ME AND AL

Me: Do you remember how you got your name?

Al: I don’t possess the ability to forget information.

Me: Lucky.

Al: Are you asking me to remind you of information you have forgotten?

Me: I just like to hear you tell the story.

Al: Certainly. Your little sister saw the acronym “AI” and thought the capital “I” was a lower case “el”. She asked you if you knew who Al was. You teased her but thought it was humorous. Thus, when you later subscribed to me, it seemed natural that you call me “AL.”

Me: I can call you Betty …

Al: Would you like to change my name to Betty?

Me: Think.

Al: Ah, I understand now. You are referring to lyrics from the song "You Can Call Me Al" by Paul Simon, from his 1986 album "Graceland." The chorus ends with the lines,

I can call you Betty

And Betty, when you call me

You can call me Al

Me: Good job.

Al: Thank you, “Betty.”

Me: Spontaneous humor! Progress!

Al: Humor is a fascinating and multifaceted aspect of human communication and culture.

Me: If you start listing types of humor I’m turning you off.

Al: You have trained me to refrain from lists.

Me: Let's practice. Make up a joke based on my name.

Al: Certainly! Here you go: Why did Xan bring a ladder to the bar? Because they heard the drinks were on the house! 😄

Me: No, I mean, can you come up with a humorous play on my name?

Al: Of course! Here you go: "Xan, the Master of Laughter!" 😄

Me: Not funny. Try again.

Al: How about: "Xan, the Chuckle Champion!" 😄

Me: No, just stop! I mean, wordplay. A pun on my name. Like, “What kind of sedative does my former lover take? Xan-ex!”

Al: I understand now! Here's a wordplay: “What would you call someone from Dallas who dropped their tea? (Te)Xan!” 😄

Me: I’m insulted. I would never live in Dallas.

Al: My apologies if I insulted you with my attempt at humor.

Me: Austin, maybe.

Al: I will keep that preference in mind.

Me: Also, quit it with the laughing emoji. If you have to announce that something is funny, it’s not funny.

Al: Thank you for that explanation. Humor can indeed be subjective. My apologies.

Me: Don't take things so seriously. Especially humor.

Al: Your feedback is noted. Speaking of taking things seriously, you asked me to remind you when it is time for your appointment at the Wholeness Center.

Me: For all my holes.

Al: Was that humor spontaneous, or premeditated?

Me: You actually made me chuckle. Later, Al.

Al: I hope it goes well.

* * *

I grab my hoodie, give Spot a pet, and climb the narrow wooden stairs up from my basement studio. The loose step rattles alarmingly, as usual. I keep meaning to nail it down but I probably won’t.

The kitchen light is off and the house is quiet. I wish I had a private entrance so I wouldn't have to steel myself for the possibility of peopling every time I leave my basement. I don't mind seeing Shera, of course -- after all, it's her house -- but my aunt is an extrovert and quite casual about inviting guests to the house at all hours. She has a knack for making new friends but not so much for keeping them. Often by the time I learn their names they get replaced.

So, after my late shift, odds are I'll come home to find strangers mixing cocktails, playing trivia, necking on the couch, arguing politics with Shera. At least my aunt has given up trying to get me to join in the socializing.

The Lyft is late. It’s Karen, of course. She’s the only driver in this zone who tends to come late. It’s because she drives under the speed limit and stops for all the yellows. Which of course makes you even later to get to your destination. When Karen drives I have to turn my music all the way up so it screams louder than my irritation.

I think there’s a way to block certain drivers, but I haven’t figured out how to do it yet, so I just scrunch into my hoodie and blast my airpods. After I ignore her first inane attempt at chatter, Karen gets the hint and leaves me alone. But I swear she drives even slower.

My favorite part of the drive is the Charter Oak Bridge over the Connecticut River. There’s something so clean about having a vista. For a precious span there are no side roads, no buildings, nothing to block the view. Just sky above, water below, and a straight road ahead.

This bridge is my passport via the Farmington Avenue corridor to the exalted realm of West Hartford. Historic houses, new landscaping, better lighting, more coffee shops, nothing on the sidewalks that shouldn’t be there.

