Out of the blue, I got a message from an old friend, A, whom I hadn't heard from in years.

He wrote that he had gotten married, built a new house in Nagoya, and had a baby girl, and that he wanted to catch up sometime.

A little while later, I had a business trip to Nagoya, so we arranged to meet up.

He seemed genuinely happy, surrounded by his petite, fair-skinned wife and cute baby daughter.

Before we parted, he took a group photo with his camera, and I left in high spirits.

Things got weird after that.

I bumped into our mutual friend B, and when I mentioned visiting A's house recently, B said he had been there too.

"Man, I'm so jealous he could afford to build such a huge house in Osaka," B said.

"Huh...? Osaka? Don't you mean Nagoya?" I asked. B looked puzzled. "It's Osaka, right? My parents live in Osaka, so I visited him when I went home for New Year's. He has two boys, too." ...What??? As I stood there thoroughly confused, B showed me the photo he had taken back then.

What...? The man in the picture was definitely A, but his wife was someone else completely—a tall, sharp-featured beauty. And there were two little boys who looked just like A.

I quickly sent A an email.

"Thanks for having me over the other day! Could you send me that picture we took?"

A reply came back almost immediately.

"Sorry for the delay! Attached!"

I screamed.

The wife in the photo was a completely different Asian woman. She wasn't the wife I had met, nor was she the woman in B's photo. What's more, a three-year-old boy I had never seen before was hugging my leg in the photo, smiling and flashing a peace sign.

Shaking, I typed out a reply.

"Thanks for the photo! By the way, I ran into B the other day, and he mentioned he visited your place too lol"

The moment I sent that, A stopped replying.

Whenever I tried sending another message, it bounced back as address unknown. I haven't been able to contact A ever since.