DOPPELBÄNGER

  W.H. LOCKWOOD

  For a list of potentially sensitive content, and for more information about this book, please visit the website at www.whlockwood.com.

  Please note, this book is written in Australian English, and abides by Australian grammar and punctuation conventions.

  Cover and interior art by @lis_photoart

  Proofreading by SJ Buckley

  Copyright © 2026 by WH Lockwood

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  CONTENT ADVISORY

  Thank you for picking up Doppelbänger.

  Please check the CWs on my website: whlockwood.com

  This book is intended for an adult audience and includes scenes and themes that may be upsetting for some readers. These include but are not limited violence, attempted murder, explicit on-page intimacy, sci-fi themes, a guy who absolutely falls for his actual self, and Bon Jovi.

  Thank you, and if you choose to go ahead, I hope you love this book.

  WH

  DOPPELBÄNGER OFFICIAL PLAYLIST

  Find the official Doppelbänger hair metal playlist on Spotify.

  You Give Love A Bad Name—Bon Jovi

  Kickstart My Heart—Mötley Crüe

  You’re So Vain—Faster Pussycat

  Mirror Mirror (Look Into My Eyes)—Def Leppard

  Dancing With Myself—Billy Idol

  Bad Medicine—Bon Jovi

  Talk Dirty To Me—Poison

  In And Out Of Love—Bon Jovi

  Cum On Feel The Noize—Quiet Riot

  Pour Some Sugar On Me—Def Leppard

  I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead—Bon Jovi

  Metal Health (Bang Your Head)—Quiet Riot

  We’re Not Gonna Take It—Twister Sister

  Cherry Pie—Warrant

  Why Can’t This Be Love—Van Halen

  Rock You Like A Hurricane—Scorpions

  Livin’ On A Prayer—Bon Jovi

  Ain’t Talkin’ ‘Bout Love—Van Halen

  Lay Your Hands On Me—Bon Jovi

  Here I Go Again—Whitesnake

  Runaway—Bon Jovi

  Smokin’ In The Boys Room—Mötley Crüe

  I Wanna Rock—Twisted Sister

  Unskinny Bop—Poison

  Bad Moon Rising—Leatherwolf

  I’ll Be There For You—Bon Jovi

  I Love Rock ‘N’ Roll—Joan Jett And The Blackhearts

  Up Around The Bend—Hanoi Rocks

  Mighty Wings—Cheap Trick

  Turn Up The Radio—Autograph

  Rebel Yell—Billy Idol

  I Hate Myself For Loving You—Joan Jett And The Blackhearts

  Ride The Wind—Poison

  Scratch And Bite—Treat

  Eyes Without A Face—Billy Idol

  Do You Wanna Touch Me (Oh Yeah)—Joan Jett And The Blackhearts

  Bad Boys (Of Rock ‘N’ Roll)—Twisted Sister

  Can’t Get Enough—Winger

  Take Me Home—Studs

  Always—Bon Jovi

  Armageddon It—Def Leppard

  Nothin’ But A Good Time—Poison

  Keep The Faith—Bon Jovi

  Johnny B. Goode—Judas Priest

  Detroit Rock City—KISS

  Wanted Dead Or Alive—Bon Jovi

  Rock And Roll All Nite—KISS

  Bed Of Roses—Bon Jovi

  Once Bitten Twice Shy—Great White

  Without Love—Bon Jovi

  Every Rose Has Its Thorn—Poison

  Don’t Pay The Ferryman—Chris de Burgh

  This Ain’t A Love Song—Bon Jovi

  Rock Of Ages—Def Leppard

  Highway To Hell—AC/DC

  In These Arms—Bon Jovi

  You Really Got Me—Van Halen

  You Took The Words Right Out Of My Mouth—Meat Loaf

  The Final Countdown—Europe

  Blaze Of Glory—Bon Jovi

  CONTENTS

  1. Good August

  Is A Fucking Narcissist

  2. Good August

  And How His Day Got Even Weirder

  3. Good August

  Is Beside Himself. Literally.

  4. Bad August

  That’s me. But ‘Good August’ Doesn’t Need to Know That Just Yet…

  5. Good August

  Out Of Time

  6. Bad August

  To The Rescue. Sort of.

  7. Good August

  Has Probably, All Things Considered, Earned A Drink

  8. Bad August

  Does Not Level With Good August

  9. Good August

  Is NOT Smitten

  10. Bad August

  First Thing

  11. Good August

  Well, Shit

  12. Good August

  Loops

  13. Bad August

  Actually Likes Good August Quite A Bit

  14. Bad August

  And The Prettiest Aspect In The Entire Galaxy

  15. Good August

  Is Thinking…

  16. Bad August

  Unfortunately Cannot Read Minds

  17. Good August

  Kickstart My Heart

  18. Bad August

  Bad Medicine

  19. Good August

  Runaway

  20. Bad August

  In And Out Of Love

  21. Good August

  Endures a Talk

  22. Good August

  Mirror Mirror

  23. Bad August

  Wanted Dead Or Alive

  24. Bad August

  Shot Through The Heart

  25. Good August

  Boyfriend Material

  26. Bad August

  Doppelbänger

  27. Bad August

  Every Rose Has Its Thorn

  28. Good August

  This Ain’t A Love Song

  29. Bad August

  The Final Countdown

  30. Good August

  Okay, But What The Actual Fuck?

