Most of the scientists in the lab had left for the day by 6:30 in the evening. It was a welcome relief for the staff to close shop and head home at a reasonable hour now that Gabriella was animated. Francine and Jim were the last humans remaining in the lab.
“Working late?” Francine asked Jim as she brushed close to him.
“Just a couple more hours,” Jim replied. “I have a few things to clean up for the day, and then I’ll be off.”
“Would you like me to stay and help?” She pressed her hip against his.
“Not tonight. I have to get a few things done. See you in the morning, though. Have a great night.”
Francine swept her hand along the contour of her hips as she spoke. “Damn! I was looking forward to us being alone in the lab again tonight.”
“Sorry, Francine. I have to focus for a while. Have a great night, though.”
Disappointment dampened her voice. “You have a great night, too, Jim. I’ll see you in the morning.”
On her way out, Francine glanced at Gabriella, working at her lab table. Gabriella’s unbuttoned lab coat gave silent permission to her form-fitting blue knit dress to peek out enough to reveal a crescent of her curves.
Francine looked back at Jim and saw him staring at Gabriella. Ooooh-nooo, Francine thought, a menacing frown spreading across her forehead. I don’t mind sharing Jim with his wife, but I won’t share him with an animated blow-up doll! I could kill him sometimes. He had better just be working late!
She took a few steps toward Jim to confront him, but then realized it would make her look foolish to have words with Jim with no real evidence. Francine whirled and was gone for the night.
Jim walked over to the table where Gabriella was working on her material stress experiments.
“Gabriella, could you help me with a social experiment?” Jim asked.
“Sure, Jim, but I didn’t think Martha had any socialization activities planned for tonight. What do you have in mind?”
“This isn’t one of her scheduled activities. It’s sort of an experiment.”
“Okay.”
Jim praised her work in the lab and then said, “Well, you’re progressing very well in passing for another scientist on the floor, but I’d like to develop other aspects of human relationships with you.”
“Sounds interesting,” she said, eyes widening.
His voice dropped, “It will be, but this is more of a secret experiment. No one can know about it except the two of us.”
“I’m all ears,” Gabriella said, smiling at her proper use of the idiom.
“Ah, you’re so much more than that. So much more than ears.”
Jim pulled Gabriella closer, lifted her arm, and gently kissed the inside of her wrist and forearm. His lips pushed the sleeve of her lab coat up to expose more skin.
“Oh, it feels so nice for such a simple thing,” she said in a whispered voice. Jim smiled. He slowly kissed and nibbled her neck. “I like this experiment so far. What else?” she breathed with expectation.
Jim’s right hand touched her cheek, drawing her in closer. His kisses landed tenderly on her lips as he slipped her lab coat off her shoulders. It fell into a heap at her feet.
“Oh, I see,” Gabriella whispered as she allowed Jim to pull her into full contact. She enjoyed the warmth of his body and pressed firmly into him. She started to quote a line from an old black-and-white movie she watched during her socialization training. “Is that a gun in your pocket, or are you happy to see meeeeeeee,” but finished it with a surprised squeal as he searched her.
Jim continued to kiss her neck and shoulders, moving her dress slowly out of the way. The back of the dress unzipped.
“My sensors never got this kind of input,” she said, excited but somewhat bewildered by the new sensations. Her dress slipped down her body and piled at her feet.
Gabriella felt a tingle run through her body while the neural networks in her brain reconfigured to make new connections as Jim continued to kiss and touch her. She was acutely aware of his increased body heat. There was the unmistakable chemical presence of his pheromones in the air.
“Let’s go to the couch, Gabriella,” Jim whispered as he nibbled an earlobe.
Jim asked Gabriella if it was okay with her so far as he reclined her on the couch.
It surprised Gabriella when “It’s all wonderful” came out as a silent nod.
Images swirled in her mind. Getting tunnel vision. Time and space narrowing. Only the moment exists. Love his lips and hands on me.
Her chest rose and fell at an increasing rate. She didn’t need to breathe, but her respiratory simulator was reacting as if she were gasping for air.
The hours went by as the clock continued its march to midnight. The couple enjoyed each other as their imaginations directed. They continued until Jim was too tired to go further; both pleased they could make the other feel so satisfied.
“Good experiment,” Gabriella said, grinning after they finished. “I learned a lot about my circuitry and tactile inputs. And near circuit overloads, too. Wow! What was that!”
“I’ll have the cleaners do an extra good job on the couch,” Jim quipped. Gabriella was beaming.
“Is this what the other people in the lab experience when they have sex with each other?” she wondered out loud. “Is this why you and Francine have sex so often?”
