Guava and Gears

The knock at the door signaled the arrival of the plumber. Tullia put the knife down on the cutting board, where she was cutting guava for the empanadas she planned on making. She wiped her sticky, juice-covered hands on her apron on the way to the door.

He stood there, tall and broad, in the doorway. The plumber was from one of those new companies-- one of the ones that were introducing androids to the general public via manual labor. Though she knew he wasn't human, Tullia found herself grinning at him as she welcomed him into the house.

"Hello, Mrs. Tullia Carpentier." His voice was robotic, like a computer, and he pronounced her surname incorrectly. "I am here to fix the sink. Will you point me to your kitchen?"

It was odd, she thought to herself as she led him to where she had been trying to wash her hands when the plumbing gave out. The way he spoke was odd; the way he held himself was odd; the way that robots and androids were being normalized was odd.

She supposed that she didn't know much of anything on the subject. Waldo thought it was a good idea, so she let him get the new sink and she let him get the cleaning robot they kept in the broom cupboard. He was firmly on the side of progress, he insisted. (Of course, progress only meant that he was there for the technology, not for the progress of the rights of others. When it came to that, he was a traditionalist.)

"Here it is!" Tullia gestured to the sink. There was a bowl in there from earlier; she must have forgotten to take it out. "Oh, dear! Hold on, let me move this!"

She continued apologizing as she whisked around the kitchen, suddenly aware of everything wrong with the room. There was dust on the blinds; she could see it by the sunlight leaking through. The radio was still on. What would this poor plumber think of her, seeing the absolute state that this kitchen-- which she thought was clean but was apparently not? Then there was the matter of the guava on the cutting board and the juice leaking onto the plastic tabletop. Tullia felt like bunching her skirt in her fists and crying.

No, that wouldn't do; there was still so much she had to get done, and crying in front of the plumber wasn't one of those things. She turned to face him, to apologize once more, and she remembered that he was a robot. Of course, he wouldn't care about the cleanliness of her domain. There was no hint of personality or judgment behind those glowing red eyes and no hatred in those metal limbs. She could hear the innocent clicking and whirring of gears as the robot stood and took in what he could see of her home.

She faked a smile. "The sink is just in here. I'm sorry for the wait."

"This will take." The plumber paused, as though calculating. "Approximately twenty minutes. This depends on the nature of the leak."

Without waiting for her to respond or tell him anything, the robot barged into the kitchen and tried to force open the cabinet under the sink. It was stuck; something inside kept clicking.

Tullia felt like hitting herself in the head. "Right. The child lock. I have to undo it."

She reached over cold metal to the cold wood, then stuck a finger in the cabinet and pressed down on the lock. The door swung open and dinged the side of the plumber's leg.

Tullia backed away. The child-protective locks were Waldo's idea; he insisted that they child-proof the house even though both of them knew no child was coming. No matter how hard they tried, no child was coming.

The job was over quickly and the android left, taking his massive metal toolbox and massive metal chassis with him. Tullia was left alone in her overly-cheerful house.

The nuclear teals and pinks of the house caused her to feel worse than she normally did. It was as though she was reminded once again of what she would never be able to have and the bold patterned wallpaper, the thick-rimmed clock, the black spherical TV on the counter, and the chunks of fresh pink guava on the scuffed orange cutting board were just there to mock here. Everything was pressing in on her. She wanted to fall to the floor in a pile of clothes and tears.