It was like I was trapped in a movie – with a hideous plot twist

I met Eric on a dating app in early 2018 when I was living in New York. He was handsome, talkative and interesting. I was falling for him – but there was something he needed to know. In 2015, I’d been in love with a guy called Mike. On my 30th birthday, my parents threw me a party at their house. Everyone was having a great time until I heard my brother scream Mike’s name. As I ran towards the noise, I saw Mike on the ground by my parents’ pool. He’d slipped into the water and wasn’t breathing. I frantically tried to do CPR on him, but he remained unconscious.

At the hospital, I was told that Mike wouldn’t ever wake up. No one knows how he got hurt. He broke some bones in his back, and had a brain injury, but we don’t know how that happened.