Close, But Not Matching

Ever since moving to a new town full of people I didn't know, people kept coming up claiming to know me. They thought my name was Brian.

Sometimes I'd correct them, politely of course. Usually I chose to go along with the misconception.

"Hey there, Brian!" They'd say "How's it goin'?"

"Good, how are you?" I'd say back, moving along like I had somewhere to go and couldn't stand around shooting the breeze. A nice friendly smile seemed to be enough to leave behind.

This went on for years. After many encounters with Brian's legion of acquaintances I learned that he was single, played hockey, worked for a bank and was a francophone. Although we apparently looked almost identical, we had little else in common. I was married, never really learned to skate, worked in the social services and was an anglophone.

I puzzled over this at length. I tried to come up with ways to get people who thought I was Brian to say his last name. That way, I thought, I could look him up and perhaps make contact with my French doppelganger. Anyway, I wasn't clever enough to devise a plan that would work without letting on who I was not.

Then one day a friend of mine invited me to go to a tavern that I otherwise would never have entered. There was live music there every Wednesday night, a strategy the owners had initiated to try to revive their sagging mid-week cash flow. The place was obviously headed for oblivion. Pieces of the drywall ceiling were hanging down, the rafters above well-charred by a long-ago fire. Some of the worn linoleum tiles on the floor were missing, exposing rough-sawn splintered planks underneath. Bare neon tubes flickered incessantly overhead. The bored-looking bartender and lone harried table server looked as though this were the last place on Earth they wished to be.

As it happened, on this night the place was packed with customers talking and laughing as loudly as they could while the band played at maximum volume. The smell of beer, tobacco and weed permeated the air. The server had to squeeze her wiry frame around people as she moved from table to table with her hands full of pitchers.

I was watching her when my attention was seized by a face in a corner of the room. It was like looking in a mirror. At the same moment I saw my double, he saw me. I imagine the light of recognition I saw in his eyes shone in mine as well.

I got up and started making my way to the table where he was sitting. The closer I got, the greater my amazement at how much this man looked like me.

Finally I stood before him.

"You must be Brian," I said.

The other fellow replied, "And you must be Bob." His perfect English was delivered with a distinct Northern Ontario French twang.

"People say we look alike."

Brian rose to his feet and started to say, I think, that those people were right, when he stopped abruptly.

Actually, both of us stopped. I think words escaped us both.

You see, I am six feet tall. Brian, whose hair, face and upper body looked just like mine, was five-feet-two. After a awkward moment of silence we both started laughing.

Brian invited me to have a seat and bought me a beer. We listened to the band that was playing, not saying much, but every so often we'd catch each other's eye and start laughing again. When the musicians finished their tune, I bought Brian a beer and went back to my friend's table for the rest of the evening.

Since that encounter, I haven't bumped into Brian again, but do occasionally run into someone who thinks I am him. Now, however, I tell them, "Sorry, you've got me mixed up with someone else," while I wonder how they could possibly mistake us for one another.

When I hear someone say that every person has a double somewhere in the world, I think, Yes - well, almost - maybe.

I am still waiting to meet mine.