Here is an excerpt from “November Elf.” This is the transition. Up until this point, the story has been a traditional first-person past tense. But memory, especially with this character, is a tricky thing. And at his age it’s just beginning. Still, if the encounter is what he believes it to be, this portion of the story conveys, as best I could capture it for now, the confusion that should accompany the experience. If it is at all intriguing, please visit Hogglepot and read the story.

…

I felt a light tingle in my temples. Was he erasing my memory? “Hey, wait a minute!” I yanked the glasses from the bridge of my nose.

“You’ve had trouble remembering,” he said.

“Well yes, but—”

“Then it’s a fair trade,” he said. “You’ve been most kind. Thank you.”

“What trade?”

He stared back pleasantly. A bus arrived. Its door opened with a whoosh and a clunk.

“Third Street,” said the driver.

I shook my head. The door hissed closed and a cloud of diesel followed the bus away. I checked the time on my cell. If I didn’t get moving, the commute would be torture.

I don’t recall why I sat at the bus stop that day, but the moment is vivid in my memory.

…

There is more leading up to this point, of course, and a little more that folllows. The narrative has been described as light and “breezy,” although the story itself is anything but.