His Three-Day Girlfriend novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: Wrong Man at the Bedside
Meredith wakes with every memory back, overhears Colin handing her to his friend as a game, decides to play blank, and finds her diary says she caused the crash Colin caused.
I woke up in the clinic bed with every one of my memories back.
The hand holding mine belonged to the wrong man.
For fourteen months I had opened my eyes to the same face.
Colin Crocker, my boyfriend, sitting in the plastic chair with both hands around mine.
"Easy, Merry," he always said. "Your memory only lasts three days. I'll fill you in. I'm not going anywhere."
And I always cried, and believed him, and fell in love with him all over again.
This morning I knew my own name, and my sister's phone number, all ten digits.
I knew the wet road, and the guardrail coming at the windshield.
I knew every morning after it, too, every one of them.
The man in the chair was Colin's best friend, Elliot Rainier.
He did not say Colin's line.
He just looked at me.
"Morning, babe," he said. His voice was rough. "Do you know where you are?"
I opened my mouth to answer.
Then I saw the door.
There was a narrow window in it, and through the window I saw Colin in the corridor.
He had his arm around a girl in a pink coat, and he was laughing at something she said.
He didn't look at my room even once.
Elliot let go of my hand. "Stay put a minute."
He stepped outside and pulled the door almost shut.
It stayed open an inch.
"Thanks for taking this, buddy," Colin said, warm and easy. "I redid her diary for you last night. The videos too. Every page says you now. Tell her you love her a few times and she'll say it back."
"And she never remembers?" The girl in the pink coat laughed. "Not even a little?"
"Not once, Poppy. Three days, then I reset her. We call her the three-day girlfriend."
A third voice joined in, loud and eager.
"Man, you said your week with her was the best of your life. Elliot goes first, fine. But I'm next, Colin. Saturday, you promised."
That was Dane Doherty, who sold luxury cars.
Colin had introduced me to him four times, and four times I had shaken his hand like a stranger.
"Everyone gets a go," Colin said. "That's the rule. Elliot, look after my property."
Poppy giggled. "Your property. You're terrible."
"She doesn't mind. She doesn't know."
I lay very still.
I thought of every morning that Colin had sat in that chair.
I thought of every time I had cried into his shirt and thanked him for not leaving me.
It hadn't been love.
It had been a game, and I was the prize.
Then Elliot spoke, and his voice was flat.
"Fine. I'll give her the shot myself, when it's time."
"Good man," said Colin.
Footsteps went away down the corridor.
Poppy's laugh went with them.
I did not scream.
I did not tear out my IV and run into the hall.
If they found out I remembered, they would give me the shot again, and I would wake up knowing nothing.
So I closed my eyes.
I counted to thirty.
When the door opened again, I turned my head and looked at Elliot.
"Where am I?" I said. "Who are you?"
Something moved in his face and was gone.
"I'm Elliot," he said. "I'm your boyfriend. You were in a car accident. Your memory resets every three days."
He sounded like a man reading a menu in a language he didn't speak.
"I'm here to look after you. You're safe with me."
"Okay," I whispered.
He sat down in the plastic chair and did not take my hand.
A nurse came in with a tray.
On it lay a used syringe and one small empty glass vial.
She reached for the vial.
"I'll take that," Elliot said.
He closed his fist around it and slid it into the pocket of his coat.
The nurse shrugged and left.
"Here," Elliot said, and put a worn leather notebook on my blanket. "This is your diary. You write in it every night. It'll explain things."
I opened it.
Inside the cover it said *Meredith Hartwell, this is yours.*
It was my handwriting, round and tilted, the way I had made my letters since I was nine.
Every page said Elliot.
*Elliot made me pancakes today. I love him so much.*
*Elliot says I'm brave. Elliot says we're going to be okay.*
I turned the pages.
Then I reached the page from the day after the crash.
*I'm so sorry. I was driving and I wasn't careful. Colin says he forgives me. He's the kindest man alive.*
My thumb stopped on the line.
I had been in the passenger seat.
I was the one who said, pull over, Colin, you're drunk, pull over.
Colin was the one who didn't.
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