by Trixie More
“Pretty close. I had to come to this part of town for work today,” Spencer Moss shrugged. “Thought I’d eat here.”
“I’m surprised you didn’t have to rush back to save someone,” Derrick said.
“Don’t worry,” his father shot back. “Unlike some folks, I don’t punch out half way through the day to go home and tinker. I’m sure I’ll find my way back to the hospital.” The sound of the kitchen door swinging open stopped any further father-son pleasantries. No loss there.
“What?” Grandma Rose came out of the kitchen, speaking to Derrick like they were already in conversation. His sister, Sophia, was nowhere around.
“Who’s watching the bar?” Derrick asked.
“What bar?” But when his grandma spoke, it came out like what bar? Basically, pointing out that there were no customers.
“Well, I’m here aren’t I?”
“What bar?” she asked again, not backing down. She came over and gave him a kiss on the cheek. “What’s a matter?” Her quick brown eyes flitted across his face. Inwardly he groaned, he didn’t want to discuss his recent failures.
“I’m hungry.” Nothing suited Rose more than feeding someone, and she took the bait easily, giving him one more worried glance and then heading back to the kitchen.
“Sophia’s making pizza,” Rose explained.
Derrick followed Rose into the kitchen. The damn kitchen felt all wrong to him. Where was the space? Mastrelo’s was owned by his mother’s parents, Rose and Angelo. In the years since high school, when it was a restaurant, it had been a haven for Derrick. A safe place full of food and heat, big enough to host a dance in. Now it was small and cramped, thanks to the renovations that had cut most of the kitchen off to carve out the business next door. Which brought to mind their new neighbor and her round ass. He felt a little pissed off just thinking about her. What was her problem? He knew he was no fancy doctor like his father or his brother David, but women usually didn’t turn down free muscle.
“Derry.” Sophie turned from the pizza oven, wooden paddle in her hand. She held up her left hand, showing him her forearm, wrapped in a discolored aluminum cuff that went from her wrist to her elbow. His pizza-no-burns. So he sucked at naming his inventions, so what? “These actually work!”
“You didn’t think they would?” He still felt irritated. He’d been bolting beams all day, and his arms and back were sore. Not that little Miss Bubble Butt next door would care. What a waste of time that had been.
“No, I thought they would,” Sophie said. “But I never thought that would work.” She was boxing up the pie now, and she gestured with her head at the deep fryer where Lorenzo, their cook, who was not Italian despite his name, was struggling to get the fry basket out.
“Damn thing. Man, you gotta take this off.” Lorenzo’s black skin gleamed with sweat, his kitchen whites splattered with grease and bits of batter.
“What’s wrong with it?” Derrick asked. Rose handed him a sandwich as he shouldered past her and he took a minute to kiss the top of her gray head. “Thanks.” He looked down into the fryer, took the basket handle from Lorenzo and lifted it out easily.
“Yeah, right,” the cook groused. “Easy for you to lift out, tall boy. When I’m working fast in here, I don’t grab it at that angle.” Lorenzo demonstrated how it caught on the guard when he tried to pull the basket out. “Damn thing.”
Derrick saw the problem now. To hell with it. He grabbed the top edge of the guard and yanked the metal out of the hot oil, ignoring the women’s shouts of alarm. He was already headed for the back door, grease dripping from the guard, sandwich forgotten next to the fryer. He strode across the alley to the dumpster and had a bit of satisfaction flinging the piece of hot metal into the garbage bin. It made a terrific racket, and that felt pretty good. He knew what else needed to go in there. He went around the corner to his truck, yanked the bot out of his tool bag, stuffed it in a plastic sack that was lying on the floor and carried it back to the alley. Only an idiot would keep working on these things. Only an idiot would have risked losing his job by bringing the thing to the job site.
