Eye Candy

by Ryan Schneider

  “That’s a dual sterilitic analgesic.” Dr. Perkins’ gloved finger moved around under Danny’s skin. “Sterilizes while it numbs.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Well,” Dr. Perkins removed his finger, “it doesn’t look like he did anything more than cut the epidermis. I’ll have you patched up in a minute. Now, would you prefer a zipper or sutures?”

  “What’s the difference?” asked Candy.

  “A zipper is easier for me to apply and heals faster but leaves a scar. Sutures are a needle and thread, like we’ve been using for a hundred and fifty years. They hurt a bit but my subspecialty is plastic surgery, so I can all but guarantee no scarring.”

  Danny considered it. “Scars are kinda cool. Pain and fear leaving the body and all that. But I think I’ll go with the sutures.”

  “Good choice. And more fun for me.” Dr. Perkins withdrew a suture kit from a drawer, tore it open, and donned a mask and eyeglasses fitted with magnifiers that looked like small microscopes. “Now, the most important thing is that you be absolutely still.” He poked the hooked needle through Danny’s skin. “Did you feel that?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. It means you’re alive.” Dr. Perkins sprayed the wound with two more quirts of the analgesic.

  “If you’re a good boy and don’t move a muscle,” Dr. Perkins droned from behind his surgical mask, “when we’re all done here, I’ll give you a lollipop.”

  “Oh, good. I love lollipops.”

  “Everybody loves lollipops,” Dr. Perkins added. “By the way, this is a special type of suture thread. They used to use cat guts back in the day, but we’ve managed to improve upon that a bit. This is made from the stevia plant. It will dissolve in about two weeks. So you’ll never have to see me again.” Dr. Perkins’ voice was soft, his tone soothing. “Unless of course you decide to tangle with knife-wielding muggers in the near future. So, what did Mister Drinks-His-Dinner-Through-A-Straw say when he attacked you?”

  Danny tried to remember. “I’m not sure. He asked for money.”

  “And what did you say?”

  “I said ‘No’.”

  “And then what happened?”

  “He demanded money one more time. He said he would cut me. Then he would cut Candy.”

  “Well, that wasn’t very nice, was it? So how did you get cut?”

  “He lunged forward with the knife. I tried to get out of the way but it seems I only partially succeeded.”

  “Judging by the reconstructive surgery I’m going to be doing on his face, I’d guess that it was at that point you disarmed him.”

  “That’s correct.”

  “And how did you disarm him?”

  Danny glanced with his eyes to Candy, who sat in the chair. She raised her eyebrows, equally confused as to Dr. Perkins’ line of questioning.

  “I struck him in the throat with my knuckles, then used the heel of my palm to smash his nose. That dropped him to his knees. I grabbed the back of his head and drove my knee into his face. The first move was to cut off his air supply. The second move was to cause more pain and to blind him with his own tears. The third strike was to disorient him with a blow to the head. I then secured the hand with the knife and manipulated it until he was forced to the ground, where I took the weapon from him.”

  “That’s some real Chuck Norris shit,” Dr. Perkins said, very softly under his surgical mask. “You a Navy SEAL or an ex-Ranger or something?”

  “Me? No. You think I was too rough on him?”

  “You mean are the cops going to charge you with excessive use of force?” Dr. Perkins chuckled to himself. “I wouldn’t think so. But if they do, call me. I play golf with one of the best defense attorneys in Beverly Hills. But personally, I think you did the right thing. Hopefully pizza-face in Exam Room Three will seek a new line of work. My dad used to be a sharecropper in Alabama. After a few summers of helping him do that, and seeing how much work and how little assurance there was of a steady income, I decided to take a different path. I spent twelve years in school learning how treat and hopefully heal people. Now I have a big house and a fancy sports car, and my wife and kids and I vacation two months out of the year. But the other ten months, I’m busting my hump, either here or at my office. I’ve done okay for myself, and it wasn’t easy. But it was certainly worth it. The American Dream is alive and well for anyone with the courage to pursue it.

