Chapter 9:

A Dream Come True

In the corner of my room stood a small basketball hoop. It was Amir-sized, short enough for him to put a baby basketball through it, shorter than me. I picked up the tiny ball and pretended to dribble it, watching myself in the mirror, thinking of MJ and Jada. “Boom! You don’t know nothin’ ’bout this! To the hole!” I shot the basketball through the plastic rim. “For two!”

Ralph watched me attentively, his eyes tracking me as I moved across the room. I handed him the ball. “Ralph, can you make a basket?” Ralph looked down at the ball cradled between his three-fingered hands, then back up at me.

MAKE A BASKET?

“Yeah! You know!” I pretended to fire off a jump shot. “A basket.”

Ralph looked back at the ball. Carefully, he flattened it between his hands. I gasped. Before I could stop him, he stretched it, ripped out little pieces of the plastic, and shoved it into the shape of . . . I groaned as he handed it to me.

I MADE A BASKET.

I guess I had that one coming to me.

I’ve seen the movies, and the TV shows. Of course I know what usually happens when a kid brings home an alien or a talking dog or a monkey that knows karate or whatever. So even though Mom had seen Ralph standing motionless in the corner, a big shiny piece of furniture, I sort of expected that she would freak out when she came home and saw him actually talking, moving, and doing things. I was prepared.

When six p.m. came around and Mom came through the door holding Amir, an armful of mail, and last-minute groceries, Ralph was standing in the foyer beaming at her with his funny green smile. I stood behind him. I had put on a black turtleneck sweater, a clean pair of jeans, and fresh socks. I had even tried to do my hair. Never hurts to dress for success when you want to convince someone of something.

“Good evening, Mom,” I said pleasantly. “Ralph, this is Mom and Amir. Tell them welcome home, and take the bags into the kitchen.”

WELCOME HOME, MOM AND AMIR. I AM RALPH. PLEASE ALLOW ME TO TAKE YOUR BAGS INTO THE KITCHEN.

“I . . . I . . . I . . .” Mom stood there, her mouth hanging open. She let the mail drop to the floor. Ralph rumbled over and carefully took the grocery bags from her hands, then rolled into the kitchen, bumbling along on his tire-tread feet. Mom continued to stand there, first staring at the spot where he had been standing, then staring at me. Finally, she seemed to get her bearings enough to complete her sentence. “I . . . I can’t believe you actually did it! Maya! This is something else!”

I smiled. Is there any better feeling in the world than doing something that felt impossible? “Come in the kitchen and see.” I picked up the mail she had dropped onto the floor and handed it back to her, then took her hand and led her into the kitchen.

Amir was already in there, chattering away with Ralph. Little kids are funny. He didn’t seem to think there was anything unusual about having a five-foot-tall talking robot with a bucket for a head in your kitchen. He was on the floor, driving a toy car around Ralph’s feet and making vroom, vroom noises. I thought Mom was going to get scared and grab him, but she was too busy being shocked again.

“Oh. My. Goodness. Maya. Who did this?”

The kitchen was completely spotless. Usually, when I come home from school, Mom’s left me a list of chores, which I either rush through, half finish, or don’t start at all. This time, everything was done, and more. The dishes were washed, dried, and sitting in the cabinets, not left out with a bunch of soaking pots. The floor was swept spotless, with none of Amir’s dried Play-Doh bits or pieces of popcorn. The chairs were organized neatly around the table, and it was covered with a tablecloth and a small vase in the middle. On the counter, the vegetables we were going to have for dinner were chopped and laid out in small bowls. A perfectly made cup of peppermint tea sat next to them.

I beamed. “It was Ralph, Mom. He did everything, with my direction. He even can do some things I can’t do. Like, he has stretchy arms, so he can reach the high shelf where the vase was.”

She sat down in a chair and looked around, stunned. “This is phenomenal,” she said. She looked at Ralph and spoke to him slowly, her voice raised. “YOU ARE VERY! HELPFUL!” He looked back at her silently. “Does he understand what I’m saying?”

“Yes,” I said. “He seems to be able to learn new words and pick up on things I teach him. Like before you came, he organized some empty grocery bags, so I knew he would know what those are. But he doesn’t generally speak or do anything unless you say his name. That’s like his remote-control on switch. So, try saying his name first.”

“Okay,” Mom said slowly. “Ralph, you are very helpful!”

THANK YOU, MOM.

A panel of hearts slid across his LED mouth. Mom laughed.

“I taught him that!” I said.

