Single mom living in LA meets Ace.
- There's something different about him.
He's like, "I'm ready to be a stepfather.
I want to have children."
So that's why I wanted to just see what's going on.
- Searching of the phone number.
- [gasps] Pacific Payphone?
- What? And there's a map.
- MacArthur Park. - Yeah.
We're actually not that far from there.
Here it is, okay.
- Ready for the stakeout.
- If anyone comes from there or there, we'll see them.
There's someone. This could be our guy.
[dramatic music]
I got up at 6:15
'cause I was supposed to have a Reiki session this morning.
And then my Reiki person overslept.
- That's very LA of you.
That's when they do, like, the...
- It's basically meditation, but they are there
apparently channeling energy in and around you.
- I could do that right now.
- Yeah, you wanna do some Reiki on me?
Oh, it works. All right, let's get to work.
- Let's go.
[upbeat music]
- All right, we're ready to go. Okay.
Email here from Tracii.
- With two I's. - Yep.
"Dear Nev and Kamie, my name is Tracii.
"I'm a single mom, splitting my time between LA and Vegas.
"I've been talking to a guy named Ace since May, 2020.
Ace is ten years younger than me."
- ♪ I want you so badly ♪
- "And he lives in Miami, Atlanta, and Dallas."
Hold on a second.
So let's just take a walk over to the map here.
- The hotspot.
- So he lives in Miami, Dallas, and Atlanta.
He literally lives in the three top catfish cities.
- Yeah, if he would've added Michigan, it would have been--
- Or states, right, the only thing he's missing is Michigan.
- Yeah, God. - Unbelievable.
"We met when he sent me a friend request.
"I saw we had a mutual friend,
"so I figured it was okay to respond.
He's really cute and charming."
- ♪ You got me losing sleep ♪
- "We share the same interests, and are both hard workers,
"and he makes me laugh.
"As a single mom, dating isn't easy.
"But Ace was quick to let me know
that my kids did not scare him off."
♪ ♪
"Hearing a man say that, has meant the world to me."
- ♪ Off my mind ♪
- "We talked a lot at first, just through Messenger.
"And then he asked for my number,
"and we started talking on the phone almost every night.
We still haven't videochatted because he travels a lot."
- The phone travels, too, by the way.
- Yeah.
"There are a few numbers he calls me from,
"but lately, it's been the same number,
"and we talk every night after work.
"I did ask him why his numbers change so much.
"He said I was paranoid and just brushed it off,
"saying that it doesn't matter where he's calling me from,
just that he's calling."
- I just don't like the gaslighting
- "Things are feeling good with him,
"and he's invited me to Miami to meet him next month.
"I'm excited, but also a bit nervous
because I've never done anything like this before."
♪ ♪
"I hope you guys can help me figure out
"if this is a good idea or a dead end.
Thanks so much, Tracii."
You're gonna go to Miami
before you just jump on a [bleep]ing FaceTime?
- No. Tracii, seems a little naive.
- Let's text her.
- "Hey, Tracii It's Nev and Kamie.
- "Can you jump on a Zoom?"
- "Oh wow hi how are you guys?"
- All right, well, I think
we can tell her with pretty high confidence.
It's not a good idea.
- It's definitely not a good idea.
Hey. - Hi.
- How are you?
- I'm great. I'm doing good.
- You look gorgeous.
- Thank you so much.
- Are you in Los Angeles?
but I'm currently in Las Vegas just visiting my mom right now.
I just kind of go back and forth.
- What do you do?
- I am a model, aspiring singer,
I'm a student, and then single mother.
I wear many hats.
- Yeah. - Yeah.
- That's a full-time job on school.
- You're a beautiful woman. You live in Los Angeles.
You're single.
How is this hap--what is going on, guys?
- I always attract the wrong type of man, always.
So that's why this guy, Ace, is so different.
- Go through the timeline of when you met Ace,
the entire scenario.
- So we started talking in May of last year.
He said that he just saw my picture.
He thought I was beautiful.
He started sending me messages, and it was just always,
you know, "Hello, beautiful, good morning.
I hope you have a blessed day."
It was so different from, you know,
"Hey, girl send me, you know, a picture of you."
You know, just some guys are just so vulgar.
And so we talked for a few months, like every day.
He's also a model.
So we talk about, you know, the business a lot.
That's another thing that's a plus
because we share the same interest.
you know, we understand how it goes and how it works.
- So he says he lives in Miami, Atlanta, and Dallas.
- He travels between those three places
but mostly lives in Texas.
