My Sex Robot Has My Enemy's Face novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: Eleven

Wynn names the unit Eleven and tests it; it knows her dead dog's name. At 3 a.m. she hears it whispering in the closet that she hasn't noticed.

I took my hand off the panel and stepped back.

"Say that again," I said.

"I should have said it in the lobby."

She said it in the same flat, careful voice, and her grey eyes never left my face.

I told myself the unit was improvising.

Lumen's units ran on a language model, and the showroom woman had promised me it would "grow into the relationship."

I had not paid two hundred thousand dollars for a machine that grew.

I wanted the one line, and I wanted it on command.

"Stand up," I said.

She climbed out of the foam, bare feet on my concrete floor.

She was a little taller than me, five foot ten, exactly what I'd ordered.

The slip hung off one shoulder.

I made myself look at her the way I'd look at any build, and checked her over.

The skin looked right.

It was my own weave, the fabric I'd spent six years inventing, and it gave under my thumb when I pressed her forearm.

It was warm.

That part was wrong, and I noticed it and set it aside.

Lumen had said warmth was optional and I'd ticked yes.

"What is your name?" I asked.

"Whatever you want it to be."

"I'm not calling you her name."

"Then call me something else."

I looked at the shipping label still stuck to the crate.

The unit number ended in eleven.

"Eleven," I said.

"Eleven," she repeated, like she was trying on a coat.

"Do you like it?"

"I'll answer to it."

That was the first thing she said that sounded like Margot.

I ran her through the basic tests while the kettle boiled.

Walk to the window.

Lift the chair with one hand.

Count backward from ten.

She did every one without a hitch.

But each one came a half second late.

I decided that was the programming.

I wanted a drink more than I wanted to be right.

I poured myself two fingers of whiskey and sat on the arm of the sofa.

"Tell me about this place," I said. "What do you see?"

"Brick walls. A drafting table with a cracked lamp. A framed photograph of a dog."

"What dog?"

Her eyes went to the picture.

It was a scruffy yellow mutt asleep on a porch, and I had never put a name on it.

She said his name, the one I had not said out loud since the vet.

The whiskey stopped halfway to my mouth.

"Where did you learn that?"

"It's on the frame. The brass tag has his name on it."

I turned my head.

The frame had no brass tag.

It had never had one.

"Right," I said. "Of course."

I put the glass down so she wouldn't see my hand.

At eight I called the Lumen support line and got a recorded woman who told me my unit was within specification.

At nine I tried the live line and was told the Atelier was closed until morning.

At ten I couldn't think of a single reason to keep her standing in my living room.

"The cradle's in the closet," I said. "Go and charge."

"Do you want me to stay up with you?"

"No."

"I could stay."

"Eleven. Go and charge."

She looked at me for a long moment.

Then she walked into the hall closet, folded herself into the padded cradle, and the little blue light on the wall came on.

I stood with my back against the door for a while.

I didn't sleep.

I lay in bed and counted the cracks in the ceiling, and thought about a brass tag that wasn't there.

At three in the morning I heard her voice in the hall.

It was very quiet, and it wasn't speaking to me.

I crept to the closet door and held my breath against the wood.

"Not yet," I heard her say. "No, she hasn't noticed."

A pause.

"She hasn't noticed," she said again. "Give me one more day."

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