Tldr: I snooped and found out my straight, engaged friend [M26] has hundreds of photos of another male friend [M21] saved on his phone. I decided to warn my friend – he wasn’t aware of the photos but had noticed some other very creepy behaviour. Neither of us know what to do next.
I asked for advice on this before but the situation has changed quite a lot and got even creepier. Any advice would be gratefully received. I’m going to try to keep this brief – if anything doesn’t make sense let me know.
I’m F23, my issue relates to two of my friends, I’m going to use fake names to hopefully make it less confusing. Adam [M26] is straight and has a long-term partner he recently got engaged to. Ben [M21] is gay which I’m not sure is relevant. I never noticed any weird vibes between them, they aren’t the closest in the group but they seem to get along fine and I never sensed any awkwardness.
I was recently at a party where everyone was drinking quite heavily. Both guys were there, Ben left early. After he left I saw Adam very focused on his phone, I saw him scrolling through an album which appeared to be exclusively pictures of Ben. I snooped (I know) and saw literally hundreds of pictures, a few were saved from social media and cropped but there were also photos that looked like they’d been taken without Ben noticing. There were a couple of him asleep (looked like he’d passed out at a house party or something).
I could’t think of any innocent reason why Adam would have a separate album with hundreds of photos of Ben. To be honest Ben is an extremely good-looking boy but (a) Adam is (allegedly) straight, (b) he’s in a relationship and (c) this is creepy behaviour regardless!
After some consideration I decided to speak to Ben. He was not aware of the photos and he was understandably very freaked out. However he told me there have been several incidents with Adam that made him very uncomfortable when both were drunk and had crashed at the same place (usually Adam’s as he quite often hosts). Apparently he has come into the room when he thought Ben was asleep, sometimes touched him (hair and face, not anywhere else but obviously it’s still inappropriate) and creepiest of all he once seemed to be touching himself. Ben said he pretended to still be asleep because he didn’t know how else to deal with it especially when he’s been at Adam’s house. With the last example he moved around as if he was “waking up” so Adam would think he was going to get caught and go away.
Ben hasn’t felt able to tell anyone because he’s scared of causing conflict and didn’t think anyone would believe him. Ben has not known the others in the group as long as Adam has and he has mental health problems which he thinks will make him seem less reliable. He says Adam has said a few inappropriate things when he’s been extremely drunk but mainly he acts like everything’s normal which made Ben question whether he was imagining things (imo the photos suggest that he definitely isn’t imagining it). He’s been avoiding being alone with Adam and has started leaving early every time we hang out, which I have noticed but didn’t realise why.
He says that aside from avoiding Adam he’s not sure what he wants to do or if he wants to say anything which I understand. Hopefully I’ve made it clear that I’ll support him regardless but I have absolutely no idea what to advise him. I would not expect Adam to respond at all well to being confronted and to be honest I’m concerned his fiancée is likely to be quite defensive too.
7 comments
No-win situation as is. You confront, he denies, he deletes the album. Avoid him as much as possible.
Tell the fiance what you saw. And how they could find it on his phone. After she does that, tell her that you have more to share about it, but to wait until she believes you first.
It’s up to her to decide if she wishes to do anything with that information. I’d bet that you get 0 response and at that point you’ve done your due diligence.
Not hanging out with the creep after this point seems advisable.
Are there any reasons that you two can’t cut both members of the couple out of your lives entirely right now? Because that would be the shortest distance between two points – Ben no longer has to worry about what Adam does, Adam’s fiancee can tell herself whatever she wants to hear, and no one has to have any kind of confrontation. Whether Adam finds another person to fetishize or not will never be your concern.
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It’s not helping anyone at all – not the fiancee, not Adam, nor anyone else he fixates on in the future, but no one is obligated to put themselves through drama to help others.
Why in the world are you snooping on your friend’s phone? this is next-level bad friendship and you are way overinvolved in the life of your friends.
Does Ben want to confront Adam? I think you should put Ben’s feelings first before anything else. Don’t go creating drama where it’s not necessary especially if it is likely to blow back on Ben. If Ben wants to confront him maybe offer to go with him or just be there to support him emotionally. I would definitely stop hanging out with Adam he sounds like a complete pervert. Ask Ben how he wants to proceed and be a good friend to him. Telling Adam’s girlfriend seems beyond your role here imho and more of a headache for you in the long run.
Edit: spelling
I’d advise him to speak up honestly and have you back him up. I feel like if you tell adams fiance she’ll likely be in extreme denial because he’s “straight” and engaged to her why would he possibly behave creepily towards ben. But it’s a no win situation honestly, regardless the friend group will be fractured somehow, or ben will be shunned and alone. Ben should keep doing what he’s doing by avoiding being alone with Adam and obviously record any phone conversations/texts etc.
First up you and Ben should talk to his fiance without Adam.
Tell her than Adam has an album of photos of Ben on his phone, Ben has not given any of these to Adam and he wants them deleted. That Adam’s behaviour around Ben is “off”.
Ask her is she can please have a look at Adam’s phone (quietly) and remove the photos.
Ben should also block Adam everywhere, but maybe wait until F23 has had a look at the phone.
Tell her that she has a right to know and that you are bringing this up publicly now, because she has a right to know first.