“You’ve gotta meet this guy, he’s so cool!”
Sometimes, you get a feeling about someone who everyone else thinks is cool. It’s in your gut. Sometimes, you try to suppress it, and maybe it goes away. Sometimes, you’re left thinking, “I knew it all along.”
Thanks to everyone who contributed. If you would like to read more stories like these, be sure to check out the source link at the end of this article. Comments have been edited for clarity.
Not a person but a dog. Years ago, I had a girlfriend who lived at home with her sister, parents, 3 dogs and a cat. One of the dogs was a big goofy lab that loved everyone, I mean everyone. Two-year-olds could climb all over him and he loved it. Anyway, the sister had been seeing some guy for a little while, maybe a month and she’s bringing him home to meet the family for the first time. The guy hadn’t even come to the door yet. The dog was in the house and went ballistic. I had never seen anything like it. He went from goofball to apex predator. Needless to say, he couldn’t come in the house. They had to leave. About two weeks later the sister comes home, he had slapped her and she ended it. She also found out that he beat his ex wife before her.
porkpie1028
My parents had this family friend when I was around 15-16. Friendly, funny guy who gave me the absolute creeps. I didn’t want to be alone in a room with him, he made my stomach turn.
Anyway, about five years after I moved out of home, he wound up in court, convicted of three (very historic — back in the 80s) cases of indecent assault of young girls.
Sometimes our guts really know what’s up.
signorapaesior
My sister’s boyfriend. I just immediately found him to be very “fake” and disingenious. But the rest of the family loved him and found him very charming. He owned a running store franchise that was more successful than the original store and was also doing well trading on the stock market. He sold the store back to the owners for a ton on money to focus on the stock market, but this was around the time of the market crash. So, to help with that he worked at the store as a salesman. They eventually got married and bought a huge house.
And that’s when the cops came knocking at the door to their large home with a view. He wasn’t rich. He never owned the store. He was only ever a worker and had been stealing cash from the register/products and selling them on eBay. The divorce came quick after that.
saladada
I suppressed the feeling quickly and fast, because I felt like it was horribly ungracious, since she was being so friendly. Over the next couple years, she became my closest friend in the new town I had moved to. Then the following couple years it vacillated between being close, but just feeling like she really didn’t want me around or was messing with me a little bit. Turns out she was having an affair with my husband and was literally intentionally gaslighting me.
AllysWorld
The girlfriend and I used to work at the same ski hill, and the place was pretty much full of seasonal employees. Revolving door status. Anyways, she got this new dude in her department that everyone thought was a super nice guy. I did not trust him. There was just something about the way he talked to female employees that just seemed…weird. He was trying to gain their trust way too quickly. I made my sentiments known to my girlfriend and other friends and they thought I was just being jealous or something. I worked part time out of town at the time, and he’d aways ask me what days I was gone, it was weird. He also didn’t have a car, so sometimes my girlfriend would give him a ride home and he’d ask her to hang out at our place when I was out of town. She declined. So, at the end of the season, a female friend of ours and this kid decide to rent a place together, (they weren’t dating), and as they’re in the final steps, Federal Marshalls show up and arrest him. Turns out he had been on the run for over a year for kidnapping and assaulting a girl in a different part of the country. His family had been helping him, and he took the name of his brother while on the run. Filling out the housing application somehow tipped off the marshalls. Trust your instincts.
hyphen8892
When I was a boy (7-8), at a coffee shop I would go to with my parents frequently there would often be a middle-aged woman hanging out. She was a regular, the baristas knew her, my parents were friendly with her. Sometimes I would play board games with my parents and her.
She gave me the creeps, but I couldn’t pinpoint why. My parents knew I didn’t like her much, but not the full extent.
Anyway, the very first time I was with her without my parents there, (they were starting the car or something like that), she tried to get me to come back to her house. She wouldn’t take no for an answer and got pushy. When my parents came back I told them what happened and we never went there again.
