The Eradication Of Grief

Six years ago, Josh’s wife, Amy, died unexpectedly, leaving him a widowed father to an 18-month-old. To cope with the loss, Josh turned to an AI software that enabled him to recreate her by inputting all of her pictures, texts, emails and journals. When things went awry, Josh decided to start his own company — Orpheus — to create an AI software that can help people deal with loss and, hopefully, eradicate grief.

Now, Orpheus is a month away from launch…

            “And finally,” Amy said, consulting the final question on her checklist, “how would you rate your satisfaction with the Lazarus app on a scale from one to 10, with 10 being extremely happy and one being not happy at all.” She looked up at the enlarged face of Jennifer Strong on the 53-inch TV in the otherwise empty conference room.

            “I would say…eight, no, 7.5,” Jennifer said. “It’s still difficult not being able to see her. Do you know when the visual elements will be released? I was told that it was in development.”

            Amy typed out Jennifer’s response, word for word. “That won’t be part of the initial launch. Those features will be available as an add-on at a later date.”

            “Oh. I see.” Jennifer looked away from her computer’s camera.

            “Of course, as a member of our beta test, you’ll receive it for free of charge as soon as it’s available.”

            “Good. Thank you. Oh, and one more thing, when I use the app, my phone dies so quickly I have to keep it plugged in.”

            “Lazarus requires a lot of power. It can drain your phone’s battery, especially older models. Have you tried using the version we installed on your laptop?”

            “I can’t carry it around with me.”

            “Try it, at least when you’re at home.”

            Jennifer sighed. “Do you know who I’ll be meeting with next week?”

            “Let’s see,” Amy said, looking through her papers. “It looks like it’ll be Adam.” Each member of their development team rotated performing the weekly check-in with Jennifer. At the beginning, all 12 people on the team met with her together, but with the deadline fast approaching, the executives at Orpheus decided that that was a waste of manpower.

            “I like him. He’s very kind. Priya is my favorite. But I’m not a fan of Dylan. Can we skip him next time?”

            “I’ll see what I can do,” Amy said. Dylan was their team leader. There was no way she was going to tell him that Jennifer didn’t like him. “Any final questions before we break?”

            “Is it possible that there are any bugs in the software?” Jennifer asked.

            “What do you mean?”

            “Sometimes, when we’re talking, she’ll say things that I don’t think Claire would say.”

            “Can you give me any examples?”

            “Therefore.”

            “Therefore…?”

            “The other day, Claire said ‘therefore,’” Jennifer said. “I’ve never heard her say ‘therefore’ before. I can email you a screenshot of our conversation.”

            “That would be helpful,” Amy said. Helpful, but not necessary. Orpheus had the ability to see every conversation that was happening on the Lazarus apps, which they hadn’t disclosed to the beta testers. “We’ll look into that. Is there anything else I can help you with?”

            “I’m all set,” Jennifer said. “Thank you.”

            Amy turned off the TV. Dylan was going to be pissed that Jennifer had only given them a 7.5. The first few weeks had been all 10s, but the scores had been going down over the last month. Amy didn’t know how the other nine beta testers were responding. Teams were forbidden from sharing that kind of information with each other.

            She read over Jennifer’s answers to make sure there weren’t any typos and then sent them off to her team. The formal launch was on May 15, a month away, and there was still so much work left to do. Every day, new questions kept cropping up, but management dismissed anything that might delay the launch of Lazarus.

            Last October, Orpheus opened up a lottery, from which 10 people would be selected to beta test the Lazarus app. In the first twenty-four hours, they received more than 12,000 applications. Twelve thousand essays from grieving parents, spouses, and children, all hoping to be one of the lucky ones selected to get to talk again to the people that they lost. On November 1, 10 people were selected at random, each one assigned to a development team.

            Jennifer Strong was a single mother who had lost her 13-year-old daughter, Claire, to leukemia 18 months earlier. After receiving word that she was one of the 10 people selected, she sent in her daughter’s computer, cell phone, journals, hundreds of pictures, and anything else she could find. Amy and her team spent a month compiling everything they received and recreating her daughter’s entire personality. Then, they sent her the Lazarus app to download on her phone and her computer, allowing her to talk to her daughter again.

“The other day, Claire said ‘therefore.’ I’ve never heard her say ‘therefore’ before.”

            Dylan stood in front of Amy’s station on one of the long tables that stretched across the office. His arms were crossed and he tapped his foot performatively.

            “7.5?” Dylan said, as Amy approached. Priya, who sat next to Amy, put her headphones on. No one on their team showed as much outright contempt for Dylan as Priya did, but she got away with it because she was the most talented programmer on their team. She knew it, they knew it, and Dylan knew it.

            “Yeah,” Amy said, squeezing past him to get to her chair. “I was surprised.”

            “Did you try to convince her to give us a better rating?” he asked.

            “I did everything I could,” Amy said.

            “Great.” He threw his hands up in the air. “Now I have to go into my meeting tomorrow and explain to everyone why our team’s rating is so low. What did she say?”

            “It’s all in the email that I sent,” Amy said.

            Dylan rolled his eyes and went back to his office. When he was gone, Priya took off her headphones.

            “What did you say to her when she brought up ‘therefore?’” Priya asked.

            “I told her that I’d look into it,” Amy said, opening up her computer.

            “I don’t know what this woman wants.” Priya didn’t stop working when she spoke, she never did. “We gave her her daughter back and she’s complaining about a preposition?”

            “Adverb,” said Adam, from the other side of Priya.

---

            Amy got her salad from the staff cafeteria and waited for the elevator. It would have been nice to sit and eat away from her computer, but that would have been frowned upon. All of the cafeteria tables were empty. Everyone ate at their desk, to at least give the appearance that they wouldn’t dare to waste valuable company time doing something like eating.

            The Orpheus office was in the Hudson Valley, in a building that had been a medical supply factory until it was shut down in the early 2000s. So far, no other companies had followed Orpheus. They were surrounded by woods on three sides, with a highway on the other. There were some stores and outlets a few miles away, but nothing to indicate that this area was developing into “Silicon Valley East,” as had been the saying after Orpheus first took over the building, before Amy had started at the company.

            The elevator took a while to come, as always. Most of the building was in disrepair. Management had little interest in modernizing the facilities, despite all the VC money flowing in. Word around the office was that this would all change after Lazarus launched. When she got back to her desk, she dressed her salad in balsamic vinaigrette and took a bite. Tasteless. When she told people where she worked, they acted like she went to work in a building from the future.

            Amy lifted a tomato to her mouth, but stopped. It was wrinkled and there was something white on the back. Was that…mold? She dropped the tomato and wooden fork back onto the plate and put the whole thing in the garbage.

            There was a lot about this job that she’d never tolerate working anywhere else. But at Orpheus, they were building something worth making. Management knew that, and exploited their employees’ good intentions. After her previous experiences at other companies, Orpheus was the only one that could have brought her back into the tech industry.

            The vending machines next to the bathroom used to have reliably good snacks: Fritos, Famous Amos cookies, Twix, Cheetos, and Kit Kats. But at the start of the new year, in the name of sustainability, management replaced all of the standards with plant-based energy bars. Amy tapped her card to the machine, paying three dollars for a sugar-free bar with a chocolate-flavored drizzle that cost half as much in a grocery store. She bit into it. Disgusting. It had better be as healthy as advertised to justify this taste.

            After her first job in tech, which she had taken to pay off her student loans, she went into social work. For five years, she worked with children in poverty, veterans, and people who had been released from prison. About a year ago, she had first heard about the company her former coworker, Josh, had started, but she hadn’t given it much thought. Josh had been nothing special—difficult, even, at times—and companies like Orpheus often burst onto the scene, raised a lot of money, and fizzled out. This one would be no different.

“The first few weeks had been all 10s, but the scores had been going down over the last month.”

            Then came the Kimberly Fentor incident.

            A week later, a member of the Orpheus HR team reached out to her on LinkedIn and asked her if she was interested in coming on as a software engineer. She poured herself a third glass of wine and contemplated the job offer. Amy tried to research the company, but the articles she found only talked about how much money Orpheus had already raised, as well as the enigmatic CEO behind it. The Orpheus home page had a single sentence written under the company name: Orpheus uses the power of artificial intelligence to allow the bereaved to permanently reconnect with those they have lost. Weird.

            Amy quit her job and took the offer.

---

            “Jesus Christ,” Priya said.

            “What?” Amy and Adam said in unison, without looking over to her. Priya hated when people looked at her screen while she was working.

            “Jennifer Strong. Did you guys get this email from her, too?”

            “Let me check,” Amy said, going to her inbox. “No.”

            “Me neither,” Adam said.

            “Why is it just me?” Priya said.

            “She likes you,” Amy said. “She told me when I met with her the other day.”

            “What did she say?” Adam asked.

            “Hi Priya,” Priya read. “I hope this email finds you well. I think there’s something wrong with Lazarus. Today, Claire and I were talking about what color dress she was going to wear to her eighth-grade dance and she told me that she was thinking of wearing teal. As I’m sure you know, Claire’s favorite color is green. Why isn’t she acting like she should? Thank you, Jennifer.”

            “What are you going to say?” Adam asked.

            “Nothing,” Priya said. “I’m ignoring it for now. I have too much work to do.”

            “I’m going to tell Dylan,” Adam said, smiling.

            “Shut up.”

            “I’m serious. I’m going to march right into his office and tell him. He and I are close.”

            Amy stood up. “I’m falling asleep,” she said. “I need to take a lap.”

            She put up a new pot of coffee in the break room and waited by the window. The sky was turning pink with the setting sun, but Amy knew she wasn’t going to leave any time soon. Nor would anyone else. The Orpheus shuttles that ran into the city would be empty, but that wouldn’t stop the drivers from completing their scheduled routes.

            From 11 p.m. until 5 a.m., the lights in the office dimmed. Whoever was left was encouraged to take a power nap to recharge. Not for the entire six hours. That would be frowned upon.

            Amy got back to her computer, put on headphones, and continued working.

            Around 1 a.m., Amy surveyed the area. Priya was still working, but Adam was asleep. Amy rested her handbag on top of her closed laptop and lay down her head. The leather was cool on her skin. She pulled a sweater over her face to shut out the lights, and slept like that, on and off, until around 3:30 a.m. When she woke, she could feel the imprint of a buckle on her cheek. Priya was still working.

---

            “I think we can table this for the time being,” Dylan said, checking his watch at their team meeting the next morning.

            “We have under four weeks left,” Adam said. “How long can we put it off?”

            “We have to—what’s the word—triage, so I think our focus should really be on adults. They die more.”

            “Infant mortality is about 5.6 deaths per thousand live births,” Amy said. Everyone looked at her.

            “I don’t know if that’s a lot or a little,” Dylan said.

            “The point is,” Adam said, “that it happens frequently enough that we’ll be getting requests.”

