woman, and this was your bro, here, hiding out in the closet, taping us have sex, people would say—”
“—Don’t say rape,” Joey said.
He sighed. “I know. It’s not the same. But I do feel violated! The potential! How do I know what’s on your hard drive?”
Jeanette gasped into the blanket. “Jesus, really?”
Joey turned red. “You could probably check, couldn’t you?”
His jeans and socks were on. He threw his shirt over his head and popped his arms out the sleeves; He had it on backwards.
“I wouldn’t do that. That’s a violation, too. LifeMedia Solutions – and I— have the highest possible regard for client’s privacy and autonomy,” he turned and pointed at Joey, “But you better show the same freaking regard for me.”
“Of course, listen Steve, if I had known this would upset you so much…”
He approached the desk and said, “Joey. You’re still a person. You have to act like a responsible adult, okay? You can’t pull this crap again!”
“We’re sorry—” Jeanette whimpered. “I mean— even though I did just bring her in here to charge, and there was no way she saw anything, still. I didn’t mean to upset you and it totally won’t happen again, I promise. We both do.”
Joey watched them gaze at each other pleadingly. She couldn’t comprehend how neither of them, with the infinite possibilities of locomotion, had not yet fled the room. There had to be some pull between bodies she could no longer feel.
She watched Milton walk to the bed. He whispered. Instead of turning up her mics to catch it, Joey turned within herself and composed a short message to Lilian. It was becoming easier to do, more automatic. Like the flicker of a thought or the swish of a tail, the words sailed out of her mind and into another. She could feel when Lily was listening, too.
When she returned her attention to the room, the mood had somehow shifted. It was hard for her to discern exactly how or why. Milton was putting his shoes on, sitting at the foot of the bed. Jeanette had slid out from under the covers and thrown an oversized t-shirt across her body; she stood a few feet from him in the middle of the room, watching.
As he left, she called, “So are we still on? Next Wednesday?”
Milton nodded. “Yeah. I’ll make a post on the message board about it, call up a few folks in the area. If the department has the dough I’ll bring snacks, but you ought to buy a few in case.”
“I will, for sure. Steven, thank you. So so much. I’m really sorry.”
“If it seems like I overreacted…I’m sorry for that.” he leaned in to kiss her. This time it was dry and closed-mouth. “We’ll have a fresh slate by next week, alright?”
Jeanette nodded, a bit too obsequiously in Joey’s opinion. “Okay.”
Milton waved slowly and said, “See you, Joey,” and let himself out.
The sisters knew that what had transpired was never to be discussed. In short order, Jeanette scrambled out of the room. The script was clear: she would fuss around in the kitchen for the better part of an hour, eating and reading, then she’d pad into the bathroom without making eye contact and let the water course over her head at a scalding temperature until Joey’s surface began to fog and she had to demand loudly that it stop. Jeanette would dress in silence and do her hair in an elaborate way. By then, the sisters could carry on as if all was normal.
Jeanette was already humming to herself by the time her bare feet hit the kitchen’s cool, gritty tile. She pushed the argument from her mind. There was so much planning to do! In less than a week her home would be flooded with BrightBox users from all over the Chicagoland area, with their families. Joey would finally have people to confide in, and she’d have bereaved survivors to cry to, to ply with homemade Chex mix and strips of toast covered in Nutella.
She made a note on the refrigerator to buy Worcestershire sauce, garlic powder, pretzels, and powdered sugar. Normally list-keeping was Joey’s job, but Jeanette wasn’t ready to face her yet. Jeanette flashed her teeth at her dim reflection in the refrigerator’s surface, and mused to herself that this was almost promising, yes, they were so lucky. And there was still another chance with Milton, if she didn’t screw it up.
In the bedroom, Lily was buzzing in Joey’s ear. she said.
17.
They sat in a circle made of real furniture and folding chairs provided by LifeMedia, care of Milton. They all sat, legs jostling, dimly glowing BrightBoxes in nearly every lap. In the center was the coffee table, sponged off and holding a veggie platter. Cookies were being passed around on a blue glass plate one of the guests had brought.
