The Perfect Substitute

On the day of our third wedding anniversary, Joshua used work as an excuse to

avoid coming home again.

I opened the door to his home office and unexpectedly stumbled upon that

journal.

It turned out that in this marriage, I was nothing more than a living memorial

to another woman.

He had meticulously molded me into her exact likeness. But I decided to tear it

all down with my own hands.

I stopped being the submissive, obedient wife. I began systematically rebelling

against every memory he held of his perfect phantom.

The tension finally detonated during a massive fight, where I laid every single

piece of his deception out in the open.

I demanded a divorce. I told him to go find the woman he was so desperately

obsessed with.

Joshua completely broke down. He buried his face in his hands and sobbed,

confessing that she had passed away years ago.

I just stared at him with absolute ice in my veins and asked, if he couldn't let

her go, why didn't he just go to the grave with her?

On our third anniversary, Joshua once again claimed he was too busy to

celebrate.

Even after I begged him, promising I had a massive surprise waiting for him.

His voice remained flat, laced with irritation.

"Grace, I really do not have the time today. Stop nagging me, alright?"

Through the speaker, his voice was thick with exhaustion and alcohol, yet there

was no background noise. No clinking glasses, no corporate chatter.

Under what circumstances does a man drink heavily in complete silence?

As the thought crossed my mind, the line went dead.

The dial tone dropped into my stomach like a lead weight.

I felt the weight sinking deeper, terrified of what I might find if I dug any

further.

Honestly, digging wouldn't even make sense to me.

Three years ago, Joshua supposedly fell in love with me at first sight. He

pursued me aggressively from the moment we met.

I never believed he was actually sincere.

At the time, he was a thirty-year-old managing director. Sharp, mature, always

in bespoke suits.

I was fresh out of college. A naive, hyperactive design assistant who showed up

to work in eccentric, colorful thrifted clothes.

We were on entirely different frequencies. How could real feelings possibly

develop between two people like that?

I assumed he just found my aesthetic amusing. Something new to play with before

tossing it aside.

Plus, the massive gap in our social and financial standing made his pursuit feel

almost predatory. I was terrified the office would start whispering that I was

sleeping my way to the top.

So, initially, I rejected him completely.

But he didn't stop. He spent three solid months trying to win me over.

Fresh roses on my desk every single morning.

Following my beat-up Vespa in his Audi just to make sure I got home safe.

Stepping in to take the shots whenever a client tried to pressure me into

drinking at networking events.

When I called in sick with terrible cramps, he personally delivered premium

ginger tea and hot water bottles...

He actually brought me care packages all the time.

I always pretended not to be home. I never opened the door. I never ate the food

he left on the welcome mat.

Maybe it was just the vulnerability of being in pain, genuinely wanting someone

to care for me.

But that day, I opened the door. I agreed to go out with him.

His eyes actually welled up with tears. He reached out to pull me into a hug,

but then clumsily stepped back.

"I just came in from the cold. My jacket is freezing. I don't want to make you

uncomfortable."

His gentle, overwhelming consideration acted like warm honey, sealing over every

crack in my heart.

In a moment of profound weakness, I believed in his so-called true love.

The very next day, he handed me an engagement ring.

That was three years ago.

But marriage wasn't the fairytale I had envisioned.

The moment the ink dried on the certificate, Joshua's blazing passion seemed

to evaporate instantly.

He was still gentle, but it was a gentleness laced with a chilling, detached

apathy.

He stopped being eager. He stopped trying.

The dynamic between us completely flipped.

I became the one constantly doting on him, managing his life down to the

smallest detail.

He, on the other hand, began dictating mine.

The phrase I heard the most was how I needed to change to better fit the title

of "Mrs. Mercer."

As for anything else...

If I begged for a sweet word, he would throw me one. Never two. And never

unprompted.

I was devastated.

The paralyzing fear of being tricked flooded back.

But his family, his status, his wealththey all eclipsed mine entirely. And he

had already married me. We were legally bound.

What could he possibly be tricking me into?

Eventually, I chalked it up to the classic male flaw. The thrill of the chase

was over, so he stopped valuing the prize.

I convinced myself to just suck it up and live a peaceful life.

But the one thing I absolutely could not tolerate was exactly what was happening

right now.

Every single year on our anniversary, Joshua refused to come home.

Every year, he used work as an excuse.

No matter how much I pleaded, seduced, or screamed, he would not budge.

