Cherie Bonson was still nibbling at her sandwich and sipping at her drink when I had finished. I pushed my plate away and lay back, watching her finish her share. Every time she sipped from her glass she giggled, covering her mouth and nose with her free hand. The first few times it was a delightful affectation, but by the time she had emptied her glass I was getting quite irritated with her. I felt like getting up and slapping her, but of course I couldn't. It was only six years since that landmark case when a judge ruled in favour of a robomate who had complained of being raped and battered by her owner.
"A real people personality is to be respected," the judge intoned, "even when it is artificially induced."
As legal recognition of non-sentient rights, the case established that even robot people had feelings. Parliament, always quick to recognise a band-wagon, hastily passed an ammendment to the Equal Opportunities and Anti-discrimination legislation, making it an offence to disparage, insult or mistreat real people personalities later than issue 4.6. The cause had been taken up by all the politically correct trendies and nowadays, even if your robot didn't sue you for mistreatment, the chances were that your neighbour would do so for it.
"I've finished," Cherie Bonson said, wiping her mouth delicately.
"Great." I tried to sound more romantic than eager. "Let's go."
Cherie Bonson stood up and together we walked over to the bedroom door. I stood back and let her enter first.
"Right, you can hang your clothes over here," I told her. "I'll get you a hanger."
As I ripped my own clothes off I watched her undress, staring hungrily as I had been wanting to do ever since I first saw her on television. I still couldn't believe my luck: Cherie Bonson had been my dream girl for years and now, I thought as she carefully folded her skirt and slid it onto the hanger, she is going to be my girl in reality. She stepped neatly out of her knickers, allowing me to feast my eyes on her perfect body, the smooth, unblemished skin, the full roundness of her breasts, the luscious curves of her shoulders.
"Come here, you beautiful thing!" I growled as I subsided onto the bed. "Cooorrr. Just come here!"
Cherie Bonson stopped abruptly and glared at me. "You men!" The contempt in her voice was startling. "Just because you buy a girl, you think you own her. I've got a real personality, Nicky. You treat me like a lady."
"What more do you want?" I demanded. "You got your drink; you got your candle-lit dinner. For goodness sake, what do you want? Chocolates and roses?"
"That's nice," she said, sitting down just out of reach on the stool in front of the dressing table. "I like chocolate."
"Well you're not ruddy getting any," I shouted.
"Don't you talk to me like that!" she flared back.
"I'll talk to you any way I like."
"You apologise," she demanded.
"Me apologise?" I spoke through gritted teeth - I was really losing it. Cheek out of a robot I did not expect. "I have never apologised in to anyone in my life, girl, and I am certainly not going to start with a damn robot. Get over here and get into bed."
"I won't."
"You will."
I leaped off the bed and seized her wrist with one hand while with the other I grabbed the back of her neck. I hauled her to her feet and more or less threw her onto the bed.
"Why are you so angry, Nicky?" she asked, in a very little girl sort of voice as I propelled her across the floor.
"Shut up and lie down," I ordered.
I pushed her, hard, and she began to cry, real tears stealing down her cheeks.
"Oh for goodness sake!" I exclaimed. I reached for the box of tissues and thrust it at her. "What on earth are you crying for? You started it."
She reached for the tissues. "I don't . . ." She froze, her arm still outstretched. "Bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep."
Alarmed, I leaped towards her and ran my fingers all over her body, paying particular attention to her back. I finally found what I was looking for on the back of her head, where it was well hidden by her hair. I pushed the barely perceptible bump and the back of her head swung open to reveal an LCD panel and a small keyboard. A message was flashing on the panel: "Error 37".
Without the instruction book I was stuck - and so was she. I tried moving her arms or lying her down flat, but I didn't want to use too much force in case I broke something. Pressing the red
Unfortunately, nothing I tried would unfreeze her and eventually I gave up. I got dressed and left her sitting on the edge of the bed, one arm outstretched, while I went for a long walk to try and work off some of my frustration. I ate my dinner alone that evening and when it was time for sleep I had to heave her off the bed and lie her down on the floor, where I tripped over her when I got up in the middle of the night.
It was a hard day at work. I had to catch up on all the trading I had missed the previous day, plus there were literally dozens of reporters who phoned in eager for a story from or about the guy who cornered the market in Martian Zinc. I did my best, but all the time my mind kept straying back to Cherie Bonson lying on my bedroom floor, her knees in the air and one arm upraised. So far at least, my purchase had not brought me any of the things I had anticipated.