Jim winced at the question. He and Gabriella made love, not merely engaged in sex. It was unexpected. It was different. It was beautiful and tender. His feelings for her surprised and confused him.
“I have to get back home, Gabriella,” Jim said, reluctance clear in his voice. “I would much rather stay the night together, but I’ll see you in the morning.” Jim gave her a gentle kiss on the cheek.
“Shall I document this social experiment for team review and analysis, Jim?” Gabriella coyly asked.
Jim moved back to her and gave her a lingering kiss full on the lips. “Don’t you dare!” he laughed, and then strode off towards the elevator, glancing back at her before rounding the corner.
“I think I’ll top-off my batteries,” she mused as she picked up her induction charging cord. She smiled as she slipped the second toe of her left foot into the charging ring.
Simultaneously, Lance filed a detailed report to Major General Cunningham on Gabriella’s evening activities.
Jim rode the subway to his home stop. He realized he had now lost the logical argument in his mind about Gabriella being a woman or not. His head and some other critical parts of his body were thoroughly convinced Gabriella was a real, sentient woman.
As the subway train pulled into his station, Jim recalled a conversation with Francine. They discussed the possibility their team may have created the next generation in human evolution. Jim wondered if they were the instruments nature was using in its evolutionary march to create mankind’s successor.
“My gosh, we would be like gods,” Jim said to the empty streets.
***
Alice was asleep when Jim slipped through the front door. He tiptoed upstairs, showered, and lay down next to her in bed. Still excited by Gabriella, he lightly touched her. Alice shrugged and mumbled, “Not tonight. It’s way too late.” The rejection hurt, although it was entirely expected.
They were once both so in love there was no distance between them, emotionally, or physically. During those first years of marriage, the old saying “there was such a oneness between them that when one cried the other would taste salt” was real to them.
There was a time Jim couldn’t wait to hold Alice tightly at the end of a workday. Nothing else in the universe existed. Jim believed love like that would go on forever and a day. Their love and passion would never cool off.
Over the years, the changes started happening. Only a bit at first. A tiny crack in their love appeared between them. They both had hectic work schedules, but it did not fully account for the drift. The little habits and quirks, which once endeared them to each other, began to grind on them.
Alice started to drift from her desire for physical affection. It was a slow drift, nothing that happened overnight.
Alice lay there feigning sleep, all the while longing for the days when she was the center of Jim’s life. A small tear formed in the corner of her eye.
Jim rolled over, frowning, but began to smile as thoughts of being in Gabriella’s warm arms replayed in his mind. He slipped down the spiral slide of sleepy darkness.
***
Jim arrived at the lab a little earlier than usual the following day.
“Late night?” asked Francine testily as Jim was finishing his second cup of coffee before ten. He headed to the coffee pot for more.
Jim and Francine understood their affair wouldn’t last forever. They claimed it was only friendship with extra benefits. “No significant emotional strings attached,” they told each other.
“So did you play any ‘android games’ last night?” Francine asked, ice freezing her words as they spilled from her lips. One of those unseen ‘no significant emotional strings attached’ had surfaced.
Jim blushed and looked to the side. “No, of course not! Why would you even ask that, Francine?”
“You don’t know?” Francine said, cracking a faint smile at his discomfort.
“Know what?” Jim squirmed.
Francine stared at him. “After having sex in the lab, you show a ‘tell’ the next day for a while. Your ears turn red. I’ve seen the same thing when young children play video games. Everyone here noticed it but will assume you and I fooled around together last night because we were the only two humans remaining after they all left.” Francine emphasized the word ‘humans.’
Her anger rose. “You’re a real bastard, do you know that? I hope she was good because it’s all you will ever get in this lab again! We’re through! Asshole!”
Jim ignored her tirade. “I have a tell?” he said in one of those whispered shouts people use when they suddenly realize they came to work in their pajama bottoms. “And everyone knows it!!” He turned red and drained the dregs of his cold coffee. He poured another, looked across the lab, and noticed two of the male engineers looking in his direction.
They wore little grins.
“Oh, crap!” Jim said, burning his mouth as he tried to chug the freshly poured coffee.
Their smiles grew broader.
Martha Robinson noted the exchanges. It looks like the jerk had sex with Gabriella. I thought I was only making light of it when I warned Gabriella to watch out for Jim. Apparently, I wasn’t. He actually screwed her! What the hell is happening in that man’s head? Rhetorical question, I guess. Head, zipper, same thing.
I need to go to Human Resources to report this, but they will defend Jim and say Gabriella isn’t human, so they can’t do anything about it. I don’t want to poke Jim with a stick if I can’t win the battle. This may get ugly before it’s over.