Weekly Short-Short Note Behind-the-Scenes: Screenshot Swoosh

When I saved the screen on my smartphone, it made a strange sound.
"Swoosh, swoosh, swoosh."
A screenshot—it was supposed to be just a standard smartphone feature.

However, unfamiliar words were being overwritten onto the saved images.
"Chuo Line delayed." A few minutes later, the train actually stopped.

I tried displaying my report card and adding the word "perfect score," and even the grades changed.

From then on, I kept taking screenshots.
To manipulate the future, just a little bit.

My life changed completely. I could rewrite any result I didn't like.

But there was one troublesome thing.
Photos were disappearing from my album, one by one.

At first, I didn't notice.
But I couldn't remember scenery that should have definitely been there.
Who was there, too. Their names, their voices—nothing remained anywhere.

Every time I flipped through the photos, the blank spaces expanded.
The album was being buried in the growing number of screenshots, and the gaps I should have known were being crushed.

Even so, I couldn't stop.
The smiles of my family, which I remembered until last night, I can no longer recall.

And this morning. I checked the screen I had saved and gasped.
"I" am not in the photos where I should be.

What my face looked like, my voice, my name—

I can't remember.
There's no way I could remember.
Because "I," too, have been overwritten.

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