When Marissa opens the door expecting her husband, she’s met by someone who looks exactly like him—but something feels off. What begins as a chilling imposter encounter unravels into a family secret neither she nor her husband ever imagined.The knock came at 2:07 p.m.I was cleaning the kitchen, thinking about oat milk and croissants. Hayden wasn’t due home for hours.

But there he was—same hoodie, same lanyard.”Why are you home early?” I asked.”My boss let me go early. Felt sick,” he said, stepping inside. No kiss. No pet name. Just moved through the house like a stranger.He tore through drawers in the bedroom.”What are you looking for?””Our emergency stash,” he said. “For work.”

We didn’t keep cash in the house. And Hayden never called me “babe.”Then Waffles—our cat—hissed. She never hissed at Hayden.I kept calm. “It’s in the basement,” I lied. As he stepped in, I slammed the door and locked it.Then I called the real Hayden.“There’s someone pretending to be you,” I said. “He’s in the basement.”Hayden rushed home. The police came. The man came up quietly.

His name was Grant. They’d met at a bar—same birthday, same city, same face. Twins, separated at birth.A mistake no one knew about.“I never had a family,” Grant said.Hayden was shaken. “I got everything. He got nothing.”We didn’t press charges. But Hayden kept in touch. Offered him a job.“He’s my brother,” he said. “We have no one else.”Eventually, we had Grant over for dinner. I cooked too much. Waffles watched but didn’t hiss.“You didn’t have to do this,” Grant said. “Thank you.”Weeks passed. He never came back. Sometimes, I rewatch the security footage. That man with Hayden’s face…But Waffles knew. And so did I.