Looking down at the bag in his hand, he shook his head. Who did he think he was? At this moment, the bot seemed juvenile. He was an ironworker. Other men built robots for a living, and they were learning faster, keeping up with change better than he ever would. They simply had more time than he did. Derrick thought about another robot he’d tossed out in a dumpster on a job site. His sister had named it Christopher Robot. In what he supposed was a misplaced attempt to get Derrick to visit their father, she’d rescued it, stashing it in the garage at the house in Pelham. He contemplated the bag in his hand. Making up his mind, he swung it by the handles and let it sail into the dumpster. It wasn’t nearly as satisfying as heaving out the grease guard had been. He turned and headed back to his truck. Behind him, Sophie came out through the door, holding his sandwich in her hand but he was already at the corner, and he kept going.
Sophie watched as her big brother left the alley, his long legs moving him around the corner and away from her. He hadn’t always been like this. When they were kids, Derrick had been open and happy, much easier to talk to than their older brother David, who was very serious.
She wandered over to the dumpster and climbed up onto a stool they kept in the alley for just this purpose. There, on top of the black garbage bags, was the grease guard. Nothing to save there, it was just a bent sheet of metal. Derrick could make a dozen with the stuff in his workshop. More interesting was the plastic sack next to the guard. The top was open, and an arm made out of open metal work was sticking out. Most likely a robot. Sophia dragged the stool over and went back inside, retrieving a broom. Using the broom handle, she tried to poke the robot. It whirred to life, frightening the daylights out of her as a silver extension unfolded and batted the broom handle away. Sophia dropped the broom in the dumpster and grabbed the dirty edge to keep from falling off the step stool.
Crap. Now Sophia had to find something else to get the broom with.
“What’cha looking for?”
Sophia turned. It was the curly headed girl who’d bought the business next door from Grandpa Angelo. She’d been in a week ago and had a black and tan, but Sophia couldn’t quite remember her name.
“Hey,” Sophia said. “I just dropped a broom in there. Derrick threw a robot out, and I’m trying to get it.”
“A robot?”
“Yeah. It’s a hobby, building stuff. Looks like he made a bot and got frustrated with it.”
The woman came closer, standing by the stool. “Can I look?”
“Sure.” Sophia climbed down, and the curly girl went up.
“Huh. It looks like it was made with an erector set. What do you think it does?”
“I have no idea, but when I tried to get it with the broom, it moved.”
“No.”
“Yep, scared the dickens out of me.”
The woman climbed down. “I have a grabber thing. I’ll be right back.” Moments later she returned with a device that had a little claw on one end and a handle that controlled the pinchers. She clambered back up and then gave a shriek when the robot moved. At least Sophia imagined that’s what happened because the same mechanical noise preceded the other woman’s cry. She had been warned though, so she didn’t drop the claw, and after a bit, she got the broom out.
It took both women another fifteen minutes to finally pull the robot out.
“So, Derrick built this?”
“Yep.” Sophia scanned the rest of the dumpster. This appeared to be the only one.
“What does it do?” Allison asked.
“Damn if I know.” Sophia smiled. “But it’s mine now.”
Allison. The curly woman’s name came back to Sophia. Allison grinned back at her. “You like him.”
Confused, Sophia frowned. “Of course I like him. Don’t you?”
A small blush spread across Allison’s face. “I was just closing up. My dad and I will be ove
r for dinner in a bit.” She picked up her tool and headed back inside, pulling the metal door shut behind her.
Sophia looked at the robot in her hands. “You know what, bot?” She tossed the bag back in the dumpster. “I think our neighbor has a crush on my brother.”
She strolled around to the front of the bar. Her grandma would not appreciate her bringing something from the dumpster into the kitchen, even if it had only been in there a minute. Sophia hurried into the restroom, washed her hands and arms thoroughly, took the bot and gave it a wipe down. Carrying the robot out to the table where her dad sat, she placed it on a chair.
Spencer Moss looked up. “What’s this?”
“A robot.”
“Don’t tell me you built it?” he asked. She couldn’t tell if he was impressed or aghast. It was hard to determine with him. She knew if she said these were Derrick’s, the robots would be fodder for ridicule. If he thought Sophia built them, she had a nasty idea that her father would act differently.