  31. Bad August

  In Freefall

  32. Good August

  Is Surprisingly Okay With Destroying The World To Keep Bad August Around A Bit Longer

  33. Bad August

  Rift

  34. Good August

  I’ll Be There For You

  35. Bad August

  Talk Dirty To Me

  36. Good August

  Here I Go Again

  37. Good August

  Hard Science

  38. Bad August

  In These Arms

  39. Bad August

  Nothin’ But A Good Time

  40. Good August

  Slippery When Wet

  41. Bad August

  Livin’ On A Prayer

  42. Good August

  Lay Your Hands On Me

  43. Good August

  Why Can’t This Be Love

  44. Bad August

  A World Away

  45. Bad August

  And… August…

  46. Maybe Not Always So Completely

  Good August

  47. Good August

  Pour Some Sugar On Me

  48. Bad August

  Can’t Get Enough

  49. Good August

  Take Me Home

  50. Actually Not So

  Bad August

  Epilogue

  Thank you for reading Doppelbänger!!

  Acknowledgments

  Also by W.H. Lockwood

  About W.H. Lockwood

  “Sometimes it is the people no one imagines anything of who do the things that no one can imagine.”

  —ALAN TURING

  CHAPTER ONE

  GOOD AUGUST

  IS A FUCKING NARCISSIST

  “You’re an absolute fucking narcissist, August Blackthorne!”

  “I’m a fucking narcissist?” I scream right back at my phone. “Have you seen your hair lately?” I pause for Jon to reply, and when he doesn’t, the silence—that sinking feeling of being alone—stabs a reminder into my heart of why I’m calling him in the first place.

  I need his help.

  Badly.

  I force myself to calm down, drawing in a deep breath to get control. “Listen, I’m in trouble and…”

  Still nothing.

  Such a void-like nothing that my stomach clamps in outrage. “Did you just hang up on me?”

  I wrench the phone away from my ear, every muscle in my arm ready to smash the thing when I see that blank screen. But it’s a champagne-pink finish, and I can’t afford another one.

  All that energy has to go somewhere, though, so I simultaneously clench my fists, stomp my foot, and make a weird screech-shout sound, before yelling at the top of my lungs, “Fuck you, Jon!”

  Then I slightly recoil when I hear a mother, a few metres away, scolding her son into crossing the street away from me.

  His big blue eyes are open double wide, locked onto me as she carries him along while he protests, “But that man said the f-word!”

  To which she hurriedly whispers, “Don’t make eye contact!”

  Because yes, I’m standing in the middle of the street at nine a.m. on a Thursday morning, screaming at my ex over the phone like a madman. And maybe I look a li
ttle rough. A lot rough. But with good reason.

  He was there again this morning.

  My stalker.

  You know that feeling when you’re being watched? That was me fifteen minutes ago. Sound asleep, but then the sensation of another presence nearby ripped me into reality. It felt like a demon sitting on my chest, that sense of danger. My eyes flicked towards the window by instinct, and there he was—a dark shape, obscured by shadow and the thick lace curtains my landlady insists are just as good as the blackout blinds she won’t let me install. But it was him.

  Until now, the guy’s mostly been poking through my mailbox, stealing clothes off my line. He’s followed me home a few times. But this was the boldest he’s been to date.

  Clearly he scared the shit out of me, so I sat up and yelled something very decisive and threatening like, “Hey!”

  I thought it did the trick because he ran. And I ran to the window, searching for him.

  No sign, for about one minute.

  I was just deciding whether to call the cops again when I heard it. That scuff of boots echoing off the concrete just outside my front door.

  I knew it wasn’t my landlady. Thursday morning is mahjong day for her. She never misses it. Sure, it could have been someone else, but…

  The door handle. No knock, no announcement—he went straight for entry. I watched it swivel, heard the sound of it rattling. Then it stopped.

  I was bolted to the spot, my pulse hammering in my ears.

  I know what to do in an altercation. Rule number one of self-defence: run.

  Yet even as the thought occurred to me, I stood there watching, hoping that lock would hold—that he’d give up and go away.

  Then came the gentle clang of metal on concrete. Did he have a knife? No… It was softer… It was…

  Metal scraping metal.

  A lock pick.

  I barely remember what came next. My hoodie from the floor because it’s winter. My sneakers in my hand, ready to escape. My laptop and phone because they’re the only things I own of any value.

