I was allowed to leave hospital two days later, with strict instructions to rest and allow my battered ribs to heal properly. As a result, Mum wouldn’t let me visit Aiden, who was still recovering at his clinic. Even if I’d been in perfect physical shape, she probably wouldn’t have allowed it. I’d been told that when he’s getting his routine operations for Klinsmann’s disease no one’s allowed to visit because he’s kept in isolation to minimise chances of infection. Not that I’d ever wanted to visit him then. Now I wasn’t even allowed to call him. But Mum told me he was doing fine and would be home within the week, just in time for our birthday.
Mr Meredith and the class sent me a lovely big get-well card. All the school staff and my fellow students had signed it with personal messages. There was another card waiting for Aiden as well. The camp, it seemed, had been abandoned after the dust devil incident because too many students were worried about further accidents and no amount of reassurance that what had happened to me was freakishly improbable made those worries go away. So they’d all packed up the next day and come home. Apparently the school was arranging partial refunds to the parents.
I was going to be off school for a couple of weeks, but Mum said Charlotte could come to stay over around the time of our birthday, which was brilliant.
Resting is boring. I wasn’t allowed to swim or even do much walking in the garden, so I spent a lot of time in the library. But even that paled after a while. And it’s a funny thing. When I went to bed I’d find myself reaching across to take Aiden’s hand. And when I found emptiness, I felt loneliness like a pain. Most nights I didn’t sleep well at all.
I wasn’t prepared for how Aiden would look when he finally came home. Dad brought him through the front door in a wheelchair and for the longest time, all I could do was stare. I’m not sure what I was expecting – the same old Aiden, I guess – but he was pale and obviously tired. The most dramatic thing was a contraption around his head that had metal spokes that seemed to dig straight into his skull; not that you could see much of his head, since it was wrapped in a bandage from just above his eyebrows. It was pretty obvious that Mum and Dad hadn’t told me the whole story about just how ill Aiden had been. And perhaps still was. I forced myself to smile, though I felt more like crying.
‘Hey, Aiden,’ I said. ‘Welcome home, bro.’
‘Thanks,’ he said. But he didn’t smile and his voice seemed different somehow, as if that had been damaged as well.
I didn’t know what else to say. I wanted to say thanks for saving my life, but that seemed weird somehow, there in our front room with Mum and Dad looking on. Artificial. So I just smiled. We’d talk later, probably in bed. I’d hold his hand and tell him how brave and wonderful he was. We had time.
‘I’ll take you to your room if you like, Aiden,’ said Dad. ‘You’re probably a bit tired after the journey home, huh?’
‘I’ll take him, Dad,’ I said.
‘He’s going to be in his own bedroom for a while, Ash,’ said Mum. ‘We’ve made up one of the spare rooms. It’ll be better all round. Aiden will be sleeping upright for a while until the head brace comes off, and he gets restless at night. This way, you’ll get a decent night’s sleep and he won’t be worried about disturbing you.’
‘But I don’t mind being disturbed,’ I said. ‘That’s fine. We’ll keep sharing a room, won’t we, Aiden?’
He licked his lips, but even that simple act seemed to take a huge effort.
‘I think I’d rather have my own space for a bit, Ashleigh,’ he said. ‘Just until I’m feeling a bit better.’
‘Of course,’ I said. ‘Whatever you want.’ But I have to admit, I felt a little hurt.
When Dad had wheeled him out of the room, Mum came over and put an arm around my shoulders.
‘Just for a while, Ashleigh,’ she said. ‘He’s been through a lot, you know. You both have. It’s going to take a little time to get over this.’
I nodded.
‘And I’ll bring your birthday present home tomorrow,’ she added. ‘You’re going to love it. Both of you.’
Our birthday was still two days away. She probably thought we needed a gift sooner rather than later, after all we’d been through.
‘What is it?’
Mum ruffled my hair. ‘Nice try, kiddlypunk,’ she said. ‘But I’ll tell you this much. You are going to be surprised. Very surprised.’
I love surprises and most times, coming up to my birthday, I’d be so excited that I wouldn’t be able to sleep. Lying in bed that night, though, I could only think about Aiden and what he was thinking and feeling a few doors down the corridor. He hadn’t come out of the guest bedroom since Dad wheeled him in and Mum said I couldn’t even go in to say goodnight. I tried some reading, but the words just floated off the page and didn’t touch me. When I finally fell asleep, a thunderstorm rumbling, I had muddied dreams that gave me no rest whatsoever.