“Dad, who, in our family, invents stuff?”
“David is working on a new technique for identifying early onset Alzheimer’s,” Spencer said coyly. “That’s an invention.”
Sophia rolled her eyes and went into the kitchen, returning after a moment to join her father. She brought a single serving pizza on a small bent metal pan, paper plates, and garlic powder. Setting it all on the table, she slid the pie onto her plate, the metal pan inching toward the edge of the table. Sophia reached over and grabbed the robot, turning the lightweight figure this way and that, looking for the on switch. Like so many of the robots she’d seen her brother make in high school, this one was light, built on an open framework. Colorful wires ran inside each arm and leg. She found the switch and turned the bot on. An electric hum followed, and a light shone in what would be a torso, so she figured a camera must be on board. Sophia set the bot down on the floor, watching it wander in small circles, staying close to her chair.
“Dumbest thing I’ve ever seen,” her father announced.
Sophia turned her head, and as she did so, the empty pie plate crashed to the floor. A silver rod sprang out of the arm of the bot, deflecting the pan, which clattered on the tile. It waited a moment and rushed back to the pan, which it lifted, small fingers curling around the edge. After a moment, the bot turned a bit and continued moving over the floor in small swatches, little by little roving farther from her, back and forth covering the floor, section by section.
“Huh. Wonder what that’s actually supposed to be doing?” she asked.
Her father looked at her. “Where did you get it?”
“Derry tossed it in the garbage today. I figure he’ll want it back.”
Her father looked at her over his paper. “Are you planning on storing it at our house?”
The comment was meant to be teasing, so she didn’t answer. She thought about her brother. Sophia was never sure why, but in his senior year of high school, about a week after the FIRST robotics competition, Derrick dropped out of the robotics club. He still fiddled with computers and metal bits; she didn’t think there was any way he could stop himself. In fact, her brother had created something sublime once, a robot she’d named Christopher, that could walk, open doors and move around a room, picking up items. In a move so typical, she was quite sick of it, he’d thrown it out. Tossed it in a dumpster. Ben had pulled it out and given it to Sophia. Since she had no place to store a five-foot robot in her dorm, she’d had to haul the thing out to her parent’s home on the train and stash it in the garage. She’d told Ben where it was, in case Derry wanted it back, but as far as she knew, Christopher Robot was still sitting under a sheet among the cars and lawn furniture.
She thought about that, how Derry rarely went home. Sophia was four years younger than Derrick, and she’d been getting ready to start high school the year he graduated. That summer, when she might have tagged along with him, he dropped all interest in his college applications and started spending more time with his friend Ben Connelly, leaving Sophia behind. No muscle-bound brother for her friends to moon over, no protector and fellow adventurer to take her out to the local fair or accompany her to the city for a show. And finally, in a move that shocked everyone except her father, he made good on a threat to join the union, and moved out, to sleep on a cot in George Connelly’s garage for a year. He’d showered at the gym and acted as a glorified night watchman for George, attending trade school by day. All of which had left Sophia suddenly alone with their parents. Derry had been too far away for her to go visit by herself. While she might have contented herself with telephone calls, worst of all, her beloved brother stopped talking. Oh, of course, he spoke. He wasn’t mute. But his sentences became shorter and shorter until her happy and fun brother became a puzzle that she wasn’t able to solve.
Beside her, her father laughed harshly, and it took a moment for Sophia to realize he was mocking the robot. Of course.
“That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever seen,” her father said. “At least he had the sense to throw it away.” The paper rattled, but Spencer kept watching the robot, a pensive look on his face. “They sent me to training today.”
She turned her head to look at him. “Training?”
“Yeah, I had to come down here to get it.”
So that was why he was here. She’d wondered, but hadn’t wanted to make a big deal about it. A part of her hoped that her father would stop by more often, that proximity might finally reduce the snarling between Derrick and her father.
“What kind of training?” she asked.
