"Where's. My. Beer?"

"I didn't get any at the shop, Daniel. Rex and I thought a red would pair best with dinner."

"I don't like wine. I like beer."

"Well, I'm sorry. I didn't get any. Relax, you're a Synthetic. You don't even need to eat or drink--"

"I don't care about that! I was programmed to like beer and I want one. Or five. Now."

"Daniel, go to your room if that's how you're going to behave."

Daniel stomped his feet on every step of the staircase and I could hear him slam his door shut with a boom. 

He must have turned the dial on his amp all the way up because I swore the ceiling above my head was shaking. I could hear him rip into his guitar like a madman. I could hear the angst and frustration in his voice, out of breath and raw. 

Sadly, this was a recurring fit of his. For the past several months we were growing more and more apart.

"GONNA BE A LIAR? LIE TO ME! GONNA BUY WINE? LIE TO ME! SAY YOU'LL PICK UP SOME BEER? FOR ME? LIE TO ME! YEAH!!"

Rex took a swig of the deep purple shiraz I purchased at the shop and looked over at me with concern tight in his brow.

"Sweetie," he leveled with me as his chestnut eyes looked upwards for a moment, "we really need to do something about him. How about we get him a companion, another Synthetic to play with? Eh?"

I tried to pretend he had not suggested this very thing before. It was useless.

Instead of crying and balling up on the sofa with a blanket, I poured myself a glass of wine and sat next to him, our shoulders touching, noticing his hair graying at his temples and loving the sight of it.

"No way. It wouldn't work," I said. My shoulders were slumped over and Rex began massaging them. "He's only programmed to love a human. One human. Me. Plus, he'd see straight through our ruse and it would anger him even further."

"Don't want to anger our teenager, do we, love?"

"Funny," I was loosening up as his hands moved past my shoulders and down my back, "when I read the fine print it never occurred to me that he'd stay eighteen years old forever and I would just keep on aging. I was too blinded by loneliness...and unrequited lust."

"Something has to be done," Rex urged, massaging a little too hard for my taste at that point. I spun around and twisted my hair in my hand so I could rub on the part of my neck he got a little heavy-handed with.

"What are you saying?"

"I'm saying you're going to have to spend more time with him. You know, like you used to, before we were married, when things were peachy and all rainbows and pink sand beaches between the two of you."

He gingerly picked up his glass and drank as if he had nothing more to say. As if he had figured it all out, finally.

"Are you saying you want me to sleep with my Synthetic Daniel Johns, Model DPJ1997FS, that I bought for myself over eight years ago when I was a total complete desperate mess of a girl?"

He set his glass on the table and held my hands in his, squeezing them, rubbing his thumb over my diamond as he did so.

"If that's what it takes, then yes, that's what I'm saying."

"No. I don't want to."

"Jacinda, we need this to be a happy home again. You know I'm right."

He left my side and walked over to the counter and turned around to look out the window. There was not a single cloud in the sky. If it weren't for Daniel's ruckus upstairs I could have heard the waves through our French doors that were wide open to the other side of me. Christmas was approaching fast.

I knew Rex was right. Wasn't he?

💙💙🎸💙💙

tysm 4 reading

I have an affliction. Please, forgive me.