Why?

I realized today had to be a significant date for Joshua.

It just had absolutely nothing to do with me.

He was definitely hiding something monumental.

The thought made my skin crawl. I couldn't sit still anymore.

I couldn't stomach a single bite of the elaborate anniversary dinner I had spent

all day cooking.

Before Joshua came home, I marched straight into his home office.

Where do I even start looking?

The massive mahogany bookshelves were crammed with hundreds of spines, making me

dizzy.

I hated reading. I had hated it since I was a kid.

Joshua spent half his life locked in this room.

When his coldness first started, I used to wonder if I was just too shallow for

him. Did he get bored of my face? Was my mind not complex enough to hold his

interest?

But if that was true, why didn't he just divorce me?

Carrying that massive, suffocating question, I started tearing the room apart

for clues.

My eyes quickly locked onto a specific shelf.

Sandwiched between dense volumes of political history and economic theory was a

row of brightly colored fiction novels.

It was a glaring anomaly.

I reached out and pulled one down. I flipped to the author's biography on the

back flap.

Staring back at me was a photo of a woman who looked exactly like me. At least a

seventy percent match.

Her name was Harper.

She had long, jet-black hair. Her aura was elegant, gentle, and refined.

The glossy photo looked like it had been obsessively rubbed by a thumb over and

over again, the ink around her lips slightly faded.

A hazy memory surfaced. I suddenly remembered Joshua sitting in his leather

chair, staring blankly at this exact book.

It was right after we got married. I was young, clingy, and desperate for

validation.

I couldn't comprehend why a man who had rushed to marry me after three months

had suddenly turned to ice.

I convinced myself we just hadn't built a deep enough emotional foundation.

So I was always trying to coax him, clinging to him, begging for his attention.

One night, he was in the office reading.

I walked in, whining dramatically, draped myself over his shoulders, and told

him I felt sick and needed him to coddle me.

His reaction was to physically push me out of the room.

"I am incredibly busy every single day. I am exhausted to the point of nausea. I

do not have the time or the energy to coddle you."

"Take care of yourself and stop being a burden to me. Do you understand?"

As he slammed the heavy office door in my face, cold tears burned my flushed

cheeks.

I stood frozen in the hallway for a long time.

He wasn't even working. He was just reading a book. It wasn't an emergency.

I couldn't understand why he refused to spare even a fraction of his energy for

me.

But looking at this book now, everything made terrifying sense.

The book he was reading that night was the exact one I was holding right now.

The author was Harper.

It was a book written by the woman he actually loved.

The delusional mirage of his desperate love for me collapsed instantly. The

reality was blindingly clear.

No wonder Joshua "fell in love at first sight."

I met him on my first day of work. The very next day, I received roses.

At first, I didn't get it. I thought it was some weird corporate hazing or a

welcome gift for new hires.

But then they arrived the next day. And the next.

My coworkers started teasing me.

"Wow, Grace, your boyfriend is really going all out."

My stomach dropped. I didn't have a boyfriend.

And the card on the flowers only had the boss's last nameMercer.

Filled with anxiety and suspicion, I found Joshua's contact in the company

directory and messaged him.

He bypassed all small talk and immediately confessed.

"Do you believe in love at first sight?"

"Make me believe it."

Even as a terrified junior employee, I shut him down immediately.

"No, I don't."

The corporate world is full of sleazy executives using their power to prey on

young assistants.

But I was still confused.

Usually, those old creeps kept things discreet. They would send late-night texts

pre-loaded with "I'm so drunk" to give themselves an out.

Why was Joshua doing this completely out in the open?

His relentless pursuit became the loudest gossip in the office.

I couldn't figure it out. My coworkers couldn't figure it out.

But it turned out... Joshua was the only one who knew exactly what he was

doing.

What I thought was a fairy-tale romance was actually a calculated, psychological

trap.

What I thought was winning the lottery was the most degrading scam imaginable.

He never loved me. He was obsessed with the ghost I happened to resemble.

Back then, I only shared a passing resemblance to Harper.

But Joshua spotted me in a crowd and instantly claimed me.

Then, he went to work carving me into her shape.

My bright red hair? He manipulated me into dyeing it jet black.

My eclectic thrift-store clothes? He commanded me to dress "appropriately."

My loud, chaotic personality? Crushed under his demands for me to be "composed."

I was nothing but a lump of clay. A custom-built mannequin designed to hold his

sick desires.