When I got down for breakfast Mum had already left for work. She often has the car pick her up at five-thirty in the morning so she’s in the lab by six o’clock. She says she likes the quiet at that time of the morning and it gives her space to think without the distraction of colleagues, questions and meetings. She gets her best ideas then, she says. I wasn’t too bothered by that. I just wanted her to remember to bring our birthday present home, like she’d promised.
The weather had threatened a storm in the night, but it never arrived, just grumbled quietly way off in the distance. Now the sky was cloudless and even from inside the house I could tell it was going to be very hot. The kids at school wouldn’t be getting out into the playground today, sunblock and hats regardless.
I made myself two rounds of toast and watched Dad clean the solar sail through the dining room window. It’s meant to be self-cleaning, but Dad doesn’t trust it. I would’ve knocked on the window to say good morning, but he was operating the pressure cleaner drone so there was no point. I took my breakfast into the library.
Aiden was already in there, which was a surprise. He was sitting in his wheelchair, staring at the shelves. Not reading, just staring. It’s not often he seeks out time by himself. Normally he hangs around me whenever possible, only backing off when I tell him to give me some space. He didn’t even turn around when I said good morning.
‘How’re you feeling, Aiden?’ I asked.
He gripped the wheels of his chair and spun to face me. It was as if I’d surprised him, brought him back from somewhere far away in his head. He smiled.
‘Oh, you know, Ash. Like my skull’s on fire and someone’s constantly stabbing me in the neck with a red-hot knife.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Don’t be,’ he said. ‘I feel loads better than yesterday.’
I sat in one of the library reading chairs in front of him, put one hand on his knee. He glanced down as if surprised to see it there.
‘Did they tell you what’s wrong with you?’ I asked. ‘Why do you have to wear that cage thing and when’s it coming off?’
‘You know doctors, Ash,’ he replied. Actually, I didn’t. Until recently I hadn’t needed any medical treatment, unlike Aiden who needed it constantly. ‘They think you’re an idiot who can’t understand or handle the truth. So they just went on about head trauma, which means nothing at all really. Just that your head’s been damaged and I could have told them that.’ Aiden rarely talked about his medical experiences and he never made judgements about the doctors treating him. I felt a little uneasy. I mean, I know he was entitled to feel grumpy and maybe even angry at the injuries he’d got, but it’s just that Aiden always … accepted what happened to him, rather than complaining about it. I didn’t know whether to be pleased or worried that he was showing another side to his personality. ‘The cage is to keep my head steady while it heals,’ he continued. ‘Stop my brain rattling around in there, or something. Mum says it’s coming off in a few days and I’ll also be able to get out of this chair. I hate being stuck in here, so that’s good news for once.’
‘I’m so sorry you’ve gone through all this, Aiden,’ I said. ‘And I want you to know how grateful I am that you risked your life to save mine. You’ve been amazingly brave.’
‘Or amazingly dumb,’ said Aiden. ‘Depends on how you look at it.’
I put my head to one side. Another remark I never would have thought he’d make. But if anyone needed to have some slack cut for him, it was Aiden.
‘What were you thinking about?’ I said.
‘When?’
‘When I came in you were staring at the bookshelves and not like you were trying to decide what to read next. It seemed like you were thinking about something important.’
Aiden swung his wheelchair around and headed out the door towards the kitchen. I followed. I was going to offer to push him but almost instinctively knew that wouldn’t be a good idea. Aiden was in a strange mood and I didn’t think he’d like me interfering.
‘The spider,’ he said over his shoulder.
He wheeled himself to the fridge door, opened it and took out a flask of his green goo. Breakfast.
‘What?’
He moved over to the kitchen table, unscrewed the flask and took a swig. I wanted to turn my eyes away, but forced myself to watch. He deserved that much respect.
‘That golden orb-weaving spider we saw on camp,’ he said.
‘It was amazing. Mr Meredith told me not to let anyone else, other than you, know it was there. He said some of the other kids would destroy it, just because they could.’
‘Probably right about that, our amazing, talented and empathetic teacher. But I was thinking it was symbolic of our family, Ash.’
‘What?’ This was getting weird.
‘Think about it,’ he said. ‘The home the spider built was beautiful. She must have spent an enormous amount of time constructing it. An engineering marvel. Like this place.’ He spread his arms wide. ‘And there it is, in its environment, but if you didn’t catch it at just the right angle, you’d never know it was there. Just like this place.’
‘I don’t know what you mean.’
