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Claudia Brown.
An exceptional woman, really. Someone who deserved the world and more. It was a shame she never got to see more of it, even if she had bore witness to more of it than most people could even dream of. It was also a shame she never even truly existed, in this timeline, at least.
Jennifer Lewis.
Also an exceptional woman, just in an entirely different way. Where Claudia was sweet, Jenny was sharp. It was not a complete character flaw, but it was just such a stark difference to the face she wore that it became hard to see the similarities sometimes.
Two women who were the same in every physical aspect, yet almost polar opposites in personality.
The first time that Nick saw Jenny, he could have sworn he was going insane. Everyone around him claimed that Claudia Brown never existed, yet there was undeniable proof that she was still alive standing in front of him. It was only when he looked past the immediate likeness that he began to see the differences.
Jenny wore more makeup, dressed a lot fancier than Claudia did, and was much colder to him.
Claudia Brown was truly gone.
The revelation on its own was enough to devastate him. The fact there was someone masquerading around with Claudia's face was just rubbing salt on the wound.
Claudia had been a breath of fresh air for him, the first woman he dared to love after Helen's death. Supposed death.
Helen was another issue entirely. It was her fault, as far as Nick was concerned, that Claudia Brown was replaced by Jenny Lewis. He doesn't know how, exactly, but it must have been her. There was no other rational explanation. She seemed hell bent on making his life much more difficult once she had returned, and while she could not have directly changed the past, she must have done something to influence it.
Claudia didn't deserve her fate. No one deserves to just stop existing entirely. No friends, no family, no trace of a being. Really, he just wished that she was by his side once again, those brown eyes sparkling when they looked into his.
Those eyes still looked at him now, just from a different perspective.
That's what Jenny is. A different perspective. A different woman in the same body.
When he looked at her he still felt the love he did for Claudia, yet it was twisted, distorted. Looking at her felt like looking into an anomaly itself. The past becoming the present.
He supposed that they were one in the same, the anomalies and Jenny. Neither were supposed to exist, or maybe they were, but either way they were a surprise. They were not something that fit into the world that Nick imagined, yet presented themselves to him anyways.
As time went on he found himself missing Claudia less. Well, less isn't exactly the word he would use. His love adapted. After a while he felt that living in the past was of no use to anyone. There was no point dwelling because the past had a way of haunting him and coming back when least expected. He knew this. He had lived this. Yet it was still a surprise to him when he found himself truly falling for Jenny.
Behind her sharp exterior there was more Claudia in her than Nick had first realised. As she warmed up to him he truly saw it for the first time. She wasn't the same, of course, but it was just enough to catch his attention.
However, that wasn't what attracted him to her. The aspects of Jenny that were entirely unique to her were what truly enticed him. It was confusing, but for the first time he truly saw her as her own person rather than someone wearing Claudia's skin.
He began to love her, as he once did Claudia.
Yet the universe was ever cruel, and in his final moments the only person he could think of was her. Claudia Brown, now Jenny Lewis. The woman who stole his heart.