by C. W. Crowe
"Mom, I would like to mate, but I can't. Humans need to know the person they are going to mate with, to understand them and care for them. I haven't disobeyed you; I just don't know Lucy well enough yet - we haven't had enough time together to get to know each other. Plus Lucy needs normal clothes and a normal routine. In the world of humans, she is my equal and I need to treat her that way as we begin to know each other. I hope you understand."
Once again, mom looked into space, like she was studying some invisible master source of information on human behavior. Actually, she was probably studying the old Internet which was pretty much the same thing.
"I detect many instances where humans mate without any such period of acquaintance." It was likely that Internet porn again.
"And I'm sure you detect many others where humans spend extended times with each other before mating. It is very common and, for humans of my type, necessary."
Her eyes bored into mine, "You should have made your suggestion last night, before we left."
I'd been afraid of this. It was the job of the human pet, me, to intercede if the master was on the verge of making some type of mistake. By keeping quiet last night, the robots assumed that I understood and would carry out their wishes. If there was to be a problem, I should have brought it up then.
But mom wasn't done. "Did she cause you to fail us?"
She meant Lucy, of course. This was the tricky part. Tricky in terms of what I had to say and tricky in that I had to be alert and make sure Lucy stayed quiet. Right now, if she lost her temper and started yelling at mom the way she'd done to me, she was in real danger of spending the rest of her life in the Nursery. I turned to Lucy and smiled at her, willing her to keep her mouth shut.
"No, mom, no. Lucy is not at fault at all. It was me. Just me. I should have said something, but wanted to be alone with her. It was the idea of mating - it was such a surprise that I didn't know what to say. I let you down."
Robots liked confessions. I don't know from what movie they got it from, but they did. Most of the time, if the infraction was small enough, a confession was enough for them.
But this one was not in that category. "Hold out your hand," mom said as she reached into her stylish little purse.
*.*.*
The pain stick is a small thing, really. Mom's was pink in color and was shaped like a bullet. I held out my hand and she touched me with it.
*.*.*
The pain starts like a muscle cramp you wake up with at night. It begins as a one or two on the hundred point pain scale, but marches steadily upwards until it hits two hundred.
And it's not just a leg muscle; it feels like every muscle in your body is trying to tear itself away from bone and explode right out of your skin.
I fell to the floor and started to writhe. I don't think I was making any sounds, but I wasn't completely sure.
I wanted to pass out, actually to die, but that wasn't part of the game. I simply had to endure the unendurable until mom put away the pain stick. It felt like hours, but it was probably only seconds.
Only then, as the pain receded and the feeling of humiliation started, did I pass out.
It was all normal. Just like always.
*.*.*
As I awoke, my vision wavered like I was coming up from beneath a body of water. The first thing I saw was Lucy's face. She was staring down at me while I was still lying on the floor. The pain was totally gone - no soreness or residual effects at all. Nothing was left except for the memory of it.
She must have been on her knees over me because her face was only inches from mine. The blanket had been discarded, so I could see her bare shoulders. I could also smell her. Not perfume or hair spray or any of the things mom used to smell good around her robot friends; instead, Lucy's smell was . . . something elemental, female. It was barely there so that I wondered for a moment if I was dreaming.
And her face was beautiful. I reached up to touch it.
"God, Leonard, are you all right?"
My vision cleared and her beauty was gone. But I think that smell was still there.
*.*.*
She helped me to the couch and sat beside me. Recovery from the pain stick was always rapid, so within a minute or so I was pretty much back to normal.
"Where . . ."
Lucy cut me off. She knew what I was going to ask. "She's gone. She said she would be out most of the day and that you should take me shopping for clothes."
I looked over at her and realized she'd left the blanket behind. She was only wearing what she had called her "hooker outfit."
She saw me looking and frowned, but continued, "She asked me . . . I didn't know what to say, Leonard. She asked me how much time you needed before you could mate. She still had the pain stick in her hand and I didn't know what to do, so I just said the first thing that came into my mind. I told her that I wasn't even sure if you liked me and that it would probably take thirty days to find out. She got that dazed look on her face for a second and then said, 'No more than that.' Then she left."
I nodded, "That dazed look. I think it means they are checking in with robot central - getting some type of advice in making a decision. On their own they just want to repeat things again and again, but when they need to do something unexpected, they contact their headquarters or whatever."
I don't know why I was prattling on about robot behavior - probably it was to avoid staring at her.
Lucy glanced across the room at the blanket that was lying on the floor, but instead of getting up to get it she turned to me and said, "Leonard . . . I want to apologize. I'm sorry for yelling, for not trusting you. I feel like this is all my fault."
Deep inside my head, I could hear her and knew that her apology was sincere. I shook my head. "No Lucy, that's not true, not at all. They kidnapped you, remember? You didn't ask to be here. And I'm sorry about yelling too. I guess we both have been away from normal humans for too long to remember how to act. I finally get someone to talk to and I end up getting in a fight with her almost right away."