- You said you have a mutual friend?
- Yeah. My cousin's name is Frank.
So I asked my cousin if he knew him personally,
and he said, "No, just from Facebook."
- Okay. - Okay.
- This is a 26-year-old model. Obviously he's on his phone.
How can he not FaceTime?
- It's always, like, the lamest excuses.
He'll just say like, "Oh, my phone's tripping.
I'm in an area where you can't really hear me."
- Okay, Tracii.
But the changing phone numbers, that's strange.
You can acknowledge that.
- It is. Yeah, it is.
- And yet you're still engaging with this guy
and getting deeper and deeper into this relationship.
- Yeah, I don't know.
It's just like with Ace,
he kind of caught me, you know, like at a vulnerable time,
I was just getting out of a really bad relationship,
and there was something different about him.
I felt like I can talk to him.
He doesn't judge me on my past versus my last relationship.
He encourages me.
He even talks to me about my kids.
He's like, "I'm ready to be a stepfather.
I want to have children."
He's just different.
You know, versus other guys, they've just been so immature.
- Do you guys say, "I love you"?
- I mean, I feel like sometimes he wants to say it,
but he hasn't said it, but he's calling me a lot.
He's calling me every day.
- So you guys talk on the phone a lot,
and you text him, right?
- He doesn't like to text.
He likes to talk. He'll call me.
- But has he ever texted you? - No.
He likes to send me messages from Facebook, or he'll call.
Those are his two, but mainly calling.
He loves to just call.
He's like, "I don't like to text."
"That's a lot, you know. I have so much to say to you.
I'd rather just say it than text."
- Weird, that's like the reverse of everybody ever.
- Right, all the catfish are always like,
"No, I can't call."
- Right. - "But like, I can text you."
Do you feel like his voice on the phone
matches the pictures that you're looking at?
- Yeah, it sounds like it matches.
He has like a nice, soft, kind of deep voice.
- All right, well,
I'love to see what this guy looks like.
- Okay. - All right, here we go.
Whoa, wow, okay.
Definitely not wearing underwear.
- He's definitely not wearing underwear there.
So I said, "Well, are you doing nude modeling?
I mean, if you are, you can let me know."
And he's like, "No, you know, I don't hide anything from you.
I'm not--if I was doing that, I would let you know."
- I'm gonna be honest,
he's giving me gay escort vibes.
- [gasps] - [laughs]
- Oh, my God.
- But he is cute.
- He's very handsome. - Let me ask you something.
You said you got out of a bad relationship
and that shortly after, Ace showed up.
- Mm-hmm.
- Is there a chance that maybe Ace could be your ex?
Have you ever considered
that maybe it could be someone you know?
- You've talked to Ace so many times on the phone,
I feel like, that you should recognize the voice.
- Exactly. - Yeah, yeah.
And what's going on with this trip to Miami?
- He wants me to come next month.
He said he'll fly me out.
He'll get a nice hotel room.
And, yeah, I'm supposed to go.
First, I have to see what's going on with this guy,
but he's worth checking out for sure.
- Obviously, you need to know more about this guy
before you hop on a plane.
- Definitely, yes.
Just see, you know, what's going on.
You know, I don't wanna be lied to.
- All right, so send us his Facebook,
send us the phone numbers, pictures that you have,
and let us do an investigation and see what we find.
- Thank you so much.
- Of course. - Tracii, we got your back.
- We will talk to you soon. - Bye.
- You know it's not his pictures.
It's not.
That guy is not gonna have an issue with getting on FaceTime.
- Right, the unfortunate reality is that Tracii doesn't
feel like she can meet good guys in person.
I'm just worried that if this doesn't work out for her,
it's gonna mean she's gonna stop looking for guys
altogether and basically just give up on dating.
I'm nervous about what we're gonna find.
- Okay, recap.
- Okay, we've got Tracii, single mom living in LA.
She's a model, meets Ace. He's very kind.
And he seems like he is great, except for the fact
that he changes his number all the time.
And they've yet to FaceTime, but she's planning
on meeting up with him in Miami next month.
And why we're even being brought in is for her to decide
whether or not she's actually gonna go forward with it.
Good recap?
- For sure. All right, let's dive in.
Should have an email here from Tracii.
There it is, oh. "Hey Nev and Kamie.
"Thank you so much for your help.
"Here's everything I know on Ace.
"His full name is Ace Davis.
"The pictures he sent me are attached.
There are more pictures on his Facebook page."
And she linked it.
