The Remarkable Robot

Warning--mature themes, mention of abuse

I woke up from a bad dream I couldn't remember. Just before midnight, I ended up in the bathroom, looking at myself in the mirror.

"Are you real?" I asked myself.

Still me, still Cynthia Rowe. Forty-two, green eyes, blonde hair in a stacked bob, mint green pajamas, owner of a "Remarkable Robot" named Kasha. Kasha was now reclining on the twin bed next to mine. With all my money, I still bought clothes on sale, used YouTube on my laptop, shopped for groceries at dollar stores. But I had splurged on my robot. Kasha stood for kind, affectionate, smart, happy, assertive--my requirements for her personality.

Her last name is Gato, standing for given ability to...let's just say the O isn't for organize.

Kasha's soft silicone face pressed against my shoulder. She was very observant and had noticed my cat, Carter, pressing against me, and had picked up that habit. "Do you not think you should go back to bed? The wedding rehearsal is tomorrow afternoon."

"When they passed marriage equality, I'm not sure this is what they had in mind," I muttered.

"Are you making a joke? You know that it is difficult for me to understand humor. I was under the impression that you took our marriage seriously."

I turned and gently placed my hands on a body created in a factory. "You are my companion and lover, and of course I take our wedding vows seriously." I paused, hoping I was expressing myself like I should. Just because her intelligence was artificial, our relationship was real. "I love you. It's not because of you that I feel conflicted. It's the situation. Getting married to someone who is not human. I wonder if it's the morally right thing to do."

"We are not hurting anyone by what we are doing," Kasha said in her cool voice.

She convinced me to return to bed, but I tossed and turned, unable to sleep. Memories flooded my mind.

I had met Guy Merrill through mutual friends. I first noticed how handsome he was. Tall, muscular, and very Italian-looking, black wavy hair slightly touched with gray, black eyes, dark skin, and a gleaming smile. I found him fascinating. He'd traveled to places I'd only dreamed about, like London, Tokyo, and Rome, just to name a few. He'd been a curator at museums in New York City, putting to use his advanced degrees in history. Guy had inherited money and had no need to work. He could talk about anything--philosophy, psychology, religion, history of course, current events, etc. The conversation never lagged.

It was a whirlwind romance. I believed I was the luckiest girl in the world when Guy asked me to marry him after dating a few months. He refused to make me sign a prenuptial agreement and insisted I keep my maiden name.

The first argument we had was during the wedding planning. I had never liked any of the traditional wedding marches used for the bridal entrance. I was trying to think of something else we could use when Guy exploded. "I don't care if you use heavy metal music from Sweden. Just pick something!" He stormed out of the room and slammed the door behind him.

I was baffled at his anger over such a trivial problem, but reminded myself wedding planning was always challenging. I went after him and apologized. I decided to skip the entrance music.

After a honeymoon in Hawaii, we came home to his beautifully furnished high-rise apartment. The first evening we were home, he offered to cook me a meal. Spaghetti and meatballs. I didn't really like spaghetti, but didn't want to tell him that.

The table was set with a crisp white tablecloth, candles in crystal candle holders, silver utensils, goblets of wine. Guy had made the spaghetti sauce from scratch. My heart sank as I looked at the meal.

"Guy, dear, I love you for cooking this meal for me. But--"

"But what--"

"You put mushrooms in the spaghetti sauce. I hate mushrooms."

He rolled his eyes. "You're such a picky eater. I've noticed that before."

"You knew I didn't like mushrooms when you made this."

Guy sighed deeply. "Just be quiet and eat it."

I didn't. I went through that spaghetti sauce and put every single piece of mushroom on the edge of his plate.

He didn't like that. As I tried to fill up on garlic bread, meatballs, and plain spaghetti, Guy quit eating and drank several glasses of wine. His face reddened, his voice slurred. He sneered, "You whore. After everything I've done for you, you won't even eat the food I made for you."

"It's not like you worked all day and then came home and slaved over a hot stove to fix me an elaborate meal. Cooking this is the only thing you've done all day besides watch TV." I paused. "You knew I hated mushrooms."

He stood up and glared down at me. Suddenly he grabbed my neck with both hands and started squeezing. I knew choking someone was very dangerous. I tried to back my chair away and release myself from his grasp, but he began laughing and tightened his grip. I punched him hard right in the crotch and he let go, bending over, gasping in pain.

