Margaret leans in, puzzlement crosses her face and clouds the sparkle behind her spectacled eyes. She brings her latte to her lips. “Tell me that again,” she says. “I hardly remember that.”

Clair pops a date in her mouth, “You don’t remember?” Margaret thinks there might be salt in her coffee, hopes Clair doesn’t choke on the pit.

“I might if you say it again. When did this happen?”

“The eye doctor. Remember? I was 90% blind in the left eye. A worm, they said, a parasite. Every two weeks, ophthalmologist. You took me. Across the street, the mall and there was a skating rink on the top floor. You used to take me - you don’t remember? How could you not remember that?”

A skating rink…

Margaret sat back, willing herself to remember. All the damned greyness in the way.

Before their parents split, there were lessons. Swimming, piano, and skating -Margaret’s favourite of all - she fancied one day, she would be an Olympian. There wasn’t a moment she wasn’t day dreaming about skating: leaping and spinning, flips and splits…the sound of the blades cutting the ice, the quiet vastness in the open arena…

She would remember a rink at the top of the mall, wouldn’t she?

“Oh my gosh…yes, yes! It is coming back to me now! How could I have forgotten? And we had popcorn afterward? And that one time there, I saw Jeff Cross - Oh he was so hot. You remember that time, Clair?”

Now it was Clair’s turn to remember. Clair’s eyes drifted to her right ear. She always did that when she was thinking hard. She could hear the craftiness in that story, Margaret thought. Clair’s memory was sharp as glass, did she know Margaret was making her hustle?”Yes, Margaret - and I saw Greg Robbins there that day. I do remember.”

They laughed, looking back, remembering.

And this is what Margaret loved the most about not remembering: making up the past the way she wanted it to be.

“Yes! That’s right, Clair. Exactly.”