She smiled and as she did, she put her open hand across her face - she'd done something similar with the blanket. It occurred to me that this was a habit of hers, maybe starting when the other girls in her home schooled group grew into young womanhood. I imagined that, in those days, she felt shame at her appearance, but there was no reason for it now.
She probably wasn't even aware of it, but she was covering her face.
*.*.*
"So what do we do now, Leo? And what happens when our thirty days are up?"
That was two questions, neither one of which I had a good answer for.
I stood up and offered my hand and, after a second's hesitation, she took her hand from her face and put it in mine. I helped her rise until she stood beside me. "I don't know, Lucy, but I do know we need to go shopping and get you some proper clothes. Let's start there."
She nodded in agreement.
Her hand felt warm.
Chapter Nine: Decision Time
The next three weeks were either the best of my life, or perhaps some of the worst. Looking back, it's hard to tell.
Most of the time, I was ecstatic to have another human to talk to. Even though I'd spent most of my childhood keeping my distance from other people, I never felt the need to do that with Lucy - at least the noises she generated in my head didn't cause me to want to be away from her. The sounds I heard from her were relatively quiet and I quickly got used to them. Even at night, as I fell asleep, they didn't bother me. Actually they were kind of comforting. It was a little like being a peeping tom - I could feel her relax and drift off in the other bedroom. Sometimes, I could feel when she was dreaming and, if it was a good one, I could tell that too. So far, I hadn't told her about my "gift."
Yet, while it was easy to get used to her noises, having another human constantly around me was another thing completely. We both knew we'd been tossed together; that neither of us had asked for our current arrangement, so it shouldn't have been
a surprise that there were . . . problems.
The first thing was the habit of using her hand to cover her face. There sure wasn't any reason to do that since, after all, I knew exactly what she looked like. I tried to talk to her about it and tell her that I understood; that we only had each other now. That her looks or mine meant nothing.
That caused a yelling argument that lasted almost a full day, with her threatening to wear a hijab.
Then it was her clothes. She didn't have a nice classic figure with curves and soft parts - she was mostly straight edges without much change from top to bottom, but she was at least a female. And I was a male. So why did she have to pick clunky shoes, loose fitting jeans two sizes too big and shapeless sweaters all the time? If you ignored her face, it would be easy to think she was a man. I tried to hint when we passed by a store - "Look at that dress, Lucy. You'd look nice in it."
But she didn't take the hint. Actually, she got it, but it just made her angry. She told me to mind my own business and that she wasn't going to dress like a common bimbo to please any man. It took another day to get over that.
And, okay, I guess I had my own share of habits that got on her nerves. I quickly learned that I shouldn't burp around her or man-spread to excess or come to breakfast wearing what I slept in - a T shirt and tighty-whities. Who would have thought that would lead to another fight?
So those first days were both good and bad. I suppose that was to be expected since most people date for months or years so that they learn to live with their partner's idiosyncrasies. But we didn't have that luxury and now our thirty day time period was running out. Soon, we'd have to decide what to do about mom and dad's demand that we mate.
*.*.*
For the last two days we'd both been on our best behavior. I held the door for her and thanked her when she did something for me. She smiled at me and even held my hand a couple of times.
We both knew that our meeting tonight was important and we were both smart enough to want go into it without the drama and hysterics that had sometimes marked our time together.
We had to decide what to tell mom and dad and we were going to do it tonight.
Robots don't drink and there are few intact humans around who are allowed to, so there was plenty of alcohol left in Ft. Smith. I went to a wine store by myself and picked up a bottle of Cristal champagne. It had a couple of different kinds, but I took one in a black box that was priced at three hundred dollars.
And I wasn't the only one who had been shopping for this night. I was almost shocked to see Lucy dressed in a modest dress - one that nevertheless showed her legs and let me see that her waist was actually a bit smaller than her hips.
Also, mom had left her dressing table loaded with all kinds of makeup, perfumes and things that girls used to make themselves attractive. As far as I know, Lucy had never touched any of them. One time, she called the stash her "whore paint."
But tonight, I was almost sure she'd used some makeup - not much, just enough to even out her skin and cause her lips to glisten in their fullness. No amount of makeup could hide her nose, but it didn't seem to bother me anymore. I wanted to tell her how impressed I was, but I was afraid of her reaction, so I only said that she looked really good and she only said, "Thanks."
That night we had a dinner of chicken, tomatoes and canned beans. Lucy cooked it and it was delicious - far better than what I could have done and light years better than anything mom ever cooked.
Food was a problem for the humans that still lived in Ft. Smith. At first, after the walls went up and all the original inhabitants were forced to leave, there was a lot of food available for the humans who were brought in as pets or workers.
But even though there weren't that many humans, the fresh food couldn't last. The uneaten meats, fruits and veggies all spoiled because the robots never thought about moving those items into freezers.