"And he lives in Miami, Atlanta, and Dallas.
He's used a few numbers, a (424) number,
a (323) number, (213) number.
And so all the numbers he's had are California numbers.
"He mentioned calling me today around 4:00,
"so that's probably the next time we'll talk.
"Let me know if you need anything else.
"I'll be around today if you need me.
Thank you."
All right, so let's dive into this investigation.
Let me save these pictures. Okay.
Let's see what we can find.
[tense music]
Okay, so no hit there.
How about the flexing one on the terrace
by the ocean in the green briefs?
All right, how about this one? No match.
Is this even working?
Oh, yeah! We got a hit.
- Ooh! - We got a hit.
- Ace! - Whoa!
- No. - Wait a second.
- Ace Rockwood.
- What? Black guys on the [bleep].
- Does that mean, like, hard wieners?
- Ahh! It does mean hard wieners.
I put on my glasses at just the right moment.
- Holy moly.
So he's definitely a nude model.
- But he told Tracii-- - He wasn't.
- That he wasn't.
- But more importantly,
it looks like this guy's name is actually Ace.
Or his professional name is Ace Rockwood, sorry.
- His stage name. - Right, right.
- Oh, Rockwood.
- Oh. - Oh.
- Of course.
- It's all making sense now. - All right.
Well, so this one comes up on a bunch of different sites.
- Gay porn [bleep]. - Oh, yeah.
- Rockwood, gay model.
- Hold on. There's a Twitter.
- This is all, it's gay porn. This is a lot.
It's a lot of-- - This is a lot for me.
- [laughs]
There's a lot going on. - There's a video.
- Buenos días, amigos. Good morning, y'all.
- Well, this is good 'cause his voice is in it.
- Right.
- So on the off chance it could still be him.
Maybe his secret is that he's a gay porn star.
- Yeah, yeah.
There's a possibility that this Ace
is who Tracii's talking to, so--
- Right, because he did say his name was Ace.
- Right.
- Maybe he was like gay for pay and did porn,
gay porn, at one point,
but he's interested in women only, and like--
- Or maybe interested in both.
- Maybe interested in both and never brought it up to Tracii.
- It could be that they're the same person,
and he just gave her a different last name.
And she's actually talking to Ace Rockwood.
- Well, should we try to find--I feel like we need
to do better research to find who the real Ace Rockwood is.
- Let's go to Instagram. I wonder if Ace has a page.
Oh, yeah. Oh, [bleep].
- OfficialAceRockwood.
Here he's with a girl.
"If you love what we do, then it'll be very easy
for you to love the latest update, too."
So it looks like he does different types of porn.
- The Ace that Tracii's talking to told her
that he doesn't have other social media.
- Right, although,
maybe he told her that because he doesn't want her
to find out that he's a porn star.
- We don't know.
- But we could reach out to him.
Let me find his--all right. Let's send him a message.
"This is Nev from "Catfish,"
"and we're hoping you could chat with us quickly
"about an episode we're filming right now.
Let me know."
Okay, all right, so that now leaves us...
We've got three phone numbers to try.
Searching of the phone number.
- Oh, Sprint.
- Oh, it was a Sprint number.
All right, let's run a different number.
- T-Mobile.
- Another actual cell phone.
- We have a third number.
- Yeah, this is his newest number.
- Pacific Payphone? - What?
- That's the potential owner.
- Well, that's a first.
- But location is Los Angeles.
- And then the a map.
- MacArthur Park. - Yeah, that's Downtown LA.
We're actually not that far from there.
7th and Coronado. 7th, here it is, Coronado.
What is this right here? [bleep].
- There's a payphone. Isn't that a payphone?
- Yeah, but she calls him on that number, doesn't she?
- No, they talk on Messenger. He says, "I'm gonna call you."
- Right, she said, "He mentioned calling me
today around 4:00."
And this is his current phone number.
♪ ♪
- Do you wanna go and, like, stakeout the payphone?
- Yeah!
I mean, what an incredibly rare opportunity we have.
It comes up as that payphone.
It's in Downtown LA.
And if they're supposed to talk today in an hour,
we could just go and see if anyone comes to the phone.
- You've got that crazy look in your eye.
- This is crazy.
This is exciting. We're gonna catch this guy.
- Here we go. - All right.
- I feel like a vlogger.
[upbeat music]
- All right. This is a big deal.
We're heading to the specific payphone
that might be where our catfish is calling from.
- Stakeout time.
- Which seems insane that a catfish would use a payphone,
but maybe he's really trying to stay,
you know, kind of incognito.
I don't know. It's pretty wild.
- ♪ Easy come and easy go, I want it all ♪
- ♪ I want it, I want it ♪ - ♪ Oh, I want it all ♪
- It's just wild to me.
I mean, you have to fall on really hard times
to not have access to any kind of means
of calling someone other than a payphone.
- Right, or unless, like, you're really trying
to keep your location and your identity secret.
- I mean, that is--that's like spy [bleep].
And then they've been talking almost every night.
for hours sometimes.
- That's a long ass time to be standing outside.
But if he's in LA, what was his plan for this Miami trip?
Like, was he just gonna ghost again
and, like, do some weird [bleep]?
- Right.
- I wanna bust him, soon as he picks up the phone.
- Text Tracii and--just so she has a heads up.
- "Hey, Tracii.
Text us as soon as Ace calls you."
♪ ♪
She said, "Hey! Okay, I will."
- ♪ Make my head spin 'round, make my head spin ♪
♪ Turn me upside down ♪
- All right, we're very close. There it is.
Okay, all right. So I'm gonna turn here.
- ♪ Oh, I want it all ♪
It's exactly 4:02.
I don't see anyone on the phone.
All right, well, we're kind of just far enough away from it
that no one would look over here and suspect that we were--
- No, we look very inconspicuous.
- Yeah. - I got the binoculars.
- Where did you get those?
- Ready for the stakeout. Wrong way.
- All right.
So this is the liquor store, and that is the payphone
right there that we were looking at.
So if anyone comes from there or there, we will see them.
There is a guy walking down the street.
[tense music]
- Do we look suspicious?
- [indistinct]
There he is. There he is.
- He's looking to the left and right.
Put it down. You look like a narc.
- So there's this guy.
♪ ♪
- Nobody using that dusty ass payphone.
- And that guy standing there, is he getting on the phone?
♪ ♪
It's 4:12. Where is this guy?
- One thing about Ace, he's not punctual.
- He's not here yet.
I'm starting to get discouraged,
but she also hasn't texted us that they're on the phone yet.
So-- - Right.
- There is still a chance.
- He said around 4:00.
- Right. - He didn't say at 4:00.
- Right.
Watch this guy. He's walking over there?
♪ ♪
He is walking over to the phone.
This could be our guy.
Right to the payphone.
Is he gonna stop? He's gonna stop.
He's gonna stop.
No. [phone dings]
- [gasps] - Oh, is that her?
- He's on the phone now. - [Bleep].
He must be using a different payphone.
All right.
- Is he on another payphone?
Let's just cruise around the block a couple times
and see if we see someone on a payphone.
- Damn.
♪ ♪
I mean, truthfully,
to see anyone on a payphone in 2021 will be a rare sight.
♪ ♪
- No, that's the closest payphone.
- That's the payphone.
- Man, I really thought we'd caught this catfish,
and now I just feel like we're back to square one.
One way or another,
we are gonna catch this person.
- Yesterday was both thrilling and disappointing.
- Yeah.
- I really thought we were gonna catch him
like, picking up the phone, dialing that number.
Nothing.
- I mean, I'm just so curious how that number and the fact
that it comes up as a payphone at that location
is related in any way,
or if it's just completely random, strange nonsense.
♪ ♪
- I don't know, but I do know Tracii
is not going to be very happy when she finds out--
- About Ace Rockwood.
Did he message us back?
- I don't think so. So it says sent but not seen.
- Ready to break the news?
- You ready? You ready?
- You mean, am I ready to sleep on the couches behind you guys?
Absolutely.
- All right. Let's text our girl to join us.
We can show Tracii everything that we found.
- She's going to be...
[upbeat music]
Hey, Tracii.
- Hi. - Hello.
- I like this marigold.
- Oh, thank you.
- How are you?
- Oh, I'm just, like, anxious. I've been anxious all morning.
I couldn't get any sleep. [sighs]
- All right. Well, look did some research.
We actually had a pretty wild day yesterday.
- Okay.
- We definitely have some things we need to talk about.
- Okay. - So I'm gonna share my screen.
All right.
So when we searched all of the photos you had sent us...
- Mm-hmm.
- We did get a hit on one of them.
- Okay.
- This picture came back actually with a bunch of hits.
- [gasps]
- And one of them is this website.
- [gasps] Oh, my God.
- That's what I said.
- Wait a minute. [gasps]
Oh, my God!
- We then also noticed the name for the person in these photos
seems to be Ace Rockwood.
