The Colour of Memory

Category A: First Place (2026) Monash Short Story Writing Competition
Author: Ker She Poon

Kaden waited outside the Exchange building in Memoria as another customer stepped through its doors. Behind them, the queue stretched halfway down the street. They emerged with irises a little greyer than before, every memory taking a little of the amber with it.

Heads were bent, eyes fixed on the ground as they walked away from the Exchange, clutching whatever their memories had bought.

His grandmother appeared a few moments later with a small bag of honey cakes.

“Come sit with me,” she said warmly.

She lowered herself onto the stone steps and patted the spot next to her. Kaden sat, swallowing a lump in his throat.

The warm cakes filled the cool afternoon air with the scent of honey. She smiled to herself, the last thread of amber shimmering in her iris.

“I think I had a grandson,” she said. “Around your age.”

Kaden looked at the honey cakes without saying anything.

“He once buried flour, honey, and sugar in the garden because he thought they would grow into a honey cake tree.” She chuckled. “Every morning he’d run outside to water them with his little green bucket.”

“Or maybe it was blue.” Her brows furrowed.

Kaden flinched. He wanted to tell her, It was green, Grandma, but words turned to lead in his throat.

“Doesn’t matter,” she laughed. “When nothing grew, I…”

She closed her eyes.

“I’m sorry, dear,” she murmured. “I seem to have misplaced the ending.”

Kaden remembered every part of it.

How she laughed so hard that she accidentally spilled flour across the kitchen.

How she stayed up all night baking honey cakes while he slept.

How she woke at dawn to bury the honey cakes herself, leaving just enough poking through the dirt for him to discover when he woke up.

How he had sprinted into the house, shouting that it had worked, that Grandma’s garden could grow anything.

She stared at the bag of cakes on her lap.

As honey became more expensive, they stopped making honey cakes together. The sweet smell of honey in the kitchen slowly faded as she began buying them from the Exchange.

Over time, Kaden had watched the amber fade as memory after memory was traded for necessities.

His sixth birthday, when she stitched green dragons onto his jacket.

The neighbour who taught her how to bake honey cakes.

The street their house was on.

Until one afternoon, when she paid for the bag of honey cakes with the memory of ever baking them.

Behind them, a father drifted out of the Exchange, turning a photograph of his daughter over in his hands with quiet confusion.

His grandmother turned back to him. Kaden looked into her eyes, where the amber had faded until only the faintest ring remained.

“If you ever see my grandson,” she said, smiling sadly, “will you tell him I’m sorry?”