Replaceable No More

Synopsis

"A backup should know her place," Dylan Carroll said. His voice floated in from the balcony. He sounded drunk, and there was a playful edge to his tone I'd never heard before. I froze in the living room, holding the hangover pills I had just found. "Giselle's back. What are you going to do now?" That was his friend Erick Decker's voice. "What else can I do?" Dylan chuckled. "Estrella's great. She's family-oriented and obedient, and she doesn't cause a scene. But Giselle is different, you know?" "I get it." Erick lowered his voice. "You went for Estrella because she resembles Giselle, right? She really has that vibe from afar." Dylan didn't deny it. "Yeah, she might look like Giselle, but she's not her," he said. I stood there, gripping the pills tightly. So that was the truth. After two years together, I didn't even deserve to be his serious girlfriend. I was only a backup, a substitute for Giselle. The hangover pills were crushed. I washed them down the sink, rinsed my hands, dried them off, and headed to the bedroom, closing the door behind me. Dylan passed out drunk on the living room couch all night. The next morning, he woke up rubbing his temples and asked, "Why didn't you wake me up and get me to bed last night?" I smiled and said, "You were out cold. I couldn't wake you." He grunted and didn't ask anything more. I looked at him from the side, and suddenly, he felt like a stranger. After two years, I thought I knew him inside and out. I knew he loved his Americano, only wore white or light blue shirts, and always wanted a bowl of oatmeal when working late. But I never realized that, to him, I was only a placeholder. It was only because I looked like her. I had actually heard of Giselle Suarez before. There was an encrypted folder in Dylan's phone gallery, but I never asked about it. On the back of his bookshelf, there was an old, yellowed copy of The Little Prince. The first page read: [To Dylan, may you always be my little prince—Giselle.] I asked him who she was once, and he told me she was an old college friend he hadn't spoken to in years. I believed him. When he was trying to pursue me, I once saw a photo in his wallet. The girl in the picture had long hair and a sweet smile. I thought she looked kind of like me back then. Now, I realized I was such an idiot. It wasn't her who looked like me. It was me who looked like her.