- No wonder I couldn't find him on Instagram
'cause it's a different last name.
- So after we saw that, we're like,
"Okay, well, let's look up Ace Rockwood."
- Oh, my God. - So we did.
And we found a video here where he's acting in gay porn.
- [gasps] No!
- But I want you to hear his voice
because it would be good to know if it matches.
- Oh, my God.
- Buenos días, amigos. Good morning, y'all.
- Does that voice sound familiar?
- Yeah, it sounds like his voice.
- Really? - Yeah.
- Interesting, so basically, we found the pictures,
we found the Ace Rockwood, and we messaged Ace
off of his Instagram page,
and we're waiting in the hopes that he gets back to us.
If it is him, if you are talking to Ace Rockwood,
and he somehow felt he should omit
much of the details of his professional career
and personal sort of sex life,
how would you feel about that?
- I would definitely not want to talk to him anymore.
I have no problem with that.
You know, it's not that.
It's just that,
I've been talking to this man all this time,
and he's never even mentioned--I've never
seen anything like that.
So it's like, what are you...
- This guy's hiding something.
That brings us to the phone numbers.
They came up as cell phones, like, actual cell phones.
- Mm-hmm.
- But what we immediately recognized
was that they're also Los Angeles phone numbers.
- Did you not ask him
why all of his numbers were LA phone numbers?
- I asked him that, and he's just like,
"Well, you know, eventually I do wanna come out there."
- Right.
- And he said that he has a lot
of friends and contacts in California.
So that was always it.
- Well, check this out.
The third number, which is his most recent number,
weirdly came back to a Pacific Payphone.
- What?
- Which is not something we've ever seen before.
- Yeah. - But it shows a location.
- Oh.
- And the location happens to be, like, Downtown LA.
- You told us that Ace
was gonna be calling you around 4:00.
- Yeah.
- It was around 3:00 when we searched the number
and found this payphone.
It isn't far from our office.
So we got in the car. We head Downtown,
We went to this payphone to do a little stakeout.
- And is that when I text you guys
and said he was on the line?
- Right, 'cause we thought maybe some guy
is gonna walk up to that phone.
- Yeah.
- And you're gonna text us and say,
"He's talking to me now," and we're gonna know who it is.
- Yeah. - But no one ever came.
You got on the phone with Ace.
We were sitting there, and there was no one on that phone.
- Oh, wow, oh.
- What number did he call you from?
- He called me from a private number.
So I don't know, maybe he's using...
[phone dings]
- Who's that? - Ace.
Ace is just writing me back on Instagram.
- Oh, my God. What did he say?
- He said, "Hey, yes, I'm available.
What do you need?"
- Oh, my God. Oh, my God.
- "Would love to get you on a Zoom."
- I mean, could it have been Ace this whole time?
- Oh, [bleep], I'm nervous.
[tense music]
- Oh, he hearted it. Great.
All right. I'm sending him the link.
- Oh, my God.
[computer chimes] - Oh, wait a second.
Hey, all right. What's up man?
- Hey. - Hey, hey, hey, how you doing?
- We're good, we're good. - Hi.
- Nice to meet you. - Nice to meet you.
- Well, so Tracii's been talking to someone
for a little over a year now.
- Okay. - Whose name is Ace.
Who looks exactly like you. So I have to ask.
Are you in an online relationship with Tracii?
- No, oh, oh, no. I'm sorry, Tracii.
- Okay. - I'm sorry.
- I'm sure this is probably
not the first time you've heard of someone
making a fake profile of you.
- No, I have fake pages of me on Facebook,
and I've never had a Facebook.
- Oh, wow.
- Okay, all right, well, this was the answer we needed.
You are just you and also for you to clear your name
and make sure people know
A, you don't have a Facebook page.
- Never had one.
- So if you're talking to Ace Rockwood on Facebook...
- You're not. - You're not.
- Oh, my God.
- I'm sorry, Tracii, that you went through that.
That's so sad, but at least now you get the real thing.
- Thank you. I really appreciate that.
You're very handsome.
- Do you date women? - Yeah, yeah.
I've had a relationship with a woman before, more than one.
- Do you live in Florida?
- Yeah, yeah, I live in Florida.
- I just wanna know, okay, if it's not you, then who is it?
And why? Why did they pick me?
You know, out of--this is crazy.
We gotta find out who this guy is, or girl, or, oh, God.
- Whoever it is. - All right.
- Thanks, Ace. - Thank you, bye.
Nice meeting you. - Good luck.
