I have a lair. It sits atop a mountain. It is not an especially tall or imposing mountain, though the service roads are not open to the public and the gondola ride up is hideously overpriced. So it is not impossible to reach, but also not easy. Despite what I am and despite what I do, I prefer not to receive guests.
And yet they come.
"And what do you suppose a fair price would be?" I say to this one man - this stalk-like, hawk-faced man, with thin, oval glasses and a knobbly corduroy jacket. I hate him.
"Well, they cost $8 a pair, I believe," he says, pulling out a naked smartphone. "Let me check. I might have the receipt in my email..."
He has come for a sock.
I find lost things. All lost things. And perhaps it is incorrect to say that I find these items. It is more accurate to say that they find me. Here, at roughly 3,245 meters above sea level, in my lair of old wood and newish plaster, they find me.
Lost things. Truly lost things, mind you. Not the temporarily misplaced. Not the momentarily relocated. Your neighborhood-wandering cat is not here, because it is not lost. Soon it will come home. Or it will be another place. Or it will be dead. But not lost. When a thing is lost it will not come back to you. If you want it back, you must come to me.
And they do. Oh, how they come to me.
"I don't deal in that sort of currency," I tell the man inquiring about his sock. "But a sock is hardly anything. If you truly wish to have the sock returned to you..."
"I do," says the reedy, bookish skeleton man. "I've an Oxford shirt that goes just right with those socks and I can't seem..."
"Please don't," I say. "What's your fifth favorite food?"
The man's eyes go wide. "Oh geez..." He hems and haws. "Havarti cheese."
There's a sock in my hand. I put it in the man's hand. He nearly squeals. "There you are. Havarti cheese now tastes like foam insulation to you."
"Oh," he coos, shoulders slumping. But he leaves. Thank it all, he leaves.
There are so many things in my lair, it's disgusting. I've genuinely no idea how it all started. I am, however, keenly aware of the fact that an aging, inaccessible mountain lair stuffed to the molding with humanity's tossed off burnt-ends is very unlikely to catch full value in today's housing market. So I persist.
And here comes another. This one is doughier, older - a man living in permanent soft focus. He smiles as he tuts up the staircase and takes hold of the knocker.
"Yes?" I say, preemptively tossing open the door, glowering down like a dark sun.
"Oh hello," says the hazy little fellow. "I've lost something and I'm told you can help."
I sigh. I think it's important that all my guests are fully aware of how put out they've made me. "Come in."
He follows, still smiling. I may hate this one the most. "What've you lost? Your youth? That's not a thing, by the way. Just so you know. Your youth is dead, not lost."
"No no," he says. He won't stop smiling. Maybe he's lost his sanity? Also not a thing I'd have access to. "It's a very particular thing. I'm not sure, well, I don't fully know if it's something you'd have."
"Well, I have a lot," I say, not proudly. "If it's the right sort of thing, I probably have it."
He nods. "It's about my wife..."
"No," I say quickly. "Is she dead? Does she not love you anymore? Not to be presumptuous. I just get those a lot. And the answer is no."
"She is dead," he says, still smiling. "But not that. Dead is dead. I understand that as well as you can. No, it's something else. It's very particular. Maybe even a bit too small for a place as grand as this."
"That is some incredibly misplaced flattery, but I'll take it. I just reunited a man with half a pair of dress socks. Size is not an issue."
"Oh good." He scratches his head and for a moment his smile falters, ever so slightly. Somehow the momentary lapse is even more unsettling. "I don't...I'm having some problems remembering."
"Oh?"
He nods. "Memories aren't lost, usually. Just jumbled up. Hard to get to. Though some...some do seem to be gone. That's the thing though - you lose a memory, you don't know you ever had it, right? And without knowing it's lost, it can't bother you that much. So, I guess I probably have lost quite a few memories, I just don't know it, and...to be honest, it's probably best that way. The less I know about what I don't know anymore...that's probably best."
I clear my throat. I am strangely uneasy. "Certainly."
"But there's a very particular memory," he says. "I know enough to know it exists, but it's just...gone."
"What is it?"
"My wife's face."
I shake my head. "Certainly you must have pictures, video...?"
"No, no," he says, chuckling. "I know what Mary looked like. I know that perfectly well. It's just one moment, right? She gave birth to Wayne - he's our son - she gave birth to Wayne and the nurse handed her the baby and...We didn't record every second of every day back then. Not even for the big stuff. So it was just me and the doctor and the nurse and Mary and Wayne in that room. And I suppose I'm the only one who was probably looking at her face just then. So I think I'm the only one who saw it. Her face. When she held Wayne that first time. When she felt the weight of him and the heat, and she got to smell him. I just know...I know I saw that, but..."
He puts his head down. "Sorry." He's wiping his eyes. I'd offer him a handkerchief, but there isn't a single one in my collection (I burn them as soon as they arrive. They're disgusting.). "But that look was burned into my heart for so long, as everything else goes, I can't forget that it happened. Except, remembering that it happened doesn't do me any good when I've lost that moment. And it's gone. All the way gone. I can't call it back, as hard as I've tried. So..." He took a deep breath. "Whatever it costs, it doesn't matter at all. It's really the only thing I want. I just need to see it again. Even if it's only just once."
I consider the request. I consider my supply. Somehow I know that memory is here, in my stores. I always know.
"What would happen next?" I ask, curious. "When you have this memory back?"
"Don't know," he says, cheerily. "I don't have anyone left. I don't have anything. I heard about you and that's all I've been thinking of. Getting back that moment. At least the memory of it."
"Okay," I say, I put my hand on the man's soft, fuzzy head. "I will give you what you ask for. And I will take the price I deem fair."
"Please," he says. I do my part. His face is beatific, as these things go.
"Do you want to know what I took?"
He shakes his head. "Doesn't matter."
"Fair enough." I lead him to the door. He practically floats across the threshold.
He will be back.
Eventually that memory - that moment - will return to my storeroom. It must. His mind cannot hold it. It cannot hold anything.
I do not like this job, but I have my pride. I won't abide the sale of damaged goods. So the price was this: I took today. I took his memory of having come here. And when he comes back tomorrow, I will make the same trade. Everyday. Until there are no more days. An old memory made fresh. The only silver lining on a pitch black cloud.
I am truly damned, but that doesn't mean I can't make the best of it.