The drive continued to be uneventful. Boring. Monotonous, even.

Alice decided to spice up the ride the only way she knew how: irritating small talk. “Hey, remember when we used to go to IKEA?”

Joseph frowned slightly. “We never went to IKEA.”

“Yes we did! You don’t remember the meatballs?”

“What? No.”

And that was the full extent of that conversation.

They had been having a lot of talks like this recently. Alice would have a fond, irreverent memory of their time together, which Joseph would have zero recollection of, and if she pressed it, he would get irritated and change the subject – or worse, accuse her of forgetting things.

She was fine, at this point, with just dropping it. Truth be told, she wasn’t sure whose memories were the failing ones. As the days went on, she began to imagine that maybe it was both of theirs, or maybe even history itself was rotting away, leaving nothing but confusion and astringent feelings.