- [sighs] Oh, my God.
- All right, so look,
we got some answers now at least.
It's not Ace Rockwood.
- I'm trying not to get mad, but it's just like, "Come on."
Like, who is this person? They're, like, wasting my time.
Like, why?
- ♪ Holding on so tight 'cause I'm afraid you might ♪
♪ Might slip away ♪
- There is nothing wrong with being mad
about your time being wasted for over a year
by a person who has lied to you about seemingly everything.
- Oh, my God.
Yeah, it's very disappointing.
Disappointing, like, come on.
This is embarrassing, too. You know what I mean?
Like, I don't understand why someone would wanna do this.
- ♪ Can't get this moment frozen ♪
♪ ♪
- I'm sorry. I didn't want to cry on camera.
♪ ♪
- ♪ So why don't we move in slow motion ♪
- Okay.
- This [bleep]ing sucks.
- Okay, I'm sorry, I'm sorry.
I didn't want to cry on camera. I look more stupid.
- No, it--there's nothing stupid
about putting yourself out there to meet someone.
What's stupid is somebody [bleep]ing conning you
that there's somebody anthat they're not.k
- Yeah.
- It's okay for you to be sad,
and it's okay for you to be angry,
but don't direct it towards yourself
as something you did wrong.
We're gonna put that energy where it belongs
in the hands of Ace, whoever the [bleep] this is.
- [laughs]
- Now having discovered that he's been misleading you,
is there a reason to continue forward
and find out who this guy you've been talking to is?
- I would like to find out, you know, who's doing it.
I was getting out of a bad relationship.
Whoever this person is came in,
and they helped me get out of that.
'Cause I really had a hard time.
I was really depressed.
You know, and now I'm just, like, nervous.
I'm like, who could this be?
This takes a lot. Why would they do all of this?
- Just feels a little, like, intentional.
- That's what makes it scary.
- So I say we reel this catfish in,
and let them explain themselves.
Give them an opportunity
to finally come out from behind the mask.
[tense music]
- Oh, God.
- So I can message him or try calling him,
but it's a payphone.
All right. Well, I'm gonna call him.
Let me make sure I have the right number.
All right. Let's see what happens.
- Goodness. - Oh, boy.
[line trilling]
[piercing beep]
- A fax machine?
- It's a payphone!
- Why can't you call a payphone?
I mean, maybe you have to pick it up right away.
Maybe you can't call Ipayphones anymore,w.
but I'm basing my knowledge on payphones from "Die Hard."
- Right, 'cause in the movies, you're walking by,
it rings, you say, "Hello?"
It be like, "You got five minutes."
- Right. - "Meet me in the park."
- We can't text him.
So I'm gonna just send him a message on Facebook.
- Oh, wow.
- "Hey Ace. This is Nev from 'Catfish.'"
All right. I think that's pretty good.
- He gonna have to get to that phone.
- Oh, my God.
- Well, let's see if he sees it.
Is he usually pretty quick with his Facebook Messenger?
- Yeah, he's usually pretty quick.
[phone rings] - Oh, that's the number.
He's calling from it. - The payphone.
- Oh, it's the payphone. - Okay.
Hello?
- Yeah, hey, this is Ace?
- Hey, man, how you doing?
- Good, good, do you know about the show "Catfish?"
- Okay, cool.
We're working on an episode now with a lady
who I think you've been talking to named Tracii.
And we were just hoping we could get you guys
to meet up, even virtually, face-to-face.
We're in a Zoom, and just full disclosure,
I wanna be honest with you.
that the pictures that you had sent her are not actually you.
- All right, so I'll send you that link,
and we'll--I look forward to speaking with you.
Thanks.
He definitely was outside.
- First of all, that is the first time in years
that I've actually heard the phone be hung up.
- Right, that's true. - I heard it, too.
- That's true, it clicked. - It was a cl-clunk.
- All right. Well, I sent the link.
- Oh, God, okay.
- Wait, so he said
that he tried to reach out to you as himself and that you--
- It must have been before.
- When? Yeah, who?
- I mean, you might have had people message you and try to--
- Yeah.
- Right, it probably happens often.
So it could have been any number of guys who were like,
"Hey, what's up?"
- Oh, God, who is this?
[computer chimes]
[dramatic music]
What is that?
- [indistinct]
- Hello?
♪ ♪
- Hello.
- Hi. - Hi there.
- Obvious I'm not the person in the picture.
- Yes.
I see here on the Zoom, is your name Tyrone?
