The lights were too bright.

 

Woohyun had to squint his eyes from the vibrant neon lights that seem to be abundant around that part of the town. He stopped in his track to clear out the flashy white streaks dancing behind his eyelids and someone knocked him on the shoulder. No apology. The stranger just disappeared among the throngs of people in the narrow street.

 

It was when he recovered his balance that it dawned on him; he didn’t even remember why he was walking in the first place.

 

Heck, he didn’t even know where he was heading and he whipped his head around, helplessly searching something that could invoke a sense of familiarity but all he could see were blinding lights and gaudy signboards in the sea of blurry faces. Like ants, there were so many of them. Woohyun couldn’t make out the faces of the people passing by him. Maybe it was too dark, which is strange considering the prolific neon lights lining the arcades and bars.

 

The man wondered what hour is it for this abundance of people to be frolicking in the night and absently stuffed his hands in his coat to search for his phone.

 

None.

 

His breath hitched as he only grasped the air from the absence of the slim rectangular device in his pocket. “Ah”, Woohyun thought, “so that is why my coat feels strangely light.”

 

Woohyun gave up patting around his clothes for the phone and slumped his head in defeat.

He leaned on one of the walls of a building and just stared into the distance. Why is he here? Where is he right now? What is this place?

 

The buzzing from a nearby arcade caught his attention. There were lines of man at the counter, exchanging their bills for tokens to the likes of highly pixelated games and loud pinball machines.

Men attached to their LED screens and flashing battlefields more than anything else in their lives.

An army of men fighting for everything and nothing.

 

His reverie was cut short when a flash of brown crossed his line of vision.

 

Through the hazy maze of people, he spotted a lady with small eyes. Brown hair that cascaded down her shoulders and smooth leather jacket. lipstick.

 

Woohyun’s eyes were trained on her. With every step she took, every bounce of her hair and how the arcade’s signboard cast a purple glow on her hair, he couldn’t help but felt there was something off, something he couldn’t put his fingers on.

 

It is when she took a sudden turn and slipped into one of the building that a light bulb lit on his head. Literally. The bulb of the streetlight he was standing under suddenly lit up for a moment. And with that, he also noticed how every streetlight along the street is not lighted up.

 

“Maybe the town council was too stingy with the funding and couldn’t be bothered to repair some measly streetlights,” he concluded. A sliver of anger lit up within him at the thought but it was pushed to the back of him mind as he trudged to the building the lady disappeared into.

 

Once he was in front of the building, with its shadow looming over him, he suddenly felt hesitant to take another step forward, clearly contrasting his demeanor a few seconds ago. It was not dread. It was more to the confusion of why was he following this random lady into an even darker alleyway.

He didn’t even realize when did he left his spot under the broken streetlight.

 

LES MÉMOIRES RECORD STORE

 

“How bizarre,” Woohyun thought as he read the sign. With the surrounding arcades and bar, it was unlikely to find a record store here. It stuck out like a sore thumb. And it had the look of hurried newness, as if someone literally threw it together from scratch overnight.

 

What a peculiar name: Les Mémoires Record Store. Sounded like french. That’s cool.

 

At loss on what to do next, he simply went with his instincts.Rubbing his palms together before stuffing his left one into his coat, he turned the knob to the door. A bell chimed, the sound shattering against the stifling silence. Woohyun walked inside.

 

 

X

 

 

It was a small place. Nothing out of the ordinary, just a typical record store with a dozen shelves lining the place from wall to wall. The lady with small eyes was nowhere to be seen. Besides himself, the place seemed completely empty. Not a sound stirred. The bulbs hanging on the ceiling were dim and if not for the light from outside streaming in from the side windows, he would have tripped at the threshold.

 

“Hello?” he said aloud. But no answer except for the echo of his voice bouncing off the bare brick walls.

 

Lacking of anything else to do, he sauntered to one of the shelves. The lady would pop up eventually. He didn’t know why but he’s confident about it. For a split second, he questioned himself on how he didn’t seem to be bothered by the poorly lit store and its eerie silence. If this was any other day, he would have picked his up the first chance he got and scrambled away.

 

Perhaps it’s because it just happened to be a record store. It’s not an everyday occurrence to stumble across a record shop and besides, you never knew what you would find in a vintage shop. If he’s lucky enough, he would end up finding a rare LP and sell it with a high price to collectors.

 

What he expected was the shelves to be arranged alphabetically but there was no ‘N’. And no ‘I’ nor ‘S’ sections either. In fact, there were no letters at all.

 

To his surprise, there weren’t even any records! Upon closer inspection, he noticed that the shelves were filled with what looked like old VHS tapes.

 

What the hell??!! Why are there video tapes in a record store??

 

Things started to go even weirder when he realized the tapes were not marked off with a film’s name or anything moderately resembling one. Quite the contrary, each tape was labeled with a date. He ran his fingers on some, scanning the tapes at random.

 

13/12/1998

 

07/06/2000

 

11/04/2011

 

“What is this?” he muttered under his breath, eyes trained on the rows of tapes.

 

“Take a guess.”

 

Woohyun was slightly taken aback by the foreign voice. He looked to the direction of the previously empty counter and there she was. The lady with small eyes.

 

“Um, excuse me,” he said sheepishly. “I was looking around here and I was a little confused about these ‘records’. Do you by any chance work here?”

 

She chuckled softly. “I don’t know. Maybe?” she grinned. “No, I just like to kidnap store keepers, tie them in the back room and stand behind their cash registers,” she said it so calmly, Woohyun wasn’t sure whether she was being serious or just sarcastic.

 

“Indeed,” Woohyun said, trying to keep his cool. “Maybe it’s your thing. I guess we’ve all got our thing.”

 

The lady raised he brows. “Oh, really! In that case, may I ask what is yours?

 

“Pardon?”

 

“Does following girls into record stores is one of your thing?”

 

At this, Woohyun started to panic and furiously shook his head in denial. “No… no it’s not like that! I was just passing by and thought maybe I should check out a few LPs. The store seems new and I thought of giving a once-over. But I’m not sure this is what I was expecting. Didn’t really expect to find VHS tapes in a record store. Rather odd, don’t you think.”

 

She leaned against the counter and rested he chin in the palm of her hand. “They ARE records,” she emphasized.

 

“No, they’re not,” he frowned. “I know how the LP looks like.”

 

“They’re not that type of record.”

 

Woohyun knitted his brows in confusion. “What type are they then?”

 

The lady straighten her back, her stance looking serious and so does her face. “They are your records. Well, to be precise, those are your memories.”

 

The creases on Woohyun forehead deepened. The skepticism oozing from his eyes and there, a trace a humor bubbling in the depth of his belly. Like air bubbles erupting from the seabed and racing their way up to the surface before exploding, he laughed.

 

He laughed like someone who heard a great joke after a few drinks. It was a full-bodied laugh.

 

However, the lady continued unabated, “And each date represents a specific day on your life.”

 

Finally recovering from the laugh, Woohyun wiped his tears and straighten up. He’s not sure but when he looked at her, her eyes, those eyes, the critical look she’s giving him, it struck something in him. Familiarity. Somehow, she seemed familiar.

 

He didn’t know why he was still in the shop, idly chatting with a lady he didn’t even know the name of. The things that came spouting from were downright ridiculous but Woohyun didn’t have anywhere to go, no destination, no commitment, so he probably had all the time to waste.