**Diary Entry – 15th March**
You never imagine disaster will strike until it does. It was just an ordinary evening—driving home after a pint with my mate, radio on, singing along, feeling cheerful. Then, in an instant, everything changed. A car tore round the bend and slammed into me. The impact was the last thing I remembered.
I woke in hospital to the news I’d been in a coma for ten days. The doctors said I was lucky not to be paralysed. Lucky? I didn’t feel it. Partial amnesia had stolen chunks of my past. I remembered my family, my closest mates, my dog—but not where I worked, nor my exact address, though I could picture the house.
Most unsettling of all, I didn’t remember *him*. The man who, according to the doctors, hadn’t left my side. The man who greeted me when I woke, claiming to be my fiancé. *Oliver*, he said his name was. His face meant nothing to me.
“Why doesn’t she remember me? She remembers everyone else!” Oliver demanded of the doctor.
“Partial amnesia works unpredictably,” the doctor explained. “She may recall some things, not others.”
“We’ve been together eighteen months,” Oliver insisted. “Engaged. Wedding plans underway. What now?”
“Talk to her. Show her photos. It might jog her memory.”
“*Might?*”
“She fell for you once,” the doctor said gently. “Perhaps she will again.”
After that, Oliver arrived daily with photos, gifts, stories of our supposed life together. But nothing felt familiar.
“I’m sorry,” I admitted. “It’s all blank.”
“We’ll get through this,” he said, squeezing my hand.
Mum, of course, was relentless. “How could you not tell me about Oliver?” she fumed.
“Mum, I *don’t remember*,” I said.
“He claims you were going to announce the engagement after the proposal, but the crash happened first. I don’t buy it. You’ve always been private, but this?”
Days passed in a blur of Oliver’s tales and Mum’s scepticism until, finally, I was discharged. Oliver drove me home—*our* home, he said.
All I cared about was seeing Archie, my border terrier. The moment we pulled up, his frantic barks echoed through the house. But the second Oliver opened the door, Archie lunged, snarling, teeth bared.
“Get him off me! Control him!” Oliver shouted, scrambling back.
“Archie! *Enough!*” I snapped. He obeyed, but his growls didn’t cease.
“Put him in the garden,” Oliver said.
“Why?”
“Because he’s *vicious*!”
“You said we lived together. Why’s he acting like you’re a stranger?”
“He’s never liked me,” Oliver muttered. “Your mum looked after him while you were in hospital. Maybe he forgot me.”
Doubt prickled. Archie hadn’t forgotten *me*. I spent an hour in the garden with him, his tail wagging wildly. When I came inside, his barks erupted again.
“This isn’t right,” I said.
“He’s a dog. Who knows what goes on in his head?” Oliver shrugged.
I asked for my phone. “Smashed in the crash,” Oliver said. “I’ll replace it tomorrow.”
“Good. I want to see Beth.”
“Not wise,” he said quickly. “Doctor’s orders—rest.”
“He said no such thing.”
“Trust me.”
That night, I slept in the spare room with Archie. Oliver’s claim that we “always left him outside” rang false—I’d *never* do that.
The next day, Oliver gave me a new phone—new number, no way to reach Beth. My social media? Locked. I felt trapped, only allowed out with Oliver.
He pushed for a quick wedding. “I love you too much to wait,” he said. But how could I marry a man I didn’t know?
Then, overhearing him at the door: “Not *yet*!” he hissed before slamming it.
“Who was that?” I asked.
“Wrong address.”
Later, a knock. Beth stood there, eyes wide. “I’m scared,” I admitted.
“He blocked me from seeing you,” she said. “Emily, listen—Oliver *isn’t real.*”
“What?”
“I looked. There’s no record of him. Either you never mentioned him, or he’s lying.”
A courier arrived with an envelope. Inside—a marriage contract. If we divorced, Oliver got half my assets. My late gran’s fortune, left to me.
“The *bastard*,” Beth spat.
We called the police. When Oliver returned, Archie’s furious barks gave him away.
“Got the contract?” Oliver asked breezily.
“The one where you steal half my money?”
“Only if we divorce,” he said, leaning in. A knock interrupted.
The police arrested him on the spot. He screamed curses, claiming we’d ruined his “perfect plan.”
Turns out his real name was *Gavin*. A former nurse, he’d worked at the care home where Gran spent her final days. He’d targeted me, exploiting my amnesia.
As the police car drove off, Archie bounded over, tongue lolling. If not for him, I might’ve fallen for Gavin’s lies.
**Lesson learned:** Trust your dog. And your gut. Both have better instincts than a stranger with a smooth story.
