My Fiancée Lost Her Memory The Day Before Our Wedding

The day before my girlfriend Lise and I were set to marry, she got into a car accident and lost her memory.

Worse, she started treating me like the villain who'd torn her apart from her first love.

I thought maybe she was just struggling to let go of that old relationship. After all, the one she loved now was me.

But later, I realized it'd all been my own wishful thinking from the start.

1

"Get out! I don't want to see you! Get out of here!"

This was the tenth time since the accident that Lise, ignoring the injury on her head, screamed at me to leave her hospital room.

The door slammed shut behind me, and I felt like I'd been plunged into ice water, unable to process it for a long moment.

Overnight, everything had flipped upside down.

Just yesterday, we'd been lying in bed together, wrapped in each other's arms, daydreaming about our honeymoon.

But today, she saw me as her enemy.

The door creaked open again, and Pamela stepped out. Maybe noticing how pale I'd gone, she tried to comfort me.

"Nicholas, don't take it too hard. Lise was in an accident-there's a clot pressing on her brain, messing with her memory..."

I lowered my gaze and closed my eyes briefly, trying to shove down the storm brewing inside me.

"I get it."

I just didn't understand.

Why, after losing her memory, did she recall everyone else but forget me-the one she supposedly loved so deeply? Why did she now see me as the monster who'd ruined her and her first love?

I could accept that maybe she hadn't fully moved on from that past romance, but even so, wasn't I the one she loved now?

I let out a soft sigh. I handed Pamela the pastries Lise always adored.

"She can have these if she gets hungry later. Don't tell her I bought them. She might not eat them if she knows."

Pamela took the bag, frowning slightly as if she wanted to say something.

"Nicholas, you..."

I forced a weak, stiff smile for her sake.

"It's fine. I believe she'll get all her memories back someday..."

2

Lise had been on her way to try on her wedding dress when the accident happened.

By the time I got the news and rushed to the hospital, she'd already come out of surgery and been moved to a ward.

Seeing her lying there, pale and bloodless, my heart twisted painfully for no reason I could name.

An hour later, as the anesthesia wore off, her fingers twitched faintly in my grip. I stood up, leaning over her. Her brows were furrowed, like she was fighting some unbearable agony.

Just as I opened my mouth to ask if she was okay, she cut me off with a voice so cold it chilled me to the bone.

"Nicholas, get out!"

-

In the doctor's office, Pamela showed me Lise's CT scans.

Pamela went on and on in my ear about how the clot was pressing on Lise's nerves, causing her amnesia, turning the man she once loved into her enemy.

"It's the memory distortion causing this... Nicholas, once the clot clears, she'll remember everything, I'm sure of it. Technology's advanced these days. Don't give up so easily. You've been together ten years-how many decades does a person get in life?"

Pamela's words were gentle, coaxing.

Yeah, how many decades? I hadn't even noticed how long we'd been together.

But why could she so easily forget the love we'd shared? Those tender, blissful years were never fake.

But she just clung to that unfinished romance with her first love.

I didn't know how deep her attachment to him ran to make her hate me this much.

But I wasn't angry.

After all, she was the one who'd said she loved me.

She was the one who'd agreed to marry me.

So I convinced myself that her feelings for her ex were a thing of the past.

What I didn't expect was Jerred showing up again.

3

I tried explaining everything to Lise.

No man could stomach his fiancée treating him like the villain who'd wrecked her happiness

Me as well.

I couldn't stand the way she looked at me with pure loathing.

When she spoke to others, her voice was so gentle.

She used to be so caring with me.

"Lise, just a month ago, you said yes to my proposal. That ring on your finger-it's proof..."

Before I could finish, she yanked her right hand out from the covers and ripped the ten-carat pink diamond off her ring finger, hurling it toward the door.

The gem lay there on the floor, alone.

Just like me, sitting beside her, abandoned without a second thought.

I'd never imagined that we, who'd once loved each other so fiercely, would end up like this.

My gaze drifted back to her face, searching for a trace of guilt or regret.

There was none.

Instead, all I got was her endless disgust and contempt.

In that moment, my chest tightened so much I could barely breathe, and a sour sting crept up my nose.

"Nicholas, you forced me to break up with Jerred, ruined my happiness, and now you think you can have me? I'm telling you, unless I'm dead, I'll never marry you!"

Her words were resolute, as if her breakup with Jerred was all my fault.

I tried to defend myself, but she shot me down again and again.

"No! That's not true! It's not like that!"

She clutched her head, her face draining of color, her breathing turning ragged.

The next second, she passed out again.

I was ushered out of the room.

Pamela told me pushing her wasn't smart.

The best thing was to let her rest, recover quietly.

"Maybe she'll suddenly remember..."

After that day, I started hoping she'd wake up one morning and recall everything.

Especially the love we'd shared.

But before that could happen, Jerred showed up.

