Secret File

There's a secret file on you somewhere in the depths of a large musty basement containing shelves upon shelves of other files on other people. If you are a natural-born citizen of the United States then this file was opened as soon as you were born and has been added to periodically for your entire life.

It doesn't exist anywhere in digital form, only in analogue records in a locked compartment on one of these shelves, or perhaps two compartments if your file is large. The file contains a copy of your birth certificate, your Social Security card, any driver's licenses you have ever held, and all of your medical history that has been formally documented, regardless of how private you thought it was.

After that, the file contains other things such as a complete history of every book or piece of media you have ever checked out from a public library, various homework assignments you forgot about from elementary school that were never returned to you with a grade, and photographs you could only speculate as to how someone got a hold of. In short, it's a comprehensive and highly ordered scrapbook of your life, kept by someone for some reason.

If you want to see your file, it's not as simple as asking. The basement where yours is kept will be within 100 miles of your place of birth, beneath a government building or other secure facility such as a bank or hospital. The people who work in the building are likely not aware of the basement's existence, and it will not be included in any floor plans that normal people have access to.

If you really want to see your file, there are attorneys who are aware of these files and can help you find where yours is located, but finding such a lawyer is something you will have to do on your own through guesswork. Even then, they may make you pay more than you can comfortably afford.

If they agree to help you, they will file a special petition on your behalf. You will need to provide a pretense for why you want to see the file, but the attorney can help you come up with one in consultation. The petition will be submitted to and signed off on by some court clerk who doesn't know what they are looking at, and you'll recieve a reply within a week.

Keep in mind that your file may contain more information about you than you care to know. Events in your life that you had passed off as unfortunate happenstance may take on a different light. If you doctor lied to you about the severity of a condition you have, the full truth will likely be in the file.