In a method, data is partitioned into partitions, which are divided into levels. The levels are ordered by creation times of the levels. A request is received at a current partition, which includes a key that identifies a field in a record and a value for the key. A determination is made whether the value exists in the field in the current partition. If the determination is false, a message is sent from the current partition to a next-older partition, and the message instructs the next-older partition to move the record with the value from the next-older partition to the current partition. If the determination is true, the record with the value in the field is moved from the current partition to a next-newer partition if the next-newer partition sent the request, and the record is deleted from the current partition.