Is that-- - Yeah.
♪ ♪
First of all, I wanna say, sorry to everyone, you know,
putting y'all on a wild goose chase, especially Tracii.
- Ah. - Wow, you look so good.
Oh my God, you look so good.
- You know what?
- But yeah, I just wanna apologize
and start off with saying I'm sorry.
- Okay. - Wow.
- So Tyrone, can you tell us a little bit about yourself?
'Cause we don't--you know, we're all very curious.
- Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So I am in LA, and I'm an artist, digital artist,
and I do some modeling on the side,
and I do travel and all that jazz.
Of course I like leather, and I have a cat named King Julian
who's on my bed over there, which if you can see him.
- [laughing]
Wait a minute.
There's no way that this is the same person
I've been talking to the whole time.
The voice, it's not the same.
- Yeah, yeah, it's Ace, baby. It's Ace.
- [gasps] Oh, my God.
Okay, I'm gone. I can't.
- Yeah.
- Oh, my goodness.
- Come back. Get it together, baby.
- Oh, my God.
- It's Ace, baby. It's Ace.
- [gasps] Oh, my God.
Okay, I'm done. I can't.
- Yeah.
- Oh, my goodness. Oh, my goodness.
- Come back. Get it together, baby.
- Oh, my God.
- Is she gonna come back?
- Well, until she does,
you seem like a very confident guy.
- No, not necessarily.
I have my insecurities, too, just like everyone else.
- Yeah, sure, yeah.
- But you got a lot going on, so what the [bleep]
are you doing on the internet pretending to be Ace Rockwood?
I can't help how I feel about Tracii.
I mean, my feelings are real. I'm just in a different form.
You know, she could still get Ace.
[tense music]
Oh, she's back.
♪ ♪
- Okay, I'm sorry. I just needed a moment.
- That's fine. - Yeah.
- Hey, I know--look, I know I did a [bleep] thing.
I did a very [bleep] thing.
- And for a long time, too, it wasn't just like a week
or two, or you know, even that would've been bad,
but it's been damn near a year, like--
- My heart is still here for you honestly.
I really like you because your energy,
you're a wonderful mother.
and you're just this cinnamon bear
that I just love.
I just want a nibble on you.
- That's creepy.
- And I told you a thing I like about whipped cream.
I really meant it.
I like whipped cream with chocolate.
- Um...
- And I wanna eat that body-ody-ody-ody-ody, eh, eh.
- Well... - [laughing]
- You know, I like your chocolate self, come on now.
It's nothing but love for you, baby.
- Oh, my God.
- And I'm willing to get this hair of mine
and rub it in your under "beyondas" and your whoo-ha,
and get you all excited.
- Oh, um...
- You know, it's all real for you, it's all real.
- We can go ahead and pass on all that.
- What is going on?
- Well, I mean, look, Tyrone, it would be great
if you could drop the act, and we could just say,
take it down a little bit 'cause I want to talk to you,
and I don't want you to feel like you need to perform,
I just want you to talk to us.
First of all, it would appear to us that you have
at least recently been talking to her via a payphone.
Are we right about that?
- Yeah, it's actually right next to my apartment.
- And why are you using a payphone?
- Because she'll find out my true identity super fast.
All she has to do--you know us millennials,
you know, this generation, period, is super smart.
You can easily just put somebody phone in Facebook,
and it pops up.
- Right, right. So you have been in LA?
- Yes.
- You had told Tracii that next month
you were gonna fly her out to Miami to visit you.
Like, were you going to do that?
- What was the plan? - Yeah.
- Well, what I was gonna do is like,
we were just gonna have a little vacation.
But eventually, I was gonna show her my real self.
I just didn't know how, and that's another reason
why I'm finding, like, this "Catfish" is a blessing,
and I might look a little silly or goofy and all of that,
but you know, I know I deserve love,
and you deserve it, too.
- Absolutely, everyone deserves love definitely,
but the way you went about it was just the wrong way.
You know, you came in with a lie, like you said,
you reached out to me before--I don't remember
you ever reaching out to me.
You could have approached me, you know, the regular way.
- Maybe it was with a different profile,
and I don't remember, but I do remember Tracii [bleep].
So I don't know.
- You have other profiles other than the Ace Davis profile?
- Oh, shoot. I done told on myself, hell.
- Okay. But my whole thing is, why?
Doesn't it take extra to sit here
and make fake profiles and do all this stuff?
That's a lot.
- Originally, the profiles were just more like me
spying on my exes when I know they were cheating,
and I ended up keeping a lot of those profiles.