BulbaBooty
My former handball coach: Everybody liked him, but I had a weird feel about him; After training he would come into our showers and give out shower caps for us to use, or in the winter, he would bring us snow to play. A few years later, he got arrested for assault, when he went to a training camp with younger girls. Apparently he got into their tents and “played” with them.
aphelii0n
My mom was a single mom and did the best she could. However, she thought it might be better to leave me with the neighbor than at home alone. From the age of 6, I pleaded with my mom to let me stay home alone until she got home from work, that I would be ok. My intuition was right. The neighbor was convicted of multiple murders of single moms one and two towns over, when DNA evidence came into being. He only liked to date and kill small women. Fortunately, my mother was large.
seagullhunter
When I first met my birth mother’s uncle I was instantly creeped out by him. He’s in his 40’s in a band, has heaps of friends everywhere he goes and gets on well with everyone. But I just had a horrible gut feeling and didn’t trust him. He’s a really touchy feely guy and he would try and kiss us on the lips and passed it off as just being family. Turns out, he touched my birth mum inappropriately when she was a child. My mother let us, as children, hang out with him. I’m so glad I was in long term foster care. But I really wish I wasn’t allowed contact with my birth family, they are truly the definition of messed up.
cassiejessie
A pastor who was involved in the community outreach program for a prison, (which I volunteered to for the first time), seemed very friendly on the outside, but seems really creepy to me… he kept putting his hands on my shoulder on that day, and got my number from one of the volunteers. He called me nonstop that night to say he is lonely and wants to talk… I was 14 at the time..
tashietashiechan
One of my brothers was dating this girl, and everyone else had met her several times before I did, since I was off at college. So the first impression I get of her is when she shows up at our house and just walks right in. Doesn’t knock, doesn’t let anyone know she’s in there. Just walks her happy self inside and sits on the couch. So then, when I come down the hallway into the living room, she had this super vapid smile on her face. I just had this weird gut instinct that she was hiding something from everyone and was going to fight to the death to keep it hidden. I expressed to my mom that she gave me a weird vibe and I got told to stop being jealous. But long story shorter, she ended up having an entire other relationship and life with another guy, three hours away.
NC_DE336
Some girl started talking to me on the bus ride home. I thought there was something off about her, but my parents, who are inherently optimists, told me to be nice and hang out with her. They even invited her over for dinner a few times. She lived about a 4 minute walk away from me, so it was hard to come up with excuses not to hangout.
Turns out she was having an affair with her foster father, and they plotted together to kill the mom, so that they could be together. They made sure to plan it during a time when the dad was out of town. The girl ends up going through with it, and the family’s biological daughter is the one to call 911. They put the 911 tape up online and it was the worst thing I’ve ever listened to.
My stepdad. On the surface, he seemed like a good guy. He went to church twice on Sundays and once on Wednesday. He always helped out when someone needed help, whether it was something as simple as loaning 5 bucks, to something as complicated as roofing a house. He had a good paying job. He refused to smoke inside the house. When him and my mom went out on dates, he always made sure to bring home food for all of us, and toys for the younger kids. He would randomly take everyone out to dinner, or to the theater.
Despite all of that, I disliked him from the moment I met him; even before he showed interest in my mom. People told me I was being paranoid, not to worry about.
Fast foreword a year. Him and my mom are married, I just got a job and was waiting on my first paycheck to move out on my own. My manager gets a frantic call that I need to come home pronto.
My stepdad had been secretly spending all of our bill money on illegal substances; we were about to be evicted, the power had already been disconnected, water service was about to be, and stepdad tried to kill my pregnant mom. Later on during the restraining order court hearing, he threatened to cut the baby out of my mom’s stomach, and leave her and the fetus in an abandoned fridge in a field.
He was buying an inordinate amount of green, and sharing it among 10 to 15 people, daily. Not just enough to get high then, but enough to supply those guys and their girlfriends/wives.
mysterious_baker
A few years ago, when I was still in college, I took a summer job at a movie theater. I met a lot of really cool people there, including my partner. But there was this one guy who always gave me the creeps. We’ll call him Drew. He was friends with almost everyone, including my partner, and had been for years. We’d attend the same parties and he’d do all these little things that would feel like red flags to be, but apparently not to anyone else.
