humans challenge, week 3, day 3: leotilda/first âi love youâ
There is a girl in his room, but her hair is too dark to be Niska, and too light to be Mia. She faces him, and he sees that her eyes are brown, not green. She is human, like he was. Like most of him still is.
âHello,â he says. He tries to sound friendly. Either she is a nurse, or sheâs someone he ought to know, and either way he should be kind, even if he feels like being sullen. This is something Max taught him. He wonders just how sullen he was, before this happened, for Max to have to say that.
âHello,â says the girl. A woman really, but young. Just a little younger than his body is. He isnât sure how old his mind thinks it is at the moment. Itâs been chopping and changing to whatever takes its fancy. âHow are we today?â
âFine,â he says. âThe bits of me that are here, anyway.â He gives her a rueful look, somewhere just below a smile. âHave I seen you before?â
âI came yesterday. We had a good chat.â
He nods. âSometimes I forget things.â
âI know. Itâs okay.â
They regard one another; him curious, her sad. âWhy do you keep coming?â he asks suddenly. âIt canât be fun for you, when I donât even remember your name. And itâs notâŠâ
He doesnât want to say, itâs not helping me either, but in a way perhaps she ought to know. Thereâs no need for her to torture herself on his account. Whether sheâs here or not, his brain gives and takes what it chooses.
âI donât always do things because theyâre fun,â she says, enigmatically. âBesides, if you were going to say it makes no difference to you, we donât actually know that yet. Doctor Morrowâs been running tests. She says thereâs still some activity in the hippocampus, so thereâs still a chance we could trigger something.â
He sniffs. He hadnât known. âNobody tells me anything.â
âSometimes we do, itâs justâŠâ
He leans forward a little. âAm I going to die?â he asks, bluntly. âIs that why everyoneâs being so careful?â
Her eyes widen. âWhat? No. Youâre healthy. Actually youâre better than ever, because Athena made you a proper charging port.â She gestures at his side, hidden by the bedsheets. He doesnât glance down. He knows itâs there. It sits in his skin, sealed and smug, as if itâs always been part of him. Interesting, then, to know that it hasnât.
âNo more infections in that big open⊠gash-thing,â she continues. âAnd youâll be up and about soon. If people are careful around youâŠâ She trails off, then comes back to herself. âMaybe theyâre just scared of making it harder on you. We kind ofâ me and Max have this thing where we vent to each other, so none of it gets to you. Which,â she raises her eyebrows, âI realise that Iâm kind of breaking by telling you thereâs a thing, but, y'know. Donât want you sitting there thinking youâre on death row.â
Heâs oddly touched. âThank you,â he says, somewhat gruffly.
She shrugs. âS'alright. Max has a great joke about the word hippocampus, by the way. You should let him tell you it.â
âIâll try and remember.â A joke of his own. She smiles in acknowledgement.
âHave you thought about writing stuff down?â she asks. She shifts, pulls a bag from her shoulder, and unzips a compartment on the side. âAt least youâd know what youâve known on other days, even if you donât know it all at once.â She takes out a slim, black notebook, with a pen clipped over the cover, and holds it out to him, looking suddenly self-conscious. âThought it might give you some practice with your motor skills, too.â
He takes it from her, runs his fingers over it. Sheâs right, theyâre clumsy, and will appreciate the workout. âAgain. Thank you.â
She just gives a short nod. Her eyes have clouded.
âYouâre good to me,â he says. âThe person I was before, heâŠmust have meant something to you.â
âYou do,â she says, soberly.
He notes the change of pronoun, wonders if heâll remember to try and refer to both his selves as the same person when sheâs around, in future. He hopes so. Heâs not out to hurt her.
Heâs not out to hurt anyone. But he manages to, again and again, every time one of them comes to see him. He doesnât always remember the specifics from day to day, but the general impression remains. A heaviness on his heart. He is pain, to all of them. Itâs tiring.
He leans back onto his pillows. âWill you let me say Iâm sorry, and not say âitâs not your faultâ?â He addresses the ceiling, because itâs easier than her face. âIt doesnât make it any better.â
And so he says, âIâm sorry,â and hears his voice crack, and closes his eyes. She doesnât shift. If she moves at all, he doesnât hear. Eventually, sleep takes him.