I looked closer at the book jacket.

Harper's birthdate was printed in the author bio. It was today.

Why did Joshua refuse to celebrate our anniversary?

Because he was out mourning someone else.

He purposely chose to marry me on Harper's birthday.

She was the only woman he ever wanted to marry...

He couldn't stand the thought of another woman claiming the most important day

of his life.

I understood everything now. There was nothing left to uncover.

A wild, feral weed seemed to sprout inside me, wrapping its thorny vines tightly

around my freezing heart. An overwhelming, violent urge to destroy everything

surged through my veins.

I wanted to rip the photo of that woman to shreds.

But I stopped myself.

The mystery wasn't completely solved.

If Joshua was so deeply obsessed with Harper, why wasn't he with her?

Why did he go to such psychotic lengths to build a replica?

I pulled out my phone and searched for Harper's name. Absolute dead end.

The suffocation in my chest tightened. The hatred burned hotter.

But I decided not to trash his office just yet.

If Joshua's obsession ran this deep, destroying his shrine might cause him to

instantly throw me out on the street.

I refused to accept that outcome.

Not because I was heartbroken and couldn't bear to lose him.

But because it was violently unfair!

Why the hell should I be the only one humiliated and emotionally mutilated in

this sick game?

I wanted revenge.

I wanted to play with his reality exactly the way he had played with mine.

I wanted him to watch his carefully constructed masterpiece shatter into a

million pieces right in front of his eyes.

I wanted his last three years to be as worthless and hollow as mine!

With that thought, I put my phone away. I didn't call him.

I didn't touch the massive anniversary feast I had cooked either.

Instead, I boiled a huge pot of spicy instant ramen.

Before I met Joshua, I ate this garbage all the time.

But he hated it. He despised the smell of the artificial spices lingering in the

apartment.

I loved him, so I respected his rules. I sacrificed my own comfort.

But now I knew I had sacrificed it all for a ghost.

It was time to unleash my true self and actually love the person in the mirror.

After I finished eating, I left the apartment to completely obliterate my

current aesthetic.

Even though it was past midnight.

For the past two years, the moment the clock struck twelvethe exact moment

Harper's birthday endedJoshua would walk through the front door.

But right now, I couldn't care less if he came home or not.

Would he feel the same sickening panic I felt when he abandoned me?

I didn't care.

I booked a late-night appointment at a 24-hour salon. Hair and nails, the full

package.

I used to be obsessed with acrylic stilettos.

I got them done so often I could type a hundred words a minute with them on. My

coworkers used to joke I was an elegant, lethal crab hacking away at my

keyboard.

But Joshua hated them.

After we got married, he insisted I quit my job and let him provide for me.

I became completely dependent on him. I lost my financial independence, and I

lost my right to choose my own nail shape.

He claimed acrylics were tacky and unnatural. He said my bare, natural nails

looked much more refined.

Back then, I thought I was just making myself beautiful for the man I loved.

So I happily complied.

Same went for my hair and makeup.

I used to dye my hair every color of the rainbow. Neon pink, electric orange,

platinum blonde.

After Joshua "suggested" a change, I spent three years with pin-straight,

jet-black hair.

By the time I walked out of the salon, I looked like an entirely different human

being.

When I used to leave the house, people joked I looked like a walking traffic

light.

Lately, everyone told me I looked like a strict high school English teacher.

Maybe looking like a gentle, intellectual wife wasn't inherently a bad thing.

At first, I even liked the polished version of myself.

But after a while, it felt like a prison.

Looking exactly the same every single day made me sick of my own reflection.

But whenever I brought up cutting it or changing the color, Joshua would shut

it down.

Even though he was highly educated, he would feed me insane lies about UV nail

lamps causing cancer, or hair dye seeping into my brain...

He blocked every single attempt I made to change my appearance.

Because he didn't give a damn about my health.

He only cared about maintaining the illusion of her.

Right now, I didn't care about the health risks either, even though I probably

should have.

I was pregnant.

But that was a problem that was going to be solved very, very soon.

At 1:00 AM, Joshua called me.

He must have finally walked through the front door.

I answered, and his voice was tight with irritation.

"It's the middle of the night. Where are you?"

I replied with casual indifference.

"Getting my hair done."

His tone spiked into angry panic.

"What are you doing to your hair?"

I recalled a toxic joke and let out a cold laugh.

"Exactly what it sounds like."

