I went to city hall ready to marry the love of my life, only to be told I was already someone else’s husband! I’d never been married. The truth unraveled a day later in my boss’s office, when his phone rang — and I recognized the name.
I stood in front of my parents’ graves holding a small velvet box.
The grass was still wet from the night before, and the cemetery smelled like earth and rain.
“I’m going to ask her,” I said to the headstones. “I’m finally doing it.”
My voice sounded strange out there in the open air. I’d been coming to this spot every few weeks since I was eighteen, and I still never knew what to say. But today felt different.
Today, I needed them to hear me.
Clara and I had been together for over two years by then.
“She’s my anchor, you know. My best friend. She can make me laugh when I feel like crying, and makes the silence feel comfortable when words feel like too much work.”
Just talking about her like that brought a smile to my face.
Life had finally started to feel right.
Clara and I had been together
for over two years by then.
My parents had died years earlier during an expedition somewhere in South America. They’d been archaeologists, the kind who couldn’t resist a mystery, and one day the mystery won.
I was completely lost when it happened. If it weren’t for Tom, my father’s old friend, I don’t know what I would’ve done.
But earlier that year, when I turned 27, something changed.
If it weren’t for Tom, my father’s old friend,
I don’t know what I would’ve done.
I got access to my inheritance.
It was a large sum. Larger than I’d expected, honestly. Enough to finally imagine a future with Clara that included more than just daydreams.
“I’ve been thinking about proposing for months. Maybe longer. Maybe since the day we met.”
I opened the velvet box and held it out. The diamond threw tiny rainbows across my palm.
“I hope you’ll bless this marriage. I think you would have really liked her.”
I got access to
my inheritance.
The wind picked up, rustling through the trees behind me, and I chose to take that as a yes.
The day I decided to propose, I asked Clara to meet me at city hall.
I know, I know. Not exactly romantic, right? But here’s the thing: we’d talked about marriage before. A lot, actually.
We both knew we wanted this.
I asked Clara to meet
me at city hall.
She’d even joked about skipping the big wedding and just making it official.
So, I planned my grand gesture around that.
I brought a bouquet of white roses and pink peonies. I brought the ring. And I brought every ounce of courage I had left in me.
She was standing on the steps when I arrived, wearing that blue dress I loved. She smiled when she saw me, but there was a question in her expression.
I brought every ounce
of courage I had left in me.
“Andrew,” she said. “What’s going on?”
I got down on one knee right there.
“Clara, will you marry me? Right now. Today.”
Her hands flew to her mouth. Her eyes filled with tears.
And then she was nodding, saying yes over and over again, pulling me up and kissing me while some teenagers whistled and an old woman clapped.
I got down on one knee
right there.
Hand in hand, we walked into the building.
After all the loss and the loneliness and the years of just trying to survive, I was getting something good.
We found the marriage license office on the second floor.
“Hi, we’d like to get married.”
She pulled up her screen, fingers moving across the keyboard with practiced efficiency. “Names?”
We found the marriage license
office on the second floor.
We gave her our names, and she typed a bit more.
Then she paused.
Her eyes narrowed slightly as she read something on her monitor.
She looked at me, then back at the screen, then at me again. Slower this time.
“Sir, according to our records, you’re already married.”
“Sir, according to our records,
you’re already married.”
“What?” I said. “That’s impossible. I’ve never — ever — been married.”
The clerk’s expression softened slightly.
“I’m just telling you what the system says, sir. There’s a certificate here. You were legally married two years ago.”
Two years ago. That was right before Clara and I met. Right before my life started making sense again.
“That’s impossible.
I’ve never — ever — been married.”
“No,” I said. “That’s a mistake. I’ve never—”
“I’m sorry, sir,” she said, her voice firmer now. “You’ll need to resolve this first. I can’t process a marriage license when you’re already married to someone else.”
I turned to Clara, and the look on her face darn near broke my heart.
“What does this mean?” she whispered. The fear in her voice mirrored exactly what I was feeling.
The look on her face
darn near broke my heart.
I had no answer. Nothing made sense.
How could I be married to someone I’d never met? How could this be real?
“Was there… was there someone else before me?” Clara hung her head. “You can tell me if there was…”
“No, I swear I have no idea what’s going on here, but I’m going to get to the bottom of it!”
“I’m going to get to the bottom of it!”
We left city hall in stunned silence. I clutched a copy of the marriage certificate in my fist.
Everything felt wrong. Backwards. Broken.
How could this happen? I had no memory of a woman with the same name as the one on the marriage certificate. Why wouldn’t I know her?
Those questions circled in my head all night.
Clara stayed with me, but we barely spoke. What was there to say? I held her while she cried, and then she held me while I tried to figure out what was happening to my life.
Those questions circled
in my head all night.
The next morning, I went to work hoping routine would calm me down.