Fast forward about a year. I no longer work there, my partner and I have been together for maybe a year, and he has been promoted to manager. Drew has also been promoted to supervisor. It should be noted that there were a lot of teenagers employed at this theater. One day, two of the younger girls come into the office, (if they were 18, they were only just), to talk to my partner. They tell him they’re sorry, because they know my partner is friends with Drew, but they have to tell him something. The younger one tells him that a few weeks prior, she was sitting alone in the break room, eating her lunch. Drew walks in and says to her, “Do you touch yourself?” She doesn’t answer. He says, “Because if not, you should.” I think he said more, but my partner was so furious when he told me that story that he was having trouble telling it.
My partner fills out the report for the poor girl and passes it onto the GM, who then informs him that Drew had five counts of harrassment on his file already. But corporate loved him. So they could never fire him.
My partner never spoke to Drew again. Last I heard, he was fired removed from his job at a brewery by security for harrassment. Many of our other friends are still very close with him. I don’t understand it, but I’m just thrilled to have that creep out of my life.
KitchenSwillForPigs
My stepfather. He’s my Mom’s third husband. Mom met him at a bar, (a country bar she used to go dancing at), and saw him there for a while before deciding to introduce him to her kids. He took us all out to dinner that night and we had a relatively good time. Then we all went back to the house.
We weren’t home long before I heard him and my mom giggling in the hallway and suddenly I just felt sick. I was about 12 at the time. I’m not sure what it was, but suddenly I just hated this guy. My mom asked what was wrong and I just said I didn’t feel good and went to my room.
Imagine the surprise of all of us kids when we woke up to see that this guy was still there. He moved in that very night. I tried to make the best of a bad situation though I avoided him for some time. No more than a week later he offers to brush my hair for me. We’re all in the living room watching TV. I’m hesitant at first but my mom encourages me. Apparently he had sisters and knew how to brush girl’s hair. I kept my hair about waist length back then and it was hard to get the knots out so I caved and let him brush my hair.
He just brushed it, no big deal. So when he offered other times I let him. Then one day he offered while no one was there. Because my hair was so long, why don’t I sit up on the edge of the chair in front of him? Oh, hey, would you like a back rub? I rub your mom’s back all the time.
I should mention this wasn’t my first interaction with a perv and I actually was very bothered, just by being that close to someone. I hated being touched back then, but because everyone obviously liked this guy I told myself I shouldn’t cause any problems.
Next thing I know he says, “Can I rub down a little further? In front? It’s your decision, you’re completely in charge here.”
Thank Goodness I had the courage to say no. I avoided him for AGES after that and didn’t have to sense to tell my mom or my brothers. This guy proceeds to find ways to get both of my older brothers out of the house by the time I’m 15. He goes long periods of time seeming to be a perfectly good guy and then out of nowhere hits me with something pervy and horrid. Sophomore year comes up and we get our class rings. Well, these things are not cheap and we’ve always been fairly poor. My mom says I have to ask him for the money. I ask him to buy my class ring and he says, “What’s in it for me?” I go silent. My mom is RIGHT THERE. She innocently says, “She can bake you a cake.” I’m good at baking. He’s quiet for a while and has to think it through. Then he says, “Okay, but there are rules.” I forget what all of the rules were, stupid stuff mostly, but his final rule was, “If you lose this ring you get naked.”
…..
“What?”
“This is an expensive ring. It’s a lot of money so you better not lose it or you get naked for me.”
My mom tells him to stop, but only halfheartedly. When I try to talk to her about it later she says, “Well, I guess you better not lose it.”
At that point I kinda figured I couldn’t count on my Mom for help. Over the years I’ve learned she was messed with a lot when she was younger and has convinced herself that all men are this way. I love my mom to death, but it kills me that she believes this.
