The City That Forgets

Pia did not, when she eventually looked up at Mr Halpren, ask what most citizens probably asked. She did not ask whether she could undo the Cup. There was no undoing. The Cup, once drunk, was permanent. She asked, instead: "What do I do now?" Mr Halpren considered her. "That, Pia, is the question. You have three options. I will lay them out and you must choose. There is no right one." "Okay." "One. You forget what I have just told you. You leave this room. You go on with your life. The Cup did its work. You move forward. That is — for most citizens — the right choice. Grief is heavy. The Cup is, genuinely, a mercy." "Two." "You carry it, alone, the rest of your life. You knew Mara, however briefly, in a way the city has agreed to forget. You hold her memory privately. You do not tell anyone — because telling people undoes the Cup's work for them, which is cruel — but you carry it. You write about her, perhaps, in a private journal. You keep the photograph. You let yourself, for the rest of your life, be the one person in this city who remembers a girl named Mara." "Three." "You become a librarian, Pia. You finish school. You apply to work here. You join the small handful of us who, every generation, choose to be the city's memory. You will, in this room, encounter many other things the Cup has erased. Some of them you will be glad to know. Some of them you will not.