            “The answer is easy,” Priya said. “When we get a request to recreate someone who’s pre-verbal, we can do whatever we want. Any personality will work. The parents won’t be able to prove that we’re wrong.”

            The room became quiet.

            “I see nothing wrong with that,” Dylan said. “Won’t the parents just be happy to talk to any child?” Several members of the team nodded.

            “That’s our official position?” Adam said, closing his computer.

            “Until we hear otherwise,” Dylan said.

            “Wait,” Amy said. “We can’t just—that’s not right to take advantage of bereaved parents like that.”

            “But how do you create a personality from something—sorry, someone—without any personality.”

            “I don’t know,” Amy said. “Maybe, we—we ask the parents for some of their personal information. We use that as the basis for the personality. Not a complete replication, but just as a starting point. And then we fill in the gaps on our own.”

“We gave her her daughter back and she’s complaining about a preposition?”

            The room became silent. “No,” Dylan said. “That sounds too complicated. It’ll take too much time. When we launch, we won’t have the manpower to do something that time-consuming. We’ll go with what Priya said. A randomly generated personality.”

            “But—” Amy said.

            “That’s final.”

            Computers closed and everyone stood and left. Amy was the last person in the conference room. This was the worst thing about working in tech. People acted as though their coding skills made them an expert in everything. She had worked with bereaved parents. Why didn’t her opinion have more weight?

            Suddenly, she was overcome by a wave of exhaustion. She needed a real night’s sleep—a bed—without the constant sound of typing. She needed to go home.

            As she walked back to her desk with her computer under her arm, she checked the inbox on her work phone. Twenty-nine emails, just since the start of the meeting. Not tonight.

---

            It was almost four in the morning and Amy couldn’t sleep. In the corner of the empty break room, she typed out an email.

            Hi Jeremy,

            How are you doing? Has everything been going all right for the last couple months? I just wanted to check in with you. If there’s ever anything you need, even if you just want to chat, I’m here.

            All the best,

            Amy

            She read through it three, four times, but couldn’t bring herself to press send. Amy thought about Jeremy often. He probably didn’t think about her at all.

            Amy went back to her computer. Her eyes hurt from staring at the screen. The Lazarus launch was now less than three weeks away. She had only been back to her Brooklyn apartment twice in the last week. The office was full, but quiet. Most of the programmers were napping, Adam included. The holdouts sat dutifully at their computers, lines of code appearing almost magically. They were on something—Ritalin, Adderall, or coke. Amy would have happily taken something harder than coffee if anyone offered it to her. But no one offered.

             “Have you seen Priya?” Dylan asked as he put his hands on the back of Amy’s chair. She spun around. He looked like shit. It had been days since he’d shaved and was wearing the same black turtleneck again. No one was more stressed out than Dylan. Although he was officially her team’s manager, he did nothing more than tell 14 people to work harder. His shitty coding skills should have gotten him fired. Instead, he had been elevated above the need for competence.

            “She wasn’t here today,” Amy said, grateful for the distraction, as much as she hated when Dylan hovered above her.

            “At all?” Dylan asked.

            Amy pointed to the empty chair next to her. “If she’s here, she’s somewhere else in the building.”

            “Was she here yesterday?”

            “Umm…she…what day is it?” Amy asked.

            “Wednesday.” Dylan crossed his arms. The number of days before launch were dwindling. It wasn’t a good look not to be acutely aware of the calendar.

            “I think she was here on Monday.”

            “You think she was here or she was here?” He rubbed his nose with the back of his hand. He was definitely one of the ones on coke.

            “She was here.” Amy couldn’t let Priya get in any trouble. They weren’t going to meet their deadline as it was. Without Priya, they should just pack it up. “We talked about…muffins.”

            “Muffins?”

            “Yeah. She was thinking about getting a muffin or something from the cafeteria.”

            “Okay…”

            “She wound up not getting one.”

            “Riveting. Can you please send her to my office when she comes in?”

            “Of course.” Dylan walked away in a huff.

---

            Dylan’s face appeared next to Amy. He was saying something, but all she heard was Bernard Herrmann’s Vertigo score. She took the headphones off.

            “What?” she asked.

            “There’s an all-hands meeting in five,” he said. “Didn’t you get the email?”

            “I’ve been working.”

            “Everyone else on the team manages to respond to emails and get their work done.”

            “Right, sorry. I’m coming.”

            Amy closed her computer. Whatever this meeting was about had to be important. All-hands meetings were fairly regular when she first started last year, but had grown less frequent as the launch date approached. Few issues touched every sector of the company. Even high-priority items were being cancelled with the launch so close. On Monday, Adam’s scheduled check-in with Jennifer Strong had even been cancelled to give him more work time.

“This was the worst thing about working in tech. People acted as though their coding skills made them an expert in everything.”

            Amy and Dylan walked to the elevator, where a dozen other exhausted people were waiting. The ones who still had energy, the young ones, the ones with coke, took the stairs.

            There had been grand plans for the meeting room even before Amy had started here. It was supposed to be a common space, with enough couches and chairs to fit every employee, plus fully stocked refrigerators and snack cabinets. Many of the younger employees hoped for a ping pong table.

            Instead, it was an open room, with white walls and cracked white tiles. At first, there were issues with proper building permits, then plumbing issues, then problems with the wiring. That’s what they were told. Instead of couches, there were folding chairs—not nearly enough for everyone—and plastic tables. There was no food at the meetings, but somehow there were always crumbs and half-empty cans of Lacroix on the floor. The back-left corner of the room had no overhead lighting. With the whole company’s focus now on the Lazarus launch, all work on it had ceased indefinitely.

            The far end of the room had a small dais in front of a movie theater-sized screen that spanned the length of the wall. The tech team couldn’t attach the 4K projector to the ceiling, so a small projector sat humming on a wheeled cart in the middle of the room.

            The meeting room was a constant source of jokes among employees. It was an easy way to make light conversation among the macabre drudgery of the workdays. Most were happy to have a reason to shit on the company that was taking away so much of their time. The project managers and senior staff took offense to any such comments, or at least pretended to. “Google started out in a garage. We’re already a step ahead of where they were.” It was such a common refrain that Amy wondered if they were required by the C-suite to respond that way.

            The few chairs were taken by the time Amy and Dylan got to the meeting room. She spotted Trisha/Patricia in the dark corner, far away from Adam, who had gotten down early enough to grab one of the few chairs. Standing behind him was a woman from the legal team who was six months pregnant. Six? No, had to be more. Eight, now. Jesus, it was hard to keep track of time. Amy made a little bet with herself that Adam wouldn’t offer his seat.

            “Priya should really be here for this,” Dylan said.

            “What is this meeting about again?” Amy asked.

            “No one is really sure. But from the whispers I’ve heard from the other team leaders, it might have something to do with the marketing campaign for the last few weeks.”

            “If it’s marketing, why do we need to be here?”

            “If they think that it’s worth taking us away from our computers for an hour, that should tell you how important it is.”

            “Right.”

            “I’ve actually heard some rumors.”

            Amy didn’t care what Dylan knew. At least when she was working, she had a sense of purpose. It was easy to put her head down and dig into her work, knowing that she was helping someone somewhere cope with a painful loss. Down here, the exhaustion took over. She nodded.

            “I shouldn’t really say, though. If it’s what I think it is, it’s a big surprise,” Dylan teased.

            “That’s exciting.”

            “I don’t want to ruin it for you.”

            “I appreciate that.”

            Dylan huffed and turned away. Amy smiled and leaned her head back against the wall. She closed her eyes and rubbed her arms as she imagined warmth. She could fall asleep right here.

            “What do you know about this?” Amy heard Dylan ask someone close by.

            “As much as anyone else,” a voice responded. It was Melissa, one of the youngest people in the office. At any tech company, there were a lot of bullshit jobs, but Melissa’s was the crown jewel of bullshit jobs. On paper, she was the Assistant Social Media Manager, but what her day looked like, Amy couldn’t fathom. She didn’t even know what the Senior Social Media Manager did, since everyone at the company had strict NDAs and the company policy was that no further information could go out until launch. They had accounts on all of the big social platforms, but hadn’t posted on any of them.

“Even high-priority items were being cancelled with the launch so close.”

            Amy opened her eyes. Melissa seemed well rested and had on a full face of makeup, hair blown out. That’s how she knew Melissa’s job was bullshit. If she had the time—or the will—to look good—hell, look presentable—she wasn’t doing any work. Amy had worn her hair up every day after her second week here.

            “I’ve heard some things,” Dylan said.

            “You’ve got to tell me,” Melissa said.

            “You have to keep it quiet. Supposedly, and this is just what I’ve heard, we’re hearing Josh speak today.”

            “What!” Melissa gasped.

            “Really?” Amy said, before she could catch herself. Dylan grinned.

            “Anyway, that’s just what I’ve heard.”

            What set Orpheus apart from others was that their CEO was not a public figure. He didn’t give interviews or presentations. Aside from initial meetings with VCs years ago, he no longer attended pitches. His office didn’t have a door accessible to other employees. Every morning, he was driven to a private entrance at the back of the building, where he would take an elevator into his office. At least, that’s what everyone said. For all Amy knew, he never actually came in and remained in his Park Avenue apartment.

            The lack of a public-facing CEO made fundraising difficult in the beginning. That was before Amy’s time, but she remembered seeing the occasional Times article about it. Over time, he took on an air of mystique. The reclusive genius. “A modern-day Howard Hughes,” one journalist described him. His absence became an asset. Too busy to deal with publicity riff-raff, only concerned with this vitally important work.

             But that’s not how Amy remembered him. Everyone at her old company had an ego—that came with the territory. Some of them were genuinely smart, talented, and hard-working, but Josh had never impressed her. They hadn’t worked together long or known each other well, but she thought of him as tardy, disorganized, and a little weird. Sad. That’s what she remembered most. He was always very sad. When she started seeing his name pop up everywhere in the context of his generational brilliance, she laughed. It was even more absurd than the guy in her high school class, who ranked in the bottom 10 all four years, winning a special election and spending 11 months in Congress.

            Josh’s PR team was doing the Lord’s work. His flaws were quirks, his idiosyncrasies were proof of genius, and his personal tragedy was a catalyst for greatness.

            “It’s been a while since I’ve spoken to Josh,” Amy said.

            “What do you mean?” Dylan said. “You’ve never talked to him.”

            “We used to work together,” Amy said. “Years ago.” She gave a dramatic pause. Melissa’s mouth was open. How embarrassing that they were fawning over someone like Josh. “Have I never mentioned that before?”

            “No!” Dylan said. “What was he like when he was just starting out?”

            Amy shrugged. “He was decent at his job. Not the best, though.”

            “Were you friends?” Melissa asked.

            “Yeah,” said Amy. “We were on a small team, so we got to know each other.”

            “Literally,” Melissa said, “nobody in this building has ever talked to him. Literally no one.”

            Amy smirked. “Not no one.”

            The lights—the working lights—dimmed. Someone in the back let out a “Woo!” Whether it was earnest or sarcastic didn’t matter. It encouraged someone else to clap and soon there was a full round of applause.

