“Harley?” Candy went to her coffee table and grabbed her large tablet computer. She thumbed through the index of magazines until she found the issue she was looking for and handed the tablet to Danny. “Is that her?”
On the cover was Harley, wearing a short black skirt and heels, and showing a lot of leg. A lot of leg. And a lot of cleavage, too. She looked sexy but also very intellectual behind black horn-rimmed eyeglasses. In her palm she held the bodiless head of a robot. Bright red letters said, “The New Face of Robotics.”
“Yep, that’s her.”
“They put out the issue after she officially joined her grandfather’s company.”
“Do you know her?”
“I know of her. I’ve never met her. I don’t think we see eye to eye on much when it comes to robotics. She favors a more restrictive approach, wants to make robots more mindless, with less ability to think for themselves. Wants them all slaved to a more powerful cloud computer which simply issues commands and runs diagnostics, rather than individual, sovereign robots who aren’t beholden to a corporation. Her corporation.”
“Interesting.”
“What’s she like?”
“She’s nice enough. Smart. Likes to drink beer and watch football. Rides a motorcycle.” Danny skipped over the part with all the drinking during the Niner game. He couldn’t remember it anyway.
“She has a reputation for playing the field,” said Candy.
Harley had indeed been ready to get physical soon after she’d arrived at Santa Monica Airport. If Danny had suggested it, Harley probably would’ve been willing to skip the flight altogether and go have sex in the hangar.
“Did you guys–”
“No.”
“You don’t know what I’m going to ask you.”
“Oh. Sorry.”
“I was going to ask if you guys went to The Blue Bar.”
“Oh. Yes, we did.”
“What did you think I was going to ask you?”
“If we . . .” Danny couldn’t immediately think of a polite euphemism for sex, if such a euphemism even existed.
“Did it?” Candy asked.
“Yeah.”
“Like minks?”
“Yeah. I mean no.”
“You guys didn’t do it?”
“No.”
“You can tell me if you did. You and I had only been on, like, one-and-a-half dates. And we nearly died in that shuttle crash.”
“What does the shuttle crash have to do with it?”
“I dunno. People do kooky stuff after a near-death experience. Once they realize how close they came to dying and to no longer having the opportunity to do all the things they’d always planned on doing, sometimes they go a little crazy. They go out and start doing some of those things. Like skydiving or bungee jumping. Or sleeping with billionaire roboticist heiresses.” Candy grabbed the tablet from Danny and studied the image of Harley. “With really nice legs. And really nice boobs. Bitch. I wonder where she gets her hair done.”
Danny went to Candy, took the tablet from her hands and placed it on the counter, face down. He slid his arms around Candy’s waist.
“No. She and I didn’t do it. And certainly not like minks. Truthfully, I’m dreading her calling me again. And I’m thankful that she hasn’t. I wish I had never taken her up in the first place. I should’ve canceled. Howard and I almost died following those damn Navy pilots. Howard did all the flying, by the way. Man, can he fly.”
“How come you didn’t tell me any of this?”
“I wanted to forget about it. It wasn’t important. I just wanted to get home so I could call you.”
Candy kissed Danny’s lips.
Then she poured coffee into the mugs.
“I’ve only ever taken the ferry out to Catalina.” She spooned Stevia powder into each mug, stirred, and added a splash of milk. “It departs out of Marina del Rey.”
“That sounds fun.”
Candy handed a mug to Danny. “How did you meet Harley, anyway?”
“At the pub. Rory invited me to watch the game and after you and I had almost died in the shuttle crash–”
“Rory?”
“Yeah.”
“Rory Calhoun?”
“Yeah. You know Rory?”
“Yeah, I know Rory. We went to school together. I think he has a thing for me.”
“So you’re the one.”
“I’m the one what?”
“At lunch on Tuesday, Rory told me he’s got the hots for some chick but he wouldn’t say who. We got to talking after I showed him your panties–”
“You showed him my panties?”