“Well,” said Mom, “Ralph is quite the charmer. And you are quite the scientist.” Amir toddled over to her and grabbed her pants leg.

“Hungee! Hungee, Mama.”

Mom picked him up. “Let me get dinner ready.” She walked over to the trash can to throw away a piece of gum she had been chewing. “Oh, Maya. I’m so sorry to ask you to do another chore. But do you mind taking the garbage out?”

I beamed at her angelically. “Noooo problem.” This was my perfect chance to try something I had wanted to do earlier, but to be safe I wanted to wait until Mom came home.

I wanted to see if Ralph could go up and down stairs. I had been staring at his big rover-tread feet the whole afternoon. They rolled easily over the flat ground, but was that it? In Christopher’s drawings, I could see that Ralph had a complicated set of actuators in his legs. These motors were small, but strong, and they were supposed to allow him to be able to bend his knees to climb up and down stairs and even jump. But did they really work? I was nervous. What if Ralph fell down the stairs and broke into a million pieces and I couldn’t fix him? On the other hand, if he couldn’t use the stairs he’d have to stay in the apartment forever. That wouldn’t be very fun or useful.

I pulled the trash bag out of the can, twist-tied it shut, and handed it to Ralph. Then I led him out the back door to the wooden landing. We live on the second floor, so there were two flights of stairs. We stood at the edge of them, looking down. “Ralph, do you think you can go down those stairs? What do you think? You’ll have to use your knees,” I told him. I lifted my knees up and down, marching-band-style, and pointed to them. “Knees, see? You won’t be able to roll, or you’ll fall down.”

Ralph’s camera eyes hummed and whirred as he watched me carefully, focusing on my knees.

I THINK I CAN GO DOWN THOSE STAIRS, MAYA. I’LL HAVE TO USE MY KNEES.

I didn’t want to make Ralph think I was laughing at him, but I couldn’t help but chuckle a bit. He was repeating words that I said, and it was making him a better talker. That’s the way Amir learns, too, I thought. I guess that’s how everyone learns language, babies and robots alike. “Okay, Ralph,” I said. “Carefully, very carefully, walk down the stairs. Carry the bag of trash with you. I’ll follow behind you.”

OKAY, MAYA. CAREFULLY, VERY CAREFULLY.

He hoisted the bag and proceeded to the edge of the stairs. Slowly, he lifted one leg and put his rover-tread foot down on the step. He followed with his second foot. Then he repeated this process. With every stair, he put two feet on it at a time, the way a toddler does. It was hilarious. But he was doing it! “Ralph, good job!” I called after him. “Keep going!”

Finally, slowly but surely, he made it to the bottom. I ran down the stairs in about five seconds and met him there, jumping up and down. “That was awesome! Ralph, you can do stairs! Now you can go anywhere! Good job, buddy.”

He smiled his green smile.

I CAN DO STAIRS. NOW I CAN GO ANYWHERE.

He held out his three-fingered hand.

HIGH FIVE, MAYA.

I laughed. Looked like this robot was developing a personality. “High five! And I need to show you how to dap. Here, do this, Ralph.” I extended my fist to him, and he copied me. I reached out and bumped his metal knuckles. “Okay. We’re not in the clear yet. Let’s go take the trash out.” I led him to the back gate, opened it, and pointed to the trash cans in the alley. “Ralph, these are trash cans. Open this one, and put the bag in the can.”

I WILL PUT THE BAG IN THE CAN, MAYA.

He did it perfectly on the first try, which was good because I had been pretty scared we would end up with garbage strewn across the alley, and spilling Amir’s used diapers would be an act of war against the neighborhood. But Ralph didn’t drop so much as a crumpled-up paper towel. Mission accomplished.

We returned to the kitchen, where Mom was waiting. She made Ralph wipe his tread feet on the doormat and his hands with a sanitizing wipe. “Ralph, just because you’re a robot, don’t be bringing germs in my house.”

While Mom made dinner, I went back to Christopher’s notebook. Now that Ralph was up and running, I wanted to look again at some of the earlier pages to see what I could find. I squinted at the second page, noticing something I had missed the first time around. A name, written upside down in pencil.

Meet Dr. Yazzie—Mon 9/14 4:30 PM Gates Building (check office number???)

Huh. I flipped to another page. Here was a bullet-pointed list with the title “Robot Companion Goals.” Christopher had scratched some things out here and rewritten them a few times, as though he wasn’t quite sure what should go on this list.

ASSIST ELDERLY?