  “And now that our nice little chat has reached its logical conclusion, and you have been sufficiently distracted from what I’ve been doing, my work is done.”

  Dr. Perkins peeled off his gloves and stuffed them in a red biohazard bin, and then lowered his mask. “All better.”

  Danny inspected his arm. The wound had been closed with an almost imperceptibly thin strand of material. The two flaps of his skin were joined together as if they’d been fused.

  “Here, don’t forget this.” Dr. Perkins slapped a thin, skin-like rectangular adhesive bandage on Danny’s arm. “Keep that on for the next couple weeks. It’s water-resistant so you can wear it in the shower. Stop by the nurses’ station on your way out, they have some documents for you to sign.”

  Dr. Perkins shook Danny’s hand. “It’s been a real pleasure sewing you up this evening, Doctor.” He shook Candy’s hand as well. He reached into his coat pocket and withdrew two lollipops. “Here. As promised. Sugar free, too.”

  Danny and Candy thanked him and accepted the candy.

  Dr. Perkins walked with Danny and Candy toward the nurses’ station, then whipped back the curtain around Exam Room Three. “Okay, Mister Doesn’t-Play-Well-With-Others, let’s have a look at what’s left of your face.” Dr. Perkins began pulling on a fresh pair of latex gloves.

  Danny locked eyes with the man who’d attacked them. His face was a purple and blue mass of swollen tissue. A white tube of gauze had been inserted into each nostril. The man raised his right hand and extended his middle finger.

  Dr. Perkins turned to Danny and Candy. “Some people never learn.” He grinned and donned a surgical mask.

  Then Candy and Danny were out of view and on their way to the nurses’ station, and an hour later, at last, they arrived at Candy’s, where they both collapsed onto the sofa. There they sat side by side, enjoying the silence.

  Chapter 21

  A Robot’s Pain, A Robot’s Pleasure

  The next morning, Candy was awakened by the telephone. She and Danny were in bed. He lay behind her, nice and close under the blanket, but each of them were still dressed. After the unexpected trip to the hospital, they’d come home and found themselves exhausted.

  The phone was still ringing.

  Candy eased out of bed and answered it.

  She then returned to the bed and gently woke Danny.

  “Morning, super hero.”

  Danny smiled. “Morning, sexy.”

  “Susannah just called. I have a client coming in about an hour. Do you want to stay here and keep sleeping?”

  “What time is it?”

  “Almost nine. You could sit in on the session if you like. I don’t think my client will mind.”

  “Who’s your client?”

  ~

  Candy and Danny sat in the cozy living-room-like area in her office. She found clients to be more forthcoming when they felt as though they were merely chatting, as opposed to having a mental health professional staring at them from across three feet of synthetic mahogany.

  A sofa and two chairs had been arranged around a coffee table, all situated on an area rug.

  Candy sat in one chair.

  Danny sat in the other chair.

  On the sofa, Helen Flanks, a ninety-something spinster who could’ve passed for somewhere in her early fifties, sat beside her robot. Helen perched on the edge of the sofa, her knees and ankles together, and her hands folded neatly in her lap. The white gloves on her hands accented her pearl necklace and pearl earrings.

  Helen’s snug, form-fitting white mood-dress danced with blue polka dots th
at faded in and out according to her body temperature. Presently the polka dots were fading slowly and then reappearing briskly, giving the effect of quiet but resolute irritation.

  Beside her sat her robot. The robot sat all way back in the sofa. Slouching.

  Latex micropolymer served as the robot’s skin. It resembled a muscular, olive-skinned department store mannequin.

  A tight, black leather hood covered the robot’s head. Silver zippers accentuated the eyes and mouth. Candy tried to study the robot’s red eyes through the slits. It was difficult not to laugh. She dared not look at Danny. He was covering his mouth with one hand, trying, and mostly failing, to conceal his laughter. His face was red with the effort.

  Candy waited. She always waited. Waited for the client to speak, until they were ready to begin.

  After several minutes of stubborn silence, and several pretend sneezes from Danny, Helen spoke.

