Lies My Memory Told Me
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Synopsis
From the thrilling voice of Sacha Wunsch comes a heart-stopping psychological mystery in a world where memories can be shared—and one girl can’t trust any of them.
Enhanced Memory changed everything. By sharing someone else’s memory, you can experience anything and everything with no risk at all: learn any skill instantly, travel the world from home, and safeguard all your most treasured secrets
forever. Nova’s parents invented this technology, and it’s slowly taking over their lives. Nova doesn’t mind—mostly. She knows Enhanced Memory is a gift.
But Kade says Nova doesn’t know the costs of this technology that’s taken the world by storm. Kade runs a secret vlog cataloging real experiences, is always on the move, and is strangely afraid of Nova—even though she feels more
comfortable with him than she ever has with anyone. Suddenly there are things Nova can’t stop noticing: the way her parents don’t meet her eyes anymore, the questions no one wants her to ask, and the relentless feeling that there’s something she’s forgotten …
Release date: October 19, 2021
Publisher: Inkyard Press
Print pages: 304
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Lies My Memory Told Me
Sacha Wunsch
1
TWO YEARS LATER
The last bell rang and I hurried out, hoping to avoid the after-school rush to the lockers, but as always I was hit by a surge of people—some of them backing out of the way as I passed. Most of the time I felt like I had three heads when I walked through the halls. In a smallish place like Marinville, I guess the new girl will always be the new girl. Especially the new girl whose parents invented “the coolest thing on earth”—at least that’s what I’d been told approximately one hundred and thirty million times, anyway. I swear, I knew exactly what it was like to be a fish in a fishbowl.
I glanced up and accidentally made eye contact with one of them.
“Hey,” Chase Mason said, with a sideways grin and a slow gaze up my body—his deodorant body spray a strangling, pulsing entity invading my personal space. He was known for being a player.
I shot him an ultraquick smile as I hurried past, trying to make it clear it was for courtesy purposes only. Still, I could feel him watching me as I sped away, tucking my books closer to my chest.
“You could do worse than Chase Mason,” Andie said as she slid up beside me, clearly having seen the whole display. “I’ve heard he’s a lot of fun.” She grinned, turning to walk backward and giving Chase a little tip of her imaginary hat for his attempt, before turning back around to walk with me, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. She was the only person I knew who could wear her hair short in the back, long in the front, color it a deep, rich maroon and not only get away with it, but look like she was born to wear it that way, striking against her pale, almost translucent skin. She definitely had a look all her own, unlike me who was all basic brown hair, gray eyes, average white skin—definitely not the kind anyone would ever comment on like they did Andie’s. She was also one of those people who could be friends with anybody. I don’t know how she did it when it was a miracle I had even one friend in this place.
I sighed. “I know, but that is not the kind of fun I’m looking for.”
She rolled her eyes. “You are wasting all your good high school years on books and old people.”
“Whatever. You work there too.”
“Yeah, but for me Golden Acres is a job. For you it’s like...a lifestyle or something.”
She wasn’t wrong. The long-term care facility on the east side of our small city was a reprieve. A chance to just be myself. A place where nobody really cared who my parents were. Honestly, I was lucky that Andie had helped me get the job.
We eventually got to the edge of the schoolyard, but neither of our parents was there yet.
“I’m just saying, all these guys are dying to get into your, let’s say...business,” she said, making herself chuckle. “It wouldn’t kill you to give one of them a chance.”
I raised my eyebrow at her.
“And while you’re at it you could, I don’t know, wear something that isn’t five sizes too big, or is, you know, a little more exciting than all black, all the time.” She tugged at the sleeve of my oversized sweatshirt. “I know you’ve got the goods under there.”
I rolled my eyes. “No thank you. I like being comfortable.”
“And by comfortable, you mean hidden,” Andie said.
I shrugged. “It’s what I like.”
We sat on the grass as people passed, getting into vehicles. A kid whizzed by on a skateboard.
“Haven’t seen one of those in a while,” Andie said.
“No kidding,” I said, watching as he nearly ran into a parked car. “Seems unnecessarily risky.”
Andie nodded as a girl who I thought was named Ashley came up to us. “Hey, guys. I don’t know if you heard, but I’m having a get-together this weekend and it would be great if you could both come.” She looked expectantly from me to Andie and then back to me again.
