Memories.

Seven years ago, at the mere age of ten, I heard rumors about a goldfish that could never die. Its owners had accidentally dropped the fish’s bowl across their bathroom’s floor whilst trying to clean its enclosure, effectively killing the fish on sight.

Yet, the next morning, the fish returned.

It swam in circles around an enclosure that was very much fixed, as if nothing had ever gone awry. Everything seemed so casual. So benign and normal. The fish’s owners could barely believe their eyes.

They marked it off as a hallucination. A strange, joint dream. Until every day, at precisely three in the afternoon, they would come to hear a bloodcurdling smash and crackle in their kitchen, and find the fish dead across the floor, once more. They would then watch as their beloved pet would be carried over to their front door, by the ghost of an invisible memory, and taken outside in order to be buried.

This lasted for days, until they, too, became part of the scene. The broken memory.

Their house was marked off as haunted, and under investigation. All citizens were prohibited from approaching the house that soon became an urban legend, that—to me, as a child—was all I assumed it would ever be.

A strange tale.

A fib to be forgotten. At least, for a good few years.

The first time I noticed something was off about my parents didn’t come as an immediate realization. Their faces were contorted in pure joy, as they continued to tell each other jokes, they looked so happy.

I found myself chuckling along, small, ignorant thing that I was.

It was when I attempted to join in on their conversation, that my world finally collapsed.

They acted as if I did not exist. I assumed they were pranking me. I giggled, got myself something to eat, then left for the bathroom to brush my teeth.

Once I was done, I traced my steps. The yellow glow of the kitchen’s light glimmered like a bright, condemning star hung above their heads. My parents were still seated, and extremely enthusiastic over the terrible pun I had heard my father tell hours ago; had the words come from anyone other than her husband, my mother definitely wouldn't have found any form of entertainment in his joke.

I did find it odd. But it’s often easier to remain in denial. To brush things off as a strange prank. And so, after the sun was long gone from the sky, and I had washed out every trace of dirt in my long, onyx hair, I made myself a cup of steaming hot cocoa. I ignored my parents, and went to bed without questioning it. It was a weird day. It will be better tomorrow, I had wanted to believe.

When I awoke the morning after, an orange shimmer was still present in the hallway.

I stumbled out of bed, ran into the kitchen and found their seats, unmoved, still. The coffee mugs, the pleats on their clothes, the smell from their dinner—all the same. And it tore at my heart.

Everything was wrong.

I screamed.

I tried to shake them, to move them. However, just like watching a display of robots programmed to act in certain ways, interrupting their course of action was impossible.

They laughed again. My knees gave out under my frail weight. I fell to the floor through sobs and wails, learning that there would be no reprieve from the outside world in my own home anymore—only two hollow husks pretending to be people, for the rest of eternity.

As it sunk in that even if I were to make it to my deathbed, they would still be here, croaking like frogs without a care in the world, the loneliness was quick to become unbearable.

I tried to report the incident, only to be brushed off as a child telling lies.

Nobody believed me, until it happened to them. And by then, it was much too late.

I wish there was a way to stop this.

I don't go into the kitchen anymore.