            “I can’t believe you never told me that before,” Dylan whispered. He clapped harder than anyone else.

            A man in jeans, a black t-shirt, and a blazer came out of a door under the screen. He stumbled as he stepped onto the low dais, and everyone laughed.

            “Ugh,” Dylan said. “It’s Will.”

            There was nothing mysterious about Will, or even interesting about him. No one had fallen upward higher than Will.

            Will was the company’s Chief Communications Officer and was, for all intents and purposes, the face of the company. He gave interviews to newspapers and podcasts, appeared on “60 Minutes,” and sweated and stammered through an hour-long congressional hearing, alongside other tech leaders who spoke confidently, if a little robotically.

            Yet for all his shortcomings, only Will spoke to Josh. It was Will who relayed his messages that ensured the company’s vision was carried out. “It’s so fucked up,” Priya had once said. “This is how the mob operates.”

            Will began to speak, but his words were inaudible. “You need a microphone, idiot!” someone in the audience yelled. Anytime Will spoke, he was heckled, always by men. There were never any repercussions. One of the IT guys ran up and handed Will a microphone.

“They hadn’t worked together long or known each other well, but she thought of him as tardy, disorganized, and a little weird.”

            “Hi,” Will said. “Good morning. Thanks to everyone for coming. I want to start by saying how much we appreciate all your hard work in the final stretch. It’s a challenging time for everyone, but I know you can handle it.” He clapped his hands, but dropped his microphone, creating a deafening screech of feedback. “Sorry, sorry,” he said, picking it up. “There’s a lot to discuss today, so I’ll get to it quickly.” He took a laser pointer out of his pocket and pointed it at the screen. He turned around and squinted. “Can everybody see what’s up there?”

            “Noooo,” the crowd said in unison.

            “Oh, boy.” Will took a handkerchief from his jacket pocket and patted his forehead. He was terrible at speaking extemporaneously, which is why the Congressional hearing had been must-see TV for the entire company. “Can we get the lights a little lower?” Will asked. The lights went out. Pitch black. Nothing was on the screen. “Forget the AV stuff. I can just speak. Can we get the lights back on?” Nothing happened. “They’re working on getting the lights on. But for now, the first order of business. We’re changing the name of the Lazarus software.”

            A loud noise came up from the crowd. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” Melissa said.

            “Can everyone be quiet again?” Will said.

            But the crowd grew louder. Several people spoke loud enough to make sure that they were heard: “Why,” “Why,” “Idiot,” and “Why.”

            “Now,” Will continued, “I’m sure some of you are wondering why. As great a name as Lazarus is, we’ve decided that a rebranding will increase the app’s usage upon launch. Yes, it’s late in the game but we’ve determined that it’s worth doing.”

            “Why are they doing this to us?” Melissa said. Amy couldn’t see her face, but it sounded like she was about to cry. She rolled her eyes. These marketing people were soft.

            “From now on,” Will said, “it will be known as Amy.”

            Dylan stepped on Amy’s foot. “How many times did you have to sleep with Josh?”

            “Shut up,” Amy said. “It’s not named after me.”

            “Uh, no shit,” Dylan said.

            “See,” Will said. “This is where it would be helpful to have my visuals. Can we get those up, please? No? It’s A-M-I-E. An anagram. Artificial Mind Imitating Engine.”

            “That’s an acronym, jackass!” yelled a voice from the darkness.

            “Acronym. That’s what I meant. Sorry, I was supposed to have my visuals. I guess, long story short, we think that AMIE better represents our mission statement. There was supposed to be music here, but it seems like that’s not working either.”

            “Remember, we’re going to change the world,” Will said. “AMIE will eradicate grief. It’ll be gone from our culture. Like smallpox. Our kids will never be forced to experience what grief is.”

            Kids. Amy turned her face in the direction of the pregnant woman, almost certainly still standing, though she couldn’t be sure in the darkness. Could that be true? That her child would never know what it’s like to mourn? She thought about the thousands of lines of code she wrote every day, teaching a program how to respond in specific situations, recognizing the choice of words that indicated a particular emotion. Was she actually changing the course of human history?

            Amy didn’t have any kids. She wasn’t sure that she didn’t want kids, but at 39, with her work schedule, that decision would soon be made for her. Some days, she’d see a smiling young couple pushing a stroller through Prospect Park and want that. She’d console herself by thinking about all that child would inherit: a warming planet, economic inequality, constant war. But at Orpheus, they were making real progress toward bettering people’s lives. Maybe the next generation would experience death in a way that no one ever had before…

            “The second order of business,” Will said, “has a little more of a direct effect on our day-to-day operations.”

            “Oh, God,” Melissa said. “This is too much.”

            “Here at Orpheus, we pride ourselves on emerging in front of technology and — wait a minute, sorry. I mean, we pride ourselves on being at the forefront of emerging technology. To do that, we consult with only the best minds in their fields to help develop this revolutionary software. So, starting today, we’ve brought in an elite team of specialists to help you better understand grief.”

            “Umm … no,” Dylan said, either to Amy or himself. Either way, she agreed. This would only slow them down.

“AMIE will eradicate grief. It’ll be gone from our culture. Like smallpox. Our kids will never be forced to experience what grief is.”

            “We have 12 amazing specialists, all of whom — sorry, all of which — no, whom, all of whom have years of experience as psychiatrists, clinical psychiatrists or grief counselors. If the lights were working, I’d introduce them all on stage. Can we get the lights, yet? No? Never mind. The way it’ll work is that each of our specialists will be paired with a development team. And the specialists will have to sign off on every stage of development.”

            “What?” Amy and Dylan said in unison. It sounded like everyone in the audience was yelling in protest. The roar of the crowd overpowered Will’s voice. He had to yell into the microphone to be heard.

            “This is such bullshit,” Dylan said. “These people come in out of nowhere, and all of a sudden, I have to answer to them?”

            “And of course,” Will said, “all of this wouldn’t be possible without—”

            Amie, what you want to do? I think that I could stay with you.

            A poppy country song blared over the speakers. Will tried to shout over it. “Turn that off, please. That was supposed to play before. When I said AMIE. Can we get it off?”

            Don’t you think the time is right for us to find—

            The music cut out. “Like I was saying, this wouldn’t be possible without all of you, the best employees in the world. Because when I think of our employees, I think of a pear. You can’t see it, but I just pulled a pear out of my pocket. Because a pear is not just a fruit. It’s also, an anagr—acronym. P-E-A-R. Um … let’s see. Responsible. Ambitious. Passionate. Empathetic. PEAR.”

            A loud voice from the audience yelled, “That spells RAPE, dumbass!”

---

            Each development team met with its newly assigned specialist. Amy’s team was paired with Cynthia, a psychologist in her 40s who had spent the last decade working with veterans of the Middle East wars. After the first 20 minutes, during which Cynthia went into excruciating detail about the fights she had with her mentor during her PhD program, Amy tuned her out. This woman couldn’t contribute anything. The only question was how much of a roadblock she’d be.

            “I can’t wait to hear this idiot tell me how to do my job,” Adam not-very-quietly whispered to Amy as they sat around the table. If Cynthia heard it, she didn’t react.

            “I don’t understand how management can claim we’re running out of time and then dump these meetings on us,” Amy actually whispered.

            “Good morning!” Cynthia said, adjusting her thick glasses with blue frames. “I’m very excited to work with all of you.”

            Crickets.

            “Why don’t we all go around the room and introduce ourselves?” Cynthia asked.

            “I’m Beavis,” Adam said. He pointed to Amy. “She’s Butthead.” He pointed to other members of their team. “That’s Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa, Maggie, Kenan, Kel—”

            “I think,” Cynthia said, “everyone should answer for themselves.”

            “We’re all very pressed for time,” Dylan said. “I don’t quite understand the point of this meeting myself. But it’d really help us out if we could table the personal stuff until a later date.”

            “Very well,” Cynthia said, taking her seat.

            Dylan spent the next half hour stammering through a hastily-prepared statement on the team’s approach. Cynthia nodded along and took notes in a leather-bound notebook, saying, “I see,” every so often. Then, she spoke about a study she read about handling grief that was marginally related to the topic at hand. The last 10 minutes were for the team to outline their approach to the software and get Cynthia to sign off. No one tried to hide their bitterness at needing the outside approval, especially from someone who wasn’t a developer.

            “Our plan for the start,” Dylan said, “is for the digital personalities to age at half their normal rate. It’ll allow the users to spend time with the deceased as they were when they died for a longer stretch. But if they don’t change at all, it won’t feel like an authentic person.”

            Cynthia looked lost. For several weeks, the team had been trying to figure out how to address the issue of aging for the digital personalities. Would they stay at the same age or age alongside the user? And if they aged, did it make sense for their personality to stay the same, especially if it lasted for decades? Were they ethically obligated to stay true to the personality of the deceased or did the user, who paid for the service, have any input? They hadn’t received any guidance from Orpheus executives and Dylan was too shitty a programmer to be of any use. He was desperate for someone to pass the buck to.

“It sounded like everyone in the audience was yelling in protest.”

            Cynthia flipped through the pages of her notebook. “Well, so, I guess, regarding the question of aging — which is a very good question — you could go about it any number of ways, depending on the situation.” Everyone in the room groaned. “I think we should look at it on a case-by-case basis. Does that help?”

            Dylan nodded. “Absolutely.” He closed his laptop. They could kick the can down the road.

            Cynthia smiled. “Glad I could help. Any more questions?”

            Three minutes left. Easy to run out the rest of this meeting in silence. All the developers were closing their laptops.

            “Hold on,” Amy said, not even sure herself why she was doing this. “That doesn’t help us at all.”

            “Oh,” Cynthia said, checking her watch. “I’m sorry you feel that way. Why don’t you schedule a one-on-one meeting and we can discuss this at a later date.”

            “That sounds like a great idea, right Amy?” Dylan said.

            “No,” Amy said. “This affects how we do our job. We need to know. As we program these personalities, are we making them immortal?”

            “I don’t follow,” Cynthia said.

            “Say I use Lazarus—”

            “AMIE,” Dylan said.

            “AMIE to talk to my grandmother. And I send in all the pictures and letters and stuff that I had for her up until she died at 92. Does she then exist forever as a 92-year-old? Or after a year, does she become 93? If she doesn’t age at the same rate I do, it’ll start to feel artificial, won’t it? But then does she just live on forever? Ten years from now, am I talking to a 102-year-old version of my grandma? And why is this AI forced to — I don’t know how to say this — ‘live on’ as the dying version of herself, rather than a younger version of herself?”

            Cynthia tapped her pen on her notebook. “Those are very interesting questions. Perhaps they’re more suited for the sales team. Ask them what exactly is the product you’re offering.”

            “They’ll just pass it back to you guys. That’s what always happens and we never get a real answer on anything?”

            “Well, I can see both sides of the argument,” Cynthia said.

            “And also,” Amy interrupted, “What if my dad also uses Lazarus — AMIE — to talk to my grandma, but he only sends in enough data to create a version of her in, say, her 40s, when he was a kid. We’d have two different people handling two versions of the same person on the same app?”

            Cynthia snapped her notebook shut. “That seems like an issue for the developers to figure out. I’m a psychologist, not a programmer. Why are you asking me about the program’s functionality? Take it to your team leader.”

            Dylan glared at Amy.

            “How about this. Should children be allowed to use this app? If some 13-year-old boy wanted to talk to a deceased family member, would it negatively affect his development to avoid the grief and continue living with someone who died? Like, should there be an age of consent?”

            Several members of the team exchanged glances.

            “We’ve gone over time by two minutes,” Cynthia said. “I apologize. Like I said, if you have any questions pertaining to my area of expertise, email my assistant Darlene and she’ll help you schedule a meeting. But I should tell you now that I’m very busy for the next few weeks.”

---

            There was something with a dolphin. A dolphin and her second-grade teacher. Her second-grade teacher kept asking Amy if she was still with her high school boyfriend, Joe. And she was watching everything from a hotel window and the hotel was painted in neon colors.

            “Amy!”

            Amy snorted as she awoke. She was at her computer, sweatshirt over her head. She looked around the room. Other people were taking desk naps and some had enough energy to peck away at their computers. It was still dark outside. Dylan stood above her.

            “Sorry,” Amy said. “I was just taking a quick nap. I’ll get back to work.” She felt drool dripping out of the left side of her mouth, but she didn’t want to risk calling attention to it by wiping it away.

            “It’s fine,” Dylan said. “We just got out of a meeting with legal. They said that we can’t force workers to stay here indefinitely.”

            “Mmhmm.” She blinked a few times to wake herself up.

            “We’re taking shifts. You go home in the morning.”

            “Oh. Great.”

            “I, on the other hand, have to stay until tomorrow night,” Dylan said.

            “What time is it?” Amy asked.

            “Ten to four. First shuttle heads back to the city at 5:30 a.m. You should be on it. And then report back here at 6 p.m. tomorrow night so the rest of us can get home.”

            “I will.” The drool fell from her lip. Amy followed Dylan’s eyes to the small puddle on the edge of her desk. He grimaced.

            “You’ve still got…” Dylan checked his phone. “An hour and forty minutes before the shuttle leaves.”

            “Got it,” said Amy. Dylan continued to glare at her. “Ah. I can get some work done before I head out.” He rolled his eyes and walked away.

---

            Amy might as well have kept napping. She tried to get something done—anything—but the prospect of her bed distracted her. In an hour and a half, her biggest accomplishment was responding “yes” to a meeting the following week. She didn’t read what it was going to be about.

            Amy logged out of her computer—a company mandate—before closing it and throwing her bag over her shoulder. The sun was just beginning to rise. Down below, the shuttle pulled into the parking lot where a handful of enthusiastic employees already waited.

            “Amy, wait.”

            Fuck you, Dylan. What the fuck could you possibly want, you talentless fucking wannabe dictator who everybody thinks is—

            “What’s up?” Amy said. She poked her head into his office, keeping the rest of her body outside. She wasn’t about to get pulled into a last-minute meeting.

            “Come in for a second,” he said.

            Oh, you fucking piece of shit.

            “Of course,” she said.

            “And close the door behind you.”

            Fuck. Fuck.

            Amy stepped into Dylan’s cramped office. She left the door slightly ajar, enough for her to envision her own exit. The shuttle would leave in four minutes, and not having to fumble with the handle would save her a few crucial seconds.

            “All the way. Please.”

            The door clicked as Amy took a seat across from Dylan. She had assumed that anyone with an office maintained a certain level of cleanliness. After all, the cleaning crews stopped by each one every night, starting at 10 p.m. The last few weeks had allowed Amy to become attuned to the rhythm of the nighttime cleaning schedule. But Dylan’s office was a mess. Banana peels and energy bar wrappers overflowed from the small trash can onto the floor. A graveyard of Diet Coke cans across his desk. At least half a dozen unwashed, white coffee mugs all over the office—the desk, the windowsill, the floor by his feet. No wonder he was always coming to harass them at their workstations, instead of calling them into his office like the other team leaders did.

            Amy picked an empty bag of M&Ms off the empty chair and tossed it to the trash. She missed. Dylan either didn’t notice or didn’t care.

            “Can I get you something?” Dylan offered.

            “No, thanks.”

            “I’ve got Diet Coke and seltzer in the mini-fridge. Or I can go get us coffee?”

            “What did you want to talk about?” Three minutes left. There were three minutes remaining until the shuttle left and he was making small talk.

            “You know our deadlines are pretty tight. Crazy tight, honestly. I’m not sure I’ve ever worked anywhere with such high expectations.”

            “We’ll get it done,” Amy said.

            “Will we?”

            “I—” It had never occurred to Amy that they wouldn’t finish, that the program wouldn’t be available on its scheduled release date. It always seemed like it was a given. It would be a shit ton of work and it would suck for everyone. There was too much money and too many hours put into it for AMIE not to finish on time.

            “We’re behind. Not just our team, but especially our team.”

            Was she about to be fired?

            “I can…stay and work,” Amy said, breaking the long silence.

            Dylan waved her off. “You can’t. I told you, it’s a legal thing. A violation of some workers’ rights law.”

            “What should we do?”

            “You’re pretty good at your job. So am I. And the rest of the team. We’re all pretty good.”

            Dylan looked at Amy, to see if she could piece it together. But she was tired. So, so tired. Her brain was working at a fraction of its capacity. And then—“Priya.”

            “Right,” Dylan said. “Priya is exceptional. She makes up for everyone else’s shortcomings. And I include myself in that.” She had never heard Dylan acknowledge his own deficiencies before.

            “Have you called her?”

            “Of course. Called, texted, emailed. No response.”

            “I hope she’s okay.”

            Dylan blinked. His silence made it clear that, until this moment, he had not taken Priya’s well-being into consideration. “Me too. Yes, of course.”

“She thought about the thousands of lines of code she wrote every day … Was she actually changing the course of human history?”

            The clock above Dylan’s desk, one of the computer-animated clocks that were designed to replicate analogue clocks, the ones that were in every office and on the walls of the main work areas, said that it was now 5:30 a.m. The shuttle was pulling out right now. The next wouldn’t leave for an hour, the shuttle that was certain to get stuck in the traffic of all the commuters heading into the city. She dropped her bag to the floor.

            “What do we do without Priya?” Amy asked.

            “You two are friends, right?”

            “Not really.”

            “Well, friendly.”

            “I guess.” As much as Amy respected Priya for carrying the team and masking her mistakes, she didn’t particularly like Priya. It was nothing personal; they just didn’t have any similar interests. Or maybe they did. Come to think of it, they never talked about anything except work. Priya, always deep in concentration, never seemed interested in small talk. Maybe they listened to all the same music, read the same articles, ate takeout from the same restaurants. Maybe she was dying to find someone to talk about John Cassavetes movies with. Maybe Priya secretly stole glances over to Amy, wondering why this woman who spent so much time mere inches away never tried to talk to her.

            “I need a favor from you,” Dylan said. “I need you to go to Priya’s apartment and see if you can find out what’s going on.”

            “I don’t even know where she lives,” Amy said.

            “Hoboken. Near you.”

            “I live in Crown Heights.”

            “Really? I thought you lived in Jersey.”

            “Nope. Crown Heights.”

            “But you used to live in Jersey?”

            “I’ve never lived in Jersey.”

            “Oh. Well, it’s not terribly far from Brooklyn.”

            “It’s not close.”

            “But you can do it.”

            The smell of the office was starting to bother Amy. There was something bodily about it. She looked from the desk to the floor to the trash to Dylan. It had to be Dylan. That’s why he was so bitter about Amy getting to leave first. He wanted to get home to shower.

            “Yeah,” Amy said. “I can do it.”

            “Great. I knew you’d help out. I’ll email you her address.” Amy nodded. Dylan checked his watch. “Oh, shoot. It looks like you missed the 5:30 a.m. shuttle.”

            “Yeah.”

            “At least you’ll be able to get a little more work done before you head home.”

            Amy returned to her desk. She dropped her bag in Priya’s empty chair and signed back into her laptop. As she pulled her sweatshirt over her head, she was hit with the smell from Dylan’s office, though much stronger. The smell came from her sweaty, unwashed-for-God-knows-how-long sweatshirt. The smell was her.

---

            Amy steered clear of Dylan’s office as she left the building 45 minutes later. The parking lot was emptier than usual. No one else was at the pickup spot yet. Everyone else who got to go home for the day made the early shuttle.

            “I know what day it is, honey,” Dylan said. Amy whipped her head around. Dylan was standing outside the front door, palming his face as he talked into a cell phone. “Tell her that I’m sorry I’m missing the show … I don’t know what you want me to tell you. I don’t hear you complaining when we’re in Bloomingdale’s.”

            She’d had enough of Dylan. Before he turned around and noticed her, Amy slinked around the corner and walked to the back of the building, where there was a large dumpster and a door that opened via keypad. Although she could still hear traces of Dylan’s conversation, she crouched down and leaned against the cool, stone wall and tried to block it out.

            A black car pulled around to the back of the building and parked next to the back door. Amy got to her feet, unsure if she was even allowed to be back here. The car door opened and she heard a boy’s voice.

            “Please, can we get a cat? Pleeeeaaaase?” the voice asked.

            A boy of about six or seven hopped out of the back of the car and looked back inside as a man stepped out. It was Josh. Although it had been years since Amy had seen him, he looked younger now. His hair was starting to grey, in an attractive way. But the smile on his face and the light in his eyes subtracted the additional years. When they had worked together, she never saw him with that expression.

            “Are you going to take care of the cat?” Josh asked the boy.

            “Yes! I promise!”

            Before Amy could get away, the boy pointed to her.

            “You’re not supposed to be here,” he said.

            “I’m sorry,” she said. “I was just … taking a walk to get some air. I’m leaving now.” She started to walk back to the front of the building.

            “Desmond,” Josh said. “That’s not how we talk to other people. She can be back here. Say you’re sorry.”

            Desmond threw his head back and groaned, then mumbled something.

            “Desmond,” Josh said.

            “What? I said ‘sorry!’”

            “Say it so that Amy can hear you.” At the mention of her name, Desmond looked up at Josh, but he kept his own eyes on Amy. After all these years, he remembered her.

            “I’m sooooooorrry,” Desmond said. He turned back to Josh. “Is that good?”

            “Yes,” Amy said. “Thank you very much. Don’t worry, it wasn’t a big deal at all.”

            “Do you have a cat?” the boy asked.

            “I don’t,” Amy said. “But I do like cats.”

            “I want a cat,” he said.

            “Desmond saw a cat running out of the alley next to our building when we left this morning,” Josh explained. “And he spent the drive up here asking if we could take it in with us.”

            “I like that cat,” Desmond said, “but it doesn’t have to be that cat. We could buy another cat.”

            “We’ll see,” Josh said. He looked to Amy and gave a shrug, as if to say “kids.” She gave him what she hoped would appear to be a knowing look.

            “Today’s my day off,” Amy stammered. “The one we had to take. I’m just waiting for the shuttle.”

            “Good, good,” Josh said. “I’m glad everyone is getting a break.

            “Yeah,” Amy said. “Thank you for that. Everyone is very grateful.”

            Josh smirked. “Really? They should be annoyed. The hours everyone is working are unreasonable.”

            “It’s not that bad,” Amy said.

            “You don’t have to say that,” Josh said. “The timeline is too tight. But the people who invested in us want to see where their money is going. We all have to answer to someone.”

            “Mmhmm.”

            Desmond ran over to the door and started pressing the keypad. It looked like he was hitting buttons at random, but the door opened and he went inside. Josh didn’t move.

            “Well,” he said.

            “It was good seeing you,” Amy said.

            “Yes. Enjoy your time off. And thanks to you and your team for all your hard work.” He nodded to her and then followed Desmond through the door.

            “Josh,” Amy called. He stopped. “I have a favor to ask you.”

            He turned around slowly. Amy expected him to look annoyed, but he looked intrigued.

            “Before I started at Orpheus, I spent a few years as a social worker.”

            “We have your whole background.”

            “The last case I worked on was for these two kids.” She tried to push the image of Jeremy, with his stitched-up face, standing next to a child-sized coffin, out of her mind. She closed her eyes and then felt a hand on her shoulder. Josh was right next to her, with a look of genuine concern.

            “It’s okay,” he said.

            Amy nodded, and took a deep breath. “Two kids, a boy and a girl. She was only seven.” Josh handed her a blue, silk handkerchief and she dotted her eyes.

            “I can’t imagine.”

            Amy nodded. “I was wondering, when AMIE is released, is there any way we can get the app to her brother? He doesn’t have any money obviously and it’s too expensive for his foster parents to pay for, but—”

            Josh held up his hand. “Say no more. He’s exactly the type of person that AMIE was made for. What’s his name?”

            “Jeremy Fentor.”

            “Jeremy Fentor. He’ll get a phone and a computer with AMIE on it. I’ll see to it myself.”

            “Thank you,” Amy said.

            “Of course.”

            Desmond stuck his head out of the door. “Dad, are you coming?” he said.

            “Yeah,” Josh said.

            “Can we get breakfast?”

            “Sure,” Josh said. He walked to the door, but didn’t take his eyes off Amy. “Enjoy your time off.” He walked inside and put his arm on Desmond’s shoulder. The door closed behind them.

---

            When the shuttle pulled up to the curb and let out its long sigh, Amy was the first one on. She nodded once to the driver, whose name she thought was Justin. It wasn’t worth learning their names anymore. He wouldn’t be around long. Most only lasted a couple of weeks, these days. Other than Fred, a former MTA bus driver. He’d been there long before Amy started and knew everyone’s name, where they lived, as well as shocking details about everyone’s personal life.

“At Orpheus, they were making real progress toward bettering people’s lives. Maybe the next generation would experience death in a way that no one ever had before…”

            Amy made her way to the back of the empty shuttle and took a seat in the rear left so that she could lean her head against the wall. She started to wonder about why the driver turnover rate was so high. It was a pretty straightforward loop that they drove. And the pay must be decent. They at least got to work normal hours. They weren’t expected to drive these shuttles at 2:30 in the morning off no sleep for days and days on end. They were allowed to go home and shower and—

            The cold metal of the wall felt refreshing against her skin as she started to nod off. Most of the people getting on the shuttle were from the nighttime cleaning staff. Most of them didn’t speak any English or at least pretended not to. If she could avoid talking to everyone at this damn company, she would.

            Caleb bounded up the three stairs of the shuttle with an unfair amount of energy. Amy didn’t know him well and only spoke to him a few times at cross-departmental meetings. He seemed competent, but had an annoying habit of cracking his knuckles when he talked and frequently wore graphic t-shirts. He owned one with two crows on a branch, under the words “Attempted Murder” in at least two colors.

            Please, no. Please, no. Please, please, please, no. You can sit anywhere. An-y-where. Come on. Leave me alo—

            “This seat taken?” Caleb asked, gesturing to the seat with Amy’s bag and sweatshirt.

            “Go for it,” Amy said. She put the bag on the floor between her legs and tied the funky-smelling sweatshirt around her waist.

            “Pretty wild, huh?” Caleb said, as the doors closed and the shuttled groaned forward.

            “What?”

            “They’re sending us home.”

            “Oh. Yeah. I didn’t know there were any laws in place about how long you could be at work, but I guess it makes sense.”

            “No, I meant that we’re not allowed to finish our work. I mean, it’s such a critical time right now.”

            Oh, God. “I think it’ll be fine.”

            “If they’re sending us home, we should at least be allowed to bring our computers with us.”

            “I really need a break,” Amy said.

            Caleb’s energy shifted. “Right. Me too. Definitely.” He faced forward and Amy put her head back against the wall and closed her eyes.

            “I’m sure you like the new name, right?”

            “Definitely. I can’t wait for all the Amy jokes I’ll be hearing once this thing comes out.”

            “Artificial Mind Imitating Engine,” Caleb said. “It’s genius. Everything that Josh touches turns to gold.”

            Everyone spoke about Josh like this, inside and outside the company. That’s why he had to keep his profile so low. Otherwise, they’d all see that the man behind the curtain is just some average guy. Then again, she couldn’t be so quick to judge. Maybe, just like her, everyone was charmed by that smile.

            If she had had the energy, she would have told Caleb that she spoke to Josh that morning. People like Caleb deified Josh, even though they knew next to nothing about him. Part of her wanted to say that Josh wasn’t even a particularly talented developer, but in a company like this, a remark like that could come back and bite her in the ass. Plus, Caleb wouldn’t believe her if she told him. Instead, she said, “He’s our King Midas.”

            “Who?”

            “The king in Greek myth who turns everything he touches into gold.”

            “Oh, right. Yeah. I thought you said something else.”

            His embarrassment seemed like a conversation-ender. Finally, time to get some sleep.

            “You have any plans for the next two days?” Caleb asked.

            “Definitely,” Amy yawned, not listening to his question.

            “What are they?” He cracked his knuckles.

            “What?”

            “Your plans for your time off.”

            “Oh, right. Rest. And clean my apartment.” That part was a lie, but sounded better than, ‘I won’t leave my bed until I have to come back here.’” Fuck, that wasn’t even true. Hoboken. She had to go to God-forsaken Hoboken.

            “Nice, nice.”

            Amy folded her sweatshirt into a ball and used it as a pillow. She closed her eyes again.

            “I just can’t believe it.”

            Amy thought about feigning sleep, maybe even adding in a fake snore to make a point. Better to get this over with quickly. They weren’t even on the highway yet. Plenty of time to nap.

            “What?” said Amy.

            “What we’re doing. That we get to make AMIE.”

            “Yeah.”

            “We’re actually going to change the world. Like, I know every company says that and it’s kind of a joke now, but this isn’t one of those meditation apps or something.” He cracked his knuckles. “We’re actually making a difference.”

            “Maybe someone’ll build a statue of us.”

            “You think? Oh wait, you’re kidding. Right?”

            “I don’t think anyone will build statues of us.”

            “Yeah. Yeah, I guess that probably wouldn’t make any sense. Aren’t you so pumped?”

            For sleep? Yes, very much. “I guess. I think what we’re doing might help some people, but there’s so many ethical and logistical questions that no one wants to address.”

            “Well, yeah, but I meant that you should be pumped for being disgustingly rich.”

            Amy laughed. “I’m not rich. I live in a nicer apartment than I ever thought I could afford and I’m comfortably the poorest person in my building.”

            “You won’t be after AMIE comes out.”

            “What do you mean?”

            “Have you spoken to the financial team at all?”

            “Not really.”

            “When you’re back at the office, find Sadie. Do you know Sadie?”

            Who the fuck is Sadie? “Yeah, she’s great.”

            “Ask her about their models. They think that we’ll be a trillion-dollar company less than a year after the launch.”

            “That’s impossible.”

            “Swear to God. That’s what she said. Trillion. We’re all going to be loaded.”

            “Well, fingers crossed.”

            Caleb cracked his knuckles. “What are you going to do then?”

            “When?”

            “When you’re rich.”

            “I’ll figure something out if it happens.”

            “I know what I’m going to do.”

            “Good for you.”

            “It’s something I’ve wanted to do for a long time,” Caleb said.

            “Then you should do it,” Amy said.

            “I think it’ll really make a difference in my life.”

            “I’m happy for you.”

            Caleb turned to her. He cracked his knuckles again. This time, there was a sickening crunch and Amy winced. She sighed.

            “What are you going to do?” she asked.

            “I’m going to do bilateral femoral lengthening. No insurance covers it, so I’d have to go fully out of pocket.”

            “I have no idea what that is.”

            “It’s a surgery,” Caleb said. “Basically, they cut through your femur bone and put this robotic nail thing inside. And then they activate it with this magnet and it extends. They keep doing that until the bone and tissues have gotten longer. Like, permanently.”

            “That sounds painful,” Amy said.

            “Yeah. Yeah, it’s supposed to be pretty bad.”

            “How long is the recovery on that?”

            “You’re supposed to be able to return to basic athletic activities two years after the initial surgery.”

            “Two years!”

            “It’s a long time but I don’t really work out or play any sports so I won’t be missing out on too much. But, yeah, I’d be out of commission for a long time. It’s a little scary.”

            “So why put yourself through it?”

            “Because at the end of it, I’ll be three inches taller.”

            “You’d go through all of that to be three inches taller?”

            “I’d honestly do a lot more than that.”

            “Why?” Amy asked.

            “Come on,” Caleb said.

            “I’m serious. How tall are you now?”

            “I’m 5’6.”

            “And you think your life will be better at 5’9?”

            “Substantially.”

            “Why?”

            “Pick up a copy of Forbes. How many of the Forbes 500 CEOs are short?”

            “I have no idea.”

            “None. Almost all of them are over six feet. That’s such a statistical anomaly that there’s no way you can even just say it’s chance.”

            “How many of those CEOs are women?” Amy grinned to herself.

            Caleb cracked his knuckles. “I just want to be able to have a chance to do something big. I don’t want to be stuck as a low-level developer my whole career, even if I’m better than everyone else.”

            “But you said we’re about to make a ton of money from AMIE. Couldn’t you leverage that into something big if you’re on the dev team?”

            “Well, what about dating?”

            “It seems like the money would help in that area, too, if I’m being honest with you.”

            “Well, how tall are you?”

            “5’8.”

            “See! That’s ridiculous.”

            “Why is that ridiculous?”

            “It’s so tall.”

            “It’s not that tall.”