Mattie waits there for a while, then wanders out into the corridor. She speaks to a few of the new synths as she goes, giving Alice a high-five when she raises her hand. Tobyâs taught all of them to do that by now, but some of them are more into it than others.
She walks along to the room where she left Sophie, and finds her little sister curled up in the book corner with Sam and Angel, one of those huge teacherâs-copy picture books spread across their three laps. Sam is reading to the two girls, over-expressing every word as if to make up for lost time.
Mattie waits for a page-turn. âFive more minutes, Soph,â she says.
Sophie looks up, immediately plaintive. âOh! Thatâs not enough to finish the story. Can I haveâŠâ She looks at the pages left. âTwenty?â
Mattie sighs. âYouâre terrible at haggling, titch. You can have ten, but only âcause Iâm nice.â
Sophie switches her attention back to the book, satisfied.
âYouâre welcome,â Mattie murmurs, and drifts from the doorway. She carries on to the charging room, finds Frankie and Tabitha there, sitting side-by-side on a bench. Both are connected to chargers, and theyâve gone into standby mode with their arms around each other, Frankieâs head on her girlfriendâs shoulder. Mattie smiles. Sheâs just about to leave when Victor arrives, and tells her a riddle about six identical synths on an island. Victor thinks riddles are the same as saying hello, and nobody has the heart to tell him otherwise.
She admits that she has no idea how to tell which synth weighs more than the others, and Victor smiles and says, âMe neither,â which is another thing nobodyâs told him about riddles.
Mattie continues along the corridor, giving waves and high-fives as she goes. Thereâs never a quiet moment here, which is good, because if there was, sheâd end up thinking about Leo again, and she doesnât want to do anything as stupid as that before sheâs safe at home in her bedroom, texting Max in the dark. The thought reminds her that she hasnât seen him around today, and she fishes in her bag for her phone, just to ask how the talks at Hesterâs factory went.
She canât feel it in there, and she takes her bag off her shoulder to look properly. No sign of her phone. Damn. Had it come out with the notebook sheâd given Leo? She doesnât think so. But she hasnât used it anywhere since she arrived, and sheâs barely touched her bag other than that. She steels herself to return to his room.
She finds him still sleeping - or rather, sleeping again. He must have been awake for some of the time between, even just for a few moments, because the notebook isnât next to him anymore. Itâs lying open, but face down, on top of his chest and arm. The pen is further down the bed, uncapped, drawing a tiny black line across the white bedsheets.
Her phone is also there, on the floor next to where sheâd been sitting. She puts it in her bag, making sure it falls to the bottom this time. Then Mattie picks up the pen, and retrieves the lid. She leaves it on his bedside cabinet.
Then she goes for the door.
She tries to fight against the temptation. She didnât give him the notebook as a way to spy on him. Itâs supposed to help him. Itâs a gross offence against his privacy, if she reads what he wrote for his own eyes only. Heâd been asleep, anyway - so it was probably a dream. Either heâs written some gibberish that doesnât even matter, or itâs something personal, and either way she ought to keep moving.
She takes another step towards the door.
Then she hears the creak of the bedsprings as he half-rolls over. The book falls to the floor with a thump, and most of the pages stay together. Only the cover flaps slightly open, bent near the spine where heâd opened it too fiercely.
She approaches slowly, like itâs a wild animal she might scare away. If he wakes up while sheâs looking, it could⊠ruin any trust sheâs reestablished here. It had been hard enough the first time around, and she doesnât want to chance her luck a third time.
When sheâs near enough, she bends and picks it up, planning just to return it to the cabinet, neatly. But the temptation overwhelms her, and she moves the cover just slightly aside.
Nothing. The page is completely blank.
She exhales, only realising now how much sheâd built up her hopes. She puts the book down, next to the pen. Standing back from it, she notices that the cover isnât the only thing that sits slightly apart from the rest - thereâs a dent a few pages in. Maybe he hadnât been too fussy about where he started writing. Half-asleep, it would make sense.
Sheâs come this far. She might as well. Sheâll never speak of it to him, whatever it says, she decides.
She opens to the right place, sees five words scrawled there. His handwriting is scratchy and irregular, but she reads it like itâs fine calligraphy.
