The contract for signing over memory rights is surprisingly simple.
Signed, one poor bastard needing money, and quick.
Co-signed, some leech rich enough to buy another person’s history.
The transaction is nearly complete at this point. But the funds always take a while to go through.
In the meantime, the memory is held in escrow.
Enter an indentured sap like me, a warm body and loamy mind to house the memory. Penance served for a crime I can’t even remember.
The neural transmission gets administered in a doctor’s office. The cool rush of gel, the transmitter pads, the tangle of cables, the pulsing of veins. I have no way of knowing how much money each transaction costs, but the company sure seems to get plenty of business.
The latest soothing reverie drifts in. The transfer was successful, and from here I get to keep it until the money clears.
What hits me first is the smell of rotting fish. The way memory transfer works, you’re effectively selling the hard copy of the original memory. It flows out from the seller’s mind into mine. In a split second, the scene itself blinks into view, like a Polaroid developing behind my very eyes. From this new POV, I’m on a family vacation in the lush tropics of Maui. I’m in these shoes, standing beside my apparent brother, pelting rocks at this old beaten-down car that some Lahaina local left in his front yard. The seller’s dad—my dad, since it’s in my head—is grinning a few steps away, shooting the shit with the old timer who’s left rotten fish on the shattered dash of his beater.
“Seems like this was a really great time of your life,” I say, turning to the now-grown man, as I relish what he’s giving up.
The company doesn’t encourage this kind of small talk. Especially in this first transfer. The seller is rather morose, laconic. Prefaced by a drawn-out sigh, he cracks a sad smile, and responds with all he has left:
“I’m sure it was amazing.”
Once I’m able to recite the scene back in detail to the holding company, I’m free to go.
Personally, I hope I don’t see the seller here again.
§
I think about the memory all the way back to my small Boston flat. When I hop in the shower to wash the scum of the day away, I delight in the steam, which replicates that sweet dewy air of my temporary Hawaii reverie.
I’m in a bit of a rush to shave, find an outfit, call a car and get to this first date I’ve arranged online. Savoring this sweet memory helps distract me from the terrible pang of anxiety that’s stricken me. I don’t remember when I last went on a first date. It seems it’s really been that long.
The car drops me off at a garish seafood restaurant, an overpriced cash-grab for king crab and faux indulgence that I picked based on local reviews.
For all the talk of memories and forgetfulness, my date certainly is anything but forgettable. By the time the first drinks arrive, we’ve already established all the basics and felt the pleasant glee of newfound interest. Her hand is on the table by her glass of house white wine, my fingers inches from hers. I go in for an ice breaker.
“So, have you had any fun vacations lately?”
Yes, she replies, detailing a recent excursion through the Caribbean.
“What about you?” she asks, between sips.
At this, I see through her, as if she’s just a ghost, just an illusion, just a promise broken.
But she’s definitely here. I just feel like I’m not.
There’s nothing I can think to say, no defining features of my life that I can dictate to her, no sweet nothings to recollect of my own. There’s just one thing that comes to mind.
“Hmmm, well, I can’t stop thinking about my trip to Maui,” I tell her. “Have you ever been? I remember when I was a kid…”
My phone buzzes in my pocket. It’s the holding company. I’m required back at the office, immediately. Company policy.
“…You know,” I tell her, rising from my seat.
All I can do is sigh, knowing that I’ve done nothing but lie to her so far, and now I’ll have to lie again.
“Maybe I’ll tell you about it one day. I’m terribly sorry, but I gotta go. Rain check?”
The cool evening air hits my face, as I race to the office. This is just the life of an escrow agent. Sometimes the money goes through quick, and you only hold onto a memory for a few hours.
The buyer joins me in the sterile room. The old man has a big grin on his face, like he’s just won the jackpot.
“Alright, sir, are you ready?” the doctor asks him, pasting the transmitters to his head.
I know he will love this memory just as I’ve already begun to. He’s rattling off the last few recollections he’s scored through the company, as I recline in my own medical chair and think, think, think:
“Aim for the window!” my brother is shouting at me, a look of glee on his face. “Let’s shatter the window!”
When I go home, I won’t be able to remember the warm sun baking the cracked Lahaina pavement, the joy of family laughter and swaying palm trees.
Nor will I remember anything I’ve lived on my own, for my penance left no consolation, not even the memory of the crimes I supposedly committed.
The transference device hums to life. The recipient gives me a wink and a nod, and the doctor nudges a box of tissues toward me. Dabbing my tears, I close my eyes, and savor what I can.
With the brilliant blue sky above head, my brother shoves a rock in my hand, and I take aim.
Eric Farrell lives in Long Beach, California, where he works as a beer sales rep by day, and speculative fiction author by night. His writing credits stem from a career in journalism, where he reported for a host of local and metro newspapers in the greater Los Angeles area. He posts on Twitter @stygianspace and has recent fiction with Aphotic Realm, Haven Spec, and HyphenPunk. His most recent appearance in our virtual pages was “Golden Arches,” the story of a fast food soft-serve ice cream machine… from Hell!
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