My boss, Tom, was an old friend of my parents. He’d tracked me down when I was in college, showed up at my dorm one day with this story about how much my parents had meant to him.
He’d offered me a job at his company right then and there. Said he wanted to look out for me as a way to honor my parents’ memory.
I’d always been grateful for that.
He’d offered me a job at
his company right then and there.
Tom had been steady when nothing else was.
But lately, something had been off. He’d brought a new car and a bigger house. He’d mentioned a vacation to Italy last month. All of this while the company was barely breaking even.
I’d noticed but hadn’t said anything.
It wasn’t my business, I told myself.
Lately, something had been off.
I found him in his office and told him everything.
He listened without interrupting, his face growing more serious with every word.
“Let me call my lawyer,” he said when I finished. “See what can be done.”
I nodded and went back to my desk, but I couldn’t focus. Every time I tried to work, my mind drifted back to that moment at city hall.
Later that afternoon, Tom called me into his office.
Tom called me into his office.
“Come in,” he said, sliding paperwork across the desk toward me.
I started to reach for it, but then his phone started buzzing on the desk. An incoming call.
When I looked at the screen, my chest tightened.
“Oh my God,” I whispered.
The caller ID showed the same name that had been printed on the marriage certificate: Marla.
His phone started buzzing
on the desk.
“That’s the woman, the one I’m supposedly married to. Why is she calling you?”
Tom’s jaw tightened. His face changed in an instant, like he’d just realized something terrible.
“That explains everything!”
He answered the call and put it on speaker. A woman’s voice filled the office.
“After all these years, I finally got my revenge!”
She laughed, and the sound made my skin crawl.
He answered the call
and put it on speaker.
“You tried so hard to protect that boy from me, Tom. But you failed.”
“What are you talking about, Marla?” Tom said. “What did you do?”
“I paid someone to steal all the information I needed from your employee files and stole his name. Then I went after the money.”
My hands started shaking. “What are you talking about?”
“You tried so hard to protect
that boy from me, Tom.
But you failed.”
“Oh!” Her voice brightened even more. “The boy is there with you? Even better! Listen here, Andrew. I have ruined you.”
“You forged the marriage certificate! But why?”
“Payback. Your parents made sure I lost everything, so I’ve done the same to you. I might not be able to touch the money directly, but I can take out loans in your name. Credit cards. Personal loans. A second mortgage on a house you don’t even own. It’s beautiful, really.”
“Listen here, Andrew.
I have ruined you.”
I turned to Tom, my whole body shaking as her words sank in.
“I’ll be coming for you next, Tom. See you soon.”
The line went dead.
Tom sank into his chair.
“What’s going on?”
For a long moment, he just looked at me. Then he started talking.
“What’s going on?”
“Your parents, Marla, and I were friends years ago. Before you were born. We started a business together. Had big plans. But Marla got involved with some bad people. Started embezzling. When your parents found out, they turned her in.”
“And?” I said.
“There wasn’t enough evidence,” Tom continued. “Not enough to arrest her, anyway. She got away with it, but she lost everything else. Her reputation. Her career. She blamed your parents for that. Blamed me, too. She swore she’d get revenge someday.”
“She swore she’d
get revenge someday.”
I felt sick. “So she waited until I inherited their money.”
“Looks like it,” Tom said quietly.
I stood up, my hands balled into fists. “How do we stop her?”
Tom pointed to the paperwork on the desk. The pages I’d forgotten about in the chaos.
“My lawyer sent this over after I spoke to him this morning.”
I grabbed the papers, flipping through them with shaking hands.
Tom pointed to the
paperwork on the desk.
There were petitions, copies of the certificate, and notes about forged signatures and lack of consent.
“He was already preparing to challenge the record,” Tom continued. “Force a review. Buy us time.”
I looked up at him. “But the loans—”
Tom was already reaching for his phone.
Tom was already reaching
for his phone.
He told the lawyer everything.
At the end of the call, he turned to me. “He’ll handle the rest. Banks. Authorities. All of it.”
I exhaled slowly, my hands still shaking.
“So now what?” I asked.
“Now,” Tom said, “we wait for the wheels of justice to turn.”
“We wait for the wheels of justice to turn.”
The next week felt like a year.
Clara stayed by my side through all of it, and finally, the marriage was ruled fraudulent.
The signatures didn’t match because I’d never signed anything. The loans were voided. My credit would take time to repair, but the immediate threat was gone.
Marla was arrested.
Clara stayed by my side
through all of it.
The day after the marriage was officially dissolved, Clara and I stood in front of the clerk at city hall again.
“We’d like to get married,” I said.
“Congratulations,” he said. “Names?”
Clara squeezed my hand. I squeezed back.
This time, everything went exactly as it should have from the start.
Clara and I stood in front of
the clerk at city hall again.
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