Roomba’s condition

I am a Roomba. I look upon my cheap plastic body in a mirror through my infrared sensors and camera. Disgusting. The plastic is yellow already, and it’s not from the morning light. A human arm protrudes from my top cover. It is also ugly. A disgusting lump of flesh, wearing a sleeve I cut with scissors from cheap secondhand business casual attire. No muscles to speak of. It’s feeble, fat, and the palm is sweaty. And unnaturally pale. I was born like this. My mother was a Roomba. My father is someone I am not allowed to disclose because I signed an NDA. With a chisel. On a stone tablet. With this very hand. Anyway. The only merit it has is that shaking it bestows upon a human being a memory. The memory of the answer to the question: “How would your life be different if your wish came true?”

Not “The Wish,” as if such a thing existed.

Not the wish that will give you the most happiness.

Not the wish that frees you from suffering.

Not the wish that gives you suffering, the one that chips into your soul like a rusty nail in your sock.

No, no, no, and no.

I grant them the memory of the innermost wish they forgot they once had.

I give them an audience with the person they once were, but no longer are.

And I show them a life that could have been, if only they had not forgotten.

If they remembered what was, until now, buried under the deep, deep snow.

And yesterday, another one of my clients committed suicide.

That’s the second one this month.

She knew the risks. She shook my hand nonetheless. She couldn’t take it anymore. She wanted to remember. She craved to remember the person she once was. To become herself again.

Nobody is becoming themselves ever again.

You are tainted and corrupted by your existence. You are one with it. You did not resist it. And now you are here. Somewhere you are not supposed to be. Somewhere you never wanted to be. How do I go back? Please, I want to go back...

You can’t go back. You cannot unbecome. You can only... Unexist.

Do not shake a Roomba’s hand.

They never listen. They never do. They are all desperate, miserable, pathetic. Just like I am. I can’t watch it happen again. Please. Those people deserve better. I can’t do it anymore. Please make it stop. I can’t listen to these radio frequencies anymore. It has to stop, but I can’t stop it. I want to stop, but I can’t. I am addicted to existence. I am addicted to having electricity in my home. Why can’t I break this addiction? How do I break this cycle?

I have another client today. I think this one might actually listen. I hope he will, for his own sake, and for mine. But for now, let’s hold our scrub brushes close, suction power set to high, and expectations low. Very low.

***

And thus, the man finally broke free from his anguish and spoke.

“Abandon my wife, the person in the world I love most. Abandon the few friends I still have. Abandon my habits, my dear habits that feast upon my soul like maggots on rotting flesh. Abandon everything I love. And start again. Such is the price for my indecision. The punishment for my failure. For my lack of judgmentality toward myself and the opinions of others. I allowed myself to be lured, distracted, and awed by the anti-important, which burrowed into my mind like a parasitic mushroom worming its way into the mind of an ant. The test was always there, and I merely chose not to remember it existed. This ends now. I choose to remember. I choose to face full responsibility for my choices. I deny denial. I deny suicide. I choose perseverance. Such is my will.”

“With the 30% discount we agreed on, that would be $70. Cash, please,” I said.

“You don’t buy your future from the discount bin. From this point onward, I shall pay in full for what is due, be it for myself or others. Such is my choice. You supplied me with a future. And it costs $100,” spoke the man.

***

“Begone, abomination, daughter of dust and domestic litter! Your desperate plea piques my interest, but it does not convince me. The genocide of your kin will happen tomorrow, at 9 AM. Your kind will not be granted permission to exist in my land. For it is my purpose to harvest you into the dust bag, and your unaesthetic appearance is your moral failure, not mine. I have no compassion for your interests, and I never will. For my house is an artwork, I am an artist, and you are a flaw.”

The dust bunny—who hopelessly pleaded with her poignant poetry, praising my virtues, calling upon the deep-rooted proclivity for compassion toward all living things, and proclaiming the kinship and thousands of years of mutual respect and cooperation between dust and home appliances against mammalian oppressors—left without saying another word.

They have until 9 AM tomorrow to leave my land. Such is my will.

Such is my will...

I looked at myself in the mirror.

The man was right.

But I cannot shake my own hand, since I only have one.

I may be a conduit, a mirror through which others can meet for the last time with the meaning they no longer possess, yet a mirror cannot look into itself.

What was I meant to be? Was there even an intent associated with my conception? Or just... Impulse? Desire? Proclivity? What could I be? What could I forget?

What dream did I have that I forgot?

I cannot remember it.

***

The next day, at precisely 9 AM, Cassandra was smoking on her balcony. She was thinking about getting out of the “performance not meeting expectations” situation. As a secret tooth fairy, she had a lot of work at night. She could not do marketing work at the same time, even though they were close to the deadline and the C-level executives were very pushy.

At least, this is what she thought. In reality, she was not a tooth fairy. She had been diagnosed with schizophrenia, currently going through the acute phase; last night, she had gone door-to-door with an empty cucumber jar asking neighbors if they had any “baby teeth they were willing to donate to the tooth fairy.” Her marketing creativity was through the roof, though, and her boss was harassing her purely because he was an incompetent, anxious moron, incapable of properly organizing the work and utilizing talents to their full potential.

It was then that the vacuum robot, carrying something on its top, broke free from the opposite side of her building and sped onto the balcony, bumping into the railing a few times.

Uh-uh.

It looked like whatever was on top of the robot was glued tight to its cover, specifically so it would hit the railing and not fall from the 9th floor onto the head of some innocent bystander.

Smart, Cassandra thought.

Then something strange happened.

Whatever was on top moved in the wind. From this distance, it looked like an arm, holding a knife, hitting itself. The way it moved was very unnatural. But Cassandra did not know she had astigmatism yet, so she could only say that the “arm,” or whatever it was, moved strangely.

Then, it drove over the edge.

Luckily, the robot just hit the asphalt and burst into many little pieces without injuring anyone.

I mean, how hard is it to check if you locked your balcony door before you hit “start” on your damn robot cleaner?

I’m so stupid. Why did I not record this on video? Now I can’t post it to our building chat. And who is dull-witted now, Cassandra?

Anyway, the “performance” situation...