I was, as usual, at a total loss for words.
“Yeah, maybe,” Andie said, used to doing most of the talking for both of us.
“Okay, great. That would be great,” Ashley said, smiling as she turned away.
I waited a few seconds before I spoke. “There’s no way I’m going to a party.”
Andie feigned shock. “What? Nova Reynolds doesn’t want to go to a party? I’m utterly flabbergasted!”
I shoved her with my shoulder and smiled. She smiled back and we fell into a comfortable silence for a minute or two.
“It would be nice if you gave everyone a chance though. I know it’s weird for you with who your parents are and everything, but most people here are pretty decent.”
I nodded. “I know. I just...I don’t know, I’m never comfortable around them. I feel like I haven’t been comfortable since the day I moved here. Like...I don’t know, I can’t even find a way to be me here. Do you ever just...feel off? Like you can’t figure out who you’re supposed to be in your own skin?”
Andie gave me a look.
“Oh god, sorry,” I said, burying my face in my hands.
Of course Andie knew what it was like to not feel comfortable in her own skin. I always envied how comfortable she was with herself—so at ease around everybody—that I almost forgot that when I first moved here, it hadn’t been that long since she’d transitioned. I couldn’t imagine how difficult the process must have been, but she was so utterly herself now, that it was hard to remember things used to be different.
And all she was trying to get me to do was wear jeans that fit and go to a party.
“Don’t worry about it,” Andie said. “Honestly, it’s the reason we’re such good friends, I think. They want to be nice and inclusive and everything, but they don’t quite know what to do with me and they don’t quite know what to do with you either. We’re the famous outcasts.” She shrugged.
I nodded, not sure if that made me feel better or worse.
“Did I ever tell you that it was partly because of Enhanced Memory that I decided to come out?”
I looked at her, searching. Shook my head.
She gazed out into the parking lot. “It just started making things easier. People would use all these EMs, and of course lots of the original memories that were duplicated had come from people all over the gender spectrum.”
I nodded. Enhanced Memories were just that. Memories. And those memories came from people. I’d seen a ton of articles and news stories about it. A collective empathy and understanding had begun to form, sort of by accident. Being inside someone’s memories, inside that lived experience, gave people tiny glimpses of what it was like to be in that person’s shoes. Like truly be in their shoes, literally feeling the things they felt, the nuances of living a life you would never otherwise know.
It wasn’t a cure for ignorance, of course—people so easily went back to who they were—but acceptance and understanding had made huge strides since EM’s release.
“People just started to understand a bit better, I guess,” Andie continued. “As much as movies and TV and social media could tell someone’s story, EM let people feel what it was like to be someone, if only for a moment. It made the world a safer place for me. For so many of us.” She turned her gaze to me. “I wasn’t as scared to be who I am.”
Tears sprang to my eyes as I imagined my best friend stuck, feeling like she had to pretend all the time.
“Anyway,” she finished, straightening her shoulders as if to shake off the heavy conversation. “Who would even want to be the same as everyone else, right?” she said, and this time it was her turn to give me a shoulder shove.
I nodded, blinking the tears back to where they came from, and we sat in silence for a minute, each lost in our own thoughts.
“So how are your lines coming?” she asked after a bit.
I leaned back on my hands. Truthfully, I’d had my lines memorized since about two days after we got our parts. I don’t even know why I was so excited—it was just a silly school play and I didn’t even have that big of a part, but this was the first time I’d ever been brave enough to try out for any kind of production and I was excited. And okay, it was definitely Andie who made me do it, but still.
I actually did it.
“Good. I think I’ve got most of them down,” I said, picking at the grass.
“Ugh, I wish,” she said, digging in her bag. “I don’t know how I’m ever going to remember mine.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Must be super terrible to have almost all the lines in the whole play,” I said, grinning.
“Well, I mean, true, but it’s still hard,” she said, mock pouting. Her mom pulled up and she stood. “We’re Face Chatting later to run lines. I need all the help I can get.”
“You’re so bossy,” I said, but of course not minding for a second.
“And seriously, think about the party. It might actually be fun.”
I nodded and waved as she got in the car.
The parking lot was starting to clear out. I checked the time on my phone and sighed.
