She smiles at us, one of those smiles that somehow means sad. “But people move on.” I consider her husband who cannot work and her children who cannot be born and her life which cannot ever be what she had every right and reason to believe it would. I consider how “move on” is exactly what she cannot do. “Some things are terrible enough it’s better to forget if you can.” We’re staring at her with our mouths open. “What?” “You teach history.” That sad smile again. “History and memory are unreliable narrators.” I think back to that first assignment, how galled I was to have to write it over
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