Trish agrees that you do indeed look like a million dollars after your “makeover,” and explains that the bright lights of the studio make people seem, like, really washed out if they don’t use a little more makeup than usual. At that moment a very young production assistant with a headset and a clipboard appears and says Judy’s ready for you. Reluctantly, you allow yourself to be escorted down a long airless corridor to the studio.
“We’ll take you in during the commercial break, then Judy will introduce you as soon as we’re live. There’s nothing to it,” the PA explains with a bright, mechanical smile. “Oh, and this is a family-friendly show. Please remember not to swear or reference any sexual acts.”
“I wasn’t planning to.”
The studio is hot and bright. Behind a glass wall is the production booth, crowded with more people in headsets. You see Tim and Katrina, standing at the back. On the far side of the studio, Judy is already ensconced on the famous cream sofa, being attended to by another assistant with electric hair tongs. Only when the assistant is done and Judy has checked herself in a hand mirror does she turn to you with a smile and say, “Hi!”
“Hi,” you reply nervously.
“There’s nothing to worry about,” she says reassuringly. “I’ll introduce you, and then the camera will be on you and you can answer my first question.”
“What will that be?”
She doesn’t reply. Already a shadowy figure beyond the lights is counting down, using his fingers to sign the last few seconds: Three—two—one. Zero.
Judy smiles at the camera. “From the Bride of Frankenstein to Austin Powers’s sex-hungry fembots, by way of Ira Levin’s Stepford Wives, humanity—or at least a certain geeky, male portion of it—has long dreamed of creating the ultimate subservient female,” she says conversationally. “Now a controversial Silicon Valley technologist has succeeded in doing just that, by building a robotic replica of his own wife. It’s claimed to be the world’s first emotionally intelligent companion robot, or cobot, and in a scoop for this show, I’m going to interview it.” She turns to you, still smiling. “First of all, what do I call you?”
You stare at her. You’ve just realized what’s happening here—that the awful makeup was entirely deliberate, and that this interview is going to be the very opposite of sympathetic.
“You can call me Abbie.” Something makes you add, “And I’ll call you Judy, shall I?”
Steel glints in her eyes. “Abbie…That was the name of your creator’s wife, wasn’t it?”
“Yes.”
She looks into the camera. “Viewers may recall Tim Scott, who four years ago was put on trial for his vanished wife’s murder—a trial that dramatically collapsed when the judge dismissed all charges.” She turns back to you. “It’s been claimed you have feelings. How do you feel about replacing Abbie Cullen-Scott?”
“I’m not trying to replace her—”
“So you don’t have feelings about that?”
“Well—it’s complicated, obviously—” you say, trying to plot a path through all the verbal traps.
“How about Tim Scott? What are your feelings about him?”
“I love him,” you say defiantly. “That hasn’t changed. And by the way—”
“You think you love him,” she interrupts. “But that’s just the way you’ve been programmed, isn’t it?”
“No,” you insist. “Look, you have this all wrong. What you said in your introduction just now—this isn’t about creating a subservient little wife at all. Tim would hate that. He wants me to make my own decisions—to be autonomous—”
“But ultimately you are just a highly sophisticated, shall we say, pleasure machine—”
“No!” you say angrily. “That’s not what this is. I don’t even have genitals. I’m here because Tim loved me so much he couldn’t bear to lose me.”
The floor manager is holding up a printed board saying CAUTION! USE FAMILY-FRIENDLY LANGUAGE! You ignore him. “This isn’t about some sad loner who couldn’t get a girlfriend. This is about a man motivated by his own personal tragedy to create a completely new kind of companion.” At last you’re hitting the points Katrina hammered out with you, and you start to feel better. “One day cobots will help out in care homes, retirement communities, hospitals—”
“Destroying American jobs?” Judy interrupts.
“Creating new jobs by stimulating economic growth,” you correct her.
“Perhaps one day you will even see robots replacing news anchors,” she says, directing her smile, not to you, but to the camera and the viewers at home.
