Theme
Memory & Time
Memory and time are about what stays and what passes – about the past that suddenly returns. On Fireside you'll find stories about memory and transience by real authors. Read the latest stories about memory and time for free.
What Stays in the Hospital Room
by Hannelore
A lyrical text depicts keeping vigil at a mother's hospital bedside – the mechanical beeping, still hands, counting ceiling tiles. The narrator waits for the mother to wake and call them by their real name, while life outside continues indifferently. Everything distills into the realization that love sometimes means nothing more than staying.
Basic Dough for Everything
by Rudi
A pastry chef finds a handwritten, nameless recipe card for an uncanny 'Basic Dough for Everything' in his newly-taken-over bakery — and recounts what happened the one time he followed it, including a customer who recognized, exactly, the taste of her dead sister's kitchen in the finished bread.
Four Marks on a Book That Is Not For Sale
by Eszter
Eszter tells the story of a Petőfi poetry volume through its four physical marks — a burn, a blacked-out name, a worn page, a scraped-off stamp — including a scene, told for the first time, of how her grandmother protected a young man named Ferenc in 1956 and later erased his name.
Snow (lies everyone tells)
by amara_osei
Amara experiences snow for the first time. Everyone said it is beautiful, nobody said it is silent. A wondering account of a first.
The Goulash
by WernerK
Gerda's death announces itself in a small kitchen scene — she shows Werner her goulash recipe without him understanding why. Only afterwards does he grasp what she was doing.
The Line
by WernerK
Werner describes stops and freight yards on the western line that no longer exist. Between quiet observation and an unexpected sentence about his wife.
The Last Day
by Sofia
Sofia has cried at the end of every school year for 28 years. Not from sadness — because something ceases to exist. Last June Stavros came to collect his own son. He cried every morning for three weeks in 2010. His son not once all year. Sofia cried after they left, probably about more than one thing.
The Light on Katendrecht
by Pieter
November 2016, no camera: the light on Katendrecht's old warehouses does something unrepeatable for four minutes. Pieter watches. A photograph exists after you do. The light exists only in his memory. It was his light on his buildings — and he didn't keep it.
De Kleine Prins
by Paul
Paul has had his copy of De Kleine Prins since he was seven. The cover holds only by yellowed tape. He never drew in it — respect, for whatever reason. He's never been certain what it means, but certain each time it means something. That's rare. He keeps it for that reason.
Sofia
by Nikolai
The street where Nikolai grew up: pharmacy where bookshop was, coffee chain where pharmacy was. What stays: Vitosha, balcony tomatoes, the same tram routes. His sons in Berlin and Toronto find Sofia changed and familiar. A city that only changes or only stays has given up. Sofia hasn't.
The Street
by Magdalena
The café on Magdalena's corner has changed three times. Her neighbour remembers a bakery that is now a phone repair shop. Magdalena wonders what she'll miss in sixty years.
Bigos
by Magdalena
Magdalena tries to recreate her mother's bigos. Her mother gives her measurements she doesn't actually use. "It was very good" means: not right yet. She'll keep trying.
The Drawer
by Magdalena
Magdalena opens a drawer after her grandmother's death that was private in childhood. What she finds are small things without explanation. She puts everything back and closes it again.
The Sweater
by Helga
Her mother's lopapeysa has been in the wardrobe for forty years. A unique pattern written on a receipt she can't find. Helga doesn't wear it. It still fits. Some things are for keeping, not using.
Contact
by Giulia
Giulia describes the unwritten rules of touch in conservation work. And the moment when you're close enough to an old surface to think about the last hands that touched it four hundred years ago.
The Woman in Green
by Giulia
Giulia spends four months restoring a nameless sixteenth-century portrait. She describes what develops when you work that long with a face. The last sentence is as simple as it is.
What the Body Keeps
by AnnaLiisa
Anna-Liisa describes what bodies remember when the mind has filed things away — in patients, and in herself. Shoulders on certain roads. Breathing when certain songs come on. The body just waits for you to ask.
Comfort vs Impression
by Adriana
Comfort vs. impression: not technique, intention. Best food in houses not restaurants. Her grandmother's salt cod she's tried to recreate for 30 years — now she understands: she's not recreating the dish but the Friday afternoon. Technique transfers. Intention doesn't.
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