I’m 23, and my fiancé, Ethan, is 25. We met at a local music festival last summer, and from the very first moment, it felt like fate. We had the same taste in bands, the same sense of humor, even the same favorite song. We spent that night laughing, singing, and talking until sunrise. Within months, we were planning our future together, convinced we’d found our forever.
Everything seemed perfect—until one dinner changed everything.
Ethan had invited me to meet his closest friends. They were polite, kind even, but there was a strange tension in the air. I kept catching them exchanging uneasy glances whenever Ethan and I interacted. The laughter felt forced, the conversation thin.
Then, as we were saying goodbye, I overheard one of them whisper a name.
“Suzan.”
On the drive home, I couldn’t hold it in any longer.
“Who’s Suzan?” I asked.
Ethan’s hands tightened on the steering wheel. His face drained of color. After a long silence, he pulled out his phone and showed me a photo.
My breath caught. The woman in the picture could have been my twin.
He explained that Suzan had been his first love in high school. They’d dated for years before she moved away for college. The breakup, he said, had been rough—and they’d never spoken again.
Suddenly, everything began to make sense. The way his friends had acted that night. The way he’d looked at me when we first met—like he was seeing a ghost.
And that’s when the fear began to creep in.
Had he fallen in love with me… or with the memory of her?
Ethan swears I’m different, that what he feels is real. But every time he looks at me, I can’t help but wonder—does he see the woman standing before him, or the shadow of the one he lost?
Our wedding is just weeks away. The dress is ready, the invitations are sent, and yet my heart feels heavy with doubt.
How can I walk down the aisle if I’m not sure who he’s really seeing when he looks at me?