“The Office You Went To Did Not Exist,” I Slapped The Book Shut, Cleared My Throat, And Put The Pen

“The office you went to did not exist,” I slapped the book shut, cleared my throat, and put the pen down.

The woman in the turtleneck examined her nails. “I wasn’t expecting that.”

I ran a hand across the brush of my short hair, feeling the stubby ends under my fingertips. “Thank you for your assistance, you may leave now.” The line was well-trodden, and it came across that way, too.

“I didn’t make it up,” she shook her head curtly. “I know you think I’m lying, but I really did go to that office. My dad took me—”

I held up a hand, and the veins popping off its back distracted me for a moment. I didn’t have those when I was young.

“I’m sure you didn’t make it up, miss,” I tried a smile. “It’s just that memories are fickle. Sometimes they’re loyal, sometimes they’re not. I’ve tried to cross-reference your memory with…” I waved a hand at the metre-tall stack of books on my desk. “All these memories. But the office your dad took you to simply does not appear in the mental geography. So what does that mean?”

“What?”

“That it’s a false memory,” I leaned back in my chair. “I’d be happy to lecture you about it, but I really have many, many more people to attend to.”

She pressed her hands on the table and scowled. “So you do think I’m making it up. You think—you think I signed up for this project just to fill it with false data? To fudge your maps?”

I pinched my forehead. “Look, false memories can happen due to trauma, and other reasons. It happens. It’s not your fault. Like I said, I thank you for your assistance—”

“Just because you can’t find it anywhere else?” The woman stood up now, bearing down on my desk. “You’re going to declare my memory invalid just because no one else remembers going to that office? What gives you that right?”

“If only it were that simple,” I lifted a pen and tapped the edge of my lip with it. “In fact, I have several memories attesting to there being a library in the spot you mentioned.”

“Off the market street, past the florist, up the tiny staircase in the building to the—”

I nodded with my hand up. “Yes, yes, I drew the map up. We have all the mental geography ready. Market street, florist, staircase… but at the precise spot you mentioned—at door 34C, there was a library, not an office.”

The woman stood up straight, folding her hands, staring at me as if trying to figure out what to do with an unwanted chicken.

“We respect all memories,” I ran my hand past the spines of the journals. “But sometimes, some memories are just false. We can’t admit them into the maps, or they’d conflict with the other memories. There’s a process.”

“If my dad was alive, you could take his testimony and he’d back me up,” she said.

I nodded. “Maybe. Or maybe, he’d tell you you were wrong.”

“I hope that one day, someone asks you to record your memory of this place, and you remember my face, my clothes, my expression, and you tell them everything just to hear that you made up a false memory.”

With that, the woman stormed out of the room, and I saw the hopeful face of the next volunteer peering for a second through the door before it closed by itself.

I pulled open the notebook I’d closed before, and started a new map. It started with an office off the market street, past the florist, up the tiny staircase in the building to the…