“Robotics, if you can believe it.” His thick eyebrows were pinched, and his narrow lips scowled. “New machine to use in surgery. It was nothing like that thing.”
Her father’s attention returned to the news and his lunch.
Sophia sat hunched over in her chair, her elbows on her thighs, head propped in her palms. She studied the bot as it moved farther and farther away, endlessly searching the floor for something it couldn’t find.
Sunlight was already streaming through the small, high windows in Derrick’s bedroom when the alarm went off at seven thirty. Pressing his palms against the headboard, he enjoyed feeling the stretch in his shoulders, the freedom of waking up a little late. Saturdays were the best days of the week, as far as Derrick was concerned. He didn’t waste any time getting out of his bed and checking the weather outside. Perfect, crisp and clear. Today, he didn’t have to try to fit a workout in around his work schedule, could do his running outside, and hit the gym for some lifting. Today, he could stop and talk with the other gym rats, flirt with the women a little. He smiled to himself, wondering if the pretty brunette would be there again. Another woman’s face came to mind, the sharp-tongued one who bought the business from his grandfather. God, she had a fine ass. Pretty face and a defensive position any coach would envy. He pulled on his workout clothes and laced up his kicks. A hookup with her would be a workout, he just knew it. And a hookup with her would also mean an entanglement he didn’t need. Entanglements took time, and Derrick wanted to remain the king of his own weekends, with plenty of time for exercise—and his standing video conference with Rob and Justin. His thoughts diverted away from Mastrelo’s new neighbor and turned toward his hobby, and his friends, as he headed out the door.
He returned a couple hours later with a sack full of breakfast sandwiches and a coffee, ate, showered and settled in at his worktable. At one p.m., like clockwork, the video call started, during which he would spend an hour and a half discussing the latest robotics projects, talking with the others about programming issues or troubles with robots. This year, all three of them were interested in artificial intelligence, AI, projects. Rob, who lived in England and was building groups of tiny bots that could work together to construct group workspaces, came online first. Particular and excitable, Rob was always a great one to talk to when Derrick wanted to get excited about what he was doing.
Justin, his hair still looking like he just woke up, joined next. A
Texan whose family owned a ranch, the kid was the opposite of everything Derrick thought of when he considered what a programmer or robotics geek would be. Of course, Justin and Rob said the same thing about him.
“You’re a wanker, Derrick,” Rob said. “You’ve been holding out on us for over a month now, haven’t you?”
“Yuh wankuh,” Justin drawled.
“Texans can’t say wanker,” Derrick countered.
He turned his back on the screen and set the bots up again. “OK, now watch. This is the issue.” Plywood lay on the floor. He was setting several bots next to the wood. Each robot resembled a human form, two legs, a hip area to control independent movement backward and forward, arms with articulated fingers, three on each hand and a thumb type appendage. Similarities stopped there because they each had four arms and their heads were truncated pyramids where modules could be snapped into place, such as cameras or heat sensors.
“Can you see?” He adjusted the camera. A resounding “yes” ensued, and he turned on his first bot. It stood itself up and turned its head left and right. The next one followed suit, and the two moved toward each other. The third one remained on its hands and knees, crawling forward. “That’s the primary right there. All of them are connected via Bluetooth. They are receiving and storing data on the drive of the primary. The primary’s role is to find the plywood or find a hole.”
The three men watched the robots as the primary crawled over the floor, patting ahead of it with its hands.
“Dude, you need a visual sensor on that thing.” This came from Rob. “People don’t pat around like that. Why aren’t you having it see the board and go to it?”
Derrick grunted. “The board isn’t important. It’s the holes in the deck, and I’m having trouble getting them to understand holes. To the bots, they appear more like the thing beneath the hole.”
“So, lousy depth perception,” said Justin, bringing Derrick’s attention back to the present.
“Yep,” Derrick agreed. “I know they got it solved with the self-driving cars, but I can’t figure it out yet. So, for now, they’re just feeling around.”
