That day, my husband was at work and wasn’t supposed to be home for at least another three hours. I was in the middle of cleaning when suddenly—a knock at the door. I opened it, and there he was. Or at least I thought it was him.
“Why are you home so early?” I asked.
“I wasn’t feeling well, so my boss let me leave early,” he said. His voice was flat, lacking the usual melodic tiredness he carried after a shift at the warehouse. He walked right in and headed straight to our bedroom.
Something about it felt… off. So I followed him. And when he turned the corner into the bedroom, I stayed back in the hallway, my hand hovering over the doorframe.
He didn’t drop his keys in the ceramic bowl by the door—a habit he’d had for twelve years. He didn’t kick off his boots. Instead, he walked with a strange, heavy precision, his footsteps echoing too loudly on the hardwood.
“Mark?” I called out softly. “Do you want some tea? Or some aspirin?”
No answer. Only the sound of the closet door sliding open. Creak.
I stepped into the doorway. He was standing with his back to me, staring into the dark recesses of the closet. He wasn’t changing clothes. He was just… standing. The light from the window hit his neck, and my stomach did a slow, sickening flip. Mark had a small, jagged scar just below his left ear from a childhood accident.
This man’s skin was perfectly smooth.
My heart began to hammer against my ribs like a trapped bird. I backed away slowly, retreating into the kitchen. I needed to see his face again, but more than that, I needed a weapon—or a lifeline.
I grabbed my phone from the counter. My fingers trembled so hard I nearly dropped it. I hit the speed dial for Mark’s work cell.
Ring. Ring. Ring.
“Hey, babe,” Mark’s voice crackled through the speaker. He sounded busy, the background hum of the warehouse machinery unmistakable. “I’m just about to head into a meeting. Everything okay?”
I couldn’t breathe. My eyes darted to the hallway. The man—the thing—was still in our bedroom.
“Mark,” I whispered, my voice breaking. “Where are you?”
“Still at the plant, honey. Why? Did the furnace act up again? I’ll be home around six.”
I hung up without answering. The silence in the house was suddenly heavy, pressing against my eardrums. Then, the footsteps started again. Thump. Thump. Thump.
He was coming out of the bedroom.
I ducked behind the kitchen island, clutching a heavy marble rolling pin. I watched the doorway. He stepped into the light of the kitchen. He looked exactly like Mark. The same salt-and-pepper hair, the same broad shoulders, the same faded flannel shirt. But his eyes… they were like two pools of ink, reflecting nothing.
“Who are you?” I demanded, stepping out from behind the island, trying to project a courage I didn’t feel.
The man stopped. He tilted his head to the side, a slow, mechanical movement. A smile crept across his face—but it stopped at his cheeks, never reaching those hollow eyes.
“I’m home, Sarah,” he said. The voice was a perfect mimicry of Mark’s, but the cadence was wrong. It was too rhythmic, like a recording played on a loop. “I wasn’t feeling well.”
“My husband is on the phone,” I spat, holding up the device. “Get out of my house.”
The thing that looked like Mark didn’t flinch. Instead, he took a step toward me. Then another.
“Mark is tired, Sarah,” the thing said. “Mark wants to rest. I can be Mark better than Mark can.”
I didn’t wait. I lunged for the back door, fumbling with the deadbolt. I felt a cold hand—colder than ice, like reaching into a freezer—brush against the back of my neck. I screamed, threw the door open, and sprinted into the bright, safe sunlight of the driveway.
I didn’t stop running until I reached the neighbor’s porch. I pounded on their door, sobbing, looking back at my house.
When the police arrived twenty minutes later, the house was empty. There was no sign of a break-in. No muddy footprints. No missing jewelry.
But when I finally walked back into our bedroom with the officers, I saw it. On the bed, perfectly laid out, were the clothes Mark had been wearing that morning. His actual boots were in the closet. His keys were in the bowl.
And on the vanity mirror, written in the steam that shouldn’t have been there because no one had taken a shower, were four words:
“See you at six.”
The air in the kitchen felt thick, like breathing through wet wool. I backed against the counter, my knuckles white as I gripped the marble rolling pin. The man—the thing—stood in the doorway, his head tilted at that sickening, unnatural angle.
“Who are you?” I demanded again, my voice cracking. “My husband is on the phone. I’m calling the police.”
The “Mark” in front of me didn’t flinch. Instead, he reached up and began to unbutton the flannel shirt—the one I had ironed for him just that morning.
“Sarah,” he whispered. This time, the voice didn’t sound like Mark. It sounded like me.
I froze. As he pulled the shirt away, the skin underneath wasn’t flesh. It was a pale, translucent membrane, shifting and pulsing like a jellyfish. Beneath the surface, I could see shapes moving—small, dark shadows that looked like memories.
He stepped into the kitchen light, and his face began to melt. Not into a monster, but into a mirror. The salt-and-pepper hair receded, the jawline softened, and the shoulders narrowed.
Within seconds, I wasn’t looking at my husband. I was looking at myself.
It was a perfect replica of me, down to the coffee stain on my apron and the way I bite my lower lip when I’m scared. The “other” Sarah reached out a hand, her fingers trembling in perfect synchronization with mine.
“You’ve been so tired, Sarah,” she said, her voice a flawless echo of my own thoughts. “The cleaning, the bills, the pretending to be happy when Mark comes home late. You’ve been wishing you could just… disappear.”
My heart skipped a beat. A cold realization washed over me. This wasn’t a home invader or a supernatural fluke.
“You’re the part of me I left behind,” I whispered, the rolling pin slipping from my hand and hitting the floor with a dull thud.
“I’m the part that stays,” she corrected. She walked toward me, her movements no longer heavy, but graceful and light. “I’m the Sarah who doesn’t feel the weight of the house. I’m the Sarah who doesn’t remember the fights or the loneliness. Give it to me.”
She was inches away now. I could see my own reflection in her eyes, but it was a version of me that looked rested—peaceful.
“If I stay,” she whispered, leaning into my ear, “you can finally go. You can walk out that door and never look back. I’ll do the laundry. I’ll kiss Mark when he gets home. I’ll live the life you’re too exhausted to carry.”
I looked at the back door, then back at the “me” standing in my kitchen. The temptation was a physical weight. I thought about the years of mundane repetition, the quiet resentment, the exhaustion that lived in my bones.
I reached out and touched her cheek. Her skin was warm now. It felt like coming home.
“Will he know?” I asked.
“He never notices the details anyway,” she smiled. It was the same sad smile I gave myself in the mirror every morning.
I stepped back, handing her the house keys I had tucked in my pocket. As our fingers brushed, a jolt of electricity surged through me. For a moment, my mind went blank—a terrifying, blissful void.
I walked out the back door without a coat, without a purse, and without a word. I didn’t run. I walked down the driveway, the gravel crunching under my feet.
As I reached the end of the street, a car pulled in. It was Mark, home early after all. He slowed down as he passed me, squinting through the windshield. I held my breath, waiting for him to stop, to jump out, to ask why I was walking away in my apron.
He waved. A short, distracted wave, his eyes already drifting toward the house. He didn’t see me. He saw a woman on the sidewalk.
He pulled into the garage, killed the engine, and walked inside. Through the kitchen window, I saw the “other” Sarah meet him at the door. She took his bag. She leaned in to kiss his cheek.
I turned the corner and kept walking. For the first time in ten years, I felt light. I was no longer a wife, a homeowner, or a hollow shell. I was a stranger in my own life, and finally, I was free.