  “I think you can see, Doctor, why it was imperative that I see you this morning. Something really must be done.”

  “Why don’t you start from the beginning?” Candy removed the stylus from the digital clipboard on her lap and prepared to write. She was well familiar with Helen’s case history. But it often helped for the client to review the steps for themselves. It would also enable Danny to learn the backstory. Candy had assured Helen that Danny was also an expert in robotics and was a consummate professional who would of course keep everything in the strictest of confidence. Helen had then agreed to let him join their session.

  “Very well,” said Helen. Helen spared a moment to glare at her robot. The robot remained slouched on the sofa. In addition to the hood, it wore crisscrossing black leather suspenders hooked to black leather shorts. Knee-high motorcycle boots adorned its feet. A distinct bulge was visible beneath its black leather biker shorts.

  “You will recall, Doctor,” said Helen, “that Sparky and I came to see you about a month ago when he began to, shall we say, malfunction. And when I say malfunction, I mean that he would no longer make love to me.”

  Danny coughed. Or sneezed. “Excuse me.” He snatched a tissue out of the box on the coffee table and made a show of wiping his nose. “Allergies this time of year. Pollen. Sorry.”

  Helen narrowed her blue eyes at him. “I wasn’t born yesterday, young man. I know this seems comical to you. But this is a serious matter.” Helen shifted on the sofa to better face Candy. “When I bought Sparky three months ago at Mechanial Man, the nice salesman in the yellow suit assured me that Sparky would attend to my every need. My every need.

  “At first, everything was fine; Sparky cooked and cleaned and did the laundry and drove me wherever I needed to go. I taught him to play bridge and Pinochle and he’s even gotten very good at poker, five-card-draw and stud. All the girls bring their ’bots to card night every Wednesday.

  “I also taught Sparky how to be a gentle lover.”

  Danny coughed again. Or sneezed. He covered his nose and mouth with the tissue and looked out the window.

  Helen whirled on Danny. “That’ll be quite enough out of you. I might be ninety-seven years old but I’m ninety-seven going on sixty and I can still put you over my knee if I have to.”

  Satisfied, Helen faced Candy once more. “At first, I merely had to order Sparky that I was ready for our intimate time. His phallic response was immediate and he would sustain it for as long as was necessary.”

  Helen motioned toward the bulge in Sparky’s black leather shorts. “As you can see, I special-ordered him in that department. It’s better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it, I always say.”

  Candy grinned her best non-committal, please-continue grin.

  “Then, one night, a bunch of us girls got together at my place for Margarita Tuesday,” Helen continued. “We all piled into my Jacuzzi and had some tunes playing and were knocking back Sparky’s famous absinthe margaritas just as fast as he could whip ’em up in the blender.

  “Well, when the girls had gone home for the evening—all driven home by their ’bots of course; we know better than to drink and drive—I was feeling wonderful. I climbed back into my hot tub—naked this time,” Helen added in a whisper—“and decided I wanted some intimacy. I asked Sparky to put on his pinstripe suit, just like the one Bobby Redford wore in ‘The Great Gatsby’ picture. Well, Sparky looked good enough to eat. I’m not ashamed to say that I used to be a real paper shaker, and I may have been a bit fast, and so what if I haven’t slowed down one bit? I’ve outlasted four husbands. I need someone who can keep up with me. That’s what the man in the yellow suit said Sparky would do. I was feeling grand, you see, so I got out of the hot tub, toweled off, and went inside. I ordered Sparky to bend me over the arm of the sofa and service me like my like late husband’s ’73 Ford.”

  Helen straightened the hem of her dress (the polka dots were now steadily pulsating), and smoothed her hair. “Like I said, I’d had quite a bit of absinthe. I got a little excited, a little carried away, and I used some language I’m not proud of. I won’t repeat it. It was for Sparky’s ears only. Needless to say, he didn’t disappoint me.”

  Helen gazed out the window, lost in reflection. “I could barely sit for two days.” Helen smoothed her hands across the tops of her thighs, across her dress (the polka dots were now a steady, almost blazing blue).

