The shop appeared only after midnight.
Arjun discovered it while walking home through a street he had used hundreds of times.
Between a pharmacy and a closed bakery stood a narrow wooden door.
Above it hung a sign:
MEMORIES BOUGHT & SOLD
Arjun laughed.
Curious, he entered.
Shelves covered every wall.
Glass bottles filled them from floor to ceiling.
Each bottle glowed faintly.
A woman behind the counter smiled.
“Buying or selling?”
“What exactly do you sell?”
“Memories.”
Arjun pointed toward a blue bottle.
“What’s in that?”
“Someone’s first snowfall.”
A golden one?
“A mother hearing her baby laugh.”
A tiny red bottle?
“A first kiss.”
Arjun shook his head.
“This is ridiculous.”
The woman shrugged.
“Then you lose nothing by leaving.”
But Arjun stayed.
There was one memory he wanted to lose.
Five years earlier, his younger brother had died in a car accident after Arjun asked him to drive across town.
The guilt had followed him every day.
“Can you remove a memory?”
“Yes.”
“For how much?”
“We don’t take money.”
“What do you take?”
“Another memory.”
Arjun agreed.
The woman touched his forehead.
The accident disappeared.
So did the guilt.
For the first time in years, Arjun felt light.
He left smiling.
The next morning, he visited his mother.
She was looking through family photographs.
She pointed to a picture of two boys.
“Remember this trip?”
Arjun stared at the photograph.
He recognized himself.
But the boy beside him was a stranger.
“Who is that?”
His mother laughed.
Then she realized he was serious.
Her face went pale.
“That’s your brother.”
Arjun ran back to the street.
The shop was gone.
For the next year, he searched every night.
Nothing.
Until one rainy evening, the wooden door appeared again.
Arjun rushed inside.
The woman looked unsurprised.
“You took the wrong memory!” he shouted.
“No,” she said. “You chose not to remember his death. But grief and love share the same roots. Pull out one, and sometimes the other follows.”
“Give him back.”
“There is a price.”
“Anything.”
She placed a glowing bottle on the counter.
“What do I lose?”
“Every memory you have of yourself before today.”
Arjun stared at it.
He would forget his childhood.
His school years.
His friends.
Almost everything.
But he would remember his brother.
He took the bottle.
The next morning, Arjun woke not knowing where he was.
He could not remember his own birthday.
He could not remember his first day of school.
But beside his bed stood an old photograph.
Two boys smiled at the camera.
Arjun touched the younger boy’s face.
He smiled through tears.
“Welcome back.”