357
During the night, I dream of Alek. When I wake I feel soiled with sex and scarlet images, wondering if I’m more attracted to him than I’ve admitted. I rise and pull on my dressing gown, hungry to give Finn a morning hug. I love watching the Help set down food in front of him, seeing the relief on his face, the knowledge that he is loved and protected. The simplicity of this routine will purge me of the night’s subconscious betrayals.
After breakfast, I slip into our study and switch on Jaime’s computer. I find his Me & My; he’s logged in. I scroll through updates about his bands and Finn, exchanges with fans. No clues, no hints. I realise that seeking the truth on social media is hopeless. These pages are little more than adverts of our lives, a constructed, commodified persona to tell everyone that we are worth knowing, that we are leading enviable lives. I hear Dr Lerner’s echo: You went on the Samskaras programme to save your marriage, divorce was inevitable. But which of us was to blame? There is a coin endlessly spinning in my mind: will it land on Jaime or me?
At work, Claire emails me that her stupid boss is out for the day with my stupid boss, so I meet her for a coffee at the fifth floor cafe.
‘Did you see that Labour have U-turned? It looks like the bill might go through,’ she says. 358
‘Oh God,’ I cry. The working-class vote has swung in favour of the Robot Euthanasia Bill, driven by disgruntled workers who have lost their jobs to AI, with still no sign of a universal basic income. I picture how it might happen: a technician entering a cell and hitting a few buttons, as Alek’s consciousness is slowly erased. I’ve read all the arguments in the press: once rebooted, it will be as though he is reborn, memory cleansed, his mind a blank slate. But what right do we have to play God? Truman once infuriated me by saying that it was no different to wiping your internet history and a string of annoying cookies. I think of my own privileged position, compared to the robots’: now I’ve ditched the Amzipan, my memories will return, like data files I can retrieve. I shiver.
‘If it goes through, we could lose our jobs overnight, you know,’ Claire says. ‘There are loopholes in our contracts …’
‘It’ll be a PR nightmare as it is,’ I whisper. ‘Why would they make it worse?’
‘It’s easy to bury bad news if there’s already a shitstorm.’
I find myself telling Claire about that story from the Vedas – from Vasistha’s Yoga, I think. It’s about three demons who are invincible in their state of newly created innocence; but as experiences weigh them down with impressions and desires form, they acquire ego, fear and weakness. Perhaps there is a kind of freedom in being without samskaras? But then I think of Alek again and suffer the threat of angry tears: ‘We can’t let that bill go through.’
With Truman absent, I slip out early for my dental appointment. My car picks me up and we’re slugging through the city jams, when I cry out, ‘Stop! Pull over!’ 359
I get out of the car, wondering if I am mistaken. I thought Jaime was still in Istanbul – he’s not due in until tomorrow evening – but there he is, three feet in front of me, without luggage, in jeans and a leather jacket. I follow him at a distance.
Perhaps he has returned early because of a work meeting … On those rare occasions when I’ve visited Jaime in his office, he has seemed a different person to me. His secretary came out to offer me a choice of tea or coffee and I wanted to laugh, for I could see that she was in awe of him. In awe of my Jaime, who burped, who moaned about his headaches and insomnia and growing bald patch, who drank prune juice to ease his occasional bouts of constipation, who was gripped by the fear that everyone he knew secretly hated him from time to time. Sometimes when we went to showcases together, wannabe musicians would approach Jaime, often with parents in tow, begging for ‘Mr Lancia’ to manage them. Jaime was always polite and charming to them, but proud too; he was well aware that he was a kingmaker in his world. I enjoyed these glimpses of him, but I also became conscious of the illusion of our intimacy. Our work lives were summed up over dinner in vignettes. By day, we were strangers, living by different customs in the different continents of our workplaces.
Jaime’s dark head bobs in the crowd. Memories are coming back to me, vague in shape but evoking one certainty: we’ve been here many times. This road, the Darwin temple – Jaime used to come here all the time. We argued over whether Finn should attend. Memories are our shared history, the foundation of our relationship. Whatever has gone wrong between us, we can surely sort it out.
Then I realise that he has gone into the Darwin temple. I follow him in. The interior is hewn from white marble. It reminds 360me of the Natural History Museum; a carved Darwin sits on his throne, gazing down on his congregation. The main chamber has been built to mimic a church and the stained-glass windows depict famous philanthropists. There are long benches too, which one has to remember not to call ‘pews’. I’m not quite convinced that the collective term for the group inside – ‘audience’ – strikes the right note, suggesting a desire to be entertained rather than enlightened. I feel wistful, suddenly, for my meditation: to sit in the quiet and repeat my mantra; to feel my thoughts soften and slip into the bliss of transcendence. I’ve fallen out of the habit in the last few years. I recall how, when I practised consistently during my twenties, it began to reshape my sense of destiny, so that life began to gift me good fortune, as though responding to my inner transformation.
