She scraped away her tears with a sad hand. Pity welled up in herself and for herself. She sank into the pity, shifting her weight around to make herself more comfortable. It was pleasurable and miserable. She closed her eyes, reaching for a succulent morsel of memory.
Each memory would swell up making her chest ache in a low deep sort of way. Every time she went through her little ritual she would try her best to recall the subtle details that made the moment superior to reality. She savored each detail, tasting each aspect of her memories slowly and deliberately, closing her eyes to sharpen her palate.
Reality was nice enough. She had a loving family, friends who adored her, a good job and an easy likability. Oh but what was there to crave and consume in reality? What enjoyment was there in accepting and feeling and releasing the pain that had now become an effortless part of her person?
Some people enjoyed the radio. The way songs can transport you in a moment to a different reality, one where you a fun, or confident, or loved. Arlington had a different hobby. When she would turn on her car instead of turning on her radio, she would turn on her memories. Some memories had been so heavily altered to suit her own personal interpretation of a past moment that the reality that inspired them was equivalent to the fruit juice content in Juicy Fruit. Her past wasn’t tasty enough, so she modified it with fillers to enhance the flavor. On a high dusty shelf alone her memories sat, wearing the faded label “Now made with real experiences!” The key thing to keep in mind when reading such a label is that those products are not made “of” this or that ingredient, they are made “with” it. The fillers in our memories, like most fillers, are dangerous.
Arlington drove into her apartment’s pleasant parking lot after ingesting a particularly nostalgic memory about her childhood. The complex was situated in a charming patch of wood forty minutes from the city. It had a large lawn and the leaves were in the full bloom of their August death. The air was crisp and true. Arlington took no notice. She was still fading out of the memory. She had been sitting in thoughts of her fourth year. Her mother had driven she and her brother to a brook near their home that had a dense population of pine trees. “Go find some pine cones Arlington!” She had felt her mother saying. Arlington had wandered carelessly through the meadow by the brook, gathering the little pine cones. Later they had taken them home. They had tried to paste googly eyes and miniature felt santa hats to the cones. They couldn’t get the eyes and hat to stay on the oddly layered cones. They tried again and again, but the eyes slid off. It had been a cold day, colder than her mother had expected.
“Arlington?” A voice brought her out of herself and up towards a gentle pair of eyes.
“I’ve been calling your name!” Her neighbor Charles said kindly. “Was something on your mind?”
“Everything’s great!” She responded automatically, tightening the corners of her lips upwards.
Then, really seeing him, paused.
“I.” She hesitated. “I was just thinking about this time my mother took me to gather pine cones. It was stupid.” She laughed with embarrassment at this momentary break in her guard.
“Oh yeah?” Charles responded with excitement. “How was the quality? Are you on Mem-Pro or Quala-Mem? I hope you’re not on Heva-Mem, it got recalled a few weeks ago. Something about retention issues.”
“Wait, What? What are you talking about?” She asked smiling, noticing his eyes again. They were a pale green.
“Oh! I’m sorry! I just assumed you were on a memory enhancer! My psychiatrist put me on one two months ago that’s been working wonders! The dosage was a little off at first but they adjusted it and I haven’t had any issues for weeks.”
“A memory enhancer?” She asked, her smiling fading as her mouth began to water at the concept.
“Oh yeah! I’m on Mem-Pro! It has all of the normal side effects of your standard memory enhancer: dry mouth, fatigue, irritability, but it’s been working great for my psychotherapy. I mean they really don’t recommend you stay on it for longer than a few months, like most of your standard psycho-enhancers, but everyone’s loving it!”
Her face was placid fixation.
The next morning Arlington took off work to see her psychiatrist.
“Here you are!” Her psychiatrist said in a cheerful-accommodating voice. “I expected you in here weeks ago for this! Ha! Ha! I’m impressed you held off for as long as you did!” She placed the prescription in her hand casually. “Your insurance co-pay covers a filter as well if you would like to apply it. It looks like you can either have Sepia Tone or Color Saturation at no additional cost.”
“How does it work?” Arlington asked quickly.
“Oh it’s just your standard neuro-stimulant . This one targets the limbic system and works to increase serotonin levels in deficient memories. Now there are side effects to keep in mind and it is a relatively new drug, but the only really adverse reactions took place with Heva-Mem and that was recalled weeks ago.”
The psychiatrist continued to speak, it’s voice going up and down, but Arlington was not there. Staring at the small piece of paper on her lap, she nodded at the appropriate times.
On her way home she stopped by the pharmacy and now, sitting in her beautiful living room, swallowed her first dose. She had chosen a Sepia filter for this batch of Mem-Pro. She closed her eyes and began to re-experience the memory. At once she was struck by how evident the Sepia filter was. She had gone back for the pine cones. The whole setting was now a hazy golden. Euphoria crept through her body. The subtle details that had long ago faded into nothingness were again clear and bright. Last week the memory had maintained its vague mystery. Her mother who had died years ago, was now, behind closed eyes, almost in the room. She saw the delicate lines by her eyes from years of laughing. Before, her memory of her mother’s words had been purely implied emotion. Now, sitting alone in her living room, eyes pinched shut, she heard her mother’s voice.
“Come on! “ Her mother called. “I see more over here! You are finding so many! Great work!”
They were in the meadow, running, floating through the moment. But something was oddly different. It was warmer than it had been.
Again they were home with the pine cones. She could feel the sticky texture of the paste and the soft fabric of the felt on her finger tips.
“There! Perfect!” Her mother said, holding up the finished pine cone. The hat and eyes sat fixed on the small cone, staring back at her.
For an instant it was not comfortable. It hadn’t really been like that. They eyes had slipped off. They eyes had slipped off of the pine cone in reality. Her mother had been embarrassed. Arlington had cried in confusion and disappointment. Then her mother had overcome her small embarrassment and had held Arlington and rocked her through her tears. Her warm arms and chest engulfing Arlington and suspending her for a moment in total unawareness of self. But then, in a moment, that memory was gone. The Mem-Pro had registered the emotions of disappointment and the release of tears and programmed the mind to replace the “Inadequate Memory” with something more “Emotionally Sufficient”. The Mem-Pro coursed through her veins and within fifteen minutes, to Arlington’s knowledge, she had lived an emotionally sufficient life. The next day she took two.
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