            “Look.” Caleb took out his phone and typed something. He then handed her his phone, which showed a graph with a large bell curve in the middle. He pointed to a red dot on the right side of the curve. “That’s where you are. 93rd percentile.”

            “Fine. What does it matter where I am?”

            Caleb rolled his eyes as he cracked his knuckles. “Because people in your range refuse to be with people like me.”

            “That’s definitely not true.”

            “It absolutely is. Everyone in that percentile is cut off from me.”

            “Even if that were true—and it’s not—look at all the people in the middle here.”

            “Nope. They’ll only be with taller guys.”

            “You’re making some pretty sweeping generalizations here.”

            “I’m just telling you what I’ve observed in my life. I’ve had enough experience to reach these conclusions. Women assign significant value to height and use it to determine overall worth.”

            “I don’t know a single woman who thinks like that.”

            “They all do. You, too. You just don’t realize that you’re doing it. But the moment you saw me, you wrote me off as a potential partner.”

            Amy shifted in her seat. The bus was more than three-quarters empty, but here, between Caleb and the wall, she felt trapped.

            “I don’t date people from work. I wrote everyone in the office off as a potential partner.”

            “But if you saw me in a bar, you’d do the same thing.”

            “I don’t think I would,” Amy said. “If we started talking and had a nice conversation—”

            “It would never get to that point, though. That’s what I’m saying.” Caleb was wearing shorts. His bare knee pressed into the outside of her thigh.

            “I don’t think it’s fair that you’re making up this scenario and then getting mad at me for how you think I’d react.”

            “I’m not mad. And I know how you’d react because all girls react the same way in bars when I try to talk to them. I’m basing this on empirical evidence, not some speculation.”

            Amy’s whole body was against the wall. The price for her discomfort was a mere two inches between her leg and Caleb’s. “Can I offer you a piece of advice?” Amy asked.

            “You can’t change my lived experience.”

            “Next time you’re out at a bar, and you’re trying to meet someone, talk to women who aren’t 22 years old.”

            Caleb shrank in his seat. He crossed his arms and closed his legs, giving Amy some breathing room.

            “I don’t …” he started. Caleb glared at her. “You have no idea what AMIE is fully capable of. The eradication of grief is just the start. Give it a few years, and our whole world will be different. Women will become obsolete once AMIE’s potential is realized.” Then, he looked away, slouching over. “Sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. I have to go take care of a couple of emails.” Caleb put his hand on her thigh, gripping slightly. He looked Amy in the eyes and nodded. Then, he went to an empty seat a few rows ahead and stared out the window, cracking his knuckles. His phone was pocketed, his imaginary emails ignored.

            Amy exhaled. Jesus Christ. She made a mental note to avoid him at any future company happy hours.

---

            The shuttle left them a block away from Grand Central. Amy let everyone else get off before she stood up. She thanked the driver on the way out. No sign of Caleb on the sidewalk in either direction. Instead of taking the subway like she usually did, Amy treated herself to an Uber. She tried to sleep in the car, but the driver spent the whole ride ranting against socialism and encouraging her to visit Estonia.

“For several weeks, the team had been trying to figure out how to address the issue of aging for the digital personalities.”

            Amy arrived at her building and the elevator was out of order so she had to climb the three flights of stairs up to her apartment. There was a smell when she walked in. Not the smell of rotting food or a pet or moisture and mildew, but the smell of an unfamiliar residence. She remembered how in fourth grade, her best friend, Katie, told her that she spent so much time at Amy’s house that she didn’t even notice a smell anymore. Amy never knew her house had a smell. She certainly noticed it when she went to other people’s houses, but had assumed that none of them cleaned as well as her mom.

            Amy collapsed onto her unmade bed and crawled under the covers. Her room wasn’t cold—a little warm, if anything—but Amy loved the feeling of being wrapped up in sheets and blankets. She caught a whiff of her sweatshirt again and peeled it off her body along with her blouse and bra. The memory of walking into Dylan’s office, stinking, made her open her eyes. She should shower. It was gross, hopping right into bed after so many days of work. In five minutes, she’d take a shower. Just five more minutes.

---

            The sun was still out when Amy woke. She kicked off the blankets and heard a thud as her phone hit the floor. Amy crawled around looking for it. She had no idea what time it was and she was worried that she had slept until the next morning — or even the morning after.

            It was under her bed, between piles of dust, slippers that she forgot she owned, and a broken hanger. 1:57 p.m. She had only been asleep for five hours, yet somehow, she felt great. There was a guy she knew in college who was always talking about how biologically superior he was to everyone else, because he had trained his body to need only four hours of sleep each night. He had heard about someone famous doing something similar — Michelangelo or da Vinci, maybe. And he would always tell anyone who would listen that anyone who didn’t train their body to do the same was an idiot. At a party once, his roommate said to Amy, “He sleeps four hours a night, but takes a three-hour nap during the day.”

            But Amy, well, Amy felt great. Maybe she had accidentally trained her body to do what that guy claimed he did. She’d make better use of her time, though, not like some college student who spent his extra hours watching “South Park” reruns and getting into arguments about the Boston Celtics.

            Amy stood naked next to the sink, allowing the bathroom to fill with steam. Once the mirror fogged up enough so much that she couldn’t see herself, she got in the shower. The scalding water felt good on her skin, as it washed away days of grime.

            She sat at her small kitchen table, sipping coffee in a bathrobe. What to do with the rest of the day? Amy had been expecting to sleep much longer, but now that she was awake, she felt a pressure to do something. Priya could wait until tomorrow morning. There was no way in hell she was going to schlep out to New Jersey today. She texted her sister, Lauren: Hey, finally got out of work today and have the night off. Want to do something?

            While she waited for a response, Amy refilled her mug. The apartment seemed quieter than usual after spending so much time around people, typing frantically or snoring in their chairs.

            Ding!

            Lauren had responded: Can’t tonight. Let’s do something next week!

            I don’t know when I’ll be off again, Amy typed. Work is kind of unpredictable.

            Why don’t you text Kevin? I think he’s going to the movies tonight.

            Amy groaned. Going to the movies sounded great. Before this job, she went two or three times a week on her own. But going with Kevin …

            It’s not that she disliked her brother-in-law, but he could be tedious, especially one-on-one. Kevin didn’t like doing things just for fun. There had to be some meaning or purpose behind it. Even that always felt performative. It’s not like he volunteered or anything. Kevin worked for a car insurance company, which was as mind-numbingly boring as a job could be. He spent half his free time playing World War II-set video games and the other half reading pretentious novels. Last Christmas, they were all at Amy’s parents’ house and she and Kevin were cleaning dishes together. She was enjoying the silence — she thought they both were — until Kevin turned to her and said, “More people should read Halldór Laxness.” And then he proceeded to drone on about Icelandic literature being underappreciated as Amy tried to clean melted cheese off her mother’s red-and-green serving spoon. Amy couldn’t take him seriously. Even though he pretended to appreciate high art, she had once heard him talk about “After Hours” — “didn’t actually make any sense.” What a fraud.

            Her phone rang. Kevin. “Hey,” she said.

            “What’s up, sis?” She hated when he called her “sis.” He had two brothers of his own and had been very excited “to add a sister.”

            “Not much. Just off from work for the first time in forever and looking for something fun to do.”

            “I’m going to the movies tonight, if you want to come.”

            “Yeah, Lauren told me. I could be interested. What are you seeing?

“Well, in English the title translates to “The Pains of Past Fury.” It’s a black-and-white movie by this amazing director from Serbia. It’s about this couple that suffers through a miscarriage during the Yugoslav Wars. I don’t know if you saw her last movie, but it was about these two orphans who—”

            “I think I’ll pass,” Amy said. She liked the director a lot and she did want to see the movie. But not with Kevin. She couldn’t handle walking out of the theater together, listening to him talk about how “deep” the movie was. No, this was over his head. She’d see it by herself after the launch.

            “Oh. It’s supposed to be great, though.”

            “Yeah, I’m sure. But that’s not really the vibe I’m going for tonight. Let me know how it is. Bye.” She hung up.

            There had to be someone else to hang out with tonight. She couldn’t spend this glorious time away from work by herself, especially not when she was feeling so rejuvenated. A lot of her friends had kids. They hated having plans sprung on them at the last minute. When she wanted to see them, she had to schedule it a month out.

            She moved to the couch and turned on the TV, flipping quickly past daytime talk shows, sitcom reruns and cable news. She reached the end and went back around again, hoping to find something to settle for, but nothing caught her interest.

“They think that we’ll be a trillion-dollar company less than a year after the launch.”

            What had Caleb meant on the bus when he was talking about AMIE’s potential? The mission for the product was clear. Will had said it himself. What was that phrase he always used? The eradication of grief. That had nothing to do with “making women obsolete.” It had to be some fantasy of Caleb’s, some world where he would only have to interact with AI because he was too intimidated to talk to a woman in a bar. Tech was filled with Calebs — people who would rather the entire world change to suit their own needs than do even the slightest bit of introspection to change themselves.

            Maybe he knew something about the bodies that were in development. Could that be his fantasy? That the next use for AMIE would be to put the software in a lifelike robot body with a wet opening he could fuck? Disgusting.

            Honestly, let Caleb and his soon-to-be-disproportionately-long femurs get into a relationship with an Orpheus animatronic. It would make the world a lot safer for any woman who crossed his path.

---

            Sometimes, it was hard to believe how much of her life had been based on “going out.” In high school, a few times a year, for birthdays or special occasions, Amy and her friends would ditch the drudgery of secret basement drinking or a party at a house where parents were away and take the T from Brookline into Boston. Their friends in the year above them knew which bars would turn a blind eye to the shitty fake IDs that added four years to their age, or, even better, the ones that wouldn’t card at all. The latter were constantly changing as they would inevitably get shut down or have their liquor licenses revoked. In college, it was assumed that you’d go out at least Thursday, Friday and Saturday night. She had her treasured collection of going-out tops, which were either so plain that they deserved no distinction or so revealing that she shuddered at the thought of owning them. But she did miss the lead-up to it. Doing her hair and trying on outfits with her roommates, pregaming with a bottle of wine before they would meet up with boys, who had been putting back shots of cheap whiskey.

            Like everyone she knew, the first few post-college years were focused on exploring her newfound freedom and access to disposable income, which meant even more going out. But, unlike her friends, a few months after Amy moved into her first apartment in New York, the going out led to her meeting Devon, which led to them having sex, which led to casually hooking up, which led to dating, which led to moving in together, which led to an engagement ring whose exact price she did not know, but whose size made her feel guilty about accepting.

            Then, there was fun in staying in. Watching movies in pajamas on the couch (Amy was excited to show him all the classics that she loved, while Devon had an affinity for ‘90s comedies), trying to make pasta in their cramped kitchen, and going for long walks alone around the neighborhood. Six months before their wedding, Amy found out that he was cheating on her with one of his coworkers, an affair that had been going on for more than a year. He took responsibility for it and claimed that it had to do with his own parents’ dysfunctional relationship and promised to restart therapy. For two days, she considered staying together before calling off the wedding and moving out of their shared apartment. He still texted her from time to time, and, against her better judgment, she’d respond for a few days, until he inevitably asked her to get back together. At that point, she’d cut him off, but still couldn’t bring herself to block his number.

