A sample of Forget Her
By Holly Riordan
Dedication
To my fiancé
and the memories we’re going
to continue to make.
Chapter 1 — pages 5–6
An announcement cuts into my movie marathon uninvited. “You can’t change your past, but you can cleanse your memories,” it says in messy, mismatched fonts. Like a ransom note.
"Jesus. More commercials?" I say in between beer slurps. "We’re lucky if our web series gets a single ad break."
Arrow, my miniature dachshund, perks at my voice. He waddles his sausage belly to my side of the couch, abandoning his favorite pillow. I keep it flipped to the plain side to hide the bubble-lettered message about my kid having paws. My mother sewed it as a surprise when I adopted him. One of her subtle guilt trips.
Arrow settles onto my lap as the words on screen dissolve into a beach scene with a barefooted spokeswoman. She looks out of place with her pale, sunken cheeks and long-sleeved dress. I don’t recognize her face, but she feels familiar, like a neighbor only seen from peripherals. Someone inspecting apples in the produce aisle or tugging a flopping dog away from a mud puddle.
"I’m honored to announce the grand opening of Endellion Resorts," she says with a Long Island accent, a copycat of mine. "When you purchase a weeklong vacation package at our exclusive island, you’ll receive a complimentary Memory Cleansing. This quick, noninvasive procedure will temporarily remove your most traumatic memories. It will help you have a truly stress-free, relaxing vacation."
She pops a monochrome umbrella, tilts the canopy toward the camera, and spins it rapidly enough for the spokes to blur. Dark splotches spit from the center and smack the lens like blood in a B-horror film. A beat later, the camera thrashes side to side, shaking away the grime. The umbrella, remodeled with vibrant purples and pinks, slows to a stop.
Their editing sucks. It looks like one of those local family furniture commercials with jump cuts and green screens. It has to be a scam.
I switch stations, creating a flip-book effect. The same commercial spams every network.
The spokeswoman continues spouting nonsense in a voiceover while a helicopter captures a high-angle shot of the resort. Two separate beaches border opposite sides of an oval island. A U-shaped building with arcade and cafeteria signs sits on a curved end. On the other end, a white wooden boardwalk branches toward rows of bungalows.
A montage follows. Slick, spiraling water slides. Lobster tails dipped in cocktail glasses. Claw machines with colorful, woolly prizes. Each image blinks past at a frame rate reserved for flickering projectors in old monster movies, brainwashing victims with their lids taped open wide.
Fifty photos later, regularly scheduled programming returns, but my interest lingers on the resort. I unlock my cell to check social media, to see whether anyone else finds the concept sketchy.
Endellion Resorts is listed at the top of the trending tab. Friends tag each other, teasing about awkward hookups they want erased. Influencers upload reaction videos with mouth-clasping thumbnails. Trolls patch together memes, Photoshopping the spokeswoman onto characters from campy sci-fi movies about science going too far.
I roll my eyes at the strangers with nothing better to do than vomit their opinion onto a screen, but I keep tapping on mine. Another beer later, I cave and join the crowd. I scribble on forums. I sign electronic petitions. I reblog articles about how Memory Cleansing could wreak damage on long-term memory, then toss in my own theories about the company manipulating viewers with a low-budget commercial to come across as unintimidating, harmless.
My coworkers drop question-marked comments beneath each post. They believe I should be at the head of the line to have my mind purged of the childhood stories passed around our studio like cigarette stubs.
Publication details
Copyright © 2020 Holly Riordan. All rights reserved. Published by Thought Catalog Books, an imprint of the digital magazine Thought Catalog, which is owned and operated by The Thought & Expression Company LLC, an independent media organization based in Brooklyn, New York and Los Angeles, California. This book was produced by Thought Catalog. Cover illustrated and designed by KJ Parish. Visit us on the web at thoughtcatalog.com and shopcatalog.com. Made in the USA. ISBN 978-1-949759-23-5
Back to book options