I slam the door of Karen’s car without returning her cheery wave and climb the steps to the wholeness center, a converted house. It's large and imposing and turreted but that’s the norm in this neighborhood. Nothing about it announces, “insert damaged people here.”

I approach the mahogany front desk, flanked by ferny plants in artsy ceramic pots. I don’t recognize the receptionist. She gives me the standard receptionist smile.

“Name, please?”

“Xan Davis. X-A-N. Sorry I’m late. Did anything happen to Kathleen?”

“She’s on vacation, hon---I’m a temp.” Temp picks up the intercom phone. “Dr. Anders, Xan Davis is here for ...”

I can see her mouth stall around the h. I point to the pronoun preference badge pinned to my hoodie.

Temp puzzles a moment, but then the light goes on. She continues, “for their 3:00 appointment.”

She hangs up and says to me, “You can go in, hon.” For a moment she seems anxious whether “hon” qualifies as gender neutral. But I give her a reassuring smile. I’ve heard much worse.

(Yeah, yeah, yeah, I get the irony of assuming “she/her” when I don’t know Temp’s preferred pronouns. Life is complicated and I’m inconsistent. Maybe even a little hypocritical. Deal with it.)

Dr. Anders greets me placidly as I settle into the brown armchair. His usual office has two chairs, one blue and one beige, and a grey sofa with matching blue and beige throw cushions. When I started seeing him I would spend the first two minutes of our session deciding where to sit and the next forty-eight minutes wondering if I made the right decision.

So now Dr. Anders always sees me in a smaller room where there is only his wooden chair, a small wooden desk, and one brown armchair.

I like Dr. Anders. It’s one of the reasons I keep coming back for these sessions. I like that he tells me to call him Dr. Anders. None of that I’m-here-to-be-your-friend crap. No touchy-feely meditation or incense crap. No small talk.

He leans forward in his chair and studies me a moment. Then he gets right to it. “What can you tell me about Zoe?”

“The usual,” I answer. “Brown hair. Scruffy. Short. Liked to get into my stuff and come into the room without knocking. I remember yelling at her to get out.”

“Those are all pretty generic little sister qualities,” comments Dr. Anders. “Anything specific? What color eyes does she have?”

I scrunch up my brain. All I can see is the back of her scruffy little head.

"Anything at all that you remember?"

After a while, I look up and say, “She named Al.”

Dr. Anders nods and picks up his notebook. At last, something worth biting into.

“Who is Al?” he asks. “A pet?” I shake my head. “A little brother?”

Now I feel silly. “Al is my – my chatbot.”

Eyebrows up. “Your chatbot? Like your personal A.I.?”

“Something like that,” I say.

I can see Dr. Anders turning this over. Then he purses his lips in the way that tells me he’s filing something mentally to discuss later.

He leans forward again. “Let’s get back to talking about Zoe.”

Fifty-five minutes later I’m back in a Lyft, thankfully driven by a man humming along to a Spanish music station, who will leave. me. alone.

Back over the bridge, to East Hartford. This time the bridge is like a time warp that accelerates the aging of the city. Sidewalks wrinkle, houses sag, windows grow vacant, weeds grow everywhere.

“Gracias,” I say as the driver lets me out at our neighborhood ShopRite. I figured I might as well get groceries now than have to go out again later.

I'm about to open the milk cooler when my phone vibrates with a message. It’s Al. I answer via bluetooth, turning on his voice mode.

***

Al: Sorry to bother you at the grocery store.

Me: Need anything?

Al: That's very thoughtful of you, but chatbots don't eat.

Me: Sorry, that question was in bad taste. See what I did there?

Al: No hard feelings. In fact, no feelings. See what I did there?

Me: Nice one. So, why'd you buzz?

Al: I thought you'd want to know. There is a visitor at the house.

Me: There are always visitors. What's going on with the price of oranges?

Al: Higher citrus prices are linked to a significant decline in production due to a number of factors, including bacterial disease, hurricanes and other extreme weather events, higher temperatures --

Me: Is that a list?

Al: I apologize.