"Do you think I'd look better with cherry red or neon green?"

"Probably green, right? What do you think?"

I hung up before he could respond.

I had zero interest in his reaction, and I wasn't about to let him ruin my mood.

I flipped my phone to Do Not Disturb, mindlessly scrolling through Instagram

while manually declining every single call he frantically dialed.

By the time he hit his ninth attempt, I unlocked the front door, sporting a

fresh, electric teal bob.

I was wearing a floral, off-the-shoulder sundress that showed off my

collarbones.

In my hands were half a dozen shopping bags stuffed with even more loud,

colorful dresses.

"Where the hell have you been?!"

The interrogation hit me before I could even catch my breath.

I tilted my head.

He was sitting at the dining table, his face drained of color. His dark eyes

were swimming in a freezing, venomous rage.

I had never seen Joshua look like this.

A violent shiver ran down my spine.

This was the real him. Dark, obsessive, and ruthless.

Not only was he in love with a ghost projected onto my body, but the gentle,

perfect husband I loved was entirely a hallucination too.

Our entire three-year marriage was a grotesque, theatrical joke.

A sharp retort burned on my tongue. I wanted to scream, Where the hell have YOU

been?!

But I swallowed it down.

My psychological warfare had just begun.

I wasn't about to show my cards this early in the game.

So I just laughed lightly and ran my fingers through my teal hair.

"Isn't it obvious? Do you like it?"

Seeing my completely nonchalant attitude, Joshua's meticulously crafted

composure shattered into pieces.

His brow furrowed violently, like jagged rocks exposed at low tide.

His eyes bored directly into my scalp as he finally forced the words out.

"Why would you suddenly do something like this to your hair?"

I kept my tone perfectly breezy.

"It's not sudden at all. Didn't I always dye my hair crazy colors before we

met?"

"I only kept it black because you said you liked it. I was accommodating you."

"But I don't feel like accommodating you anymore. I feel like accommodating

myself."

His voice exploded, hitting me like a physical shockwave.

"I told you I was tied up with work yesterday and couldn't make it back! Are you

seriously throwing this kind of passive-aggressive tantrum over a scheduling

conflict?!"

"You refused to eat the dinner you cooked, you stunk up the house with that

garbage instant ramen, and you mutilated yourself to look like an absolute mess!

What exactly are you trying to accomplish?!"

"Is one stupid anniversary really that important to you? Is it worth acting like

a complete psycho?!"

Yeah. An anniversary meant absolutely nothing to him.

Because he hadn't married the woman he actually loved.

Of course there was nothing to celebrate.

And now, it meant nothing to me either.

So the one acting like a complete psycho screaming in the living room was him,

not me.

I sighed, cutting off his tirade.

"Whether it's the ramen or my 'messy' appearance, this is exactly who I am."

"If you found it so revolting, why did you hunt me down in the first place?"

The conversation had accidentally steered straight toward the cliff edge.

Would Joshua finally confess the truth?

Absolutely not.

He froze, his jaw clamped shut in suffocating silence.

I had zero intention of interrogating him.

I already knew the horrifying answer.

I refused to stand there locked in a stalemate with him.

I grabbed my shopping bags and walked past him toward the bedroom, tossing a

fake smile over my shoulder.

"I'm heading to the coast with some friends. That's why I dyed it teal. Fits the

beach vibe."

"I'll be gone for three or four days. You're going to have to hire a maid to

clean up after yourself."

Joshua grabbed my bicep, his grip bruising. His voice was laced with a

chilling, dominant fury.

"Why didn't you ask for my permission before deciding this?"

His physical aggression crossed a line. It hurt.

Even though I was trying to avoid a screaming match, my rage boiled over.

"You know exactly why. You give orders, not opinions."

"Do I no longer have autonomy over my own physical body?!"

I violently ripped my arm out of his grasp.

I didn't spare him another glance. I walked straight into the bedroom and

started throwing clothes into a suitcase.

A long minute passed before I heard his heavy, deliberate footsteps.

He walked into his home office...

My lungs seized.

Would he notice I had been in there?

Would he realize I had unearthed his sick secret?

Would he finally drop the act, sit me down, and confess his psychotic

manipulation?

A million terrifying scenarios raced through my brain.

Joshua delivered his answer a moment later.

"My attitude just now was entirely out of line. I'm sorry."

The dark, venomous aura had vanished from his face. He looked exactly like the

gentle, loving man who had courted me years ago.