1…

~~Evans~~

Is this doctor being for real?

“Are you certain he has amnesia, and not faking it?” I asked, watching the doctor’s face for any flicker of hesitation. I needed to be sure. This wouldn’t be the first time he’d used a lie to get exactly what he wanted from me.

“Mr. Evans, I understand your skepticism, but I assure you, I’m not lying.” The doctor set down his tablet and met my eyes directly. “He’s experiencing retrograde amnesia. It’s affected the past year of his life specifically. Everything before that year is intact, his childhood, his family, his early memories. But that one year has been wiped clean. As far as his mind is concerned, it never happened.”

My chest tightened. “Retrograde amnesia. What does that even mean, in plain terms?”

“It means the injury disrupted his ability to recall memories that were already stored, rather than his ability to form new ones going forward. The trauma to his temporal lobe likely damaged the neural pathways tied to that specific window of time. It’s not uncommon after the kind of head injury he sustained. The brain sometimes protects itself by sealing off the period closest to the trauma.” He paused. “In some cases, memories resurface gradually, triggered by familiar smells, places, faces. In others, they never come back at all. There’s no way to predict which path he’ll take.”

“Oh.” I heard my own voice come out smaller than I meant it to. “So that means he doesn’t remember anything about me.”

The doctor’s expression softened, the way people’s faces do right before they say something they know will hurt. “If you’ve only known each other for that year, then no. As far as he’s concerned, you’re a stranger.”

A stranger. The word landed somewhere behind my ribs and stayed there.

“Doctor, how long until his memories come back? Give me a number. Weeks? Months?”

“I wish I could give you one. I won’t tell you this is temporary, and I won’t tell you it’s permanent, because the truth is I don’t know. What I can tell you is that reintroducing him to the people, places, and routines from that year, gently and without pressure, can sometimes act as a trigger. Photographs. Familiar rooms. Repeated exposure to the person he was closest to.”

Help him remember. Hell, no.

The thought rose up so fast and so sure that it almost frightened me. He’d forgotten which is even better. We will keep it that way. If the year he couldn’t remember was the year everything fell apart between us, then maybe forgetting was the mercy neither of us had been brave enough to ask for. It was time for new memories. Ones I got to write this time.

I swallowed the storm behind my eyes and looked back up at the doctor, arranging my face into something calm, something grateful. “Okay. Thank you, Doctor.”

He nodded, already turning back to his chart, already moving on to whatever came next in his day, unaware that he’d just handed me the one thing I didn’t know how to ask for. A blank page.

I stepped out into the hallway and let the door fall shut behind me before I allowed myself to breathe. My hands were shaking. I pressed them flat against the wall until they stopped.

Then I pulled out my phone and dialed.

“Priya. It’s me.” My voice came out steadier than I felt.

“Mr. Evans? Is everything alright, is Felix—”

“He’s stable. He’s fine, physically.” I started walking, fast, like if I moved quickly enough my thoughts might keep up. “I need you to do something for me, and I need it done fast.”

“Of course. What do you need?”

“The Hollow Pines property. The villa on the lake. Get it staffed and stocked by Friday. I want it lived-in, not staged. Real books with cracked spines on the shelves. Two toothbrushes in the master bath, worn down like they’ve been used for a year. His clothes need to already be in the closet, mixed with mine, not folded like they just came from a store. Coffee mugs with a chip in them. I want it to look like a home two people have shared for a long time, not a house someone moved into last week.”

There was a pause on the line, the kind Priya only gave me when she already knew this was going to be one of those requests. “Understood. Anything else?”

“Yes~~ make sure there are personal items in the house that he would recognize.”

“Such as?”

I thought for a moment.

“His favorite coffee. The perfume he used to wear. His watch collection. The blue sweater he always complained about but secretly loved.”

I paused.

“Put our names on the mailbox.”

My assistant went quiet.

“Anything else?”

“Yes.”

I lowered my voice.

“Find someone who can create a wedding certificate replica for the photographs.”

“Sir, that might be—”

“Not a real legal document.”

I cut her off.

“I want something framed for the bedroom. Nothing official. Just something that looks sentimental.”

“Understood.”

The elevator doors opened and I stepped out.

“And one more thing.”

“Yes, sir?”

“I want the staff briefed and the security hidden”

“Briefed about what?” She asked not asking about the security as if already reading my mind on that topic… I don’t want Felix to find out about what I did to him in the past one year.

“No one tells Felix the truth.”

My assistant went completely silent.

I smiled.

“When he asks how long we have lived there, the answer is one year. When he asks where something belongs, they already know. When he asks about our wedding, they remember it. When he asks what we usually do together, they have an answer.”

“Sir…”

“Do I make myself clear?”

“Yes.”

“Good.”

I ended the call and walked towards his wardroom.