She puts the wad in my hand and I stuff it into my pocket, reminding me that I’m wearing pajamas as the amount of cash drags my pants off my hip. She gives me a glance and I swear I see a smirk on her face. 

One thing at a time here. 

“Come with me,” I turn on the lights as we head upstairs. “It’s a delicate process. Worst case scenario is fatal, but there’s a lot of degrees between that. I take the wrong element, the wrong memory and it can mess with your personality too. Your memories are what make you you. If you need me to remove anything from your childhood, I could turn you into a robot.” 

“I’m not looking for that kind of thing. I saw something tonight. It was about 15 minutes. I need that out of my head.” 

“Can’t you just lie about it?” 

“No. He’ll know. He’ll check.”

“Who’s he?” 

“My boss. Just trust me, it’s better you don’t know.”

I start prepping the chair and she stops at the doorway. 

“You know my name,” I say, moving back to the terminal. “Do I have to search around your memories to get yours?” 

“Tasmin. Sorry.”

“Well, Tasmin Sorry, take a seat. Put your head in the halo over here.” 

She smiles at my awful joke, but it’s mostly nerves. She slowly sits down and backs her head into the halo. 

“We don’t have to do this,” I say in my calm, understanding voice. It took a lot of practice, but I’m an expert at it now. “There are other ways to handle this.”

“We have to. It’s the only way.” 

“Do you have someone to come get you after this? It’s like surgery, you’re not going to be able to get yourself out of here once I’m done.” 

“It’s just 15 minutes. I think-”

“It’s the brain we’re dealing with here. Even if it’s 10 seconds, it’s going to mess you up a bit.”

“I- I can’t-”

I put my hand on her arm to let her know it’s going to be alright. It’s starting to feel like a regular job, even though it’s the middle of the night, I’m not wearing a shirt and I have more cash than I’ve made all month in the pocket of my pajamas. 

“Don’t worry about it. For this to work, I need you to relax.”

“Can’t you give me something to settle me down?”

“No. I need you in a clear state of mind.” 

She nods, wiping away a tear that she is trying to hide. She leans back into the halo and lets out a big breath. 

“Okay. Okay. I’m ready.”

“You’re going to feel a tingle. It’s extremely important that you stay still.” 

I get the terminal going and start the procedure as I normally would. It takes a few minutes, but I get into a groove. It’s not like accessing data on a computer. The brain is still extremely complicated. Even more complicated by the fact that it’s doing so many things at once. 

The colloquial term for this procedure, sifting through someone’s brain matter, is a catalog. It’s a dumb term because it doesn’t nearly match the complexity of the procedure itself, but that’s what the congloms, like Delcor, do to soften the idea. They compare it to flipping through one of those old department store flyers and trying to see how they’re organized. What they don’t tell you is that every person is different, so it takes some skill to figure it out without doing any damage. 

The first trick is to zone in on the specific part you need to work on. Since we’re talking about memories, we’re in the temporal lobe. Once I’ve found my way in there, I need access to those memories she’s looking to excise. I can only get to the area. Looking for memories is like being on a road that’s constantly shifting and changing course. She’s driving. She’s going to take me there. 

“Okay, Tasmin. I need you to go back. I need you to remember what you saw tonight. What is it you’re looking to forget.” 

 My video output lights up on my monitor. She thinks back and I see a bunch of guys in a swanky nightclub. Her outfit is starting to make a lot more sense. She was turning heads. I try not to let that distract me when I take a look at her in the chair again. 

It doesn’t take long for me to see what she’s trying to forget. A well-dressed bear of a man gets up from behind his desk and starts laying into the person he was just yelling at. He’s beating him to a pulp. 

I look over to Tasmin. She’s feeling the anguish all over again. I understand why she wants this memory gone. It’s not just the trouble she could get in for seeing this, it’s not something anyone would want to remember. It’s raw violence.

If I do my job right, she won’t even know this happened. I still will though and I don’t like it one bit. Who knows what I’m getting myself into? I need to know who and what I’m dealing with. 

“I think I’ve got what I need. You’re going to get really sleepy. That’s just me doing my work. When you wake up, this will be gone. You’ll be back to your normal self.” 

“Thank you.”

I run the wipe. The process causes Tasmin to fall asleep immediately. Soon enough, she can go back to whatever life she was living before tonight. Assuming she’s right about them taking her word for it that she doesn’t remember a thing. 

While that’s running, I try to figure out what to do with her. She doesn’t have anyone to bring her home. She doesn’t have anywhere to go. If someone saw her, someone from this crew, it could be a real problem. 

I’ve already taken my chance letting her in. I can’t send her back out now that I’ve played my part. I pick her up out of the chair when the procedure is done and bring her to my bed. I get her under the covers and take my pillow with me to the couch. 

I hide the cash. I trust she was telling the truth about why she’s here, but it doesn’t mean she’s not a welch. I’ll sleep much better knowing this wasn’t for nothing. Not that I’ll get much sleep after this.