  Then I was out the window. Out the window and running down the street. Calling the cops to hear that they’ll ‘drive by in a few hours.’ They’re too busy this Thursday morning, apparently, since they know I’m ‘safe.’

  Then it was me calling Jon to hear that I’m a fucking narcissist because how dare I have a stalker when he doesn’t have one. Classic Jon. The prick.

  And now here I am, standing in the middle of the street, with my stalker in my apartment doing god knows what. Maybe he’s stealing more of my clothes? Maybe he’s wanking into my sheets? Maybe he’s writing a threatening message on the wall in red paint? Or blood? That will be nice to sleep with tonight, since I don’t have anywhere else to go.

  All this to say, it’s no wonder I’m scaring small children with my dishevelled appearance.

  I push the door open on a nearby cafe. It’s the safest place I can think of to get away from him. And it’s warm. This winter has been vicious, and I’m trying to keep the heating bills down at home, so I come here regularly. On a quiet day, I can get a good two or three hours out of this place before I start feeling too bad about having only bought one coffee.

  I join the short queue, looking nervously over my shoulder through the glass door. He’s never followed me away from the house. That I know of. Maybe he has?

  If I could just figure out what he wants from me… But this morning, hearing that door handle, seeing it twist… He’s escalating.

  Which is why I called Jon. Having to call an ex for help is galling enough. But having to call one for shelter when you specifically broke up during a fight about how you didn’t want to live with him…

  What an asshole.

  “Order?”

  I jump, realising the line that was in front of me has quickly dissipated, and I’m standing in the middle of the cafe holding everyone up. Head down, I shuffle forward and spit out my order as quickly as possible. “Oat cappuccino. Please.”

  The woman behind the counter grabs a paper cup and a pen. She’s already writing as she asks, “Takeaway again?”

  Again? “N-no. No, it’s for here.”

  “Oh.” She pauses with a frown like I just shat in her paper cup, then scribbles out whatever she was writing. She slams the cup back down. “Size?”

  “Large.”

  Stalling again, she raises an eyebrow. “Two large coffees in the space of an hour?”

  “What?” I lick my lips, already anxious about the stalker, having held up the line, having disgraced her paper cup. Now I’m being quizzed about my coffee intake while impatient people glare at my back. “It’s my first today.” I reach for my wallet in the hope that will move things along swiftly.

  She grabs the pay station, tapping away, but she mutters, “It’s not good for your health, that much coffee.”

  What is she, my doctor? “Yeah, no,” I sort of agree with her. “That’s why I’m just having the one.”

  Eyes like a cobra, as if I just slapped her cheek with my duelling glove, she pauses again. She looks over my mess of an outfit. The man behind me shuffles his position pointedly so I can hear his shoes creaking against the floor. He sighs over my shoulder, his morning breath boring into my nostrils. Then everything slows a little when the barista asks, “August?”

  Not again…

  And now the room shifts, the ivy and the heat lamps and the already dated raw-concrete walls all pressing down on me. My voice comes weak when I ask, “How do you know my name?”

  She pushes the pay station forward for me to tap my card. “Because this is your second large coffee today.” She studies my face, and decides, it seems, that I’m neither obtuse nor arrogant. A touch of concern falls across her brow. “You don’t remember being in here?”

  “No.” What kind of a stupid answer is that, August? “Yes.” Not better! “Yes, no, I mean, um…” Just give me the coffee! “I just need a coffee.” I smile over the words, squinting my eyes deliberately as if I can blame the lot of this mess on tiredness, but my hand’s shaking as I tap my card to pay.

  “I’ll bring it over.” Her lips are tight when she speaks, but her voice has softened a little.

  When I take a step back, it’s directly into the chest of the mouth-breather behind me. I desperately want to escape at this point, get the coffee takeaway and get out of here, because I know she’s going to be scowling at me for the next two hours while I sip my steadily cooling large drink. But I’m both polite to a fault and too broke to afford my heating bill at home (also, there’s probably a killer there), so I thank her, idiotically apologise to the encroaching guy I walked into, then look for the warmest table in the place.

  As soon as I sit down, I realise I’m too close to the heater, but you can imagine how many fucks I give at this point. I rip my hoodie off and get my laptop out so I can pretend I’m busy working. Of course, the job market being what it is, I’ve really got nothing to do but sit here and sink into my anxiety.

  Maybe I shouldn’t have got that triple shot…

  But how does she know my name?

  The thing is, this keeps happening to me. People recognising me in places I haven’t been, asking me why I’m back there already, saying they just saw me. People who know my name when they shouldn’t know my name. It’s been going on for a full week, at least, and it started right about the time my stalker turned up.

  The obvious conclusion is he’s trying to steal my identity. That he’s taken mail out of my bin to figure out who I am, and now he’s using my name around the place. But why me? My credit’s shot, I have no money or assets to steal. What the hell does he think he’s going to find in my crappy studio apartment? Other than me…

  But even then, none of that explains why random people are physically mistaking this guy for me. What’s he got, a face mask or something?