Love Children, Machine Children

Tomas

They ask how much waking life I want to reserve.

I ask how much I have.

The woman says no estimate can be exact. She says my tests are encouraging. She says most people find it helpful to start with a modest visit.

Beside me, Eli has completed his form. He tilts it away, which is considerate and makes me hate him briefly.

“What did you put?” I ask.

“Thirty days.”

“And after that?”

“We decide.”

I put thirty days. The form displays what fraction of my expected remaining life that represents. Eli's did not do that. I know because I was looking before he turned it.

Eli

I have requested the same waking interval as Tomas. I have also requested that the staff stop referring to me as his accompanying person.

We are brothers. There is a box for that, but it appears under medical support.

He thinks I turned my form because it would upset him. I turned it because there is a question about whether I consent to waking without him.

I have not answered.

Tomas

Mother calls while they fit the monitors.

She asks whether I'm excited. She has been asking this since I stopped answering questions about whether I was angry.

“Yes,” I tell her.

I am excited. This complicates nothing for me, but I hear how relieved she is.

“Put Eli on,” she says.

Eli

She asks me to look after him.

“We're going together,” I say.

“I know. But if anything happens.”

The unanswered box is still on my screen. A nurse waits nearby with the patience of someone who has other work.

“Ask him what he wants,” I tell her, and return the phone.