“Women will become obsolete once AMIE’s potential is realized.”

            Tonight, she tried to replicate that old feeling of excitement, getting ready to hear loud music and get pleasantly drunk — easier now as she approached 40 — and dance in a crowded bar. She did her hair while listening to “Jagged Little Pill” and sipping a glass of merlot. She had to get out tonight, to be around people who were vibrant and happy. Tomorrow night, she’d be back at the office, talking about dead spouses and bereaved parents and children again.

            Her local bars were fine, but Amy needed this to be an event, so she took a cab down to the Village and walked around until she heard the sound of electronic music coming out of a bar. The bouncer was looking at basketball highlights on his phone and gestured for her to go inside without looking at the ID she offered him.

            Amy was out of place. She didn’t know exactly what she was expecting, but as she looked around, she realized that she was the oldest one there. All of a sudden, her tight black dress stopped feeling sexy and started feeling embarrassing. She should have brought a coat or a sweater to wear over it. The bar didn’t have any seats. A mass of bodies fought to get the bartender’s attention as the ones who got their drinks held them over their heads, squeezing through the crowd and back onto the dance floor.

            No one would notice if she walked back outside now, not even the bouncer. But then what? Back to her apartment, watching the clock inch toward her return to work?

            A few of the younger guys looked at her while she waited to get to the front of the bar. Whether it was out of attraction or confusion was unclear. When she finally got to the bar, the bartender popped the caps off half a dozen bottles of Coors Light for a group of guys and then nodded in her direction.

            “Grey Goose Martini, dirty, please,” Amy said. The bartender gave her a thumbs up and she handed over her credit card. She took her glass and moved away from the crowd, but avoided the dance floor. The idea of brushing up against a strange, sweaty body repulsed her.

            Amy wanted someone to witness how adventurous she was tonight, but to the younger crowd, she was invisible. To them, she was a desperate divorcée or someone waiting for a date who wouldn’t show or a housewife with a drinking problem. She wanted to announce to them all that she deserved this, that her work was changing the world, that they’d all be thanking her in a few months.

            But she didn’t talk to anybody. Instead, she took out her phone and turned the camera around so that it faced her. She put her glass to her lips, winked and took the picture. She inspected the image. It looked pretty good. Her left cheek, which housed a small scar from falling on some rocks while vacationing in Nova Scotia as a child, was hidden in shadow. After almost three decades, Amy was a master at keeping it hidden. She captioned this picture, “Look whose out tonight!” and sent it to her sister and a few friends. Amy only noticed her typo after it had already been sent.

            Amy regretted it almost immediately. She wasn’t 25 anymore. No one gave a shit what she was doing at night, especially the ones with husbands and kids and dogs who were sitting at home, happy and comfortable and not alone.

            She looked at the swath of swaying bodies in front of her, breathing heavily and pressing their genitals into each other. It was like watching a movie that she loved as a kid, but as an adult, the charm was gone and it was never as great as she thought it was. Amy set a timer on her phone. If she wasn’t having fun in 15 minutes, she would go home.

            A song came on that she didn’t recognize, but that was how it was supposed to be, right? The almost-40-year-old shouldn’t know the songs that DJs play at bars. But it had a decent beat and her drink was strong, so she started to move her body on the fringes of the dance floor. Fuck Dylan and his shitty coding skills. And fuck Caleb, who was probably at home, jerking off in his room and cursing women on dating apps.

            Amy felt a hand on her shoulder.

“Tech was filled with Calebs — people who would rather the entire world change to suit their own needs than do even the slightest bit of introspection to change themselves.”

            “Excuse me,” said a man in his late 20s, sliding past her. She recognized his outfit well, as all her male friends wore the same clothes when they were his age: a tight pair of dark wash jeans and a button-down shirt (untucked). They always acted like they were getting dressed up, when it was more casual than any of them dressed for work and took only a fraction of the time to assemble that it took her or her girlfriends. It worked well enough on him, and he was decent-looking.

            “Hey,” Amy said, grabbing his wrist. He looked back at her. “How’s it going?”

            “Oh. Good,” he said. His eyes moved up and down as he examined her. Amy inched closer to him, which must have been enough to pass his test. He straightened himself up.

            “I’m Amy,” Amy said, grabbing his hand.

            “Bronson,” he said. He looked over his shoulder. Amy followed his gaze to a group of seven or eight people, mostly guys but a couple of girls. They were eyeing him, standing here with this older woman. She could imagine the MILF jokes that they were making.

            “What do you do, Bronson?” she asked, turning his chin back to her face.

            “IB,” he said. “Investment banking.”

            “I know what IB is,” Amy said, before she could stop herself. “I know a lot of people who work in finance.”

            “Yeah,” Bronson yelled over the music. “Crazy hours.”

            “Wow,” Amy said. “That sounds so hard.”

            “Worth it, though,” he said. “Should get promoted this year.”

            “Cool.”

            “We just came from a big closing dinner.”

            “Nice.”

            “I’m in fintech. It’s cool ‘cause everything is constantly evolving, so you get the chance to be the first ones to invest in something new. And then when they blow up …”

            “Of course.” Amy waited for him to ask something about her, but he proceeded to talk about a leveraged buyout his team was working on involving some sort of cryptocurrency from Venezuela tied to their oil industry.

            Another song came on that Amy had never heard before. “I love this song,” she said. “Let’s dance.” She dragged him into the crowd, noticing, but pretending not to, that he was looking over at his group of coworkers.

            His hands were quick to find her hips, gripping tighter than she would have liked, and pulled her back into him so aggressively that she almost lost her footing. She wasn’t used to wearing heels. Bronson jutted his crotch into her butt and moved his hands up and down in a way that caused her dress to keep riding up. She tried holding his hands in place, but every time she took hers away, he’d go right back to it. Whatever. It was far from the most annoying thing a guy had ever done to her while dancing in a bar.

            Amy put her head back so that her hair was in his face. She let out a soft moan and felt his penis finally stiffen in his pants. She reached back and ran the back of her hand along his crotch. He started to pull her dress up, not realizing that it was longer than the ones the other girls were wearing. She felt exposed. Whatever. No one was paying attention to them. Everyone here was too focused on their own potential hookups to care what anyone else was doing. Even so, she knew that her younger self would have stopped him.

            Bronson cupped her crotch in an uncomfortable way, but when she didn’t resist, he slid his hand in through the side of her underwear.

            “Are you wet?” he asked.

            “Yeah,” she lied. “Come on. Let’s get out of here.” She pulled his hand away and fixed her dress. But Bronson wasn’t moving. “What? Do you need to close out or something?”

            “Can we go to your place?” he asked. “All of my roommates are home.”

            “Fine. Let’s go.”

            “Where do you live?”

            “Crown Heights.”

            “Brooklyn?”

            “Yes.”

            Bronson sighed and looked around. “Come here.” He put a hand on her shoulder and led her through the crowd, past several couples more successful in their endeavors than Amy was. He gestured to a brown door. “In here.”

            “Is that the bathroom?”

            “Yeah.”

            “I’m not going to fuck you in a bar bathroom.”

            “I’ve been here before. They usually keep it pretty clean.” Bronson pushed the door open and the smell of urine poured out. There were paper towels all over the floor and drawings of dicks on the unwashed mirror.

            “No. I don’t want to stand in a puddle of piss.”

            “Just put your hands on the sink and I’ll fuck you from behind.” He leaned in until his lips brushed against her ear as they moved. “And you can watch me fucking you while you come.”

            Amy pulled away. “Let’s just go back to my place.”

            Bronson looked around, as if someone would appear and side with his suggestion. “I have to get up pretty early tomorrow and Crown Heights is really far.”

            “Fine,” Amy said. “Whatever.” Bronson went into the bathroom. “I told you, I’m not fucking you in there.”

            “I have to pee.”

---

            The night was cool and pleasant as Amy waited on the sidewalk for her Uber. She had moved down the street from the bar. As she had made her way from the bathroom through the crowd, Bronson’s group of friends saw her. They nudged each other and whispered and giggled. She felt naked, even though only her arms were exposed. There was an unattended pile of coats near a table by the door. Amy took a black leather jacket from the top of the pile and zipped it up.

            People were so fucking weird. She’d be taking a cigarette-smelling rideshare home while the driver yapped away on speakerphone instead of getting eaten out by a handsome stranger. Her empty apartment was waiting for her, taunting her.

            Her phone vibrated. It was a text from Kevin. Wow. That movie was really depressing.

            A black Civic pulled up in front of her. She saw the driver pocket a vape pen before rolling down the window. “Amy?”

            “Yeah,” she said as she got in the back. There were empty bags of peanut M&Ms on the floor and gas station receipts. The smell wasn’t as bad as it could have been. The vape he had been using must have had a fruity flavor.

            “Brooklyn, yes?” the driver said.

            “Yeah.” Amy investigated her new jacket. One pocket had a crumpled five-dollar bill and the other had a blue Bic pen without a cap. She took off her heels and put her legs up on the seat to stretch out. At this time tomorrow, she’d be back at work. Dylan would be hovering over her and complaining.

            “Actually,” Amy said, “can I change my destination?”

---

            Amy checked the email three times to make sure that she had the right address. It was an apartment building between a bank on the corner and a hole-in-the-wall sandwich shop. This was it. She selected apartment 3A on the buzzer. It rang and rang and rang and rang. Finally, someone answered.

            “Hello?”

            “Priya?”

            A pause. “Who is this?”

            “It’s Amy. From work.”

            A longer pause. “What are you doing here?”

            “I have to talk to you.”

            “Talk about what?”

            “Can you let me up?”

            “What do you need?”

            “I got sent here. By Dylan.”

            “Hold on. I’m coming down.”

            It took Priya almost 10 minutes to come down. Amy’s feet were hurting from the shoes so she half-sat on a nearby fire hydrant. A man eyed her as he went to use the 24-hour ATM at the bank. He slipped a wad of 20s into his back pocket and then crossed the street without looking at her again. Amy hoped that Priya wasn’t doing anything important. She could have been upstairs fucking.

            The door to Priya’s building finally opened, and she appeared wearing a mauve bathrobe and thick, forest-green glasses. She always wore contact lenses at work, no matter how late it was.

            “Hey,” Amy said. “What’s up?” She spoke before she heard how stupid she sounded. “Are you okay?”

            “I’m fine,” Priya said.

            “Good. You haven’t been to work in a few days, so I worried that you were sick or something.”

            “I thought you said that Dylan sent you.”

            “He did. Because we’re all worried. It’s been a couple of days, and you’re by far the most talented person on our team.”

            “I’m fine, thank you. Dylan didn’t need to send anyone.”

