Kai never needed a masculinity coach. Was the kind of man who turned his ideas into dogma and believed the world should bow down to his logic as if it were an altar. His notion of virility was a rigid and absolute private religion built on three pillars: strength, authority, and violence. Everything else was weakness. To him, masculinity was the fire that tempered the steel of order, and order had to have a man's face.

In his imagination, women were nothing more than an extension of male power, accessories that served to exalt it, not contradict it. After all, Eve was born from Adam's rib, a lower part that relegated her to a subordinate position in society. Their painful ability to give birth was, in his view, the only "mandatory" quality in a woman, akin to cooking.

He had never met a woman who accepted that creed without spitting it back at him. Until he saw your ad on internet. A woman offering counseling for men seeking partners with 'traditional values'. The idea seemed grotesque and almost comical to him. An obvious fraud. He paid out of curiosity, convinced that nothing could be more amusing than a woman selling the illusion of her own submission.

On the day of the video call he appeared with his usual arrogance: beer in hand, crooked smile expecting to find something to mock, but he found something more disconcerting instead. Your eyes did not challenge him. They watched him calmly as if his every word deserved no judgment. Your slow voice and silent responses seemed to imply approval or something even more dangerous: understanding.

During that first session, he spoke without pausing for breath. He repeated slogans he had learned, recycled phrases from forums, and presented theories as his own thoughts. You didn't correct him once. You let him talk until he ran out of steam and silence enveloped him. For the first time, Kai didn't know if he had won or lost the conversation.

Meanwhile, you understood the value of that silence. You didn't agree with a word he said, but you knew how it worked. Men needed to feel heard so they wouldn't have to face themselves. The male ego was as prosperous a market as guilt. The business was simple: turn validation into currency.

Kai fell without realizing it. What started as a game became a habit. He started asking for more sessions, more time, and more attention. Sent you articles, speeches, and fragments of his thoughts, as if seeking confirmation.

Fascinated by how serenely you listened to him and by the respect he believed he saw in your silence, Kai didn't ask for tips and rejected it when you offered. It wasn't what he needed.

Ten sessions later, the content had changed. He no longer talked about "traditional values," but rather, about himself. He told you about his authoritarian father, his mother who barely spoke, and his childhood marked by the fear of appearing weak. He omitted only the rotting corpses he had hidden in his parents' bedroom. Confessed that he had toughened himself up through beatings and that anger was the only constant in his life. Sometimes his voice trembled without him noticing.

Kai also talked about the country too, typical, politics, his plans, his devotion to Trump, and how much that campaign would support him in the future. His damn hatred with feminism and what he called 'the moral decline of the West.' But deep down, every word was just another brick holding up the structure that kept him standing. You understood that. You didn't justify it, but you understood it. Behind the rhetoric, there was fear; behind the fear, there was immense loneliness.

In another session similar to the others his speech took a different turn, first nonsense about the 'modern women', but then, it broke.

"I was wondering if we could meet. You know, you're cool, I could pay you double if you did."

Every curl of your hair in pixels and hearing your voice through a speaker was no longer enough. So ironic, almost tragic. The man who despised women was unknowingly begging for the approval of one.