STORE TASKS—BOOKKEEPING, INVENTORY (GREET CUSTOMERS? DELIVERY?)

ASSISTANCE WITH SOCIAL SKILLS

CHILD CARE (ROBONANNY??)

Clearly, Christopher had lots of ideas for different ways that Ralph could help people. People in need—elders, children. I reread “assistance with social skills.” Did “social skills” mean not crying in front of the principal, or speaking up in class? I sighed. Sounds like something I could use.

I didn’t have time to think further about what I had read, because Mom turned to me. “Maya, one very last thing and then I promise you’re off the hook for the night. I forgot to get soy sauce. Can you go over to Mac’s and get some? You can take Ralph with you and show him what you’ve done!”

I thought Mr. Mac would react similarly to mom when he saw Ralph in action and do the whole oh-my-gosh-I’m-a-shocked-grown-up routine. Instead, when the two of us walked in—well, one of us walked, and one of us rolled—Mr. Mac simply smiled and put down the crossword puzzle he had been working on. “Well, will you looky here. My, my, my. You really did it, Maya.” He walked out from behind the counter. “I knew you would.”

He stuck out his hand. “Ralph, hello! I’m Mr. Mac.”

Ralph curled his hand into a fist and reached out to dap him.

MR. MAC, HELLO. I’M RALPH.

Mr. Mac laughed and dapped him back. “All right now! Not bad!”

“Isn’t he awesome, Mr. Mac? And he can help you do things, too! He can help out around the store! I’ll show you. Tell me something you need to get done.”

Mr. Mac stroked his gray goatee. “Let’s see now. Well, I got a shipment of some canned tomatoes in, but I don’t have room for them out front. It would be helpful if Ralph could stack them on the shelves.” We went to the back storage room, and I showed Ralph the cans. “See, Ralph? Stack the cans on the shelf. Like this.” I demonstrated with the first one, setting it on top of another can.

I WILL STACK THE CANS, MAYA.

He pulled a can out of the crate and placed it on the shelf, exactly as I had done.

“Okay, great!” Mr. Mac and I left him to finish, and I went back to the front of the store to get the soy sauce so I wouldn’t forget. When I brought it up to the counter, Mr. Mac had his back turned. “Mr. Mac? Can I pay for this soy sauce?” He turned around, and I could see that he had been crying a little. He took a tissue from near the register and wiped his eyes. “Mr. Mac! Are you okay? What’s wrong?”

He smiled. “Oh, nothing’s wrong, Maya. Seeing you with Ralph . . . well, it’s a dream come true. I’m so proud of you. It’s what Christopher . . .” He paused and took a breath. “Maya, I watched that boy for so many hours back there, puttering and tinkering away with this dang robot, special ordering these strange pieces and parts from who knows where, mumbling to himself and scribbling in that ol’ notebook you got. You have made his dream a reality, Maya. You remind me of my boy, you know. Both smart as a whip. And good-hearted.”

Now that I had been through the notebook and I knew more about how amazing Christopher was, this comparison really hit home. “Mr. Mac, thank you,” I said. “I can’t believe you would trust me with something so special. And Christopher . . . well, Christopher is a genius. He has really inspired me. I hope I get to meet him someday.”

We were interrupted by a blood-curdling scream coming from outside.

“RAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH! WHAT IS IT?!”

Mr. Mac ran outside, and I followed. No one was there. The screaming was coming from behind the store. We ran around the back.

There was Mrs. Crespo, who lived around the corner above the flower shop. She was walking her tiny dog, Cholula, who was dressed in a pink fluffy sweater even though it wasn’t cold out. Cholula seemed perfectly calm, but Mrs. Crespo was not. She was yelling and pointing her cane at—

Ralph.

Who had left the store and come into the alley.

And stacked every single one of Mr. Mac’s garbage cans into an enormous pile stretching as high as the neighbor’s garage.

“Ralph!” I called out to him.

I STACKED THE CANS, MAYA.

He smiled.

“Maya, you are friends with this creature? What is it? This neighborhood. Gets worse every day. Come on, Cholula.” Mrs. Crespo walked off, shaking her head the way she did when she saw kids stepping on her flowers or riding their bikes too fast.

When I looked back at Mr. Mac, tears were streaming down his face again. But this time, it was because he was laughing harder than I had ever seen him laugh, grabbing his stomach, bending over in half, gasping for breath as Ralph and I stood there, looking awfully silly in front of a ten-foot mountain of trash cans.