For me—Aaron Cole, the legendary playboy of the D.C. social scene—gave up three things:

Racing. Cigarettes. Every other woman.

At our lavish, headline-making wedding, he knelt on one knee, his eyes red and voice choked as he slid the ring onto my finger.

“Ariana, you are the only woman I will ever love.”

His vow still hung in the air when I woke up the next morning—six years into the future.

And the man who once cherished me like his own life now looked at me without a trace of affection, only a frost-bitten emptiness.

He threw a stack of papers toward me.

“Sign it, Ariana. I’m done with you.”

...

“Sign. The house is yours, the cars, five percent of the company shares—enough to keep you comfortable for life. Just one condition: stay away from me and Reese.”

Reese?

Which Reese?

My mind reeled. A torrent of questions, chaotic and insistent.

“Aaron, what are you talking about? We just got married yesterday. Why would you divorce me?”

I searched his face for any hint this was some cruel joke.

There was none. Only cold, weary contempt.

He barked a harsh, derisive laugh. “What new game is this, Ariana? Amnesia? You tried that one six years ago. Don’t you ever get tired?”

I rushed to the floor-length mirror in the living room. The face staring back was mine, yet not mine.

The eyes were the same, but fine lines now framed them, and a deep weariness had settled into my expression. All of it whispered the same silent truth.

Six years.

What happened in those six years?

Why was my memory still trapped on our wedding night?

Seeing my shattered expression, Aaron’s frown deepened.

“Stop the act. It’s pathetic. Reese is pregnant. With a boy. I need to give him a proper name.”

Reese...

The name struck like a thunderclap.

That timid girl who used to trail behind me, calling me “Senior Ariana” with such reverence.

The other scholarship student from the same backwoods—just like me—plucked from obscurity by the Cole family’s charity foundation.

“No...” The word slipped out, a fragile breath. “That’s impossible.”

Aaron’s patience snapped. He closed the distance, his hand closing around my wrist with a crushing grip.

“Ariana, I’m warning you. Stay away from Reese and the baby. Don’t make me sever the last thread of mercy between us.”

He leaned in, his voice a low, venomous whisper next to my ear. “Haven’t you done enough these past six years? Don’t force me to send you back to the old house. Let my mother... take you properly in hand.”

Mercy? Done enough?

Each strange accusation cut like a knife.

I looked at the man before me. Handsome, yes—but a mask of cold resolve had replaced the tender, devoted boy who once had eyes only for me.

The unfamiliar apartment was my prison, and Aaron held the key.

He confiscated my phone and anything else I could have used to contact the outside world. Before leaving, he tossed a cold remark over his shoulder. "Sign the papers when you've thought it through. Don't make me resort to uglier methods."

The door slammed shut with a heavy thud, plunging the world into a sudden, oppressive silence. The only sound left was the frantic pounding of my own heart.

I stumbled around the room like a trapped insect, desperately searching for some clue, anything to make sense of this absurd nightmare.

Finally, in a drawer in the study, I found it: a locked diary.

The lock was simple; a hairpin easily pried it open.

The first page fell open, and familiar handwriting leaped out at me—my own.

The date was six years ago. Three months after our wedding.

**[Three-month anniversary. Aaron didn’t come home. I called. A woman answered. She said he was in the shower.]**

**[I asked who she was. She laughed. "Senior Ariana, have you forgotten? It’s me, Reese."]**

**[I drove like a madwoman to find him. The usual club. Reese in a bathrobe, sitting in his lap, feeding him fruit. Aaron just frowned. "What are you doing here?"]**

The handwriting in the diary changed from neat and graceful to a frantic, desperate scrawl. Every stroke was soaked in despair.

Page by page, I turned them. The six years I had forgotten unfurled before my eyes like a silent, bloody film.

It turned out that less than half a year into our marriage, Aaron had gotten together with Reese.

At first, he tried to hide it. Later, he grew bolder. More brazen.

And me? I went from shock to disbelief, from hysterics to frantic accusations. I smashed his car. I cut up his designer suits. I even went to the headquarters of Aaron’s Group and cursed Reese’s name in the street like a raving lunatic.

I became the laughingstock of the entire Capital City social scene.

Everyone said a country bumpkin was still a country bumpkin, even in a gilded cage. She'd never be a phoenix.

The final page of the diary recorded one last event.

**[My hand hurts. Aaron pushed me. I fell against the table corner. The doctor says my right wrist is fractured. He says I deserved it. Who told me to push Reese? She’s carrying the first grandson of the Aaron family. He said, "Ariana, you disgust me."]**

I looked at my own right wrist, perfectly fine now. It had once been fractured.

And I had no memory of it at all.

It was like watching a stranger play out this tragic, ridiculous one-woman show.

I closed the diary. All the strength drained from my body.

Now I finally understood why Aaron looked at me with such revulsion.

For the past six years, I had lived as a madwoman—someone I would have despised.

I don’t know how long I stood there before I heard a faint tapping from the window.

Through the glass, from the building opposite, a familiar figure was waving frantically at me.

Stephanie. My best friend.

She typed something on her phone and pressed it to the window: **[Ariana, are you okay? I couldn’t reach you!]**

I shook my head, mouthing the words: *I’m locked in.*

Her face went pale.

Then she was typing furiously, holding up her phone again: **[That bastard Aaron! Wait for me—I’ll get someone right now!]**

Half an hour later, the apartment door swung open, unlocked by a professional locksmith.

Stephanie rushed in, threw her arms around me, and burst into tears.

“Ariana, you scared me to death! I heard Aaron was divorcing you, your phone was dead… I thought you’d—”

“I’m fine.”

I patted her back, my voice hoarse. “Stephanie, can you tell me everything that’s happened these past six years? Every detail.”

She froze, studying my unnervingly calm expression, her eyes clouded with worry.

“Ariana, you… you’re not…”

I knew what she was leaving unsaid.

She thought I was using the amnesia act again—escaping reality.

I shook my head, a thin, bitter smile touching my lips. “I’m not pretending. I woke up, and it was six years later. My memory… it’s still the morning after our wedding.”

Stephanie’s jaw dropped. For a long moment, she couldn’t speak.

In the end, she chose to believe me.

From her account, I pieced together a more complete—and far more brutal—picture of those six years.

The jewelry design career I’d been so proud of? Derailed by my own emotional breakdowns. I’d botched several major projects and had long since been pushed to the sidelines in his family’s firm.

As for Aaron’s mother, that woman who’d always looked down on my background—she’d spent those six years humiliating me in every way imaginable. And I, in turn, had done nothing but cry and throw fits.

“So, I have nothing left,” I said softly.

No lover. No career. No friends. Just the reputation of a “madwoman.”

Stephanie squeezed my hand, her voice firm. “No. You have me. Ariana, leave that scumbag. We’ll start over.”

I looked at her, warmth flooding my chest.

Yes. Even if the whole world had abandoned me, I still had Stephanie.

I picked up the divorce papers and the pen Aaron had left. Without a moment’s hesitation, I signed my name at the bottom.

*Ariana.*

The stroke was clean. Decisive.

From today on, I would live for myself.