The result was that protein was scarce for quite a while - and most of it was reserved for the robots. I think I went several months without any beef or pork except for an occasional steak that mom cooked, but that the family didn't actually eat. It was a status symbol for them, I guess, to pretend to eat; a further attempt to act human.
The answer to our protein shortage was chickens. Someone - probably a human - must have offered a "suggestion" because the robots set up a chicken breeding operation near the river on the east side of town. I think some humans worked there, but robots didn't mind work so they probably did the majority of the jobs. I could see how it would appeal to them; how they could feed them every day at ten and gather eggs every morning and slaughter every afternoon.
The result was that we had chicken. Chicken for breakfast and lunch and dinner. Mom usually microwaved it and I usually baked it, but Lucy built a little fire out back and roasted it slow so that the juices were all trapped inside just waiting for a hungry human to cut it open and let them out.
I normally paid little attention to food since it was basically just fuel, but after a couple of glasses of the Cristal, and cutting into Lucy's special main course, I was feeling good. I told her how much I liked her cooking and she even giggled as we went to the living room. I think that was the first time she ever did that around me.
"When you live on a farm and you're a girl, you learn to do all the things boys do, but you also learn to cook."
We sat side by side on the couch and finished off another glass of the bubbly; both of us quiet, anticipating what was to come.
*.*.*
When we set up this meeting, we agreed that each of us would come to it with a proposed solution to our problem. I'd thought about it for days with no luck until one night I came up with an answer. Lucy had awakened me in the middle of a sound sleep as her noises increased a lot. I think that meant she was having a nightmare. Soon, though, she quieted and I was almost back asleep when it came to me - a real, workable solution to our dilemma. The question was if she'd agree to my plan.
I could feel in my head that she was relaxed and receptive, so I took both of our empty glasses and put them on the coffee table. My arm went around her and pulled her to me and she didn't resist. She put her head on my shoulder.
"It's been years since I've been close to another human," I said. "It feels good, don't you think?" Actually, I hadn't been close to anyone except my parents for my entire life.
"Yeah, Leo, I guess it does." She slurred her words just a bit. I'd always corrected anyone who tried to call me Leo instead of Leonard, but from her, it sounded right.
Her hair smelled faintly of flowers. "About our solutions, do you want to go first, or should I?"
"You do it." She crossed her legs and her knees were still kind of bony, but I didn't mind.
This was it. I'd practiced over and over, but all that was out the window now. I blurted out, "Lucy, will you marry me?"
I'd played this scene in my mind a hundred times. Lucy would look up at me in surprise, our eyes locked together. Then a tear would escape from one of hers, but I'd hear joyful noises in my head. She'd then throw herself at me saying, "Yes! Oh yes, Leo. Yes, yes, yes!" Our kisses would be long and passionate.
But almost none of that happened. She sat up in surprise all right, but instead of joyfully accepting my invitation, she said, "What! You're kidding, right? You've got a real solution waiting, don't you?"
I'd always thought it was unlikely I'd ever propose to anyone, but it was unthinkable that I'd actually do it and then be turned down. It just never occurred to me.
"Ah Lucy . . . you see . . ."
She cut me off; looking at the ceiling, deep in thought. "Wait a minute. I see where you were going there. If we were actually married, and I agreed to it, then I would have agreed to perform my . . . wifely duties, and that would get us both off the hook with your damned robot family as a bonus. Is that it?"
It didn't sound so good when she said it like that, "Yeah, that's pretty much it."
"So how, Leonard . . . so exactly how is this different from me just
giving in and doing what they want?" She was sitting up straight, glaring down at me. Her hand moved to cover her face. "Go on, tell me."
It was a challenge I wasn't prepared for. I said the first thing that came to mind. "Ah, we'd be married - till death do us part. I thought it would make a difference."
Her noises had been rumbling in my head, but now they quieted almost instantly. She said softly, "Till death do us part. I see." Her voice sounded distant, like she was remembering something.
"I'm sorry for my reaction, Leo. I should know by now that you're a good man, an unselfish man. It's just that . . . I never, ever expected anyone to ask me to marry them, even though it happened once before."
She sat back down beside me and put her head back on my shoulder. I breathed a sigh of relief.
"I was only fifteen. We went on a field trip to the science museum in Little Rock. We were on a school bus the home school association bought; the younger kids up front, the teenagers in the back. We started to play a game of "Who we're going to marry." Every boy called out a name and we all laughed and made fun of him. Some boys called out girls on the bus, others called out movie stars or even teachers. The last boy to say who he wanted to marry was Jerrod. He was the handsomest boy in the group; every girl wanted to be his steady. Well, he called out a name and I couldn't believe it. He said 'Lucy! I want to marry Lucy.'
"All my friends looked at me in shock, but no one was more surprised than me. I struggled to find something to say, but there was no need because he yelled, 'Just kidding!'
"He wasn't trying to be mean, just funny. I laughed along with everyone at the joke, but that night I cried. I cried for a long time."