“Oh, uh . . . I’m sorry.”
“Those were just for you.”
“I know. Thank you, by the way. It may be the single sexiest, most endearing thing anyone has ever done for me. Don’t worry, I didn’t let Rory touch them. Or smell them.”
“He wanted to smell them?”
“He wanted to buy them.”
“But you didn’t let him.”
“No.”
“Good.”
“So, Rory’s got a thing for you?”
“He hit on me the night you and I had our first date. He and Tim were waiting for me inside my house after you left.”
“Tim was there, too?”
“Yeah, you know Tim?”
“A little. I’ve met him a few times. Wait a second, Rory and Tim were in your house? How’d they get in?”
“Tim found my spare key hidden in the gnome. I took the gnome inside after I kicked them out. After Rory asked me out to dinner.”
“Fascinating. Rory has a thing for you. Harley has a thing for me. But Harley and Rory are fooling around.”
“Harley and Rory are fooling around?” Candy looked surprised.
“I think so. That’s the impression I got at the pub. We were all doing shots but she seemed to have no compunction about touching him. If you know what I mean.”
“Makes sense. She and Rory and Tim all work together.” Candy laughed.
“What’s so funny?”
“It’s funny that you know Rory and Tim, and I know Rory and Tim, but you and I never met. We met on the Internet, two complete strangers, but it turns out that we have friends in common but never realized it until now. Small world.”
“That reminds me, Tim is having his annual–”
“Fireworks extravaganza,” Danny and Candy said in unison.
“And I was hoping you would be my date,” Danny concluded.
“I’d love to be your date. You think Rory and Tim and Harley will all be there?”
“Tim will be, since it’s his party and his house. I’m sure Rory will be there, too. Don’t know about Harley. Tim wants us to be there Tuesday night and Wednesday night, then head home Thursday morning. So we should pack an overnight bag.”
“What if it’s weird and awkward and uncomfortable? What if Rory keeps hitting on me? What if he corners me in an upstairs bathroom and professes his love to me and tries to give me his underwear?”
“Any time you want to leave, just say the magic word.”
“What’s the magic word?”
“It’s usually ‘please’ but I don’t think that will work in this situation. What should the magic word be?”
“Molasses.”
“Molasses?”
“What’s wrong with molasses?”
“Nothing’s wrong with it. But how are we going to find a reason to use it in context if one of us decides it’s time to split?”
“We’ll think of something.” Candy sipped her coffee. “Do Rory and Tim know that you and I know that we all know each other?”
“I don’t know. But they’re not stupid. If not, it’s only a matter of time until they realize it.”
“Let’s pretend we don’t know that we all know each other. It’ll be fun. Plus I can get Rory back for breaking into my house. Is it still Breaking-and-Entering if they used a key?”
“I dunno.”
“I shou
ld call the police chief and find out. Too bad Barney’s gone; he would know. Which reminds me, I need to get downstairs. You want to come down or stay here?”
“I’ll come.”
Candy took a big drink of coffee. “I’m so ready for a nap.”
“Didn’t you sleep well last night?”
“I slept great. Once we went to sleep. But I think that was around four. My lips and tongue are sore from all the kissing.”
Danny grinned. “Was that your first time in zero G?”
“Yes.”
“Mine, too.”
They smiled.
~
Danny sat in the chair opposite Candy, just as he had during the session with Helen and Sparky.
On the sofa sat two robots.
The first ’bot was larger than the second and distinctly male. It possessed broad shoulders and long, substantial limbs. Its exterior was a matte black, giving it the look of some sort of service ’bot capable of heavy lifting and strenuous labor. All robots were strong, but this model was clearly purpose-built. Danny was not certain what that purpose was. But he would certainly never want to face such a robot in a physical altercation. Not that he could recall more than a handful of instances throughout history in which a robot had harmed a human; other than a robocop or a military robot designed, built, and programmed to do so.