He’s never stopped being a horrible person. I lived with them until I was 20. I was very shy, and having a job was very hard for me. I tried moving in with my oldest brother to help him take care of his kid, but after three months I was asking to come home and once again got the “what’s in it for me” response. I got to hear all about how he’d lived the past few years just for me and mom. Bought us a house and everything and how ungrateful I was. I came back to what was essentially a prison. I had my nephew with me at first, as my brother was going to give my Mom custody of him. That is, until my stepdad got mad at him and kicked him hard. A three year old little boy who hadn’t done anything more than annoy him, probably by making noise. So mom calls up my brother and tells him to come get him because she’s afraid to have him around my stepfather. Then, once he’s gone she convinces herself that he never did that.
Finally, I met my first boyfriend. By this time I’m 20. I had gotten two part time jobs and he worked at one of them. I was hanging out at his house a lot and my stepdad got jealous. He decided to give me a curfew of midnight and said if I break it then I’m out of the house and can’t ever come back unless I sleep with him.
I cried to my boyfriend and he told me I could come live with him. This was after we’d only been seeing each other for about three weeks. That night I didn’t go home. My stepfather called me and screamed, called me a “stupid little [expletive],” and I screamed back and told him how he made my life a living craphole. An hour later, he and mom pull up with his truck full of all of my stuff that he could put in it. He took my car, because it was Mom’s, and dumped my stuff right there, telling my boyfriend I was his problem now. I will never forget the smirk on my Mom’s face when she hugged me and I apologized for everything. She said she wasn’t mad at me at all, but was proud.
Apparently I’d had the guts to do what she couldn’t. Of course, not long after I left he finally proposed to her and they got married. It’s screwed up to realize that the reason your stepfather didn’t marry your mom is because he wanted a shot at you first.
Everyone who meets this guy LOVES him. They do not know who he is. Just that he’s personable and relatively smart. But I never forget that first night when, for no apparent reason, I just felt sick at the thought of him.
craycatlady42
While in the Army, we moved into a new house in upstate New York. We were being neighborly and talked to a guy across the street. He had 5 kids. No wife. He also had multiple neighborhood kids playing in the yard. He told us we can always send ours over. He gave us both this horrible feeling so we smiled and got out of there. About a year later, my wife told me, (I was in Kandahar), that his kids were taken from him. He had been assaulting them ever since his wife died.
i-need-burittos
Apparently, when I was 4 or 5, my grandma introduced me to some new boyfriend. Everyone liked him, but I would have nothing to do with him. Wrinkled my nose, wouldn’t be left alone with him.
I guess he just came into her apartment one day and walked at her with something behind his back, said nothing. She got an eerie feeling and said, “Are you going to kill me?” With a dead faced stare he came at her. She managed to jump over some furniture and get away, (she’s always been in great shape, running 3 miles a day until age 80). She got somewhere safe, called the police and never saw him again..
TurboVeggie
My mothers cousin is a vet out in a rural area. This dude makes bank and is a really super nice guy. He was very close with his elderly mom and dad. Sadly, his first wife lost a ton of weight and then felt that she was out of his league and left him.
A few years later, he shows up to my mom’s house with this Sophia Loren type…way outta his league.
She was all sweet and sugar pie to everyone. I forgot what I did to tick her off, but it was an accident. She broke character for just a second…and let Cruella DaVille show through. I was a kid, and she grabbed my arm and looked at me like she would kill me. Everyone said I was imagining it, that I was jealous, that looks aren’t everything, and that she loves him. Like I was trying to sabotage his relationship. Yeah right.
Flash forward 2 years…she kicked his parents out of the house they were in for 50 years, sold their home against their will, stole all their money, forced him to choose between them and her, and sadly, he chose her. She drained him, tore apart his family and ruined the last year of his fathers life, he died scared and miserable. Told his mother, “Just give me the money, you won’t live long enough to use it.” It broke her heart that her son just stood there.
Pantarus
Ex-wife’s second husband. It took 10 years but I was right. He is currently on year 1 of a 32 year sentence for repeated assault of his daughter.
Fycngduh