‘Oh, come on. All the security devices Mum must’ve installed. If someone was to come within half a kay of this beautiful mansion, alarms would go off. Not out there. In here. And before they knew it, someone trying to take anything from us – hell, even if they weren’t thinking about it, but just stumbled across us accidentally – would be arrested or at least taken in by the security company Mum pays. It’s like a web. Get too close and you’re going to get stuck.’
‘Aiden,’ I said. ‘That’s just wrong. This house is not like that spider’s web. It’s beautiful, yeah, but it’s not designed to trap anyone.’
‘And then there’s the female spider, right there in the centre of the web, controlling everything.’ Aiden carried on as if I hadn’t said anything. ‘That’s Mum right there. Huge, controlling, at the centre.’ He laughed. ‘And tiny, ineffectual Dad stuck at the edges, too scared to come close, never mind do anything.’
‘I don’t think you should talk about Mum and Dad like that, Aiden.’ I was prepared to forgive him plenty of things after all he had done for me, but this was getting horrible. I wondered whether that head injury was much more severe than anyone had let on. But if that was the case, surely they wouldn’t have allowed him to come home? I closed my eyes, forced myself to stay calm, reasonable and understanding.
Aiden didn’t reply. He just sat there at the kitchen table, staring off into the distance. I’m not even sure he’d heard a word I’d said.
‘And another thing,’ he continued. ‘We exist with no connection to the outside world. Not really. That spider’s web was there, wonderful, rich and beautiful, but it was surrounded by the ugly. Battered, nasty nature, smashed to bits because of what we’ve done in the name of humanity, but if you look hard enough you’ll find a gem in there, hiding away, pretending the ugliness doesn’t exist.’
‘Aiden …’
‘People are suffering out there, Ashleigh, but we never see it. We stay in our beautiful web and that’s our whole world. We’re rich enough to make sure the real, ugly world is kept at a distance. So we can’t be offended by it.’
I could feel tears coming to my eyes and I knew that if I didn’t leave, then things would just become nastier. There was no talking to him and really I didn’t want to listen to the nonsense he was coming out with. He needed rest, I told myself. In a few days he’d be back to normal.
But I didn’t leave, because Dad opened the door from the outside and came in. He washed his hands at the sink.
‘Hi, kids,’ he said.
‘Hey, Dad,’ said Aiden. ‘Got that solar sail gleaming?’ Dad smiled at us over his shoulder.
‘Beautiful and at full efficiency,’ he said. ‘At least the half I’ve done today. I’ll do the other half later, once I get dinner organised.’
‘You could pay someone to do that,’ said Aiden.
‘Yes,’ said Dad, drying his hands. ‘But I enjoy it and what else am I going to do with my time?’
‘Something useful?’ said Aiden.
Dad gave us both a strange look at that. He sat slowly at the kitchen table and scratched his head.
‘How about a video game?’ he suggested after a long silence. ‘If you guys have finished breakfast, I’m willing to kick your nearly-birthday bums at a game of your choice. You have been warned.’
‘Sounds great, Dad,’ said Aiden.
And the smile he gave appeared warm. And genuine.
‘Oh, my God,’ I said. ‘Is that what I think it is?’
Mum placed the box down carefully on the kitchen table. There was a scuffling sound coming from it and the box rocked gently. It had air holes punched in its sides and a big red bow perched on the top.
‘And how would I know what you think it is?’ Mum replied. She smiled. ‘You’ll have to forgive me, Ashleigh, but my psychic powers are a bit off today.’
‘It is what I think it is,’ I said.
‘Then you won’t need to open the box,’ said Dad. ‘Let’s put it away.’ And he pretended to start doing just that.
I glanced at Aiden. He was looking a lot better now. He’d had a long sleep after we’d thrashed Dad at four different video games and his eyes were shining with excitement. It was almost unbearable for both of us. We wanted to open the box, but the anticipation was so delicious it seemed a shame to ruin it.
‘You open it, Ashleigh,’ said Aiden.
‘No, you,’ I replied. ‘I’d like you to open it.’
So he did. He shouted with delight and put his hands into the box while I forced myself to be patient. In fact I even closed my eyes. I didn’t know whether it was a cat or a dog, but I really wanted a dog. Please make it a dog. Look, it’s fine if it’s a cat, but…
It gave the most adorable woof and I opened my eyes immediately. Love at first sight. Before first sight, really. The dog was small and furry and it had a little pug nose and its tail was wagging as if it was polishing the kitchen table and it was the most glorious, wonderful, fabulous, amazing birthday gift we’d ever got and I just had to hold it and stroke it and cuddle it and …
‘It’s gorgeous, Mum,’ said Aiden. He looked up, eyes still shining, but immediately looked at the dog again, which sat on the table, tail still swirling, moving its head from side to side, and watching us with spheres of liquid brownness. I moved over next to Aiden and ran my hands through the dog’s fur, scratched under its chin. It gazed up at me and I swear I saw love in those eyes.
