Tales from the Universe
Moral Dilemma: If everyone else’s memory contradicts yours, when should you trust the crowd—and when should you trust the impossible thing you know you experienced?
Nima noticed the woman because she always sat in the same chair.
Every morning at the Glass Finch, Nima ordered tea and bread.
Every morning, the woman sat beside the window.
Gray coat.
Red scarf.
Black gloves.
She never ordered anything.
She simply watched people pass.
On the fourth morning, Nima nodded to her.
The woman nodded back.
On the seventh, Nima said:
“Morning.”
“Morning.”
On the tenth, Nima asked:
“Do you ever eat?”
The woman smiled.
“Sometimes.”
That was how they became friends.
Her name was Ilyen.
She had lived in the city for years.
She knew which baker sold yesterday’s bread cheaply after noon.
She knew a narrow staircase behind the courthouse that led to a rooftop with an excellent view.
She knew the bell in the western tower rang six minutes late.
She knew that the owner of the Glass Finch pretended not to feed a stray cat behind the kitchen.
Nima liked her.
Ilyen was easy company.
She didn’t fill silence because silence had appeared.
Sometimes they sat for an hour and exchanged four sentences.
One morning, Ilyen wasn’t there.
Nima asked the server:
“Is Ilyen sick?”
“Who?”
“The woman who sits there.”
Nima pointed.
The server looked at the empty chair.
“What woman?”
“Gray coat. Red scarf.”
The server shook his head.
“She comes every morning.”
“No, she doesn’t.”
Nima laughed.
“You serve us.”
“I serve you.”
“You’ve spoken to her.”
The server looked concerned now.
“Nima, you always sit alone.”
Nima assumed he was joking.
Then the owner said the same thing.
So did the cook.
Even the boy who swept the floor.
Nobody remembered Ilyen.
Nima went to the address Ilyen had once mentioned.
There was a house.
An old man answered.
“Does Ilyen live here?”
“No.”
“Did she?”
“No.”
“Do you know her?”
“No.”
Nima described her.
The old man stared.
Then slowly closed the door.
The following morning, Ilyen was back.
Nima nearly knocked over a table reaching her.
“Where were you?”
Ilyen looked surprised.
“Walking.”
“Nobody remembers you.”
Ilyen’s expression changed.
“Who did you ask?”
“Everyone.”
“That was unwise.”
Nima sat.
“What are you?”
Ilyen looked toward the window.
“That question usually arrives eventually.”
“Are you dead?”
“No.”
“A spirit?”
“No.”
“A witch?”
“No.”
“Then why does nobody remember you?”
Ilyen looked at her.
“Why do you?”
Nima did not like the question.
She liked it less after asking around town.
Nobody remembered seeing her with Ilyen.
Not the bookseller.
Not the flower merchant.
Not the guard who had once given them directions.
Nima began keeping notes.
Ilyen exists.
She wrote the date.
Then details.
Gray coat. Red scarf. Scar on left thumb. Hates pears. Knows three card tricks. Laughs silently before laughing aloud.
Every evening she read the list.
Just in case.
Weeks passed.
Then something worse happened.
Nima visited her sister.
They ate dinner.
Talked.
Her sister asked:
“Are you feeling better?”
“About what?”
Her sister hesitated.
“Nothing.”
Nima put down her fork.
“What?”
“Since the accident.”
“What accident?”
Silence.
Their mother stopped eating.
Nima looked between them.
“What accident?”
Her sister began crying.
They showed her the newspaper.
There had been a fire.
Six months earlier.
A tenement on Varrow Street.
Eleven dead.
Nima read the names.
Halfway down:
Nima Vale, 31.
She laughed.
Nobody else did.
“That’s not me.”
Her mother covered her mouth.
“Nima.”
“I am sitting here.”
Her sister was crying harder now.
“You died.”
Nima stood.
“Stop.”
“We buried you.”
“Stop.”
“I watched them—”
“STOP.”
The room became silent.
Nima looked at her hands.
Solid.
Warm.
Real.
She could feel the table beneath her fingers.
“I didn’t die.”
Her mother whispered:
“You come sometimes.”
Nima looked at her.
“What?”
“You don’t remember afterward.”
She ran to the Glass Finch.
Ilyen was waiting.
Nima threw the newspaper onto the table.
“You knew.”
“Yes.”
“I am dead.”
Ilyen considered this.
“Yes.”
Nima struck her.
Her hand connected.
Ilyen’s head snapped sideways.
That made everything worse.
“You’re real.”
“So are you.”
“Dead people aren’t real.”
Ilyen rubbed her cheek.
“Apparently they can hit quite hard.”
