Here’s a rather mind-blowing story. It’s told by Jay Roberts, an ex-Marine who remembers a “magic afternoon” spent in his Corps days, in the company of a kindly gay man who struck up a conversation with him on the beach, and invited him back to his hotel room to talk. The man propositioned Roberts, but the jarhead wasn’t interested in gay sex. He really enjoyed the conversation and companionship, though. Many years later, Roberts learned that this man, Randy Kraft, was perhaps the most prolific serial killer in US history, a man who would pick up Marines, drug them, torture, mutilate, rape, and then murder them.

To Roberts, who somehow escaped Kraft’s web, he was just a charming man who made Roberts feel loved for an afternoon. Excerpt:

As for that guy, I remembered him fondly. I always thought highly of him for being such stimulating company, and particularly so for being such a proper gentleman about the sex and all. I concluded it would have been a wonderful friendship if not for that pesky gay-straight complication.

At my keyboard, I recognized Randy Kraft immediately—the chin, the eyes, the eyebrows, the expressions. It would have been shocking to recognize an acquaintance as a serial killer under any circumstance, but recognizing Kraft as the guy I met on that long-ago afternoon took my breath away for days.

You blink. You look again. You look at other photos. You wonder if you’re being melodramatic, if your memory is faulty. You wonder if people will believe you, or simply think your imagination has run away with you. You wonder if there is a class of neurotic people who make up false accounts of run-ins with serial killers. You realize that to be true to your story and yourself, you can’t let what you are reading create false memories.

It took me days to accept this really happened. The only hint I got of any sociopathology would have been his remark that “You just have to get them away from their friends.”

What’s so disturbing — and so compelling — about this account is Roberts’s recollection of how captivating Kraft was. Roberts is not gay, and had no desire to have sex with Kraft (who, to look at him, was a troll), and was in fact the kind of guy who, as a Marine, was acculturated to freak out in the presence of gay men. But somehow, Kraft was different. He mesmerized Roberts, against Roberts’s better judgment.

What is it with people like this? From where do they get their power over others? Roberts says, “Everyone wants to believe they are special.” Maybe it’s as simple as that.