The Girl Who Remembered Every Universe

The Girl Who Remembered Every Universe

By Hasnain Shah

When Mara opened her eyes each morning, she had no idea which world she’d woken into.

Sometimes it was a quiet one — sunlight through gauzy curtains, a kettle humming somewhere in the kitchen, a cat kneading her ankle.

Other times, it was a world of smoke and static — buildings half-collapsed, streets echoing with sirens that never stopped.

But every world had one constant.

Every version of her remembered him dying.

In one universe, he was Daniel — her husband, a paramedic who never came back from a late-night call. In another, he was Daren, her lab partner who inhaled too much chemical vapor trying to save her from an experiment gone wrong. In others still, he was a stranger she met at a train station, a poet she never kissed, a soldier who promised to come home and didn’t.

Every life, every world, ended with the same hollow ache in her chest.

At first, Mara thought she was losing her mind. The memories came like migraines — vivid, pounding, layered over one another until she could no longer tell which world she belonged to. She’d wake up in bed with someone she loved and not remember his name. She’d walk into her office and mistake her coworkers for ghosts.

Then, one morning, she woke up knowing things she shouldn’t.

Her phone code. Her mother’s voice. The exact words the newscaster would say that night.

And the date — October 26th — the day it always happened.

The day he always died.

At first, she tried to ignore it. Fate wasn’t something you fought; it was something you endured. But after hundreds of lifetimes of enduring, something inside her fractured.

She started writing — every memory, every variation, every decision that led to the same end. The notebook grew heavy, its pages filled with worlds stacked like panes of glass. When she looked at them long enough, she swore she could almost see through to the next one.

In Universe 47, she found him again — this time, his name was Eli.

He worked at a coffee shop near her apartment, always with ink on his fingers and a smile that looked half-finished.

She knew what was coming — the car crash, the faulty light, the way she’d hear sirens at 8:14 p.m.

So she waited.

That evening, as rain slicked the roads, Mara left work early and stood on the corner by the café, heart hammering.

At 8:13, she saw him through the glass, closing up. He looked up at her and smiled — the same tired, gentle smile she’d fallen for across a thousand worlds.

She ran to him. “Eli!” she shouted, breathless. “Please, you can’t—”

The screech of tires cut her words short.

The car jumped the curb.

The world shattered.

When she woke, it was a different sky.

A different name.

But the ache was still there, buried beneath her ribs.

She realized then that she wasn’t just remembering — she was carrying the weight of every version of herself, every loss.

Each world was bleeding into the next, like ink spreading through paper.

That night, she dreamt of a place between worlds — a still lake under a violet sky. On its surface, reflections shimmered: versions of her walking, weeping, screaming. At the lake’s edge stood Eli.

He looked the same in every reflection, but this time he spoke.

“You keep trying to save me,” he said softly. “But maybe it’s not me who needs saving.”

She reached for him, but her hand passed through his shoulder like mist. “I can’t lose you again.”

“You never lost me,” he whispered. “You just never forgave yourself.”

The next morning, she woke in a world she didn’t recognize.

No city. No sirens. Just the quiet hum of waves brushing the shore. Her notebook lay beside her, but the pages were blank.

For the first time, she couldn’t remember the tragedy.

Only the warmth of his voice.

She stood and walked to the edge of the water. The tide pulled at her toes, cool and unfamiliar, but comforting. In the horizon’s reflection, she saw all the other Maras — infinite versions, smiling, free.

Maybe she’d finally reached the one universe where she could live without carrying them all.

Or maybe this was the space between — the stillness that waited when every story finally learned how to end.

Mara took a deep breath, the salt air filling her lungs, and whispered to the wind:

“Then let this be the one where I remember how to live.”