The first time I met Jess, she was wearing a blindingly bright orange dress and had a laugh that could crack glass. She burst into our apartment like she owned the air around her and immediately launched into a monologue about her latest yoga retreat. I remember standing in the kitchen, hands on a bowl of salad I hadn’t even started tossing yet, watching her swirl around the room like a tornado of too much energy and too little tact. After she left, I told Kevin, “She’s the human version of an air horn.” He laughed. I meant it.
Jess is the kind of person who posts a photo for every mood, celebrates half-birthdays, and once brought a karaoke machine to Christmas dinner. I’m the kind of person who brings a book just in case. We’re not enemies—never yelled at each other or had a dramatic falling-out—but I wouldn’t call us friends either. She’s loud and messy in ways I find exhausting. I’m quiet and meticulous in ways she finds “kind of creepy,” as she once told Kevin when she didn’t realize I was in earshot.
So no, we didn’t bond over shared sisterhood or girl talk. And when I got pregnant with our daughter three years ago, Jess’s reactions were… strange. One day, she brought over a pile of baby clothes with a smile so wide it felt forced. The next week, she skipped my baby shower, claiming a “migraine” but posting beach photos later that day. Kevin brushed it off, said she was just emotional. He knew they were struggling to conceive, so I tried to be empathetic. But still. It stung.
Now, I’m thirty-three, pregnant with twins—one boy and one girl—and honestly, I’m thrilled but also terrified. Our daughter, Riley, is three and wild as a spark. Kevin and I joke that she was born with a whistle and a clipboard, constantly trying to organize the world around her. We weren’t expecting to be here again so soon, let alone with twins. But we are. And it feels like a miracle.
A couple months ago, while we were brainstorming baby names, Kevin casually said, “Just don’t post them anywhere yet. You know how Jess is.” I laughed. But deep down, I knew what he meant.
Jess and Terrance had finally gotten pregnant last year after rounds of IVF. Their son, Archer, was born just a few weeks ago. They were ecstatic, and to her credit, Jess seemed genuinely happy—until I mentioned the twins.
Suddenly, she started showing up more often, asking weirdly specific questions about nursery colors and name ideas. Once, while dropping off a gift for Riley, she lingered a little too long in the hallway and said, “You guys better not pick something boring like ‘Henry.’” I smiled politely and said we hadn’t decided yet.
The truth was, we had decided.
Ever since college, I’d dreamed of naming a daughter “Margot.” It was classic but strong, elegant without being pretentious. Kevin loved it too. For the boy, we settled on “Miles”—after my late grandfather. It just felt right. We kept it between us. Only our parents knew.
But then Jess started getting pushier.
“Come on, you can tell me,” she said one day while we were all having lunch at Kevin’s parents’ house. “I bet it’s something cute and quirky. You always pick such… safe names.”
I looked at her, smiled, and said, “Actually, we’re leaning toward Emberlyn for the girl. And probably Jaxton for the boy.”
She blinked. “Emberlyn?”
“Yeah. It’s different, right?”
She laughed. “That’s… wow. Yeah. Definitely different.”
Kevin looked at me from across the table with a mixture of confusion and admiration. He knew. I hadn’t told him I’d planned to lie. But I had a hunch. A deep, unshakable one.
And I was right.
Two weeks later, Terrance and Jess posted the birth announcement: Welcome to the world, Jaxton and Emberlyn!
I swear I dropped my phone.
Jess had stolen the fake names.
I showed Kevin. He burst out laughing, then shook his head like he couldn’t believe it. “She actually did it.”
We never confronted her. What could we say? “Hey, you fell for the decoy names I fed you in case you were planning to be shady”? It felt petty. But at the same time, I was relieved. We still had Margot and Miles. Names we loved. Names she hadn’t touched.
At our baby shower last month, Jess kept making little digs. “I hope your babies don’t hate their names when they’re older,” she’d say, then nudge me like it was a joke. I just smiled and thought, You have no idea.
The twins were born last week. Healthy, beautiful, perfect. Margot has Kevin’s eyes. Miles has my mother’s smile. When we posted their names, Jess didn’t comment.
She texted Kevin instead: “Nice. Real classy.”
We laughed. He replied with a single emoji: 😏
There was no fight. No fireworks. Just quiet satisfaction.
A few days ago, Terrance called to apologize. He said Jess had been “under a lot of pressure” and “maybe got too caught up.” He didn’t know I’d faked the names. Kevin told him we wanted to keep things private, and it was unfortunate the names overlapped, but no harm done.
And maybe that’s true.
But there’s a lesson here. A quiet one. About trust. About intuition. About the power of observing the people around you and listening to your gut when something feels off.
I’m not proud I lied. But I’m not sorry either. Sometimes you have to play the long game. Sometimes protecting your peace means being a little… strategic.
Margot and Miles are home now. Riley loves being a big sister. Kevin keeps joking that we should trademark the names before Jess gets any more ideas.
I just smile and rock Margot in the nursery, thinking about how something so small—a lie about a name—turned into a little victory.
Would you have done the same? Or was I totally out of line?
If this made you smile (or cringe), like and share. I want to know what you think.
