Page 14 of CHOICE Lover
She holds her hand beneath a spout labeled Hair Wash and waits patiently as a thimble-sized dollop drops onto her palm. Considering the bird’s nest she’s currently sporting, one dollop won’t be enough. She waves her hand under the spout several more times. When she is satisfied with the glob in her palm, she massages the luxurious-smelling product into her hair.
It feels like she’s lived a lifetime in the last week, and she almost forgot herself. Because there is one truth she always comes back to. The universe may have dealt her a shit hand, but that’s never stopped her from picking up the pieces—no matter how shattered they are.
With the resources that Tommy shared with her, she now has so many possibilities. So many ways for her to find a niche and start over. She can write another book and try to find a publisher. Or if that isn’t a thing anymore, publish it herself through the Books platform. Maybe if she builds up a big enough audience, she can see what it takes to hire a human narrator.
Excitement zings through her as she towels off. She slips into the baggy gray jumpsuit Tommy left for her and rifles through the drawers until she finds a comb for her hair.
It takes a bit of time to make herself look presentable. She can only use getting freshened up as an excuse to avoid Res6 for so long. Especially now that Tommy has likely shared his triumph about getting her in the shower. She’s going to have to face Res6, which means she is going to have to admit, at least to herself, how awful she was to him about his company. Granted, she didn’t know it was his company when she said those things. It’s not like she feels any different about it, does she?
No. If people are masking their isolation with glorified sex clones, it is sad. No human should have to live like that. If only she could show people.
Throwing her hair in a quick braid and securing it with a piece of cloth she tore from Res6’s soon-to-be-discarded shirt, she gives herself a once-over in the mirror. Much better.
An idea hits her. Tommy said he believed his non-deities were resurrecting people like her to shake things up. Maybe that’s exactly what she’ll do. Shaking things up will be her mission.A mission whose success will finally, once and for all, give you the right to exist.
Argh, why does her inner narrator do that? She knows her worth, right? She pictures her stepmother, San Francisco’s own Ask Doctor Janet, frowning.Electra, dear, you are worthy of good things exactly as you are. No amount of money or accomplishment is going to change that.
Sadly, she remembers thinking it isn’t that simple. If she were truly worthy, why did bad things keep happening to her?
4 – My Buddy and Me!
Res6
Does delegating the task of motivating Electra to shower make him a coward, or something worse? He’s not exactly handling her well. So what if he needs reinforcements? Tommy’s job is to support him. Plus, Tommy’s referred to a sister multiple times over the years. That means he’s more equipped to—he glances at the bedroom door, which has become an ominous, threatening thing—more equipped to do whatever it is he’s doing in there. Hopefully, getting her to shower.
Then she’ll come out and . . . well, that’s where his plan loses traction. He has no clue, so he’s going to improvise. Not that improvising is going well either, based on the evidence. Every interaction they’ve had since she woke up a week ago is playing on repeat in his mind as he paces outside the bedroom door. His brain is only offering him two choices: retread every syllable he uttered, or let his curiosity about what’s going on in the bedroom drive him mad. He has plenty of other things tothink about, like his first Jerme experiment, but he can’t seem to redirect his mind. The first option—retread—is winning.
Another excellent specimen, Lextr.
Get a little mileage out of it.
How is that so unbelievably sexy?
That last one haunts him the most. She even grumbled something likeI’m not so sexy nowas he attempted to get her out of bed. The problem is, she put on his shirt and he gawked at her like a teenage boy. Even now, a week later, he can’t get the image out of his mind—her pert nipples poking through the soft fabric, the hem grazing her upper thighs. She was naked during the entire trip from his office to his unit, then standing there in the corner attached to the activation pad while the drugs wore off. But for reasons unknown, he developed a forceful attraction to her at that moment.
Still, why did he let it tumble out of his mouth? While he meant it, there’s no telling what he was thinking. If she were a manupartner, she might have giggled and coyly pawed at his chest. This woman, however, isn’t a manupartner, and he couldn’t pull his head out of his ass and act normal.
He spends too much time with lab techs and clones. This confirms it. He definitely shouldn’t have grown a manupartner using his DNA—basically a body double—to send to his weekly FRIENDS appointments, mandated by the NHOS initiative Project: LEN, Loneliness Ends Now.FRIENDS are a vitalFirstResponse toIsolation viaEngagement withNetworking as aDeterrentSystem.When NHOS first rolled out the program, he scoffed. Why would people need FRIENDS when they could get a manupartner?Yet even he can see how his NHOS-issued FRIENDS might have prepared him to interact with the woman hiding in his bedroom.
Zorg, is he considering going to his FRIENDS appointments? Her presence is clearly arresting his brain function. Perhapsthat’s why he showed her the commercial. Was it insensitive of him? If one isn’t used to the process of manupartner formation, it must seem grotesque. But that wasn’t what alarmed her.Patheticwas the word she hurled at him.
Is he pathetic? He needs context.
He glances at the door—not his bedroom door this time. The one next to it. Before he can talk himself out of it, he turns the handle and slips inside, closing it securely behind him. Nothing wrong with a little chat to gain some necessary insight while Tommy works to get Electra out of bed and into the shower.
Against the far wall, in an ergonomic antigravity chair—he isn’t a monster—sits a manupartner. Specifically, the manupartner body double he’s been sending to his FRIENDS appointments for the last seven months. He’s been doing this for decades, of course, but he recycles and replaces the units yearly to avoid glitches.
The unit’s eyes brighten. “Oh, hi! Time for another FRIENDS visit?”
This is a horrible idea. He’d be better off going into the bathroom and talking to his reflection like normal . . . but unprecedented times and all . . . fuck it.
“I want to discuss something with you,” he says, forcing the words out.
The unit sits up, angling its head as if it’s truly concerned. “What’s bothering you, buddy?”
He groans. He programmed this unit, like all his body doubles, to be especially perceptive, sensitive, moral, and intuitive. Then, upon activation, he gives them a tablet and instructs them to study the Respectful and Considerate Conduct Manual, so they’re prepared for when he sends them to his FRIENDS appointments in place of himself. To solve the memory issue, since there is—or at least therewas—no way to carry memories between manupartners, he always complains in his annual Project: LEN survey so they switch his group right before he gets a new body double. It only gets awkward when hebumps into someone in public from a previous FRIENDS group and he comes across more abruptly than his finely tuned unit. When someone appears momentarily surprised, he knows they’ve met a previous unit and not him. In those encounters, he quickly adjusts, slipping on his CHOICElover public figure persona to smooth things over. It always works.
He clears his throat, addressing the eager unit. “What do my FRIENDS think of you?”
