I looked exactly like her dead boyfriend, and I didn’t even know it until I found the photographs. I’m a woodworker, a simple man from a small town, and I never fit into her world of fancy parties…

The key turned with a soft click, and I knew my whole life had been a lie before I even opened the drawer. For three days, I had been alone in Phoenix’s apartment. She was away on a work trip, and she had told me to rest, to relax, to enjoy the quiet. But I didn’t know how to rest in a place like that.

Everything was white and gold, clean and cold. The couch was too soft, the art on the walls too strange, the silence too loud. I missed my workshop. I missed the smell of cedar and sawdust.

I missed my truck, the old red thing that made noise but always worked. I missed the river and the quiet peace of sitting there with my fishing rod. I walked through the apartment with nothing to do. I touched the smooth walls.

I looked at the fancy bottles of wine lined up on the counter. I remembered how I used to drink beer, how Phoenix would crinkle her nose and say beer was for common people. I remembered how I had stopped drinking beer because of her. I had stopped doing a lot of things because of her.

I found myself standing outside her study. The door was closed, and normally I never went in there. She never invited me in. I just walked in.

The room was small and filled with books. Big, heavy books about art and design and architecture. I didn’t understand most of them. There was a white desk in the center, clean and bare except for a few papers and a cup of pens.

I ran my fingers over the surface. Then I saw the drawer. It was small, set into the side of the desk. It had a lock, a tiny brass lock.

I pulled at the handle, but it wouldn’t move. I remembered the key I had seen in her jewelry box once, the small silver one, and I remembered finding it now under a book on the shelf, as if I was searching for answers I didn’t know I needed. My hands were shaking. I slid the key into the lock.

It fit perfectly. I turned it, and the drawer slid open. Inside were photographs. So many photographs.

I lifted them out, my breath catching in my throat. The man in the photos looked exactly like me. Not the old me, not the bearded Duncan with the stained flannel shirts and the rough hands. No, the man in these photos looked like the new me.

The man I had become in the city. Smooth-shaven face. Neat hair. Expensive suit.

Gold watch on his wrist. My watch. The watch Phoenix had given me. I studied the photos.

The man was smiling in some, laughing in others. He was at parties, at dinners, on boats, in fancy rooms. And in every single one, he was with Phoenix. She was kissing him, holding his hand, looking at him with eyes full of adoration.

But the man wasn’t me. I turned the photos over. On the back of one, in elegant handwriting, were the words: “Julian, my love, forever. ”

Julian.

The name the old woman at the art show had said. The name that had made Phoenix’s face go white and her hand clamp down on my arm. I had asked about it, and Phoenix had dismissed it, said the woman was old and confused, said she saw things that weren’t there. But this was right here.

Julian. Julian was real. I dug deeper into the drawer. There were more photos, and then I found a newspaper clipping.

It was yellowed and fragile. The headline read: “Local Designer Dies in Tragic Accident. ”

It was an obituary. Of Julian.

A car accident, two years before I met Phoenix. Julian had been a talented artist, a beloved son, and he had a girlfriend. Her name was printed right there. Phoenix.

She had been his girlfriend. And he had died. And now this man in the photos, this man who looked just like the man I had become, this was Julian. I dropped the clipping.

My hands were shaking so hard I couldn’t hold it. Everything felt cold, and I felt sick, like I had swallowed ice. I looked at my watch. The gold watch on my wrist.

Phoenix had given it to me, said it was a gift, said it was new, said it was for me. I twisted it off and looked at the inside of the clasp. Engraved there, so small I had never noticed it, were the words: “To Julian, with all my love, Phoenix. ”

It wasn’t my watch.

It had never been my watch. It was Julian’s watch. A dead man’s watch. And Phoenix had put it on my wrist and told me it was mine.

I sat on the floor of the study, surrounded by the photographs, and I felt my entire life shatter around me. Everything made sense now. Every single thing. The suit.

The first dinner at her apartment, when she had given me the box with the dark blue suit inside. She had made me try it on, had adjusted the collar, had smiled and said I looked like a real man. I had felt uncomfortable, out of place, like I was wearing a costume. I was.

The beard. She had touched my face, said my beard was too long, said it hid my handsome face, asked me to shave. I had looked at myself in the bathroom mirror, the razor in my hand, and I had known it was wrong. I had loved my beard.

It was part of who I was. But Phoenix had said please, and I had shaved it all off. I had watched my face emerge from the hair, pale and strange, a face I didn’t recognize. She had been so happy.

The wine. She had told me beer was for common people, that wine was better, that smart people drank wine. I had hated it, the sour taste of it, but I had drunk it because I wanted to be the man she wanted. The parties.

The way she told me how to walk, how to sit, how to hold my glass, how to laugh. She told me not to laugh too loud. She told me not to squint because it made lines. She told me to smile with my mouth closed.

She showed me how to tie a tie her way, because mine was wrong. She had been training me. Not to be a better man. Not to make me happy.

She had been molding me, reshaping me, turning me into a copy of her dead love. I had thought she was helping me. I had thought she was making me better. I had believed her when she said I was perfect, when she said I was exactly right.

I had let her cut away my beard and my rough edges and my simple life, because I wanted her to love me. Because I thought she loved me for who I was. But she never loved me. She loved a ghost.

She looked at me and saw Julian. Every kiss, every touch, every warm word, it was all for him. I was just the empty vessel she was filling with his image. I was a puppet.

A doll. A project. I had missed my old life so much. I had missed the smell of cedar and the feel of wood under my hands.

I had missed fishing by the river and drinking beer from the bottle and wearing my soft, faded flannel shirts. I had missed my truck, the rumbling old thing that took me anywhere I wanted to go. But I had pushed all that down. I had told myself that being with Phoenix was worth losing myself.