And yeah, I knew things were super busy for Mom and Dad, but honestly, if they didn’t want the responsibility of a kid, why did they bother having one?
As I waited, I checked my feeds.
Enhanced Memory Takes World by Storm.
I did it more by force of habit than anything else these days. I used to check all the news about Enhanced Memory because I thought it was so cool that my parents had invented this huge thing, and I guess I just never stopped. Maybe because the articles never stopped.
EM was a part of pretty much everyone’s life now. People always seemed amazed at how fast the tech became a household thing—articles always freaking out over how it moved even faster than when smartphones became the thing everyone had to have. This tech my parents actually helped invent—and truly made the real breakthroughs in the brain science part of it—was becoming so huge, and I couldn’t help but smile as I looked over at a couple kids sitting ten yards away who had EM headphones on. As much as my parents being who they were was a huge pain in my ass, I had to admit this thing that they had done was still pretty cool.
And it wouldn’t be this way forever. After graduation I could move anywhere and no one would have to know where I came from.
But as always, I clicked the link and turned up the volume.
“Not just for race car driving and bungee jumping anymore. Enhanced Memory could be the miracle cure for what ails you,” the reporter began. “With all the benefits the world is seeing from this advanced new tech, don’t be surprised if it is.
“What started off being marketed as an ultrarealistic entertainment experience is truly becoming a life-hacking system. Not only can you ‘download’ instructions on how to fix a sink or change a tire right into your memories, but this may also be the medical marvel you’ve been waiting for.
“‘Not just for entertainment,’ Experion Enterprises CEO Jackson Davies says, touting his fastest-selling device as a miracle cure for almost anything a person can suffer from.”
I recognized my parents’ boss on the screen.
“People all over the world have been discovering the myriad ways that Enhanced Memory can be used that go beyond what even we first imagined.”
The video jumped to a woman telling her experience.
“At first, I didn’t know what to make of this...thing,” she said, holding up her Enhanced Memory device. “My kids gave it to me. They live far away and I was always bored, you know? With no one to talk to all the time and everything. But because of this little device, my whole world has changed. What I didn’t tell my kids was that I wasn’t just bored, I was lonely, but now, because of Enhanced Memory, it’s like a whole new world has opened up. I have plenty of experiences and people in my life now. My mental health has never been better.”
The newscaster came back on-screen.
“There are seemingly endless ways Enhanced Memory can be used. Companies are experiencing increased employee satisfaction, as EM has become a leading tool in corporate sensitivity training as well as in the restructuring of hiring practices. People with addictions report getting off drugs and alcohol with this simple-to-use device, and still others are living in whole new worlds they couldn’t even imagine before.”
The video changed to a woman sitting in front of the most gorgeous landscape paintings.
“I’ve never had the money to travel, but it’s always been a dream of mine to gather inspiration for my art from all over the world.” She stopped, her eyes glistening. “But now I can, and because of it, I’ve been able to sell my paintings to others who travel through EM and want to show their friends all the places they’ve gone. I’m finally able to make a living off my art, which is another dream come true.”
The logo for the station popped up and the video ended.
The videos and articles were usually news clips, but every one of them was always so enthusiastic, they were almost more like a marketing campaign. As usual with these videos, goose bumps popped up on my arms. I still couldn’t believe this was something my parents had done...this thing that was changing the world.
Twenty minutes later I started walking. Having such high-achieving parents had its pros, but it definitely had its cons too.
I pulled out my phone and texted Andie. Guess what, the parents never showed.
She immediately sent back the shock-faced emoji. Are you okay? It’s scary out there. Do you need us to come get you?!
I had a habit of forgetting that people couldn’t read my intentions over text. No no. I’m good, just complaining. Should have finished with the eye roll emoji.Sorry.
Okay...if you’re sure.
Yes, I’m sure. Thanks though!
Honestly, I just shouldn’t text people. It was a beautiful day and the walk was actually kind of nice.
When I eventually made it home, Mom and Dad were both in the living room with Enhanced Memory headphones on.
I’d been hearing nothing but how I had to get off my phone and limit my screen time because I wasn’t living in “real life” for years, but like all the other rules my parents thought were so important, apparently they applied only to me and not to them. I tried my best not to roll my eyes, not to mention thank them for the nonexistent ride home.
But they had their reasons, ...
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