Nima began crying.
People in the café looked over.
Nima noticed.
“They can see me.”
“Today.”
“What does that mean?”
Ilyen pointed toward the server.
“Ask him my name.”
Nima did.
He stared blankly.
Then she asked:
“What is my name?”
“Nima.”
She turned back.
Ilyen shrugged.
“Different rules.”
Nima sat down.
“Why don’t I remember dying?”
“Why would you?”
“Because it happened to me.”
“You don’t remember being born either.”
“That isn’t the same.”
“No.”
Ilyen folded her hands.
“But memory has never been proof that something happened.”
Nima looked at the notebook in her pocket.
“And forgetting isn’t proof that it didn’t.”
For several weeks, Nima refused to accept it.
She ate.
She slept.
She cut herself and bled.
She stood in sunlight.
She became ill from bad fish.
Dead people, she argued, did not get diarrhea.
Ilyen found this argument compelling but insufficient.
Then Nima visited the cemetery.
There was a stone.
Her name.
Her dates.
Her sister had left flowers.
Nima sat beside her own grave until dark.
She remembered nothing.
That was almost worse than remembering.
“What am I supposed to do?”
She and Ilyen sat on the courthouse roof.
Below them, the city continued.
“I don’t know,” Ilyen said.
“You’ve been like this longer.”
“Yes.”
“So what do you do?”
“This.”
“Sit on roofs?”
“Sometimes.”
Nima became angry.
“There has to be a reason.”
“For what?”
“For us.”
Ilyen looked genuinely puzzled.
“Why?”
“Because otherwise—”
Nima stopped.
“Otherwise what?”
“I don’t know.”
Ilyen smiled.
“That’s where I ended up too.”
Nima began visiting her family less often.
Not because she loved them less.
Because afterward her mother could not sleep.
Her sister began waiting for Nima to appear.
Every knock became hope.
Every empty doorway became another loss.
Nima had thought returning was a gift.
She began wondering whether she was forcing them to bury her repeatedly.
So one evening she told them.
“I think I should stop coming.”
Her mother immediately said no.
Her sister said nothing.
Nima noticed.
“You agree.”
Her sister cried.
“Yes.”
Their mother became furious.
“How can you say that?”
“Because every time she leaves, you collapse.”
“She’s your sister.”
“I know.”
Nima watched them argue about whether she should continue existing in their lives.
There was no cruelty in it.
That made it harder.
Eventually Nima left the city.
Ilyen went with her.
They traveled.
Some towns remembered them.
Some didn’t.
Sometimes Nima appeared in mirrors.
Sometimes she didn’t.
Once a dog followed Ilyen for three days.
Nobody understood why.
They stopped trying to construct a complete theory.
Years passed.
Or something resembling years.
One afternoon they reached a village where an old man was sitting beside the road.
He looked directly at Ilyen.
Then at Nima.
“Well,” he said.
“Look at you two.”
Nima stopped.
“You can see us?”
“Obviously.”
“Do you know what we are?”
The old man shrugged.
“Travelers.”
“No.”
Nima sat beside him.
“We’re dead.”
“Are you?”
“Yes.”
“Unfortunate.”
“You don’t seem surprised.”
“I’ve been alive eighty-seven years. Surprise becomes expensive.”
Ilyen laughed.
Nima leaned closer.
“What are we supposed to do?”
The old man looked toward the road.
“Where are you going?”
“We don’t know.”
“Then I suppose you’re supposed to decide.”
Nima stared.
“That’s it?”
“What were you hoping for?”
“An answer.”
“I gave you one.”
“No, you gave me another question.”
The old man smiled.
“Those last longer.”
They continued walking.
Near sunset, Nima stopped.
“I’ve been thinking.”
Ilyen groaned.
“Dangerous.”
“What if everyone had remembered you?”
“What?”
“At the café. What if everyone said you were real?”
“I am real.”
“You know what I mean.”
Ilyen waited.
“I would never have questioned you.”
“No.”
“And if everyone hadn’t remembered me…”
“You might have discovered yourself sooner.”
Nima looked back at the road.
“So the crowd was right about both of us.”
“Sometimes.”
“And wrong about both of us.”
“Sometimes.”
“That is deeply inconvenient.”
“Yes.”
They continued walking.
After a while Nima laughed.
“What?”
“I spent half my life believing reality was whatever everybody could agree happened.”
Ilyen adjusted her red scarf.
“And now?”
Nima thought.
“Agreement is evidence.”
She stepped over a fallen branch.
“Not a throne.”
Ilyen smiled.
They walked on.
Two dead women.
Or perhaps two travelers.
Depending on which fact mattered more.
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