I had told myself that I was becoming a better version of Duncan. Except now I knew. I wasn’t becoming a better Duncan. I was becoming Julian.

And I had let it happen. I had let her cut me down and rebuild me into someone else because I was so desperate to be loved. I was so hungry for her approval that I had handed her my identity on a silver platter. I sat on the floor of that study for hours, holding the photographs, staring at Julian’s face.

My face. Our face. When Phoenix came back three days later, I was ready. I heard her car pull into the garage.

I heard her keys jingling in the lock. I heard the door open, and her voice calling out, sweet and light. “Duncan? I’m home.

”

I didn’t answer. I was sitting in the living room, in my flannel shirt and my old jeans. My beard was starting to grow back, a rough shadow on my jaw. I had found my old clothes in the back of the closet, the ones she had tried to throw out.

I had dug them out and put them on, and they felt like coming home. There was beer in the fridge. Not the fancy wine she kept in the kitchen. A cheap beer, the kind I used to drink.

I had twisted off the cap and taken a long drink, and it was cold and familiar and perfect. Phoenix walked into the living room and stopped dead. Her face went through a series of expressions. Confusion.

Disbelief. Horror. “What are you doing? ” she asked, her voice high and tight.

I took another swig of my beer. “Drinking a beer. ”

“Where are your clothes? ” she said.

“Why are you dressed like that? Where is your suit? ”

I set the bottle down on the table. “I threw them away.

”

“You threw them away? ” Her voice rose. “Duncan, those suits cost a fortune! Why would you throw them away?

”

“Because they’re not mine,” I said. “They were never mine. ”

Phoenix’s eyes darted around the room. She looked nervous, fidgety.

“What are you talking about? Of course they’re yours. I gave them to you. ”

“Did you?

” I stood up and walked toward the study. “Come with me. ”

She followed me, her heels clicking on the floor. She was still talking, asking questions, telling me I needed to change, that we had a dinner party tonight, that I couldn’t go looking like some hick.

I walked to the desk. I opened the drawer. I pulled out the photographs and the newspaper clipping. I held them up.

Her face went white. She stumbled backward. “Who is Julian? ” I asked.

She didn’t speak. “I know everything,” I said. “I found the drawer. I found the photos.

I found the obituary. I saw the watch. ”

I pulled the watch out of my pocket and held it up. “You gave me his watch.

You engraved his name on it and you gave it to me. ”

Phoenix was crying now. Tears were streaming down her cheeks, but I felt nothing. I had felt enough.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you. I just missed him so much.

”

I shook my head. “You didn’t miss him. You tried to replace him. ”

“No,” she said.

“I loved you. I do love you. You’re so good, Duncan. You’re so kind.

You were so much like him, that first time I saw you. There was something about you. I wanted to help you. ”

“Help me?

” I laughed, a hollow, dead sound. “You didn’t help me. You tried to turn me into him. You made me shave my beard because he was clean-shaven.

You made me wear suits because he wore suits. You told me how to walk, how to talk, how to laugh. You weren’t helping me. You were erasing me.

”

She shook her head, reaching for me. “No, Duncan, please. I love you for who you are. I want you to be yourself.

”

“You want me to be Julian,” I said. “But I’m not him. I’m not a ghost. I’m Duncan.

”

I pulled my arm away from her touch. “I’m leaving,” I said. “No! ” she cried.

“Please, Duncan, don’t go. I’ll change. I’ll stop. I’ll let you grow your beard back.

I’ll let you wear whatever you want. I’ll be better. Please. ”

But I had heard enough.

I had believed enough. I had given her everything, and she had used it to build a monument to a dead man. I walked out of the apartment. I didn’t look back.

I took the elevator down, walked through the lobby, past the doorman who looked at me with a confused expression. I was a mess, in my old flannel and my dirty jeans, the man who had always been so well-dressed. I walked to the parking garage. My truck was still there, dusty under a thin layer of grime.

I ran my hand over the hood. My truck. The one thing that hadn’t changed. I pulled off the gold watch, Julian’s watch, and threw it into the back of the truck.

I drove out of the city, out of that whole fake life, and I didn’t stop until I saw the familiar sign of my small town. I drove straight to my workshop. The door was still unlocked. I walked inside, and dust was everywhere, but the smell hit me like a wave.

Cedar. Sawdust. Oil. The smell of a dozen projects, a hundred hours of work, my whole life.

I sat on the floor of my workshop and I cried. I cried for the man I had lost, for the months I had given away, for the fake version of me that had replaced the real one. The next day, I made a fire in the yard. I brought out the suit they had given me, the fancy shoes, the white shirts, the silk tie.

I threw them all in. Then I found the gold watch in the truck and I threw that in too. I watched it melt and burn, and I felt lighter. My beard grew back.

My hands got rough again from the work. I made tables. I made chairs. I repaired things for the neighbors.

I drank beer. I went fishing by the river. The water was quiet. I was Duncan again.

It took me a long time to forgive myself. I still think about it sometimes. I drove away from that city, and I left Phoenix there with her photos and her grief. Part of me felt sorry for her.

She was a woman who had lost someone she loved, and she had tried to bring him back in the most broken way possible. But I let go of it. I forgave myself for being stupid, for being so hungry for love that I let someone remake me. I forgave myself for all of it.

And one evening, I was sitting in my workshop. The sun was setting, and the light was coming through the dirty windows. I was working on a chair, a simple design, my hands doing what they had always done. I looked down at my hands, dirty and calloused, and I realized I didn’t recognize them anymore.

But for the first time in a long time, I was okay with that. I ran my hand over a piece of cedar and brought it up to my face. I breathed in deep. That smell.

That familiar, clean, honest smell. I missed my old self, and I finally brought him home.