. She responded that she didn’t and was using the tickets instead since she only had a few more weeks left in Paris. He offered to let her use his so that she didn’t have to waste a ticket. She politely declined but acknowledged this kindness.

In the metro car, she sat down on one of the folding seats while he stood to hold the bar. Part of her hoped he wouldn’t sit down next to her, but he did. As he folded down the seat, he told her how adorable he found her to be and how he hoped that someday they would be able to see one another again. Oh my god, I hope he doesn’t want to kiss me she thought because she had never kissed another person in her life. As the car doors sprung open at her stop he brushed her side shave with his fingertips before leaning in and, to her surprise, rather than do what she had expected, he simply performed the double kiss that she had become accustomed to. Taken aback by this seemingly non-sexual attention she began to reconsider the pretenses she had made about him being solely interested in sex.

She bolted from the car and hurried to her connecting line feeling ashamed for ever thinking that he wanted to hurt her. She felt guilty for viewing him as a predator and assuming he had bad intentions when it was evident that all he wanted to do was have dinner, go dancing, and possibly reconnect in the future. Upset with herself, she couldn’t understand why her senses were on such high alert that night. She labeled it: an overreactive trauma response. Little did she know that this response was perfectly appropriate and had actually saved her from a lot of potential emotional pain.

V — Seduction

Feeling rather guilty for her behavior at the dinner, she messaged him to apologize. He reassured her that she had nothing to feel sorry for her and thanked her for having accepted his invitation.

And that was the beginning of what would be many long conversations between her and this stranger about many intimate aspects of her life: family, friends, school, sexuality, love, self-confidence issues, and many previously undisclosed desires.

Having gained her trust and decoded her so well he was finally prepared to make his move.

One night, after finally leaving Paris, she had a couple of glasses of wine at dinner with her family. Being Asian, under 5’3, and having brown eyes our young American is a complete lightweight meaning it only takes her about two glasses before the room starts to spin. Additionally, being girlfriend-less, she has the tendency to become quite lonely when she drinks.

Coincidentally, he messaged her later that night asking how she was doing. She told him she had some wine and that she was in her room because she now had a headache.

— “Oh,” he typed. “Well, now is the best time to say what’s on your mind.”

— “Isn’t it one of the worst because you aren’t conscious of what you are saying?” she messaged back.

— “Not at all. I think that you are conscious of what you are saying, but you don’t have a filter on,” he explained.

Their chat transformed into harmless flirtation but having known she had been drinking he exploited the opportunity to put his master plan to manipulate her into action.

Knowing her shyness he told her how intriguing he found her to be and he showered her with compliments and flattery because he knew how her insecurities swallowed her. He told her how much he thought about her knowing she couldn’t resist the feeling of being desired. Knowing her to be a person with few people in her life who tell her that she is loved and appreciated, he was more than obliged to assume that role. As a person who had never known love before, he offered to love her to no end. And she believed him.

Having been told about her history of sexual abuse, he had previously held off on expressing any sexual interest in her. But this evening, he admitted that he found her sexually attractive and that he actively fantasized about having a sexual relationship with her. Lesbian, she reminded him. And almost as if he knew that he had successfully been able to make her start questioning herself, he shared a story about a time that a lesbian slept with him.

— “It was at a pride event actually. There was a guy who was trying to flirt with me. I had to tell him I was straight and he must have thought that the girl next to me and I were together because he told me that my girlfriend was very lucky. The girl he had gestured to turned out to be a lesbian, but we exchanged numbers. I didn’t expect anything to happen out of that, but I guess she realized how different I was from other men because she told me that she had a sudden desire to sleep with me even though she was gay and had never had sex with a man before. And so I’ve been the only man that she has ever slept with.”