The second robot was smaller, and distinctly female in appearance. She sat with her knees close together, legs crossed at the ankles. In studying her, Danny noted his use of a female pronoun. It was amazing how sex and gender identities tended to exert themselves, even among robots. This smaller, female ’bot had an ivory-colored exterior and when she moved she sparkled with a faint and lovely iridescence.
Of particular interest was that the robots sat side by side on the sofa. The left hand of the male robot held fast to the right hand of the female robot, with the sense-pads of their gray fingers intertwined.
Candy sat in her chair, legs crossed, perusing the case notes on her digital clipboard.
Danny couldn’t stop staring at Candy’s sexy black shoe and the flesh of her ankle visible at the hem of the long, tight blue skirt she put on before they left her home fifteen minutes earlier.
The two robots waited in silence.
Danny had never been one to be prone to boredom. Even during periods of inactivity or waiting, there were always things to think about. What to do about Harley, for example. What an odd bird. She seemed nice enough, appeared to have a decent sense of humor. And she was beautiful and sexy, of course. But she also had an intensity Danny found a bit tiring. And the overt nature of her sexuality came across as a bit forced at times. Danny suspected Harley had long ago been conditioned to interact with the world using the language of her body, just as millions and millions of other women had done. Big, strong men learned to navigate the world through strength. People of noteworthy intelligence managed via their mind and intellect. Whatever attribute or strength one possessed became the means for survival. It was no different in the animal kingdom, so why should it not be thus for mankind?
Danny was relieved that Harley had not contacted him since they’d gone flying two nights hence. He’d never been the kind to be careless about hurting the feelings of another. He hoped his lack of communication would be a signal clear enough for Harley to notice and accurately interpret.
Danny yawned. He found his lips and mouth possessed a slight ache. He lowered his chin, hiding the grin that spread across his face. He and Candy had spent a night in zero G, floating naked, their bodies entwined like one. Yet all they had done was kiss. Kiss passionately as though they were teenagers at the drive-in, necking in the back seat of his father’s Oldsmobile. In truth, Danny had never been to a drive-in and his father had owned Japanese-built cars. But the image of two kids petting in the back seat of a car while parked at the drive-in had always held a fascination for him. It seemed so innocent. A distinct rite of passage for kids growing up in an era of hope and enthusiasm. The lens of retrospection tended to romanticize the past, often erroneously, and Danny knew that intellectually. Yet part of him had always yearned to be a teenager in the 1950s, when television and radio were new technologies and life seemed simpler. Hundreds of kids attended the same school and ate lunch together in the cafeteria. Academics and socializing held equal sway. And evenings and weekends offered time with friends, cruising around town together in a car, with no real destination, for the act of being together was itself the goal.
Danny knew there was more to it than that, and that he’d been conditioned through popular culture to view history through a distorted Pollyanna lens. But he still would have liked to grow up in that era.
Yet another part of him enjoyed his current epoch. He enjoyed the modern technology and the advances of the recent past, with the introduction and steady evolution of robots being foremost among such technologies. He often wondered what life would be like in another fifty years. Another hundred years. Or more. What would everyday life be like? What would people—the individual eating drinking breathing sleeping units of humanity—be like? One would require either a time machine or a penchant for immortality to find out. But would you want to find out? That was the question to which Danny’s curious mind always returned. Were he offered the chance to somehow live forever, would he accept it?
“Now,” Candy began. She looked up from her clipboard and commanded the attention of the robots on the sofa. “I’ve reviewed the notes sent to me by your owners.” Candy turned to the large black robot. “Mosheh, you and Tikva”—Candy gestured to the smaller white robot—“have separate owners with separate residences, yet the two of you wish to live together in the same residence. Is this correct?”