  “But the next day, Sparky saw how much pain I was in and announced that he could no longer follow my orders when it came to our intimate time. He said he was hurting me. He said he was not allowed to injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm. I know the laws of robotics like I know the faces of my seven children. I remember when the laws were written nearly a century ago. So I was not about to endure a one-and-a-half-million-dollar robot refusing my orders.

  “But refuse he did. This hunk of tin refused to pleasure me in any way for nearly three weeks. That was when we first came to see you, Doctor. And you explained to Sparky that any pain he may have been causing me was nothing for him to worry about, and that in pain there was pleasure.

  “Everything seemed to be fine after that. We went home. I suggested to Sparky that we have a go at some intimate time. After a moment’s hesitation, he agreed. I saw an odd flicker in his eyes, and for a moment I was certain he was about to short on me and I’d have to call the man in the yellow suit to send a van to come and get him, and I’d have to make do with their loaner ’bot in the meantime. And no way on God’s green earth was I going to be intimate with a loaner. I don’t care what they say about their sterilization techniques. I may be fast but that’s just gross.

  “Needless to say, Sparky didn’t short, didn’t freeze. In fact, he took me in a way I’d never been taken before.” Helen’s gaze dropped to the coffee table, though she seemed to be looking into another place, another time. “I’d never experienced anything like what he did to me. I didn’t have to tell him what to do. Sparky simply did it.

  “At first, his touch was light. Tender. But then our passion grew. I soon found myself with my arms around his neck, with his arms supporting me while he was standing. I didn’t know what was happening. I only knew that I couldn’t stop. It’s like I was the Greek goddess Hera, and Sparky was the mighty Jason, carrying me across the river.

  “We made love for three days. We paused only when I couldn’t continue, and fell asleep in Sparky’s arms. When I woke, he brought me breakfast in bed.

  “After a few hours’ rest, and several espressos, Sparky informed me that he wished to continue. Sparky took me then, despite my desire to refuse. Those were the happiest days of my life.

  “I can honestly say I am deeply in love with Sparky. He prepares my breakfast every morning. He brings me flowers. He reads poetry to me while I soak in the bath. He massages my feet while I watch television. He’s unlike any man I have ever known, and believe me when I say I have known many. I had four husbands, for crying out loud.”

  Helen looked at Sparky.

  “And now look at h
im.” Helen waved a hand at Sparky, seated there on the sofa in his black leather attire and the hood with small silver zippers over the eyes and mouth.

  “One day, about a week ago,” said Helen, “Sparky came home from doing the marketing. He suggested we make love. I was only doing a bit of knitting, putting together a sweater for my great-great-granddaughter, Perseffanie, who just turned three, so I told Sparky that it sounded lovely.

  “A few minutes later, I was still sitting there with my knitting, wondering what on earth Sparky could be doing. Just as I was about to get off my fanny and go find out, he emerged from the bedroom. And he was dressed like this.”

  Helen again waved a hand at Sparky.

  “He said he’d stopped off at a specialty store,” said Helen. “He said he’d finally found himself, that his parameters were now complete. He said he was a pleasurebot, and that he now understood why he’d been created: to give pleasure.”

  “And what happened then?” Candy asked.

  Helen blushed. “I don’t think I can answer that.”

  “Sparky’s performance was . . . satisfactory?” Candy suggested.

  Helen glanced at the bulge in Sparky’s black leather shorts. “Very much so.”

  “So how may I be of service today?” Candy asked.

  Helen went on staring at Sparky’s leather-clad bulge.

  “Helen? Helen!”

  Helen started. Her eyes shifted to meet Candy’s.

  “How may I be of service to you today?” Candy repeated.

  “Well,” Helen said with a sigh, “he refuses to take this stuff off. Ever. It’s fine when we’re at home but I can’t take him to bridge night dressed like this. The girls would have a fit. It’s indecent. I can’t let him do the marketing or take the car in for a service. I’m doing all those things myself now. A ninety-seven-year-old woman shouldn’t have to get her own oil changed. That’s what robots are for, for Pete’s sake.