Guy slept on the couch that night. I decided to chalk his behavior up to drinking too much, and move on. A few days later, I was shopping for some new clothes to go with my new life as the wife of a wealthy man. When I brought the shopping bags out to the car, I couldn't get it to start. I pulled out my mobile phone and called Guy.

"The car is dead. I need you to come get me," I said as soon he answered.

"I'm busy," he snapped. "I've got friends coming over. I can't be bothered just now."

"I'm your wife. I'm more important than your drinking buddies. You're supposed to help me out if I need it."

Guy ended the call and I used a cab to get home.

The next day, I took an Uber to the shop where we had the car towed instead of asking Guy to take me. Guy was giving me the silent treatment. The shop owner was puzzled. "Your oil was completely gone from the car. But we didn't find any place where it was leaking."

It was like someone had removed the oil from the car to sabotage it. The only other person who had access to my car was my brand new husband. I thought things over and had the car dealership sell my car. I told Guy that driving in the city was too stressful and finding parking was too difficult.

"It was just an oil leak. You're imagining things," I told myself. But after that I took buses, cabs, or hired rides.

Not that Guy wanted me to leave the apartment. He always griped that I left him alone too much. He didn't like my friends, although he had his friends over to watch sports and play games until all hours. I would get up to use the bathroom in the middle of the night and stumble over people in the hallway, sleeping off their partying.

Our sex life was disappointing. I had never really minded that Guy was thirty-three years older than I was. I had protested when he first asked me out. Saying that he could have any woman he wanted, that people would think I was a gold digger. He replied, "Cynthia, it wouldn't matter whether you were sixteen or sixty. I love you for who you are."

But despite him taking drugs, he had difficulty getting aroused. I told him as gently as I could that penetrative sex was not all that important to me, that I much preferred cuddling and caressing, that he could please me just as much if not more with his hands and his lips.

One night he threw the bottle of pills against the wall and sobbed bitterly into the pillow. I tenderly stroked his arm and made soothing noises. He jerked himself upright and pulled away from my touch. "It's not my age. That's not the reason I can't. It's you. You just don't turn me on. You're the reason I'm failing. You're lousy in bed."

I slept in the guest bedroom after that.

We had just been married a little over six weeks when everything came crashing down. I came home from a walk in the park to find him huddled on the couch, brooding, scowling. "You've been gone way too long."

"I was with Zoltan." Zoltan was a gay male friend of mine. He'd wanted to walk in one of the local cemeteries, but I'd talked him into walking in the park instead. I was too depressed to deal with visiting a graveyard.

"I think you two are more than just friends."

"Zoltan has been in a relationship with Jerome since they were both seventeen."

He grunted. I turned my back to him to put my keys in my purse. Something, maybe some sound, caused me to turn.

Guy was approaching me with a heavy lamp in his hand. I ducked, he swung and missed, and I fell to the floor. He gave one piercing scream, dropped the lamp, and ran out the door. I sat up, panting, my whole body shaking. I finally got up and locked the door behind him. I began packing a bag to leave and check into a hotel, throwing things in wildly, hurrying to get out before he came back.

I didn't have to move into a hotel and start divorce proceedings, as it happened.

Guy had left our apartment, gone to a bridge, and jumped over into the swirling water and on the sharp rocks below. I was no longer a wife in fear of her husband's erratic behavior. I was now a widow.

So was it any wonder than I didn't want to ever be with another man ever again? Relationships with other humans were too exhausting. I had quietly researched how to buy a sex robot, and decided to try one gendered as female. I bought the most advanced gynoid I could find. She cooked me spaghetti without mushrooms in the sauce. She didn't call me names or try to hit me. She was there for me when I needed her, and I could place her on her bed when I wanted to be alone. Her intelligence was impressive, she could hold her own during long conversations just like I used to do with my husband. And compared to Guy, she wasn't anywhere near as opinionated.

With Kasha, I got the cuddling and caresses I wanted. Her robot fingers never got tired.

So when we stood up in front of my friends, with Zoltan performing a marriage ceremony for us, I knew I was getting the perfect companion for the rest of my life. So what if she didn't have "real" feelings for me? What use were real feelings when people lied to you about how they truly felt? When relationships were transactional. When people changed as time goes by.

I was tired of being alone, as I had been for years until the idea to buy Kasha came to me. While I was uneasy with the concept of buying affection from a non-human being, it was true that I was able to give her affection and get hers, even if simulated, in return.

Married to my remarkable robot, happily ever after as it turned out, and not caring what anyone thought of it.