‘Is it real, Mum?’ I said, voice all whispery and choked with emotion.
Mum laughed.
‘Of course not, Ashleigh.’ She sat at the table and ran her hand through the dog’s fur. ‘You know it’s illegal to own pets.’
‘Some people have real dogs,’ said Aiden, but Mum held up her hand.
‘I know, Aiden, but they’re breaking the law and we won’t ever do that. No. This is better than real. This won’t get sick and it won’t die. At least I don’t think it will.’
‘You made it,’ I said.
‘Oh, yeah,’ said Mum. ‘It’s state-of-the-art.’ She gently opened the dog’s mouth, exposing a pink tongue and a set of small teeth. When she let go, the dog sneezed and we all laughed. ‘Based on some AI devices I’d already engineered for work in dangerous environments. War zones, places like that. Though we have sold or given away a number to blind people for use as guide dogs. But matey here is different.’
‘Why?’ Aiden and I asked together.
‘Because those dogs were nothing like as realistic,’ said Mum. ‘They didn’t have to be because basically they were designed for functionality, rather than aesthetics.’
I opened my mouth to ask, but Mum beat me to it.
‘They were meant to work, rather than look good,’ she said. ‘For the guide dogs, I put fur on them and gave them the ability to lick their owners. Sometimes it’s important for a machine to give the impression of friendship – love, even – and some blind people need all the love they can get. But your dog … well, he can do things that the others simply can’t.’
‘Like?’ prompted Aiden.
‘He can learn. He has the new generation of artificial intelligence algorithms installed and this means that, basically, he interacts with his environment, learns from it and changes behaviour accordingly.’ Mum was in full lecture mode now. ‘A machine will keep getting burned if it strays into a fire. A proper AI machine will do that maybe a couple of times, but then it will learn to recognise that fire is unpleasant and avoid it. In many ways, the principle is exactly the same as the way babies learn about the world. This dog will just do it a lot quicker.’ Mum ruffled the dog’s head and it stood up on its four stubby little legs. ‘Try getting it to sit,’ Mum said.
I looked at Aiden and he looked at me. He nodded, giving me permission.
‘Sit,’ I said. The dog cocked its head to one side, regarded me. But it stayed standing. I tried again, this time, putting gentle pressure on its back, close to the tail.
‘Sit,’ I said. The dog yawned and walked off. Aiden and I laughed.
‘You’re going to have to teach it,’ said Mum. ‘It will learn, trust me. It’ll sit, roll over, play dead, come to heel, do everything a real dog can do. It’s just going to take time.’
‘Could we teach it to talk?’ asked Aiden. There was silence for a couple of beats and then I burst out laughing. But I was the only one. ‘If it’s AI, then it shouldn’t be restricted just to things a dog can do,’ he continued. ‘It could learn anything. How to play chess, how to paint, how to talk.’
Mum rested her chin on her interlocked fingers.
‘That’s true, up to a point, Aiden,’ she said. ‘But it does depend on the programming and, most importantly, physical design. This dog does not have opposable thumbs, so it’s going to have real difficulty moving a chess piece, let alone picking up a paintbrush. Its vocal cords and all the physical stuff associated with sounds are based on a dog’s anatomy, so it won’t be able to speak, even if it becomes super-smart.’ She smiled. ‘I made you a dog. If you want to play chess and talk, that’s what your sister’s for. She’s just not as cute and adorable.’
‘Ha, ha,’ I said. ‘Anyway, I don’t want this dog to talk. I want it to be a dog.’
Mum told us a number of other things about our present, like how it would find a patch of sun when its energy levels started to fall, so that it could recharge. I picked him up from the table and placed him carefully on the floor. He licked my hand and I nearly died with pleasure.
‘What’s his name?’ I asked.
‘It’s your present,’ Mum said. ‘You and Aiden will have to work that out between you.’
‘Was it expensive to make?’ asked Aiden.
Mum pursed her lips and shook her head.
‘I’m not saying,’ she replied. ‘Not because I don’t want to tell you – and I do know, down to the dollar, how much Fido here cost to manufacture.’ She paused. ‘I just don’t want to say the figures out loud. They’d scare your father half to death and I know this because they sure as hell scare the living daylights out of me.’
That was fine by me. I didn’t care.
You couldn’t put a price on this present.