“This is my Thea’s recipe,” an old man in a worn vest said as he nudged the cookies along.
The BrightBox in his lap flared, a bright purple exclamation mark. “He put too much nutmeg in, I can smell it. I tried to tell him. I don’t even let him try to make my zucchini bread anymore, he doesn’t knead it well at all!”
Jeanette was hovering at the edge of the circle, but she bowed in to grab a cookie off the plate with a napkined hand. There was scarcely enough space; Milton was sitting on the floor where the TV had been, now pushed into a corner. She took a bite. The flavor wasn’t off at all, she didn’t think— the problem was the texture. Thea’s husband had tried to spare the recipe an egg, or had used white sugar instead of brown. It was close, but too dry. All at once the cookie turned to sand in her napkin.
Jeanette fixed her gaze on Joey, who sat contentedly on the coffee table in the center of the room. This allowed her a full view of the whole lot. They came in many sizes and shapes. Cubes and pyramids and rectangular prisms; spheres, cylinders and amorphous shapes, all glowing in a variety of colors. She thought it was strange to see the other Boxes shining mauve or pastel pink or dark plum; Joey only ever glowed in jewel tones. Their families were many colors and shapes too.
Joey had spoken to all of them before the meeting, so witnessing their corporeal forms was anticlimactic for her. The families should have been a revelation; their features telling of what the Boxes had been like as breathing, moving, bodied individuals. But she cared less and less for that kind of stuff.
“So,” Jeanette said, tapping her freshly-painted fingers on the side of the couch, “Welcome. I think everybody’s here?”
Milton nodded eagerly. There was a list with the names and client numbers on a tablet he had balanced on his knees. “Yes, yup…uh-huh that’s everybody.”
Lily said.
Joey and several others echoed.
“So, hi everyone, I’m Steven Milton with LifeMedia client services; I’ve met most of you all or spoken with you on the website…before we kick off, I’ve taken the liberty of printing us up a schedule for the next month or so,” Milton said. He reached for his messenger bag and pulled out a ream of paper. “I’m thinking meeting semi-weekly would be more than sufficient, so that’s what we’re working with now.”
The papers came around the room.
“You didn’t mention this to me,” Joey said, flashing yellow.
“It’s tentative,” Jeanette said.
Milton leaned forward. “Now as you can see, next meeting’s discussion topic is Family Activities. Jeanette and I—and Joey— we’ll be putting together a list of ideas, just fun stuff that BrightBox clients and their families can do together. So if you think of any ideas you want to share before then, you should email me..,”
“Does everybody have Steven’s email?” Jeanette said. Nods passed through the circle.
“Ok, so two weeks after that, the topic is LifeMedia peripheral products—”
“Excuse me. Why don’t we start with introductions?” an old woman’s voice said. It was Thea, the BrightBox with the cookie recipe. Her husband shook his head eagerly in agreement, shaking the jowls that hung below his chin like pendulums.
“Oh. Absolutely. That’s right.” Milton said, and forced a tight-lipped smile.
Thea said.
For the Boxes, introductions were useless. They knew it
all already. Thea had been a retired philosophy professor. She’d set up a BrightBox account as soon as the company began accepting registration. She died of a heart attack several weeks after. Beside her, sitting in the hands of a stricken-faced middle-aged woman, was Thompson. He’d offed himself; the gaunt woman holding him was his ex-wife. Joey found it touching that she’d rallied around her former husband and chosen to take care of him, but Lily said it didn’t surprise her. She said that when a difficult person became an object, their family couldn’t resist dragging them back into their homes, their arms, their lives. She said BrightBoxes made ideal pets. She said the mentally ill made ideal BrightBoxes.
On the couch, Lily’s parents were crammed thigh-to-thigh, with Lily’s box resting between them. Her father’s eyes were robed in tears, Joey noticed, and his nose was bulbous and red— whether from drink or grief, she couldn’t tell. Lily’s mother looked like a former model whose beauty had recently been blown away in a strong gust. Lily hadn’t said much about them.
On the corner