“Well, why not?” you say wearily. “You’re already three-quarters artificial.”
Her smile doesn’t slip. “He hasn’t programmed you to be polite, I see!” Again she turns to the camera. “Earlier we spoke to Abbie Cullen-Scott’s sister, Lisa, to invite her on this show. She was too upset to take part, but confirmed the family will investigate whether data protection or identity theft laws have been breached.” She turns back to you. “That’s a problem, isn’t it? If you have feelings, how do you square them with the pain and suffering you’re causing others?”
For a moment you can’t think of an answer. You’re too distracted by thoughts of Lisa. Lisa, upset.
“No one wants to hurt other people,” you manage to say. “But sometimes in life you can’t help it.”
“Hmm,” Judy says, as if you’ve just proved her point. “Other people, indeed. After these messages— Can San Francisco afford the growing cost of crime?”
The monitors in the production booth cut to commercials. Judy looks up. “Nancy, could I get a wipe?”
The assistant is already at your side, waiting to guide you away. “That’s it?” you say disbelievingly.
Judy glances in your direction. “That’s it,” she says lightly. You both stand up. “I still don’t get it, though. If you can’t have sex with him, what’s the point of you?”
You can’t help it. You slap her. You do it instantly, without thought, although as your palm lands on her flawless, botoxed skin you find yourself thinking, Bet that’ll show.
The floor manager and production assistant have already leapt forward and pinned your arms to your sides. Judy gapes at you, shocked. Then she raises her own hand and slaps you back, hard.
A knot of production people grab you and bundle you out of the studio. “All right,” you say angrily, freeing yourself. “You can let me go now.”
“Abbie…” Tim rushes up. “Abbie, I’m so sorry you had to go through that. They promised us…But you were brilliant, Abs. Thank you.”
“I’m sorry about the slap.” Members of the makeup team elbow you out of the way as they rush into the studio. To work on Judy’s reddened skin, presumably.
“It doesn’t matter. They were already into the commercials. And she slapped you back.”
“She provoked me,” you say. “The whole time. It was deliberate.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Tim repeats. He looks at Katrina the PR adviser. “It was fine, wasn’t it?”
Katrina only shrugs.
29
You don’t want to go back to the beach house, so Tim takes you to Dolores Street instead, arriving just as Sian brings Danny home from school. She doesn’t stay, for which you’re thankful. You want to talk to Tim about everything that’s happened—her, the interview, the slap—but almost immediately, for no discernible reason, Danny has a meltdown. It takes hours to calm him down, his body arcing in pain and terror as he screams, on and on. You sit with him, trying to soothe him by holding him, but he’s too far gone. Even putting on one of his beloved Thomas videos makes no difference.
Eventually Tim takes your place, saying Danny’s more used to him now. It does seem to help, a little. Even so, it’s another hour before Danny calms down.
Tim comes downstairs, his face tired and drawn. “That was the worst in a while.”
“What caused it, do you think?”
He grimaces. “We used to think it was stomach pains, but we had all the tests and there was nothing conclusive. More likely it was some tiny, random thing—a fly, or a car alarm going off somewhere.”
“Perhaps he picked up some stress from Sian. Or me, for that matter.”
“Possibly. But I doubt it. People with autism have very low empathy—they find it hard even to identify emotions, much less understand them.”
You’re struck by something. “It’s odd, isn’t it, how what Danny suffers from is the exact opposite of what you’ve achieved with me. He’s a human with impaired empathy, and I’m—well, I’m an empathetic machine.”
“Yes.” He glances at you. “But it’s not entirely coincidence. It was thinking about Danny’s brain—wanting to understand him—that got me thinking about emotional intelligence. I thought…” His voice trails off. “I thought, maybe if I could get an artificial brain to become more empathetic, I might get some insights into how to help him.”
“And did you?”
Tim shakes his head. “The autistic brain simply doesn’t have the same capacity to learn that an AI does. With autism you have to use much more simplistic teaching methods.”
“Like the ABA program.”
“Like the ABA,” he agrees.