Part 1Memory & Millions

The headline blasted across every screen, a push notification that shattered my quiet world: A-LIST STAR’S LOST ID LEADS TO SECRET MARRIAGE.

That’s how I found out Julian Wilder had forgotten he’d married me three years ago.

The internet, in its infinite and terrifying power, launched a manhunt. Within hours, they had unearthed me, a single mother raising my little boy, Leo, in obscurity.

Then, Julian himself tagged me in a public post: @VictoriaHollister I get the fan enthusiasm, truly. But maybe we could schedule a time to get this marriage annulled? Let me know.

I replied: Fine.

But we scheduled the appointment three times, and three times, Julian was a no-show.

The first time, his assistant called. “An explosion scene on set ran late. Julian’s so sorry. We’ll have to reschedule.”

The second time, his agent texted me. “Julian’s been hospitalized with a sudden high fever. We’ll be in touch.”

The third time, it was my son, Leo, who showed me the news on his tablet. “Mommy, Daddy was in a car crash. He hit his head again.”

…

Before the fame, before the sold-out stadiums and screaming fans, we had been a secret. In the breathless innocence of our youth, he had dragged me to City Hall. His eyes had shone brighter than any star in the night sky.

“This little book,” he’d said, his voice thick with a certainty that felt like it could bend the world to his will, “it ties us together. Not even God can tear us apart now.”

He’d tipped my chin up, a roguish grin spreading across his face as if he’d just conquered the world. “And you’re mine in the next life, too.”

But that very day, the car crash had stolen me from him.

His family, who had always disapproved of us, seized the opportunity. They scrubbed every trace of my existence from his life, erasing me so completely it was as if I’d never been there at all.

So when the news broke, I wasn’t surprised. This had his family’s fingerprints all over it. With Julian’s memory a blank slate, they could write whatever narrative they wanted, couldn’t they?

They painted me as a deranged, obsessed fan who’d found his lost ID and gone on a psychotic spree at City Hall. It was a perfectly plausible, even entertaining, story.

I stared at the blurry screenshot of the marriage certificate on the trending page. My driver’s license number was circled and magnified. The internet did the rest.

A few hours later, the address of my small rental apartment and a haggard-looking photo of me with Leo were plastered all over social media.

I’d found out I was pregnant after Julian lost his memory. Leo was two and a half now, and he looked just like me. No one would ever suspect he was Julian Wilder’s son.

Not even Julian himself.

@VictoriaHollister I get the fan enthusiasm, truly. But maybe we could schedule a time to get this marriage annulled? Let me know.

The world was watching, waiting for the tearful, desperate pleas of a scorned woman. My DMs flooded with over 99+ messages of pure venom.

They called me delusional.

They called me a low-life, a nobody punching leagues above her weight.

For the past three years, I’d watched him. I’d seen the breakout roles that catapulted him from a reckless boy in a foreign city to the untouchable "god" he was now. At his level, a wife and a child were liabilities, not assets. And after three years, he still hadn't remembered.

I’d given up hope a long time ago.

He would probably never remember me. Never remember the four sweet, tangled years we’d lived together.

I stared at the screen for five minutes, my fingers hovering over the keyboard.

Then I typed one word: Fine.

My heart had died three years ago. It was long past time for a burial.