Rather than view it as the exploitation and fetishization of this woman for her sexuality, our girl accepted it. She had heard stories about lesbians falling in love with men or feeling sudden unexplainable desires for men before and had always viewed those stories with compassion. She began to wonder if this was what was happening for her; she wondered if she too was a lesbian finding herself falling for a man. Based on what she knew about him he seemed like the perfect guy if that was indeed the case. He was kind and considerate and until now, had never expressed sexual interest in her. Because of this she felt him to be very nonthreatening. And so she let him continue.

Knowing that she had never had sex before, he kept the fantasies that he shared rather G rated and vanilla. He focused on telling her how beautiful he found her and even said things about how he appreciated the parts of her body that, even though she never disclosed it, he knew she was insecure about. Additionally, almost as if he knew about her anxiety surrounding penetration, he never discussed that either. Rather, he kept his visions very external with a focus on placing her pleasure at the forefront. Though he did illustrate scenarios that depicted the acts that he wished she would perform, they were always painted in a way that was not dominating or objectifying. As a result, he knew that they wouldn’t scare her off.

Meanwhile, laying alone in her bed, she couldn’t quite understand what was happening to her. She was so certain that she had ruled out men, but here she was letting this man sweet-talk her until the sun began to rise. She felt a little guilty for not having rejected him due to her sexuality, but having been alone for so long she let the attention that he gave her fill that void in her, and being the first person to ever speak to her in that fashion, she almost didn’t mind that it was coming from a man. She checked the time, 4:30 am, before setting her phone down and closing her eyes.

VI — Realization

She was surfing Instagram when she noticed that his feed began to become more and more sexually explicit. Knowing him as a very sexually open person she didn’t find it surprising until she looked at the images more closely.

There were several posts containing photos and videos of very sexually explicit (but still censured) representations of various Asian women. For example, there were pictures that featured his hands grabbing or fondling the breasts or rear ends of these women. There were only ever two or three where one of their faces was shown.

One post, that she found to be particularly disturbing, was a point of view photograph of him penetrating one of these women from behind. She found herself becoming increasingly uncomfortable at the sight of such blatant female objectification and exploitation of Asian women that she felt compelled to check whether or not there were people in the comment section who felt the same way.

In the comment section, there were only two threads of the kind. They also happened to, conveniently, be the only two women and women of color in the comment section as well; one woman was French, Brazilian and the other was originally from Beijing but lived in Germany. These women both brought up the problems that they had with the images. They explained how, whether or not it was his intention, the images objectified the female body and perpetuated the idea that Asian women are submissive or “easy to get.”

Rather than engage in the comments, she reached out to these women through Instagram messaging and briefly explained how she had read their comments on the post belonging to X person’s account followed by her agreement with the points they each had made. To her delight, both women responded positively and asked her how she knew his account. She responded with the cafe story and returned the question. To her shock and what would later be great frustration and pain, both of these women also had a similar story to hers.

The Brazilian girl recounted how she had met him at a vacation resort where he worked a couple of years ago. Being young, she would go out often and that was where she exchanged Instagram contacts with him. She continued saying that, as a result of his Asian fetish, nothing happened between the two of them, however, she had some friends over there who were all minors at the time all have something to say about him. For example, assuring that nothing happened, she shared how he had told one of these girls that he would patiently wait for her 18th birthday. At that, our girl’s internal alarm system went off. Having been 18 when she met him, she wondered if that had anything to do with his “attraction to her.”

The other woman from Germany had responded a day later and, to neither of their surprise, the element of this other woman’s Asian heritage added several complicated layers to both of their stories.

The woman revealed how she had gotten to know the man, that now all three of them seemed to be having issues with, through Tinder when he traveled in Beijing. When she had told him that she was moving to Germany he expressed a desire to travel there and stay with her. Immediately, another alarm went off in our girl’s head as she recounted the moment back in the Parisian metro car when he told her that he wanted to visit her in the US someday.

The woman continued, recounting how once she had informed our server that she had a boyfriend, he lost his temper and sent her a long text denouncing monogamy.