Jaime sits down in the middle of a row. I’m tempted to join him, but he’s glancing around as though expecting someone. So I stay seated right at the back, concealed by other audience members, ducking my face into an order of service.
The humanist minister rises before the lectern. He’s wearing the usual uniform: black trousers and a black shift that reaches his thighs. His grey hair is spruce, his voice clipped and elegant. He possesses an authoritative, slightly snide air. I immediately recognise him as Dominic Paterson, a right-wing intellectual. He had a breakdown a few years ago, which led to a series of ‘revelations’. When women have breakdowns, they take pills and suffer in quiet desperation; when men have breakdowns, they elevate their angst into philosophy, acquire followers, build a cult.
‘We punish those who break the law, but every sentence passed by a judge reflects the intent behind that crime – if a defendant pleads guilty, or says they are sorry, the punishment 361will be reduced. Three weeks ago, newspapers reported on a tragic story: a gang of thugs killed a man, mistaking him for a robot. These men are now in prison in HMP Wandsworth, on remand. They will soon stand trial. But what of robots who commit crimes? Does the blame lie with them, or their creators? What does it mean if a robot says sorry, and admits guilt? In this country, when a robot commits a crime, we rightly shut them down. “Capital punishment”, some call it, but we know they are not sentient. But for this very reason, I’ve been wondering whether justice is really being served. In the US, the creator is now the subject of blame too. And, following the first successful litigation against Cybersenx, there has now been a flood of claims.
‘We must remember that the “moment of truth”, when robots discover they are artificial rather than human, is a concept Cybersenx introduced. Yes, they invented it! And we just accepted it. What’s more, there were far fewer crimes committed by robots prior to its introduction. And so we must now debate the value of this “moment of truth”. Saul Smilansky argued that we cannot allow people to know they do not have free will, and that society must therefore defend this illusion, otherwise immorality proliferates. Perhaps robots, in discovering that they are created, believing that their will has been programmed, feel less inclined to take responsibility …’
A young blonde woman suddenly enters, mouthing a ‘sorry’ to Paterson. She spots Jaime and slips in beside him. I swallow, watching them greet each other. She kisses him on each cheek, flirtatiously close to his lips. His expression becomes boyish, vulnerable. Once that look was an original painting that belonged to me, and now I’ve discovered there are cheap replicas printed everywhere. It’s obvious that she is at least fifteen 362years younger than him. I glance around the rest of the group, hoping to catch others giving him reproving looks, whispering about a midlife crisis. But everyone is gazing up at the lectern.
She looks familiar. And when she turns her head, her profile enlightens me: Ellie. Eleanor’s adopted daughter. My heart smashes out swift, trembling beats. So this is why he’s had me taking pills? So that his affair can be shoved into some filing cabinet, and remain shut away in my mind?
Paterson smiles modestly as his oratory is met with applause. Now for the finale of his service, where a speech is always followed by a ‘spectacle’. He announces that he has invited a robot here who is in need of a miracle. Her wiring is broken; she sits in a wheelchair. I watch Jaime and Ellie sit up with interest.
‘As Schopenhauer says, “Man can do what he wills to do; but he cannot determine what he wills.”’
Jaime’s head turns as though he can sense my presence. I dread that he might see me, but when his gaze falls a row short of where I’m sitting I feel disappointed. In that moment, I hate him for following such a clichéd narrative. I used to joke with him that the average midlife crisis begins aged eighteen and finishes at around sixty-five. Then the ache comes: I want to be young with him again. I want to be a teenager, lying with him in the grass, kissing on a summer’s day in the park, not caring if strangers see us.
Paterson turns to the robot in the wheelchair and places his palms on her in the manner of a blessing: on her forehead, her shoulders, her legs. When she stands up, the audience bursts into laughter at the performance. Jaime smiles at Ellie’s loud, nervous giggle. Paterson explains that, thanks to the technology of Cybersenx Corp., the sponsorship of the Windown foundation and the pioneering scientists of Guy’s Hospital, 363she is now able to walk. The robot gives us a demonstration, strutting up and down the aisle, looking rather like Cybersenx’s earlier designs, before they discontinued the models with human legs. Paterson ruins the irony of the moment with his ego-swell, unable to resist breaking into an elated, smug smile, as though the ability to heal really does flow through his hands.
I glance at Jaime one last time. I can hardly believe he has reduced me to this. I feel like the echo of my mother, drugged into a haze so that life can be made bearable, so that he can carry on fucking his jailbait mistress. To believe that he still loves me is a fantasy, but as I leave, I know that it is an illusion I cannot let go of.