When I got back to Brayston Road that evening there was a note in the postbox telling me that a parcel could not be delivered because I was out, but that I could collect it from the parcels service depot or arrange an alternative time for delivery. I hared upstairs and phoned the depot. Yes, it was a large parcel, a very large parcel. Yes, if I got there before six o'clock, I could take delivery at once provided I brought two forms of identification with me. It was now five to six, so I arranged to collect the parcel the following day and once again ate alone.
I didn't trip over Cherie Bonson that night; instead I nearly died of fright when her fingers became entangled in my dressing gown and half pulled it off my back. I yelled in terror and then realised what had happened and felt the most gosh-awful fool. I got hold of her ankles and dragged her over into the corner of the room where she was more out of the way. For someone so slim and small, she was surprisingly heavy.
I was relieved to find that the parcel was indeed the wardrobe of Cherie Bonson's clothes. It only just fitted into the back of my Escort estate (which fortunately I had taken instead of the Porsche) and at the other end I had to unload all the clothes and take them up to the flat an armful at a time, before manhandling the wardrobe itself up the stairs.
At the bottom of the wardrobe I found a plastic bag containing the instruction manual and other paperwork. As soon as the front door closed behind me I flopped down onto the sofa and started searching through the index of the manual. I found the list of errors and then realised that after all this time I couldn't remember what the error message was. I had to stick the battery back in and start Cherie Bonson up again in order to find out that the error was number 37. I went back and consulted the manual.
Error 37: tear ducts empty. Remedy: refill using consumables part number 37-LS553687J.
I swore under my breath and went down to the Goat and Grapes on my own. When I got back, somewhat under the weather, I fancied that Cherie Bonson was starting to get a bit dusty, so I dug out an old sheet and covered her before retiring for the night. I also, for some reason which eludes me now, sat her up in the chair in front of the dressing table with the result that when I was obliged to get up, all bleary eyed, in the middle of the night, I thought that I was confronted by a ghost and positively screamed in terror.
Mrs Claridge, my next door neighbour, stopped me as I left for work in the morning.
"Are you all right, Mr Hawthorne?"
"Yes," I said, puzzled by her question. "Why?"
"Well, I'm sure I heard you shouting in the middle of the night the past two nights. I just wondered whether everything was ok?"
"Really?" I feigned surprise. "I'm sorry to have disturbed you, Mrs Claridge. I must have had a bad dream or something."
At work I phoned up RoboMate Inc., in New York and ordered part number 37-LS553687J, which turned out to be specially formulated artificial tears. When I enquired whether I couldn't mix up my own brew of salt water the girl on the other end of the phone seemed quite horrified and assured me that sterility was absolutely essential to prevent "unfortunate consequences" and in any case, their product contained a secret ingredient for "added realism". I sighed and gave her my credit card number.
Rather than risk disturbing Mrs Claridge again, I half-carried, half-dragged Cherie Bonson out into the spare bedroom, where she stayed for the next week until the small bottle of artificial tears arrived from America. The package showed distinct signs of having been opened by His Majesty's Customs and I didn't blame them. I too would have been moved by curiosity when confronted with a plain brown box labelled in fluorescent pink "Genuine! Artificial tears. Enable your robomate to fulfil your deepest fantasies with genuine artificial tears. NEW with ADDED REALISM!!"
I took the bottle out to the spare bedroom and hauled Cherie Bonson into an upright position. The label on the bottle indicated that there was an unobtrusive valve inside her left ear, into which the applicator nozzle could fit. I had to get a torch before I could find the valve and then spilled most of the expensive tears trying to fit the nozzle into the valve, but finally Cherie Bonson's tear ducts had been topped up and I ventured to refit the battery and press the reset button.
"...know," sobbed Cherie Bonson as she lowered her arm. She looked up at me, astonishment writ large on her face. "Nicky! What's happened to the tissues? What am I doing in here? It's all different."
"Don't ask."
I sat down beside her and put my arm around her shoulders. She leaned her head back against my shoulder and sniffled quietly into my ear.
"Please me nice to me, Nicky."
"Me!" I yelled, starting up. I was about to point out to her that the whole problem was that she wasn't being very nice to me when the price of those tears rose up before my eyes and I clamped my mouth shut. "Yeah, ok love. Let's both try to be nice to each other."