4

A month later, Lise's condition had mostly stabilized.

The bandages on her head were gone, revealing her smooth forehead, though a faint pink scar marked the end of her brow.

I remembered what she'd once said to me.

"Nicholas, I hate pain so much. Promise you'll never, ever let me get hurt. I'd die from it.

Oh, and if we have kids after we're married, I need anesthesia. I'd pass out otherwise."

Now, a deep scar sat at her brow

But she didn't seem to care at all.

Like she was a different person.

I wanted to ask if it hurt.

But the distance she'd put between us lately made even speaking feel impossible.

After the nurse left, the room fell silent again.

I sat by her bed, watching her quietly.

After a long pause, she broke the stillness.

"Nicholas, why did I ever agree to marry you? The one I love isn't you. Can you tell Jerred I miss him? I really miss him. Can you ask him to come?"

She laid bare her feelings for Jerred without holding back.

Even in these rare moments of peace with me, her mind was filled with another man.

I couldn't bring myself to tell her she'd chosen to marry me because she loved me.

Or that she and Jerred had broken up ten years ago.

My throat tightened, bitterness flooding my chest.

When I looked up, she was staring at me, eyes brimming with anticipation.

That look stabbed right through me.

Then the door swung open.

"Lise."

A familiar voice hit my ears, and her gaze snapped to the doorway faster than mine.

I saw a smile bloom on her face, the one I hadn't seen in ages.

As I turned, I heard her voice, bright and happy.

"Jerred, you're here.

I've missed you so much."

Ten years later, Jerred stood there, flashing a wide grin at both of us.

In that moment, a quiet fear gripped me.

A fear that something was about to change forever.

5

Pamela told me she'd only just found out herself.

In her office, she kept her head down, hands clasped on her knees, clearly wrestling with how to phrase things to soften the blow.

"Sorry, Nicholas. I only learned yesterday that Jerred was back."

I let out a bitter laugh, itching to smash the vase in front of me to vent my frustration.

But I held it in.

My whitening knuckles ached, but beyond that, I was powerless.

"If you knew, why didn't you tell me right away?

Why not warn me?"

She rubbed her temples, like she'd expected this reaction.

"I thought about it, Nicholas. I never meant to keep it from you. But... Lise told me if I didn't want her to lose it, I shouldn't breathe a word to you about Jerred coming back. She said this happiness she's finally grasped. She doesn't want it to slip away again because of you."

So that was how much she hated me.

That's how low she'd placed me in her heart.

Even after ten years, Jerred still meant that much to her.

Thinking of our decade together, of how I'd dropped everything to care for her these past weeks, I felt ridiculous.

A cold laugh escaped my throat before I could stop it. Pamela opened her mouth but didn't know how to comfort me-or what to say at all.

After a long silence, as my laughter faded, she sighed softly.

"Nicholas, there's one more thing I didn't tell you. Lise reached out to Jerred herself. She still remembers his phone number."

6

I couldn't believe it.

Couldn't accept what Pamela was telling me.

She said she'd gone to check on Lise that morning, just after changing the dressing on her forehead, when the door swung open.

Jerred walked in.

Before Pamela could react, Lise, who'd been lying there weak and listless, lit up like she'd seen her own personal sun.

She sat up straight, beaming at him with a wide, genuine smile.

After Jerred left, Pamela asked her if this was fair to me.

"But she said... the one she's always loved, from start to finish, is Jerred. If it weren't for you, they'd have been together ages ago. They missed ten years. This time, she doesn't want to miss out again."

7

I left Pamela's office pretending to be calm.

Then I sat by the hospital's flowerbed, letting the cold wind blow away the heaviness in my chest.

Looking up slightly, I caught the sound of laughter drifting through the cracked window of a second-floor room.

Lise's room.

When I pushed the door open again, the laughter stopped cold.

They both turned to me in unison, and the room's vibe shifted to something awkward and strained.

Lise quickly looked away from me, her eyes settling on Jerred.

"Why are you still here?"

Her words were icy as ever, laced with unfiltered disgust at my presence.

Leave?

"Why should I leave? The one who should go is Jerred!"

I'd always been patient with Lise. In our ten years together, I'd let her have her way, never once losing my temper.

But this time, seeing them so at ease together right in front of me, I couldn't hold back anymore.

"Lise, don't get it twisted. You're my fiancée. The one you're supposed to marry is me! You and Jerred? That's ancient history!"

As the words left my mouth, I realized how pathetic I sounded.

Clinging to a title to keep her tied to me.

Lise pressed her lips together thinly.

Jerred, sitting beside her, didn't look too pleased either.

Just when I thought she'd tell him to leave, she turned to me instead.

I caught the serious, solemn look on her face, and a bad feeling crept up inside me.

Sure enough, the next second, she spoke.

"Nicholas."

Her voice was eerily calm, her face blank as she looked at me.

"Let's break up."