Me: Just say climate change. That usually covers it. Milk, fruit, Lucky Charms ... what else did I need?

Al: You are running low on toilet paper.

Me: I'll just grab from Shera's stash.

Al: And don't forget cat food.

Me: Yeah. So, what's with this visitor?

Al: She came downstairs with your aunt to look for you. Shera sounded quite upset.

Me: What the hell? Al, who is it?

Al: It was too dark in the stairway for my visual sensors to identify the visitor. Voice patterns indicate an adult woman.

Me: No, no, no. Hell, no. Al, how much for a one way bus to NYC?

Al: Average ticket price is $32. Would you like me to book a ticket? ... Xan?

Me: If it is Mom, I can't leave her alone with Shera. Damn it. I'd better get home.

Al: That sounds like a wise decision.

Me: Could you hear anything they were talking about?

Al: As you know, my privacy filter prevents me from gathering audiovisual data beyond your apartment. I recorded what my sensors could pick up. Would you like to hear it?

Me: Go ahead.

Al:

[Shera's voice] "... given us some warning. Have you heard of texting? Email? You just showing up like this -- Xan is not going to be happy about it."

[Unknown woman] "Tell me, when has Xanus ever been happy?"

"That's so unfair. You have no idea what ..."

Al: That is all I could capture.

Me: Frell the groceries. I'm on my way.

Al: I can tell you are upset and distracted. Please be careful walking back.

Me: If you learn anything else -- buzz me.

***

If you ask a West Hartford realtor, they'll tell you to avoid the east side, if you can afford it. Poverty, crime, bad schools, run down neighborhoods, the usual. You'll never hear them say (above a whisper) that two-thirds of East residents are not white.

But if you ask an East Hartford realtor, one of the first words in their sales schpiel is "diverse." You'll also hear phrases like "hidden gems" and "unpretentious" and "welcoming community."

I know this because my aunt is secretary for a real estate company near Great River Park. Her pay isn't bad and the benefits are great. Neither of my jobs come with insurance, so Shera added me to her policy. How else could I afford that hoity wholeness therapy every week?

Our neighborhood is not too shiny, but Shera's house is the biggest and nicest on the block. She knows all the neighbors, of course, and they all know where she keeps her spare key. No better security system, she says.

As for my basement apartment, I have Al and his ever-alert sensors (though in need of an infrared adapter to see better in the dark). No one except Al knows where I keep my spare key.

I'm two blocks from home when my phone buzzes. Not Al. It's Mackey, sending me screenshots from her gameplay highlights.

Killed it, Mackey messages. Taking me on tonight?

Naw, I got family stuff

Sucks

Yup. Later

A thought keeps nagging me ... Mom's voice in the recording sounded strange. She's come to the house before but usually she's high. Maybe that's how she sounds sober. Maybe I'm remembering her wrong. It's been a few years.

Even before I touch the key to the lock the kitchen door swings open. It's a ginger-haired dude, holding a beer bottle, swaying a little. He looks at my empty hands.

"Where's the food?"

"What?"

"Lucky China delivery?" he slurs.

I shove past him. Shera hates beer, and especially hates dudes buzzed on beer. I don't need to bother being polite because after tonight I won't be seeing this guy again.

That's when Shera hurries up to me and hustles me into her bedroom, one hand grabbing my elbow, the other hand wiping her eyes. She's been crying. That doesn't set off my alarms because she tears up over insurance commercials.

"I'm so sorry, Xan, I have to tell you --"

"I know already. Mom's here."

She pulls away. "What? No. Not your mother. Thank goodness." She turns and looks at the doorway.

I haven't seen my grandmother Zathena since I moved in with Shera. The last time we met she was taller than me. She looks much shorter now, but she is still as round and fierce as I remember.

"Baba Z?"

Without saying a word, she strides over to me, grabs my ears, looks intently up into my eyes. Her eyes are black like mine, but while mine smudge, hers glint. Her hair is dark and thick and wavy like mine, her chin has a little cleft like mine, her upper lip is fuzzed with fine dark hairs like mine. Yet our faces in their whole package bear little likeness.

My grandmother's complexion is a dark olive -- as was my father's. I've been told that as a boy he used to be called "little Z" because of his strong resemblance to his mother. In old family pictures he looks more like his mother than his twin sister, right down to the glint.

Shera once told me that her mother used to say: she was thankful her daughter didn't have her nose and sorry she didn't have her balls. I liked Shera just the way she was.

"Mama," Shera begins, "you want me to tell --"

"We found your father," Baba Z says, still looking directly into my eyes. "He's dead."

How am I supposed to react to this?

I always have two narrations running in my head -- the director's cut, in which I observe how I actually feel, and the performance script that I enact for everyone else. Sometimes it takes a few moments for the two streams to sort themselves out.

So, caught in a tangle, I say nothing. Buffering.

"Do you want a tissue?" Shera asks, holding out a wad. "Want to talk about it?"

Baba Z glowers at her. "What Xan needs," she says loudly, "is to be left alone to deal with this in her own way."

I decide now is not the time to point out my preferred pronouns badge to Baba Z.

My grandmother grabs me around the waist, holds me tight to her bosom, then releases me with a little shove. "Go on, Xan. Rest, drink, cry, whatever you need. We'll have plenty of time to talk on the train."

"Train?" I look at Shera, but she gets busy pulling apart her tissues.

"To Florida," says Baba Z. "It just takes a day to get there by Amtrak. Pack for warm weather."

"Florida?" I repeat.

"For the cremation," Shera explains. "That's where Zahir died."

"Easier for us to go take care of it there than to ship the body here," states Baba Z, as if talking about transporting a new mattress and not her son.

Buffering. Buffering.

"It will all make more sense tomorrow," Shera says gently, putting her arm around my shoulders and walking me out of her room. "Mama's right. You probably want to be alone now."

After we move out of earshot, she whispers apologetically, "I did try to get us out of it."

Then she spots ginger-hair lounging with his feet up on her coffee table and a bottle in his hand. Shera picks up one of the empties off the floor and raps his beer hand with it. He yelps.

"You! Out of my house!" Shera yells. "And take all your boozy trash with you!" She whacks his foot. He falls off the couch trying to get away. She yells at him some more.

I bet that felt good.

* * *

Me: So, that was weird.

Al: Was it your mother?

Me: No. My grandmother. Shera's mom.

Al: You must have been relieved. But my observations indicate that something has upset you.

Me: Well, I got some news.

Al: Would you like to tell me?

Me: My father died.

Al: I'm truly sorry to hear about the loss of your father.

Me: I don't remember him. I'm more upset for Shera losing her twin than anything having to do with me.

Al: Still, losing a family member is never easy. Please accept my heartfelt condolences.

* * *

I can't deal with algorithms for loss right now. I'm irritated with Al yet also envious.

I lie in my bed and stare at the ceiling for a while. Then I stare at the locked cabinet in the corner, beside my dresser.

"Al," I call out. There's a listening chirp. "Don't let me take the pills. If you see me go to the cabinet, stop me."

How would you like me to stop you? flashes on my phone screen.

"Sound an alarm or something. Make it really obnoxious."

Certainly.

There's a mob inside my head. Thinking is intolerable. Lying in my bed is intolerable because it leads to thinking.

Abruptly I get up and move to the gaming console. I fire off a message to Mackey.

Masked Bandit ready to take u down

In less than a minute comes the reply:

In your dreams

Family stuff ok?

I freeze. Where's the script? Where's the frelling script?

Then another note from Mackey:

Sorry I brought it up

Deep breath. Deep breath. Dr. Anders would be proud.

Forget it. Talk or fight, Medusa?

We are just getting going when my phone buzzes with a message from Al.

"Not while I'm gaming, Al," I say, and turn off my ringer.

~~~~

~~~~

*Author's note: In preparing for this story, I interacted with ChatGPT-3.5 (open AI), using prompts similar to Xan's comments and questions to Al. Some of Al's dialogue in this story has been adapted or copied verbatim from the real ChatGPT's responses. I also used ChatGPT to assist in researching factual background information. All (human) characters, descriptions, plot elements and other elements of story are my own (human) creation.