(INSPIRED BY THE PROMPT: “You have the ability to see into the future but each time you do you lose an important memory.”)
Henry tried not to look into the future anymore. He learned from a young age the cruel reality of life when his own parents tried to take advantage of his ability. At first it started off sweet, a trip to get his favorite candy at the corner bodega while his Dad asked him about what he thought about lotto numbers for next week’s millions jackpot. The bodega cashier Juan Pablo laughing a deep belly laugh in amusement at seeing a father take his son’s numbers seemingly spouted at random very seriously as his son was more serious about debating the merits of Peach Ring gummies vs. sour patch worm gummies. It started off with his mother taking young Henry to visit the New York Stock Exchange and pick random stocks for weeks and months down the line.
Throughout his schooling, Henry’s teachers often scolded him for not completing homework assignments and missing questions on his tests they knew he had mastered in previous lessons. They started accusing him of not trying hard enough and looked at him with disdain when he insisted they had never learned about those subjects.
Henry realized something was wrong when he woke up the morning of his 15th birthday and realized he somehow couldn’t remember the name of his school and how to get there. Henry prized his education and intellect above all else. It was with logic and reasoning that he realized his parents egging him on to look into the future for their own benefit was detrimental to his mental acuity and promptly got himself emancipated from their care as it was clear they were taking advantage of him and he would end up with early onset dementia and never reach the heights his intellect could carry him to if he stayed with selfish parents.
Having successfully removed himself from a stressful situation, Henry became hell bent on proving himself without the aid of what he had come to think of as a curse. He moved across the country and fashioned a new life for himself void of anything familiar and put down roots in Southern California. He happily puttered about between Universities and became an esteemed and respected professor.
As news of COVID-19 virus continued to spread, Henry cringed. Each day the quarantine dragged on, he felt more and more tempted to look into the future and see if he could find a cure. Each day he delayed, unsure if he could make himself when there was no telling what memories he would lose. He was terrified of losing himself. Of losing the memories he cherished with new friends in SoCal who had become so much more than family. Of losing the memory of the first time he said “I love you” to his best friend. Of losing his memory of the freedom he felt when he ran into the Pacific Ocean for the first time, fully clothed for the sheer joy of it, hand in hand with his friends as the sun set into the water, cotton candy colored skies streaking purple, orange and pink as far as his eye could see. Of losing his memories of the long drives up and down the Californian coast, windows rolled down screaming songs from his childhood out at the top of his lungs. Of losing the memories of each of his students’ faces as they came up to thank him at the end of the semester and some came back to visit him, with some new topic to debate or a silly meme to share.
It might be selfish, Henry reasoned, but to him the memories he had left were precious things. And if anything he’d learned selfish tendencies from selfish parents who became greedy. Henry grit his teeth and pretended to be normal, for now. He’d try to reevaluate come summer. He’d try to keep on with this new “normal” he found himself living in with the rest of the world, helpless to the path of a virus that refused to discriminate based on age, class, race, or gender.
When his friends joked about how diligently he was about washing off his hands these days when he came back to the house they all quarantined in, he forced a smile. Each moment at the sink these days made him feel like all he was doing was continuously washing the blood off his hands of the thousands of people he was choosing not to save.