Conner opened his eyes, yawning. He reached an arm over to Bree's side of the bed, but found nothing but a few rumpled sheets. He climbed out of bed, assuming she must have already woken up. He trudged into the kitchen, where he saw the note card. Everything came flooding back, the argument, Bree leaving, the strange message, the recording, the weird silver machine.

He yawned, starting to brew a pot of coffee. He headed over to his fridge to grab some milk for his coffee and stopped short. His fridge was covered in the usual array of photo's, mostly of Bree and Conner. Usually they filled him with cheer and the motivation for his day. He didn't know how to feel about them anymore. He swept them off his fridge, where one of them landed in a puddle of water. He watched the ink in the photo contort, then liquify, Bree's image slowly dissolving in the pool of water. Conner shook his head, snapping himself out of a daydream. He opened the fridge, grabbing his milk and pouring it into his piping hot coffee. He grabbed his backpack, slinging it over one shoulder and walking out the door.

━━━━━━━━━▲━━━━━━━━━

Conner strode down the hallway of his college, bumping into a girl who was texting on her phone, her fingers a blur as they tapped away. They both tumbled to the ground, Conner scrambling to pick up his books and mop up his spilled coffee. She handed him his science textbook, frantically apologizing. Conner looked up to see Bree, causing him to drop his books again. He shook his head, looking more clearly at the girl he'd bumped into. It wasn't Bree at all, but it had looked like her for a second. Conner looked up at the students passing by. Every single one looked just like Bree. He rubbed his eyes, taking a closer look. The passing students no longer looked like Bree, just normal college students. He might have a serious problem. Conner looked at the spilled remains of his coffee, still half asleep.

He got into the line at a nearby coffee place, the one he always went to. He looked up to see Bree again, who was furiously making out with another coffee shop worker. Conner rubbed his eyes, but this time it wasn't a hallucination. When it was Conner's turn to order, he was able to get a good look at the guy's name tag. Alan, it read. Conner instantly hated the blond coffee barista, tapping him on the shoulder and placing his order. Bree once again looked blankly at Conner, not recognizing him at all. He rubbed his temples, thinking back to the silver machine's offer.

There had to be some kind of catch. It couldn't really be that easy to get rid of his painful memories. No, someone had to remember. Besides, there were probably some side effects. There had to be, right?

━━━━━━━━━▲━━━━━━━━━

Conner opened the door to his apartment, dumping his backpack on the couch. He stepped in a puddle of water. He looked down to see the photo he'd thrown onto the ground earlier that day, now completely soaked in water, blurry and almost unrecognizable from the picture that he'd hung on his fridge. Conner reached down, picking up the wet paper. He stared at the colors draining from the photo with a morbid fascination, almost in a trance. As the paper slowly crumbled in his hands, Conner opened the trash can, flinging the paper into the bucket. He walked over to his room, where he reached up onto the top of his dresser, pulling down Bree's purple beanie. He sat down on his bed, running his fingers through the fluffy purple wool.

━━━━━━━━━▲━━━━━━━━━

Conner pulled into the same parking spot he had parked at before, retracing his steps until he reached the strange building at 12 Willowmarsh Lane. He opened the door, this time heading straight for the silver machine. A small note card printed out of the machine.

Conner took a deep breath, steeling his nerves.

"Yes." Conner replied.

Conner quickly sat down in the wooden chair. The tape recorder turned on, starting to record.

"Conner Jonathan Bailey." Conner said.

"I'm trying to erase all memories I have of Bree Campbell." Conner said.

"I can't take any more heartbreak. Every day I have to see her on the campus, always with that guy. Two days ago, we got in a fight, I was just trying to be nice, and she stormed out. We'd done this a million times. I try to do something nice or reminisce over old memories, and she leaves. Every time, she came back. I guess I didn't know how quickly I could lose her forever." Conner took a deep breath, sitting back in the chair.

"Y'know, I told my parents I bought her a necklace, but I actually got a ring. A little part of me always knew we would fight and we did over the years, but I never expected her to wipe me from her memory and move on after two days. She always was an impulsive person." Conner said.

"You did this to me. To us. I've always done what's best for you, but I'm finally doing something for myself. Something I won't regret doing for the rest of my life, because I won't have to remember. It's such a loss to spend that much time with a person, only to find out that she's a stranger." Conner replied coldly.

The tape recorder turned off, the blinking light slowly fading. A final card shot out of the silver machine.

Conner looked at the room next to him, which strangely had a bed that was almost identical to the one he had as a kid. He kicked off his shoes, climbing into the bed. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes.