LIV: SPRING BREAK 5.5
I’m officially on team Lana, which is to say that I’m conceding there’s far more about Breck that I don’t know than I do. And—as Todd pointed out—there is no harm in trying to help. I’m not religious, but if I’m a god here, I’d rather be Jesus than Zeus.
But helping is thorny. I can’t do what Breck asking of me. I can’t Frankenstein him into my bedroom any more than I could digitize myself onto his island. We exist in different realms.
This doesn’t mean I don’t have options, they’re just all different shades of nuts. One option would be to find another digital world for him to live beyond Friday, but this raises more questions than I can think to ask right now about how. It can’t be a copy and paste of code. Dolly was a cloned copy of another sheep, but copying DNA does not give you the same life that exists behind the DNA. Dolly was a different sheep. Identical twins have the same DNA, but they’re different people. I could migrate Breck’s code, but would his consciousness move with it?
The more I think about this, the more the questions ladder until I’m ultimately contemplating—in all seriousness—a comically unreasonable question. What is life?
This is asinine. I can’t answer that, I can’t even think about it without spinning in circles.
I need to back this truck up. This isn’t a what or a why question. Those are too big.
This is merely a how or where to—and for this I can get help.
I post to a contest chat board, describing the situation with Breck and asking for advice.
As I hit enter, my cell buzzes.
“Dad’s here.”
“Let’s start with Piaget’s stages,” Doctor O suggests after listening to Lana’s recap of our day with Breck. She omits our jaunt to Rice.
We’re back in Lana’s kitchen. A half-empty cup of coffee lingers from this morning, reminding me of how quickly the situation is evolving. Or unraveling.
“The first stage is called sensorimotor. It’s about touching and feeling things. Think of babies. We explore and begin to recognize that things in our world are connected.”
“That’s exactly what Breck did,” I say. “He explored the room and eventually figured out that the cabinet unlocked the door to exit.”
“Simple enough. The second stage is called pre-operational. This is where language explodes. We learn how to express ourselves and we leverage this to begin tinkering with logic,” Doctor O says.
I explain how Breck thought through the green versus red shirts to find the tunnel, and how he solved his way through the wall.
“We also first spoke with Breck during this challenge. He was surprisingly articulate.” Doctor O pauses as much for himself as for Lana and me. “Then, the third stage, concrete operational, involves two parallel and significant transitions. First, we move from thinking logically to an initial grasp of hypothetical concepts. And second, we realize differences between ourselves and others. We see ourselves independently, and we learn to empathize.”
“The island challenge did both of those. The riddle tested the hypothetical, but to win, he had to ignore the riddle and think through how Sam might solve the challenge,” I say.
Doctor O’s hands fidget. I can’t tell if he’s nervous or excited.
“Well, then there’s the fourth stage, which is where I’m confused. It’s called formal operational. It’s when we fully develop abstract hypothetical thinking and are able to grasp things like science, algebra, or philosophical questions. Everyone at this table is still in this stage. You don’t graduate from it. This is what throws me off. If each challenge passes you to a new stage, then I’m not sure what your final challenge will test. Do you know anything more about this, Liv?”
“They only mentioned it in an initial email when I registered. They didn’t give much detail. Something like there are four challenges, each designed to pass through to another of Piaget’s five stages of development.”
“Hmmm,” Doctor O sighs, with brows nearly touching above the bridge of his hawked nose.
“So, are you saying that if Breck is in the fourth stage now, he’s the computer equivalent of a fully developed human being?” Lana asks her dad, unable to contain her excitement.
“No, that’s definitely not what I’m saying.”
“But you’re implying it,” she counters.
“I’m implying that what we are seeing bares all the hallmarks of young-adult development,” he answers, emphasizing young adult as he looks at his daughter. “There’s a lot of room to grow within the fourth stage. But I’m also admitting that, like both of you, I’m confused as to exactly what Breck is.”
Lana smirks like she’s won the debate.
“Doctor O, what would you say to a real person in his situation?” I ask.
“What’s your objective, to make him move forward, or to comfort him?”
“Can it be both?”
He smiles. “Not necessarily. Look, put yourself in his situation. It’s pretty bleak. Our equivalent might be an impending doomsday asteroid that happens to coincide with an identity crisis. It’s weighty. I would try to validate that what he’s feeling is very understandable in his circumstance. From there, it’s on him to decide what to do.”
Guilt shoots through me. “Should we not have told him the truth?”
“It’s what he was asking for. I wouldn’t beat yourself up over it. Or anyone else for that matter.” His expression shifts to something more like doctor-to-patient. “It happened. And even when we talked with him this morning, the lack of answers seemed almost as unsettling to him. He’s still not answering his phone?”
“Well, not exactly, but yes,” I answer, squirming. Just as Lana neglected to mention our Rice visit in her recap, I didn’t say anything about my last phone call with Breck. I was afraid Lana would be pissed that I called without them. Based on her glaring eyes, I was right to be concerned.
“Sooo,” I continue, “I actually talked with him before I came over. And he’s definitely not answering his phone.”
“He answered?” Lana asks, moving on without giving me a chance to answer. “Why did you call him without us and why didn’t you tell me about it?”
“I thought you might be upset.”
“Well, you might be right!”
Doctor O waves a halting hand between us. “Woah. She programmed him, Lana. She’s allowed to talk with him without you.”
“It’s not about me, Dad. It’s about you. I wanted you to hear what he’s like now. You don’t understand. If you don’t hear him yourself, everything sounds crazy. We know this from—” She stumbles, unclear where to take this. “We just know this. And she could have waited so we could all talk to him. But she didn’t, and now he’s giving us the silent treatment again.”
“I do understand,” he says.
“Do you?”
“Yes. Enough to know I’m out of my league. Enough to tell you that tomorrow I plan to call a Rice AI professor, Kimberly Ellis, to see what her perspective is on this.”
All the color drains from Lana’s already pale face.
“Did I say something wrong?” Doctor O asks.
“So . . . umm . . . it may not be the first conversation she’s had about Breck,” Lana says.
“What do you mean?”
Lana offers a slow and timid recap of our conversation with Doctor Ellis.
“Why would you do that?”
Doctor O stands, looming over Lana, with her head bowed toward the kitchen floor. I’ve never heard him raise his voice, let alone speak sternly.
“I didn’t think you’d be this upset.”
“Upset? Or this upset?”
“This upset,” she says to the linoleum.
“This is my career that you’re trying to steer. You can talk with me all you want. I feel like I’m pretty open.”
“Really? Because we’re moving to Massachusetts, and nobody ever asked me if that was okay.”
“I’m the person you talk with about that. Not my colleague.”
“I have. You haven’t listened.”
“Listening and doing what you want are two different things, Lana.” Doctor O paces in the space in front of the sink.
I don’t want to be here right now. I lower my shoulders to make my presence as unnoticeable as possible.
“You were the one that was talking about partnering with someone to write a paper about this. I was, you know, kinda trying to move that idea along,” Lana says.
“But that’s not your role. That’s my role.”
“You’re the one always telling me that I write my own future. Well, this was me trying to write it.”
“It’s not appropriate to talk with one of my colleagues about what I do or don’t want to do. Do you understand?”
Lana doesn’t answer and Doctor O pauses to either reload or further ponder on this newest revelation.
A reflection of light swings through the kitchen windows, sweeping across the ceiling, then comes to rest at the top of the worn wooden cabinets. It’s followed by the sound of a car door in the driveway next to the kitchen.
At this point, leaving can’t be nearly as awkward as staying. I might as well go face my own music.
“Mom’s home. I need to go.”
They acknowledge this as reluctantly as I say it.
Mom sits across from me at our kitchen table, arms crossed like she’s ready to hear an apology.
I can’t bring myself to start there. Yeah, I know I screwed up, but so did Mom. And she has no idea what the consequences were, or any interest in finding out because they aren’t real. Todd would probably tell me to be bigger than this right now, but I can’t. The best I’m willing to do is to try to listen. It’s still technically my resolution—for a few more hours, anyway.
“I’m disappointed,” she starts, when it’s clear I’m not going to initiate.
I nod, letting her continue.
“I thought we had made some real progress this morning. I told you why Renaissance is so important for me, and what I’d like for you to get from it. You told me you wanted to help. You even promised me—without me having to ask for it—that you were going to take the day off from devices. You were behaving like an adult, so I treated you like one. I put you in charge of everything for an hour and a half. And I came back to find you playing video games while customers roamed the store unattended.”
I was doing fine until the video game comment. My jaws clench.
Listen. Don’t react.
Mom twirls a strand of hair around a bothered finger, awaiting my response.
“You don’t have anything to say about that?” she prods.
“I’m trying to listen more.”
“I can appreciate that, but at some point a response is helpful,” she says, her words thicker on the back half of the statement.
“I meant it when I said I want to help you, Mom.”
“The only thing I’m asking for is for you to be there one hundred percent. That’s all the help I want.”
“But I can do more than just sitting in the store waiting for people to walk in the door.”
“Then offer. I’m open to it. Like you did with the Saturn. That was a great idea.”
“But I can do more than ride a ball around the parking lot. I’m really good at programming. I’m beating college kids right now in this contest. And I know you don’t want an online store, but there has to be a way for me to use what I’m good at to help. I just don’t know how yet. I was trying to pay attention today to figure that out.”
“Well candidly, Liv, I wouldn’t give you a passing grade there.”
I break.
“A doorstop failed at a bad moment. There was nobody in the store. I wasn’t doing anything, and something that’s important to me happened. You say you were trying to treat me as an adult, but you weren’t. Adults respect each other. You’re asking me to listen to what’s meaningful to you, but you’re not willing to do the same.” I feel like I’m standing even though I remain seated. “You don’t respect what I do. You think I spend my time playing video games. I created something intelligent, maybe even more than that, which you would know if you took even a remote interest in what I do.”
“Okay. You can talk with this thing?” Mom asks flippantly.
“You mean Breck?”
“You can talk with this Breck?”
“You already talked to him.”
“Then let’s call him again. Let’s add him to this conversation. I’d love to hear his thoughts.”
“He’s not answering his phone right now.”
Mom rolls her eyes and cackles dismissively. “Well, let me know when your temperamental computer is willing to speak with us.” She stands. “For now, I have to go. Todd and I are going to dinner.” She begins to walk away, then stops and looks back at me over her shoulder.
“Don’t bother coming in tomorrow. Do whatever you want. I can’t deal with both the store and you.” She leaves without waiting for my response.
I’m livid and mortified. All I want to do is run to Lana. She’d get it. But she’s in the middle of her own mess. And Todd is out. And Breck is out. What is wrong with me? The only beings I can confide in are my best friend who’s moving, my mother’s boyfriend, and an AI.
I sit in the empty kitchen, and it dawns on me that I got exactly what I wanted—all day tomorrow to work with Breck. And I feel terrible about it.
Lana is spending the evening with her parents, which leaves me on my own. The monitor is the only light in the room, illuminating my pale hands in blue light as I scroll through the list of responses to my chat board post.
If this is a group taunt, go back to Taunting 101. Step 1: Make it credible.
I held off on responding before showing this to my cat. We’re both still laughing.
You should definitely let DoRC know. They’ll want rights to the screenplay :)
Two days to go and desperation knows no boundaries.
I’m mostly a lurker here, so they don’t know me as anything other than a random avatar. But even the one person whom I have semi-befriended with the occasional back and forth sent me a DM that makes it pretty clear she thinks I’m nuts.
I didn’t want to reply to the group, but your post sounds like you’ve only got one oar in the water. Go back to the code. There’s an error somewhere if your character is inactive. Ping me if you want to share thoughts.
I don’t ping her or reply to any of the other comments.
I turn off the monitor and sit in the dark. And I thought I felt alone before. It’s one thing for my mom to be upset with me, or to not fit in at school. I’m different, I get it. But these are my people. They should understand. But they don’t. At all. No one does.
Without seeing Breck, it seems delusional. I wouldn’t listen to me. But knowing this doesn’t do much to temper the sting.
I return to Breck who is on his back with limbs spread wide, gazing upward with heavy eyes, as if bathing beneath the vast night sky. At this moment, I feel more like him than anyone else I know.
I replay our last conversation in my mind, gut checking my conviction until my final gasps of skepticism fade. I write a more cautiously worded note than my chat board post.
Dear DoRC,
I’m writing you about the current programming contest. I’ve coded a character, XNR908 (Breck), who is developing beyond what I’ve ever seen in a computer program. I could describe this, but it would sound far-fetched. It would be more effective for you to see it for yourself. Can someone please look into this and let me know your thoughts?
My hope is to find a location for this character to exist beyond when the contest ends, and a way to migrate him there. Obviously, there’s some urgency to this since we’re less than two days away.
Thank you in advance for your quick attention to this.
Best,
Liv Smithwick
BRECK: SIMULATION #39
The phone buzzes. I dug it out of the sand at sunrise about an hour ago and have since been hoping Liv would call.
“Good morning, Liv,” I say.
“I saw you waving the phone.”
“The fish in the bowl is looking for an update,” I answer, staring upward.
“I’m working on it.” Her words seem cautious. “I know what you want, Breck. I’m reaching out to some people who understand this better.”
“Do you think they will know how to move me to your world?” I ask.
Again, she hesitates.
“I’m optimistic.”
Hearing this makes me feel . . . happy? It affirms everything I have been thinking since I woke this morning. “Thank you. I’d like to tell you about my morning. I started before sunrise when the sky began to lighten. I left the island, went into the forest and walked.”
“But you’re back on the island now,” Liv says, prompting my now familiar urge to look around and wonder where they are watching me from. I resist. It’s a question without answer.
“Yes. I did it to experience something different, not to move forward.”
“Okay.”
“I walked without purpose. I wondered if I might come across Sam, but I didn’t try to find him. I looked at the trees, the squirrels, the birds, the ants, the bushes, anything living. I crumbled leaves in my hands. I watched life, as though it would give me some answers, or some clues, about what this is. About what this experience means.”
“Did it?”
“No, but it still had benefit, in ways that I did not anticipate,” I say.
“How?”
“It made me want to write about it.”
“Write what?”
“A few sentences. Not much. Something to capture my thoughts. I didn’t even understand why I was doing it, but I didn’t have any reason not to do it, so I submitted to the urge. And it made me feel better. Somehow capturing those thoughts made them feel more real. It made the experience feel more real.”
“What did you write them on?” Liv asks.
“Dirt. With a rock.”
“Are you there right now?”
“No. I memorized it. Now it’s only in my head,” I say. “Do you want to hear what I wrote?”
“Absolutely.”
Footprints that were never there, linger in a place that never was,
With feet that never made them, under thoughts never thought.
Figments tower everywhere, vivid mirages of everything.
When all is make-believe, what in this world can I believe?
Nothing. Except one thing. The one who thinks it.
I believe in me.
Liv does not respond.
LIV: SPRING BREAK 6.0
Tingles shoot down my spine. I’m gaping awestruck, wishing I had others to gape with me. Lana is still sleeping. After my fourth text, I decided to call Breck by myself once again because he obviously wanted to talk. I did think of a good compromise though; I’m recording the call.
“That is it. Those are the only words I wrote,” Breck says.
“Breck,” I start, looking around my empty room as if searching for the right words. “That’s unbelievable.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s freaking amazing. I couldn’t write something like that.”
“It is only my thoughts. Not everything rhymes like the clues to the door, but writing it made me realize what I believe in. Even if none of this is real, I still must be real. Because I’m taking meaning from it. I’m turning it into something more than it is, or never was.”
“And,” Breck adds, “I’m realizing something else right now. As much as writing that made me feel good, sharing it with you made me feel even better. It makes the words feel more real. I am real, Liv. These thoughts are real. And I will soon be with you where everything is real.”
I grab my coffee mug as though it were a shot glass, gulping down the last warm half.
I can’t keep talking to him in good conscience. Everything he’s feeling right now is based on the lie that I can help him. I can’t. And I don’t know what to do about it other than run away from the conversation.
“I have to go now,” I say.
“Do you have to work on the solution?”
“Yup,” I answer.
“Then goodbye, Liv.”
It’s another hour before Lana stirs. When she finally responds, she has already listened to the conversation I sent her.
“You told him you can bring him here?” she asks, disregarding everything else. She swings her curtain open to add emphasis.
“Yeah, I lied to him,” I say.
“No more radical candor?”
I approach my open window. “He sits on the beach and writes freaking poems. I didn’t program something to do that. Something happened. He’s something more,” I say, sliding a foot onto the windowsill. “And that something seems to feel. So, what was the harm in lying to him if it makes him feel better about his situation?” I firmly grip the window frame and swing the other leg through. “At least one of us should feel good about it. I certainly don’t. I gave him a little hope that he’s not doomed,” I finish, with bare feet dangling against the siding of the house.
“Are you feeling okay?” Lana asks.
“I think I’m just feeling stuck,” I answer, ducking my head under the window with both arms anchored inside the house. “By the way, this is not a comfortable position. How do you do this?”
“You’re not supposed to try it at home,” Lana says, opening her own window and leaning out with her pasty forearms resting on the sill. “Can’t you move him someplace else?”
“It’s not like I can drop him into Donkey Kong. It’s complicated, and I have less than thirty-six hours. So far, the only thing I’ve done is entertain trolls who also don’t know what to do with their final day and a half,” I answer.
“Yeah, I saw that. They’re brutal. You okay?”
“It sucks, but I’m not taking it too personally. You have to see Breck to believe it, and they haven’t seen him.”
“Yup. We’ve learned that one. Still, I’m sorry. By the way, aren’t you supposed to be at the store?” she asks.
“I got fired.”
“Damn. I guess we’re both having crappy days.”
“Is your dad still upset?”
“He’s cooled off. But yesterday did end up moving things in a different direction.”
“Meaning?” I ask.
“I conceded that I’m against something that I don’t know anything about. So, we’re going to Massachusetts tomorrow morning.”
I nearly let go of the window.
“For how long?”
“The weekend. We’re going to tour the campus, look at houses, see the sights, listen to their Kennedy accents, eat chowdah, do whatever they do there.” She sounds as enthusiastic saying this as I am listening to it.
“The contest ends tomorrow at noon,” I remind her.
“I know. I’m going to be on a plane when that happens. I’m really, really, sorry. I’m obviously not on the planning committee. You’re going to win it. I’m congratulating you as soon as I land.”
“I don’t even know if I’m still in it. And even if I am, it doesn’t feel right. It’s like—”
“Winning a race by running over a puppy,” she interrupts.
“That is a terrible analogy that feels pretty dead-on.”
“So, what are you going to do?”
“I don’t know, but I can’t do this any longer.” My burning shoulders feel like they are moments away from giving up and dumping me onto the row of holly bushes below. “How do you get out of this?”
“Turn and slide a leg in.”
I slide my butt back, but with arms on the inside wall, inertia takes over. My legs swing up, I drop down, and I land mercilessly on the carpet below.
I roll onto my knees, and prairie dog my head in front of the window.
Lana is somewhere between chortling hysterically and concerned. At least we got a small moment of happiness out of this situation.
“Are you . . .” she gasps for air “. . . okay?”
“Maybe. You want to come over so we can hang out without me killing myself?” I ask.
“I wish. My mom wants me to run some errands with her. She says it’s bonding time. I think she wants to tell me more about why someone who loves reading should love Amherst. You around later? Dad still wants to hear more about Breck. The paper has legs, just not at Rice.”
“I’ll be around. Send him the conversation.”
“Already did. So, what are you going to do?”
“No idea, other than avoiding the chat boards.”
“Good thinking. And stay off the window ledge. I’ll text when I get back.”
Lana hangs up and I ponder a bad idea I was not willing to share.