I looked out the window in the living room. It was a bright afternoon and the neighborhood outside seemed quiet. The apartments outside looked old and somewhat dilapidated, like it would take more than a fresh coat of paint to bring them out of that state they were in. There were cars parked along each side of the street outside the apartment. Large trees loomed over most of the cars, and most of the cars were covered in bird shit. Still, there was a certain quaintness about this neighborhood, like it felt truly lived in. I was sure it had seen a lot.
Harry and I were quiet for a few moments as we both tried to take this new reality in. The fact that I didn't know who he or Stu were seemed to really sink in with him in those moments. He was looking down, seemed caught up in his own thoughts. I knew that if I were him, I'd feel something akin to grief if a friend that I lived with forgot who I was. But it was harder to empathize since I didn't know who I was either. I wasn't sure why I decided to take that moon dust in the first place, why it seemed to allure me in such a way that I was willing to forget everything. Maybe I didn't know that would happen.
Maybe I did.
When Harry told me that Stu was a programmer, that set something off in my brain. For the first time since I'd been awake, I felt a spark in my head, like something was trying to get me back to where I was. I knew that if anyone could help pin down what happened, it would be Stu. I walked down the hallway, keeping my steps light so as not to creak the floorboards. I approached Stu's door. It was an old wooden door with an aging coat of white paint. There were a few scratches on it and some of the paint had been chipped off. I could hear a faint clacking of keys from behind the door. I knocked softly.
"Stu, it's me," I said. The clacking stopped. I waited a few moments and then saw the knob turn and the door open slowly. Stu was standing there stiffly, and he looked tired. Up close, I could see the bags under his eyes behind his glasses. His eyes looked flat, like there was no light in them, but that something deeper inside kept him going. Underneath his clean and pragmatic exterior was someone deeply exhausted, but he didn't let up his act for a second, even if I could see past it.
"What is it, Chuck?" he said, his voice airy.
"We gotta talk, need to figure out what happened last night. Can I come in?"
He took a deep breath and let out a sigh. Even though he was tired, I could tell that he still had deep reserves of patience left in him. "Come on in," he said. He opened the door further and motioned me to come inside. His room was much cleaner than the rest of the apartment. There was a neatly made Japanese mattress on the floor with navy blue bedsheets and white pillow covers without a speck on them. The room was scant of decorations. There were no posters, knickknacks, or any other personally identifying items. The room felt almost barren, except for a desk tucked neatly in the corner of the room. On top of the desk was a large black computer tower humming quietly and two large display monitors that looked like sleek black mirrors. Next to the monitors was a black keyboard and mouse. It made the rest of the room pall in comparison. Next to the desk was a fancy black chair that had clearly seen some miles.
Stu walked over to his desk and sat down in his chair, his body fitting it like a well-worn baseball glove. He motioned over to the bed. "You can sit on the bed, Chuck," he said. I went over to the bed and squatted down into it, sitting cross-legged and holding my back up with the pillows. Stu sat there in his chair, leaning back and studying me. His gears were turning, but he kept quiet.
"So last night—"
"Chuck, you were acting like a damn fool," Stu said. "The whole night you were snorting that moon dust, going on and on. You didn't say a single word that made any sense. What's worse, I've got a deadline coming up on Monday to push ten code monkeys' worth of production code, and you kept barging in here to tell me all kinds of stupid bullshit. I couldn't get any sleep because of you, and now I'm having to crunch even harder since you spent all night wasting my time."
"What kind of stupid bullshit?" I asked.
"My God, Chuck, I barely even remember. It was so incomprehensible I couldn't tell what you were thinking. You stayed up most of the night yammering on about stupid philosophy—or conspiracy theories or whatever."
"Like what?"
He pinched his nose and began stammering in frustration. "I—I don't even know. You just kept saying the word 'psyop' over and over again. Kept refusing to explain what that was. You were delirious, okay? Absolutely insane, and now you have brain damage." He took his hand off his nose and gave me that same stern look he did to Harry. "I can't have you acting like an idiot too, Chuck. I already deal with enough of Harry's idiocy."
"Stu, you don't understand. I lost all my memories, all of them. I didn't know who you were until Harry said your name."
Bitcoin address: bc1qtgqvj6qjxnaxkns20x5rcwnxvv3jqzhduvvxfc