hen my 18-year-old daughter agreed to marry her 50-year-old boss, I thought she wanted his fortune. Then she showed me his heartbreaking diary, and I realized I knew something she didn’t.
My daughter, Janine, had always been the kind of girl who preferred books to parties. While her classmates were sneaking out to meet boys, she stayed home studying, and I sometimes had to remind her to eat dinner.
She was eighteen, but she’d always seemed wiser than her years.
“Never trust a man.”
After my husband died, I raised her alone. I worked as a nurse at a local hospital, often taking extra shifts to cover the mortgage, bills, and groceries.
Those years taught me to be careful with people who offered help, especially men who made promises too easily.
When Janine started dating, I often reminded her:
“Never trust a man just because he knows exactly what you want to hear.”
“An honest man won’t mind.”
“Mom, not every man is a liar,” she’d protest.
“Of course not. But an honest man won’t mind if you check.”
After graduation, Janine found a receptionist job at a small real estate company. Her boss, Richard, was fifty, owned two houses, and ran a successful business.
When she brought home her first paycheck, she handed me part of it.
“Mom, I’m engaged.”
“I want to help you, Mom.”
I couldn’t have been prouder.
Then, one evening, she came home nearly two hours late.
“Where have you been?”
She removed her coat, revealing a diamond ring.
“Mom, I’m engaged.”
“Is this about his money?”
“To whom?”
“Richard.”
I stared at her. “Your fifty-year-old boss?”
She nodded.
“And we’re getting married next month.”
“Just trust me.”
“Janine, are you serious? Is this about his money? His houses?”
“No, Mom!”
“Then why?”
Her eyes filled with tears.
“Please, just trust me.”
“You don’t know him.”
But she wouldn’t explain another word.
Over the next few weeks, Janine and I barely spoke without arguing.
I tried everything to convince her to reconsider.
“He’s thirty-two years older than you, sweetheart. And he’s your boss! Don’t you see how complicated this could get?”
“You don’t know him like I do, Mom.”
“What is this?”
Whenever I mentioned postponing the wedding, she immediately changed the subject.
Three days before the ceremony, Janine came into my bedroom carrying an old envelope.
“Mom, I can’t let you keep thinking I’m marrying Richard for his money.”
She handed it to me.
“What is this?”
“Janine is kind to me.”
“Pages from his diary. He writes things down so he won’t forget them.”
I unfolded the first sheet.
“My name is Richard. I’m fifty years old. I own a real estate company. Sometimes I forget things. I must not panic when that happens.”
I looked at Janine, confused, then continued reading.
“Janine is kind to me. Sometimes she reminds me of Catherine. I loved Catherine a long time ago.”
“What does all this mean?”
The final entry made my chest tighten.
“I’m afraid that one day I’ll look at Janine and won’t remember who she is. I want to marry her while I still can.”
I slowly lowered the pages.
“Janine, sweetheart, what does all this mean?”
Her eyes filled with tears.
‘Catherine? Is that you?’
“Mom, Richard has Alzheimer’s.”
Janine sat beside me on the bed and took a deep breath.
“It started about six weeks ago. I went into Richard’s office to bring him some documents, and he was sitting at his desk, holding an old photograph.”
“Of what?”
“A young woman. She looked a little like me. When he saw me, he suddenly stood up and said, ‘Catherine? Is that really you?'”
“You believed him?”
I frowned.
“What did you do?”
“I told him I was Janine. He looked so embarrassed, Mom. His hands were shaking. He kept apologizing.”
She explained that Richard eventually told her about Catherine, his first love. They’d planned to marry decades earlier, but Catherine had suddenly disappeared from his life.
His doctors diagnosed him.
He’d never married anyone else.
“Richard said he’d recently started forgetting things. Sometimes he gets confused about what year it is, or thinks something from his past is happening again.”
