I used to believe love was something you could feel in your bones, steady, familiar, undeniable. That’s how it was with Kevin. He had that rare way of making the world slow down when he looked at me, like nothing bad could ever touch us. I thought I’d found my forever. But I didn’t realize that the man I loved wasn’t real, that he had built his life and mine on lies so deep even d.3.a.t.h couldn’t conceal them.
It all began two years ago when I moved to the small coastal town of Brookhaven. I had just been promoted at the hospital, and I was eager for a new start. My life then was quiet, long shifts, ocean air, and weekends spent with coffee and novels. That peace didn’t last long.
I met Kevin on a Tuesday morning outside my apartment complex. I’d locked myself out of my car, running late for my shift, when he appeared tall, dark-haired, carrying a toolbox and an easy smile.
“Need a hand, or are you hoping the car will magically unlock itself?” he teased.
I laughed, embarrassed. He helped me call a locksmith and stayed until it arrived, cracking small jokes and offering me his coffee. By the time the locksmith finished, I knew his name, that he worked in construction, and that he had an easy charm that made conversation feel natural.
The next morning, there was a cup of coffee waiting at the hospital front desk, black, just how I took it, with a small note: For the lady with car troubles. – K.
That’s how it started.
We began seeing each other casually dinners, walks by the water, and lazy Sunday mornings. He was thoughtful without being overbearing, funny without trying too hard. When I was exhausted from double shifts, he’d show up with takeout and a quiet smile. When my sink broke, he fixed it before I even had time to ask.
Within a year, he proposed. It wasn’t elaborate, just dinner by the ocean, soft music, and candlelight. He took my hand, looked at me like I was the only person in the world, and said, “You make me want to stop running. Will you marry me?”
I said yes.
Our wedding was small, intimate, just close family and friends. The sun was warm, the air filled with salt and laughter. Kevin looked so happy that morning. I can still see him standing under the arch of white roses, smiling at me like he couldn’t believe his luck.
Everything was perfect.
Until it wasn’t.
After the ceremony, we were supposed to head to the reception. But Kevin told me he had forgotten a gift for my parents back at the cottage where we were staying. “I’ll be ten minutes,” he said, kissing my forehead before walking to his car.
Fifteen minutes later, I got the call that shattered my world.
There had been an accident on the coastal road. A car had gone through the guardrail and plunged into the water below.
When the paramedics said his name, I dropped the phone. I remember running barefoot, still in my wedding dress, to where flashing lights painted the rocks red and blue. I screamed his name until my throat burned. But they wouldn’t let me near.
The rescue team worked for hours. They pulled debris from the waves, broken glass glinting under the floodlights. By dawn, they told me the car was completely submerged. The current was too strong.
Kevin wasn’t found.
The police said the impact and undertow made survival impossible. The car was mangled, the currents unforgiving. They promised to continue searching, but as days passed, hope dissolved into grief.
The following week, I held a memorial instead of a funeral. A symbolic coffin, a photo of his smiling face, and the man I loved lost to the sea. His supposed mother, Lorraine, stood beside me, trembling, clutching my hand. She whispered, “He loved you more than anyone, dear. Remember that.”
I tried to.
I spent weeks afterward in a fog, unable to eat, unable to sleep. The sound of the ocean made me sick. I took a leave from the hospital, convinced that one day the tide might wash up something, anything, that would let me say goodbye properly.
But three weeks after the memorial, I got a call from the credit card company.
“Mrs. Parker,” the woman said politely, “we just wanted to verify some recent charges on your husband’s account.”
My heart stilled. “There must be a mistake,” I said. “My husband—he passed away.”
She hesitated. “I’m so sorry, ma’am. But the card’s been used several times in the past few days. Hotel bookings, gas stations, restaurants.”
I hung up and called the police, thinking maybe someone had stolen his wallet from the wreckage. But the officer I spoke with said it wasn’t uncommon for the identities of the deceased to be misused.
Still, I couldn’t shake the unease. The idea of someone using his name, his memory, felt like a violation.
The next morning, I drove to the hotel listed in the transactions.
The woman at the front desk smiled when I mentioned Kevin’s name. “Oh yes, he was just here,” she said. “Left two days ago. Nice man. Quiet.”
My pulse quickened. “You saw him?”
She frowned slightly. “Of course. Tall, brown hair, clean-shaven. He said his wife was visiting her parents for the week.”
My knees nearly gave out.
It couldn’t be. He wasn’t found. They said he was gone, lost to the ocean.
