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It was truth known only to me, but I believed in it more than I believed in the facts arrayed against it. I believed that in some sense not factually verifiable I was a straight-A student. In the same way, I believed I was an Eagle Scout.... And on the boy who lived in their letters, the splendid phantom who carried all my hopes, I saw, at last, my own face.

In Part Five, Chapter 3, Jack's forges letters of recommendation from his teachers so that he can be accepted to elite private schools, and takes his re- creation of his identity to a new level. As Jack writes these lies about himself, they seem absolutely true to him. Jack refers to himself as a "phantom" and trades in his true self in favor of a boy who is everything he wants to be, no matter how false this new identity really is. Thus, Jack concludes that these letters are not lies, but are actually more truthful than any letter his teacher could honestly have produced.

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