— “Probably was hoping he could get me to have casual sex with him and when I declined he lashed out,” she typed with a guessing face emoji. “And you notice that he exclusively has sex with Asian women, right? I mean, it’s not a problem to have preferences, but it’s so obvious. Thank God I wasn’t one of them. Could you imagine if that was one of us that he posted?”

And it was at this that our girl began to break.

With both of these stories now in her hands, she realized just how much he had manipulated her. She now had two other women, as well as numerous Instagram posts, confirming the fact that he had the tendency to engage in casual sex with exclusively Asian women. Not only that, but he objectified their bodies and exploited their image for others to view and salivate over on his Instagram. Asian fetish. Sexual exploitation. Predator. These ideas endlessly circled in her head staining every encounter she had had with him.

All the kindness that he had shown her at the cafe was just a tactic to make her believe that he was actually interested in her for characteristics other than the sex she could give him. Looking back, she could see how the dinner was simply a scheme to see just how far he could push her. The awkward times he mentioned sex was his way of desensitizing her to the sexual advances he would later make. Once they had started messaging, he knew exactly what to say to her because he had said those things to so many other women and girls before. She no longer viewed his lesbian story as an anecdote about the complexities of sexual attraction and, rather, understood it as a manipulation tactic intended to normalize what he knew our girl would eventually feel. He learned the universal insecurities that women struggle with and he studied the sexual trauma response. All of the compliments he paid her were simply empty words he utilized as a part of a much larger plot. A plot to seduce, use, and discard her all without her knowing.

He played the nice guy card so well, and they all knew it. Each of these women had believed that they had finally found someone who was different from the rest only to realize that he was much more sinister.

This was the first time that she had closely examined the story in its entirety and she discovered how easy it was for her to trace and identify each precise incident of manipulation from beginning to end. No matter how hard she thought about it, she could never figure out why it seems that people only best understand a situation or event only after it has happened.

VII — Guilt

Realizing how similar she was to the other women that he had targeted, she couldn’t help but feel victimized. Singled out for nothing more than her gender, age, and ethnicity she felt as though her existence as an individual in the world was worthless. She felt as though her only distinguishing characteristics were these three almost meaningless details; it didn’t matter who she was or the things she cared about. She even wondered if he would have even decided to speak to her that day first she entered the cafe had she been of a different racial background

Her stomach turned at the realization that he made her believe that he loved her; that she was special in his eyes. And worse, she felt guilty for letting him in. How could she have been so blind? With her history with sexual abuse, she thought that she would have had a keenness for identifying this type of behavior. In an instant, she began to doubt herself and distrust others. If he managed to get so far deep into her head without her knowing, how could she protect herself? How could she trust that she could keep herself safe?

Her therapist had nothing to offer but compassion and empathy.

— “I’m really sorry that this happened. It sucks that these things happen and I need you to know that you did absolutely nothing wrong. There was nothing that you said or did to ask for or invite this into your life. He is a predator, and I need you to understand that he is really good at what he does. It sounds like he got in there pretty good and I’m really sorry about that. And I need you to be gentle with yourself. Emotional manipulation is complicated and it isn’t easy. It’s going to take time to process this.”

As I typed this story feeling the plastic keys against my fingertips, I’ve come to the conclusion that there isn’t a singular decisive factor to describe this “blinders” phenomenon. There is a multitude of factors ranging from large scale societal influences to more individual and personal impacts, and the object of this narrative is not to answer or explain such a complex question, but instead, reveal just how common this occurrence is as well as try to normalize any emotional distress that targets tend to feel in the aftermath of an incident of emotional manipulation.

If you find or have found yourself in a similar situation, it is important to treat yourself with compassion and view the incident as a projection of the predator’s personality rather than a reflection of your worth or judgment of your character. Emotional manipulation is not something that you can control, it is not something that you invite into your life, and it is never easy to process. You should never suffer from the guilt of believing that any part of what transpired was your fault.