And then as COVID, and the protested,
and George Floyd, and all that other stuff,
it really made me very sad and depressed.
I was going through a spiral of an anxiety and missing people,
human interaction, so I made this profile Ace.
- How many other profiles do you have that you use?
- I probably have like 10 or 15.
- But you do use your other profiles to talk to people?
- Yeah.
- Some of them are your ex relationships?
- Yes.
- How many people are you talking to
right now including Tracii?
- It's, like, at least over 20, but--
- Wow.
- They're not as serious as her.
- And are you in love with Tracii?
- Yes.
- And are you in love with any of these other people?
- No.
- Do you love any of these other people?
- No, no.
The other people, they were just playing,
and honestly, a lot of them blocked me.
- Tyrone, it sounds like
you don't know how to take a [bleep]ing hint.
Like, why not just meet somebody who likes you for you?
- Exactly.
- Why are you creating these false personas
and leading on these long relationships
- And wasting your time checking out exes
when you could be making new, you know--
- Exactly.
- It honestly has been really tough for me.
I'm pansexual.
So it's all about energy for me.
I have dated transgender.
I've dated men and female, and I don't really see sex,
but it's so hard to actually find somebody
who actually loves all of this.
And the first thing they look at is the hair.
And then the way I present myself, I don't know.
I don't know if it's intimidating,
or if it's just a little too much for them.
With the Ace character, I just felt invincible.
It was like the shield. Like, I felt like Superman.
- I get all of that.
But for someone who has so much going for themselves,
for someone who is loud and proud pansexual.
- For someone who is living in that kind of truth,
to be upholding these lies is just...
- Hypocrite.
- It makes no sense. You have no reason to.
You could meet somebody great, but instead, we're channeling
our sadness and anger into multiple profiles.
- I wish I could go back in time and fix it,
but I can't.
You know, all I can do is move forward from here.
All I'm asking for is forgiveness.
You know, you don't have to do it today,
'cause I don't wanna come across as a douchebag,
even though it's kind of looking like I'm a douchebag.
But I really am genuinely sorry for what I've put you through.
[tense music]
- I'd like to hear from you, Tracii.
I'm just curious kind of where you are with everything.
- Um...
I'm a forgiving person. I forgive him.
You know, I appreciate him apologizing.
That still doesn't take away
how I feel, like how I was hurt and affected.
You know, again, I'll accept his apology,
but I feel like anything moving forward for me
is definitely a hard no.
[soft music]
- Mm-hmm, that's fair. - Yeah.
I don't want any communication going forward.
- And it's gonna take me some time
to lose my medicine for the day, you know,
'cause you're like medicine and you know.
I'm just saying. I'm just keeping it real.
You're like a drug-- - Yeah.
- That I can't let go of, you know,
but I know I gotta respect your decision and your life.
- All right, well, my questions have been answered.
I don't know if anyone else has anything they need to say,
but I think, Tyrone, it was nice to meet you.
Now I think we'll say goodbye,
and I think it's safe to say that should in the future,
Tracii want to reach out and connect, it'll be up to her.
- She will find you.
- And she'll find you. - Absolutely.
And I am deleting the profile, so I'm gonna get rid of that.
- Okay, all right, well, good.
- All right, Tyrone. - Okay, Tyrone.
- Good luck.
- Bye-bye, thank you.
- Bye. - See ya.
- Bye.
Awkward.
- The Lord bless him. Bless his heart.
- Okay.
- Tracii, how are you?
- A lot of emotions.
Maybe I just need to take a break on dating for now
and just focus on other things
because it was already scary, now it's scarier.
- We can't let Tyrone keep you from meeting somebody special.
And, like, there's still Ace Rockwood in Miami.
- Yeah. - He's really cute.
- I mean, at this point, if I were you,
I would be booking that flight.
- [laughs]
- Take care, Tracii.
- Thank you. You guys, too.
Have a good rest of your day. - Bye.
- Bye, thank you so much.
♪ ♪
- ♪ If your love's in disguise ♪
♪ Then you're not loving anyone but yourself ♪
♪ Some things never, some things never ♪
♪ Some things never break ♪
♪ ♪
A year ago, Michael slides into Romeo's DM. [upbeat mu
- He was so generous and so sweet.
He's saying he want a future with me,
but I still haven't seen this man yet.
- Oh!
- "I'm not a catfish."
- Some weird [bleep] is going down.
- What is going on? [computer chimes]
- Oh. - Oh, no.