Can queries store data if there is no table to write back to?
I have a situation where this is happening???

Queries only display data held in tables, except action queries which can write to tables. Try and explain the problem you have.

I have a select query based on a relationship
where all parent records are shown.

There are five tables total in the query.
the query has criteria based on a child table.

so I have twenty records that pull for a field called page where it is blank because the primary key does not exist on the other three tables.

so I keyed in the page numbers and they took, but there is no table to store this data.

I re-booted my computer and the field is still filled in but I have no idea where they are getting stored.

it makes no sense