Aren Vale learned early that the world was good at forgetting.
It forgot broken streetlights, unread books, cracked sidewalks. It forgot old songs and unimportant people. And most of the time, forgetting was gentle—quiet enough that no one noticed when something slipped away.
Until it wasn't.
The ledger lay open on the desk before him, its pages yellowed with age, its ink faded like memories left too long in the sun. Aren's job was simple: archive trivial things. Names of buildings no longer standing. Events no one cared to remember. Lives deemed insignificant by history.
Nothing important ever appeared here.
That was the rule.
So when Aren saw the name, his breath stopped.
Liora Wynn.
The letters were clean. Fresh. Written in ink that hadn't begun to fade.
Aren stared at it for a long time, as if the page might correct itself if given enough patience. Names like this didn't belong in the archive. Living people weren't recorded here. Only things the world had already released.
His fingers hovered over the page.
The air in the room felt heavier than before, as if the archive itself was holding its breath.
"Impossible," Aren whispered.
The moment his skin brushed the paper, a sharp chill traveled up his arm—cold, sudden, unmistakable. Aren recoiled, heart pounding. That sensation had only ever meant one thing.
A Vanishing.
The archive lights flickered.
Aren closed the ledger slowly, as though moving too fast might tear something fragile in the air. He stood, grabbing his coat, the name burning behind his eyes.
If the archive remembered her, then the world was already beginning to forget.
Liora Wynn was sitting alone on a bench near the old tram station when Aren found her.
She looked… normal.
That was the cruelest part.
She swung her legs gently, shoes scraping the concrete in a soft rhythm. Her hair caught the late afternoon light, and when she smiled at something on her phone, it was warm enough to make Aren hesitate.
People passed by.
None of them looked at her.
A woman walked straight through the space where Liora's shoulder should have been, shivering as if she'd brushed against cold air. A group of students laughed loudly as they crossed the platform, their voices spilling around Liora like water around a stone.
She didn't react.
She was used to it.
Aren's chest tightened.
He stepped forward. Each footfall felt unreal, like he was crossing a boundary he wasn't meant to breach.
"Liora Wynn," he said.
Her head snapped up.
For a heartbeat, the world seemed to tilt.
"You can see me?" she asked.
Her voice trembled—not with fear, but with something far worse.
Hope.
Aren swallowed. "Yes."
Her eyes widened, shimmering with unshed tears. She stood so fast the bench rattled behind her.
"You really can?" she asked again, as if afraid the answer might change.
Aren nodded.
She laughed then—a soft, broken sound that cracked something open inside him. She covered her mouth, shoulders shaking, and Aren realized with a jolt that she was crying.
"I thought," she said, forcing the words out, "I thought I was already gone."
"You're not," Aren said immediately. Too immediately.
She studied his face, searching for doubt. Finding none, she let out a shaky breath.
"I'm Liora," she said. "Or… I think I am."
The way she said it—as if her own name were fragile—hurt more than Aren expected.
"I know," he replied. "I read your name."
She blinked. "Read it where?"
Aren hesitated.
How did you explain that your existence had been marked as nearly over?
"In a place that remembers," he said carefully. "When the world doesn't."
Liora stared at him for a long moment, then smiled faintly. "That sounds lonely."
"It is," Aren said.
She nodded, like she understood.
They walked together, though to anyone watching, Aren was alone.
Shadows stretched long across the street as evening crept in. Liora's reflection didn't appear in shop windows. Her footsteps made no sound. Once, a digital billboard flickered violently as she passed beneath it, the image distorting into static.
Liora noticed. She always noticed.
"Today," she said quietly, "the café I go to every morning didn't have my order ready."
Aren didn't interrupt.
"The barista asked if I was new. I've been going there for three years." She smiled, but it trembled. "And my phone—my messages to my best friend… they're gone."
Aren's fists clenched in his pockets.
"And you?" she asked suddenly. "You remember me. Why?"
"I don't forget people who are disappearing," Aren answered.
She stopped walking.
"That's a terrible ability," she said.
"Yes."
She laughed softly. "Figures."
They stood there as the streetlights flickered on one by one. For a moment, Liora looked almost transparent under their glow.
"How long do I have?" she asked.
Aren met her gaze.
He had seen Vanishings before. Some lasted weeks. Some only days.
"I don't know," he said honestly. "But you're still here. That means there's time."
"For what?"
He didn't answer immediately.
"For someone to remember you," he said at last. "Enough to keep you real."
Liora's expression softened.
Then she said something that made his heart stutter.
"Will you?"
Aren froze.
This was the moment. The one he dreaded every time.
To remember someone who was fading meant anchoring them to your own existence. It meant carrying their weight when the world refused to. It meant loss—always.
He had never said yes before.
He looked at Liora Wynn, standing beneath a streetlight that barely seemed to recognize her, and thought of the ledger. Of the ink that hadn't faded.
"Yes," he said.
Her smile was breathtaking.
"Then," she said, reaching for his hand—
—and for the first time that day, her fingers were warm.
The streetlight above them shattered.
Glass rained down like stars.
Aren knew then, with terrifying certainty:
The world would not forgive him for remembering her.