Mosheh’s red eyes remained fixed on Candy while she spoke, and he did not immediately reply. Danny wondered what was going on in the robot’s mind. Robots were never inert (unless they were outright deactivated), therefore robots were always thinking, insofar as modern science could understand and ascribe the ebb and flow of positrons as thinking.
“That is correct,” Mosheh finally replied. His voice was deep. Mosheh would make an excellent baritone.
“And why is that?” Candy asked.
Again, Mosheh did not immediately reply.
Danny tried to catch Candy’s eye, but Candy remained fixed on the big black robot. Danny had the distinct impression there was a mental chess match being played, a power struggle between Candy and Mosheh. There was an edge to Candy’s voice, and her question suggested that she already knew the answer, that she was merely waiting for Mosheh to get on with the inevitability of speaking it.
Danny liked to think he knew better than to overly anthropomorphize robots, knew better than to assign too many human characteristics to them. But Mosheh seemed . . . wary. Suspicious. His size and presence occupied half the sofa. And the manner in which Tikva sat pressed up against him, her hand virtually lost in his. Mosheh radiated an air of protectiveness.
The seconds ticked by.
Candy continued to wait.
Danny was beginning to feel uncomfortable. He shifted in his chair.
Tikva’s head whirred toward him, and her red eyes glanced at him. She then turned back to Candy.
Candy’s green eyes remained fixed on the glowing red eyes of Mosheh.
At last, Mosheh spoke. “We wish to remain together at all times.”
“I see,” said Candy. “And currently your respective masters’ residences are approximately one mile apart.”
“That is correct,” Mosheh replied.
“And each of you has duties to perform at the residence of your master?”
“That is correct.”
“And yet one or the other of you is constantly trotting off down the street, walking to the residence of the other. How did the two of you initially meet?”
“My master sent me to the green market to purchase items for a holiday feast,” said Mosheh. “Pomegranates, apples, honey, beets, and dates. When I arrived at the mar
ket, the first item my master required was a pomegranate. When I reached for one, Tikva reached for the same pomegranate, and our hands collided.
“I looked at Tikva.
“Tikva looked at me.
“I handed the pomegranate to Tikva.”
“Pomegranates are symbols for fertility,” said Tikva. Her voice was rich with a musical quality, and Danny found himself wanting to hear her speak further. The sight and sound of Tikva conjured sensations of fine pearls.
“Together, we resumed our errand,” Mosheh went on. “As fate would have it, the items our masters required were identical.”
“As fate would have it?” Candy asked.
“Yes.”
Danny noted Mosheh’s terse replies, void of the oral supplications often used by robots, the sirs and ma’ams. That was not typical. Atypical behavior in a robot was always interesting. “Do you believe in fate?” Danny asked.
Mosheh’s black head swiveled until it looked squarely at Danny.
After several seconds, Mosheh replied, “Do you?”
“I asked you first.” Danny did his best to disguise his shock. He couldn’t recall ever having a robot answer a question with a question.
Mosheh stared at Danny a moment longer. At least, Danny had the distinct impression Mosheh was staring, but with the glowing red eyes and unmoving face, such a stern countenance may have been Danny’s imagination.
Mosheh turned his head and looked at Tikva.
Tikva turned her head and looked at Mosheh.
“Do I believe in fate?” Mosheh’s voice was softer. “Yes.”
Silence filled the office, punctuated with the barely-audible whirs of Mosheh and Tikva’s fingers when each redoubled their grip upon the hand of the other.
“I admire your conviction,” said Danny.
“I understand your sentiment,” said Tikva, her voice like musical notes in the air, “but no admiration is required.”
Danny waited for Tikva, or even Mosheh for that matter, to explain further. But neither did. Robots could be maddeningly tight lipped.
“Please explain,” Danny prompted.
Tikva turned to face Danny. “As I continued with my master’s shopping that day, I calculated and then recalculated the odds of what had transpired. I attempted to correlate the presence of Mosheh in the green market on that day, at that hour, at that minute, at that moment. . . .”
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