I drove home shaking so hard I could barely hold the wheel. I told myself there had to be a logical explanation, maybe someone who looked like him, maybe a cruel coincidence.
But then, two days later, I saw him.
I was leaving the grocery store when a taxi pulled up to the curb. I wasn’t paying attention until I heard a familiar voice say, “Thanks, have a good one.” I turned and there he was.
Kevin.
Alive.
Standing right there, wearing a cab driver’s uniform, helping a passenger unload their bags. His hair was a little shorter, his skin tanner, but it was him. Down to the faint scar along his jawline, the one he got fixing my kitchen shelf.
For a moment, our eyes met. I froze. So did he. Then, without a word, he turned, got into the taxi, and drove off.
I stood there for a full minute before my body caught up with my mind. Then I ran to my car and followed him.
He drove across town, down quiet residential streets, finally stopping at a small apartment complex on the outskirts of the city. I parked far enough away not to be noticed.
A few moments later, a woman came out blonde, mid-thirties, holding a little boy, maybe four years old. When she saw Kevin, her face lit up. He kissed her. Then the boy reached for him, squealing, “Daddy!”
I couldn’t breathe.
I sat in my car, watching as they disappeared inside, my chest hollow and cold.
The next morning, I went back. I waited until he left in his taxi before I approached the woman’s door. My hand shook as I knocked.
She answered, smiling warmly. “Can I help you?”
I forced a shaky breath. “I’m looking for Kevin Parker.”
Her eyes brightened. “Oh, Kevin! You mean Marcus?”
My heart dropped. “Marcus?”
She laughed lightly. “Yes, Marcus Hayes, my partner. Is this about work?”
I stared at her, trying to keep my voice steady. “How long have you been together?”
“About six years now,” she said. “Why?”
Six years. He’d been with her long before he met me.
I muttered an apology and left before I completely broke down.
When I got home, I tore through every document, every photo, every trace of him. His driver’s license is fake. His construction company is nonexistent. The bank account he shared with me is empty. And the woman who’d claimed to be his mother? Gone. The phone number she’d given me was disconnected.
I called the police again. This time, they listened.
The officer I spoke with sighed heavily. “Ma’am, the man you knew as Kevin Parker is actually Marcus Hayes. He’s a con artist; we’ve had warrants out for his arrest for years. He creates fake identities, marries women, drains their accounts, and disappears.”
I felt my world collapse.
The accident, his “d.3.a.th” had been staged. The car was likely stolen, the crash orchestrated. The reason he “wasn’t found” was that he was never in that car to begin with.
Everything our love, our vows, his past had been an elaborate performance.
For months, I lived in fear and disbelief. I avoided taxis, stopped going near the water, and even moved apartments. I’d wake up at night imagining footsteps outside, wondering if he’d come back not because I wanted him to, but because part of me feared what he might still be capable of.
Nearly a year passed before I saw him again.
It was raining that night. I’d just returned from a late shift when someone knocked on my door.
When I opened it, my heart stopped.
Kevin or Marcus stood there, drenched, shivering, and very much alive.
“I had to see you,” he said quietly.
I stared, speechless. “You’re supposed to be d.3.a.d.”
“I know,” he murmured. “And I’m sorry. I never meant for you to get hurt.”
“Then why did you?” I whispered. “Was anything real?”
He looked at me for a long moment before answering. “You were. That’s what I didn’t plan on. You were the only real thing in my life.”
Tears burned my eyes. “Don’t you dare romanticize this. You lied about everything. You made me bury a ghost.”
He flinched. “I was trying to escape people who would have hurt me if I didn’t disappear. I had to start over. You just—”
“Stop,” I said, my voice trembling. “You used me. You made me fall in love with someone who doesn’t exist.”
His eyes softened. “Maybe. But the love was real, even if I wasn’t.”
He turned before I could speak again and walked into the rain. I didn’t follow.
Two months later, the police contacted me. They’d caught him in another city, arrested under yet another alias. When they asked if I wanted to testify, I said yes, not out of vengeance, but for closure.
Seeing him in court, handcuffed and expressionless, was surreal. I barely recognized the man who once promised me forever.
It’s been two years since then. I’ve rebuilt my life, new job, new home, cautious steps toward love again. But sometimes, when I pass a taxi on the street, I still look twice. Just for a heartbeat, I half expect to see his face behind the wheel, that same crooked smile that once made me believe I’d found home.
But I know better now.
The man I loved d.i.3.d long before the wedding, not in a car crash, not in the ocean, but the moment I realized he’d never really existed at all.
And though his body was never found, the truth was: neither was the person I thought he was.