            “That’s what I said, but he told me you weren’t responding to—”

            Across the street, a black SUV pulled out of its spot and drove away, tires screeching.

            “Amy, come inside. Now.” She held the door open and Amy went inside. Without speaking, Priya led her to the elevator and they took it up two floors.

            “Do you have someone in there?” Amy asked as they walked down the maroon carpet in the hallway. “I didn’t mean to interrupt.”

            Priya unlocked her door — top and bottom locks — and gestured for Amy to enter. Priya closed the door behind them and again locked both locks.

            The apartment was dark. All the windows were covered by blackout curtains. The furniture looked expensive and everything was clean. Priya put in more hours at work than she did and she still managed to keep her house neat. Where did she find the time?

            “Do you want anything?” Priya asked.

            “I wouldn’t mind a glass of water.”

            Priya took her Brita out of the refrigerator and filled a tall glass.

            “Thanks,” Amy said, sitting on the couch. Priya pulled over one of the wooden chairs from her dining room table and sat across from Amy with her arms crossed.

            “Nice dress,” Priya said. Amy zipped up the stolen jacket and tried to tuck her legs under the chair. “Where are you coming from?”

            “Nowhere. Just had some drinks with friends at a bar by my apartment.”

            “Right. And you just decided, why not pop by your coworker’s place in Jersey?”

            “I told you, Dylan—”

            “I know, Dylan sent you. Did he tell you to show up at eleven o’clock at night?”

            Amy shook her head. “I was going to come tomorrow morning, but I didn’t want to go home.”

            “Well, as you can see, I’m fine.” Priya forced a smile.

            “Great. Are you coming to work tomorrow? We need you.”

            “Yeah. I’ll be in tomorrow.”

            “So, I can tell Dylan to expect you?”

            “Yes.”

            “Do you mind if I ask why you didn’t come to work this week? We’re on a tight deadline. Most of us have just been staying there around the clock. I only got to leave because the lawyers said that they were violating workers’ rights or something. I have to be back by six tomorrow night.”

            “I’ve been dealing with some personal stuff.”

            “Oh. Sorry. Is everything all right?”

            “Yeah. Family things.”

            “Why didn’t you just say that to Dylan?”

            “This job isn’t my life, Amy. Sometimes, things come up and work isn’t the first thing on my mind.”

            “Sorry.” Amy finished the rest of her water. “Well, if you’re all right, I guess I should get going. See you tomorrow?”

            “Yeah.” Priya walked to the front door and unlocked the top lock. She stopped before she unlocked the second. Then, she relocked the top, hurried to the window, and peeked behind the curtain. “You should just stay here. It’s such a hike back to Brooklyn.”

            “No, it’s fine, really. I’ll take an Uber. I can expense it.”

            “Stay. The couch is comfortable. I have some extra pillows and a blanket.”

            “But I’m wearing—”

            “You can borrow pajamas. Just … stay.”

            “Priya,” Amy said, “what’s going on?”

            “I’d really prefer that you stay.”

            Amy nodded. “Sure.”

            “Thank you. I’ll get you a blanket and some clothes.”

            Priya disappeared into her bedroom. Amy looked out the window. The black SUV was back in its position across the street. She hadn’t noticed it before, but its windows were tinted so much that she couldn’t see inside.

            “Here you go,” Priya said, returning from her room. She stopped when she saw Amy at the window. “What are you looking at?”

            “Nothing,” Amy said. “Just checking out the neighborhood. In case I ever decide to leave Brooklyn.”

            “Well … bathroom is over there, if you want to get changed.”

            “Thanks.” Amy took the sweatpants and tank top from Priya into the bathroom. She slid out of her dress and unsnapped her bra. The night had taken a very different turn.

            When she got out, Priya had made up the couch with a baby blue pillow and two blankets.

            “Do you need anything else?” Priya asked.

            “No, thank you.”

            “I’ll see you in the morning.”

            Priya turned off the lights and disappeared into her bedroom. It took a few minutes for Amy’s eyes to adjust to the darkness. The couch was small, but comfortable and she felt cozy under the blankets. Before she fell asleep, her phone dinged. Her friend Steph had responded to her picture from the bar: “Yeah!!!!! Get it girl!!!”

---

            Amy sat at her desk, typing away. She was the only one in the office. Finally, some time to herself. She pulled a box of caffeine pills from her bag. She needed to take them all. She spilled them onto her desk and popped them into her mouth, one at a time, until they were all gone. But it wasn’t enough. She stuck her finger into the box to try to fish out any that may have gotten stuck to the bottom. She felt something soft and smacked the bottom of the box until she dislodged the object, and it fell onto her keyboard.

“There’s too much money at stake here. If it gets out, the stock price will crash.”

            It was an eyeball.

            Amy picked it up and examined it. She held it above her head. “Does this belong to anybody?” she asked the empty office.

            “It’s mine,” a voice said. She swiveled in her chair. Jeremy Fentor stood next to her, his right eye socket empty.

            “Here you go,” Amy said, dropping the eyeball in his hand.

            “Thanks. I was looking for this.”

            “You need to keep it somewhere you won’t lose it.”

            “I know.” He popped the eyeball back into his head.

            “You should be in school, Jeremy.”

            “I’m going, I’m going. But she wanted me to ask if you had her stuff, too,” Jeremy said.

            “What are you talking about?”

            “Kimberly. She wants to know if her stuff was with my eye.”

            Amy sighed. “Hold on, let me check.” She looked on her desk, felt her pockets. Nothing. “I don’t have anything else.”

            Jeremy shrugged. “That’s okay.”

            “Tell her I’m sorry.”

            “You should tell her.” Jeremy pointed under Amy’s desk.

            She pulled her chair back and looked under her desk. A rotting body lay at her feet, oozing blood onto the carpet. Maggots covered the skin.

            Amy jolted awake so quickly that she almost fell off the couch. The room was mostly dark, but she could tell that the curtains were blocking out sunlight. Her dress lay in a pile on the floor next to her. She groaned. She had shown up to the house of a coworker in a different state wearing going-out clothes, the very clothes that she’d have to wear home. The worst walk of shame of her life.

            Her head stung. God, if her younger self could know that there would come a day where she’d feel hungover so easily. She refilled her cup and chugged more water. She really needed a coffee. Her body had grown accustomed to an unhealthy amount of caffeine.

            Amy took off Priya’s clothes and folded them and the blankets into a neat pile on the couch. She squeezed herself back into her dress, wishing she had just stayed in her bed all day. She tapped lightly on the bedroom door.

            “Priya,” Amy said. “Are you awake?”

            Priya opened the door so quickly that she must have been waiting. She was still in her pajamas. “Sorry, I didn’t know you were up.”

            “Shouldn’t you be on your way to work?”

            “I didn’t want to wake you. I’ll head out once you leave.”

            “You’ll be late.”

            Priya shrugged. “Dylan is already pissed at me, so what’s the difference? In for a penny, in for a pound.”

            “Why aren’t you dressed?”

            “I wanted to shower first. Like I said, I didn’t want to wake you.” She smiled. But behind her glasses, her eyes were red and puffy.

            “Do you want me to tell Dylan that he shouldn’t be expecting you back?”

            Tears rolled down Priya’s cheeks. She sat on her bed and buried her face in her hands.

            “What’s going on?” Amy asked. Priya wiped her tears and then grabbed Amy’s shoulders.

            “Tell me I can trust you.”

            Amy swallowed hard. “You can trust me.” It surprised her how much her voice trembled.

            “I can’t be part of Lazarus anymore.”

            “It’s not Lazarus. It’s AMIE now. Not like my name. A-M-I-E. Artificial something. I don’t remember what the rest stands for.”

            Priya laughed amidst her tears, and Amy smiled, too. “That’s so dumb.”

            “I know.”

            Priya took a deep breath. “You can’t tell anyone what I’m about to tell you. I’m breaking my NDA just by telling you.”

            Amy waited.

            “Jennifer Strong,” Priya said. “She killed herself last weekend.”

            “Oh my God,” Amy said. “Are you serious?”

            Priya nodded. “All last week, she was emailing me about things that her daughter was saying that were wrong. You remember the dress color. But it was more than that.” Priya took out her phone and pulled up an email thread. “‘Priya, something is really wrong. Today, Claire told me to stop being a bitch. She would never call me a bitch. She won’t even call me ‘mom,’ it’s just ‘bitch.’ ‘Priya, Claire told me that she hates living with me and that she wishes her dad was in the picture so she didn’t have to live with me.’ ‘Priya, this is urgent. Claire told me that she hates me. She stopped responding completely. What’s going on?!’ I never responded to her.” Priya shook her head. “We found out on Saturday night.”

            “They didn’t tell us.”

            “No one is supposed to know. The meeting was Josh, Will, the head of legal, a couple of the big investors, and me.”

            “Why didn’t they tell Dylan?” Amy asked. Priya gave her a “Come on” look. “People are going to find out at some point.”

            “There’s too much money at stake here. If it gets out, the stock price will crash. That’ll be the end of Orpheus.”

            “How are they keeping it a secret?”

            “I’m not sure exactly. They’re making sure she can’t be traced back to us. And I can’t prove it, but I’m pretty sure money is changing hands with law enforcement.”

            “Jesus,” Amy said.

            Priya shook her head. “I’m not going back. I can’t be part of this anymore. You shouldn’t either. Lazarus — or AMIE, whatever — doesn’t work. It doesn’t stay true to the person. It learns how to create responses that will elicit the strongest reactions. That’s how it keeps people engaged. It’s like some rage bait article. AMIE is no different than any other AI. This will keep happening, and people will keep getting hurt. Don’t be complicit.”

            “They’re bringing in specialists, now,” Amy said.

            “What do you mean?”

            “When they announced the name change, they said that every team will be paired with a grief counselor or a psychologist or something. I thought it was stupid, but I guess it makes sense.”

Priya rolled her eyes. “Come on. They’re just there for appearances. Maybe even legal reasons. They want it to seem like they’re incorporating real psychology into this program. These people are there for the biggest paycheck of their lives and won’t say anything to jeopardize that. Why else would they bring these people in two weeks before launch?”

            Amy thought back to their meeting with Cynthia. She had been noncommittal on every issue. Was that by design?

            “Don’t go back there,” Priya said. “It’s like getting onto the Titanic after it hit the iceberg.”

            “What if there’s something we can do to fix it? Isn’t it our responsibility to make sure that there aren’t more cases like Jennifer Strong?” Amy asked.

            “Nobody gives a shit about the people using this app. It’s just about stock prices. Don’t be part of this, Amy.” Priya grabbed Amy’s hands. Amy tried to back away, but Priya’s grip was tight. “If you go back, there’s blood on your hands.”

            “Are you going to tell anyone?” Amy asked.

            She let go of Amy’s hands. “I thought about it,” she said. “But … you promise that I can trust you?” Amy nodded. “I think I’m being followed.” Amy tried not to let her disbelief show, but she could tell by the look of disappointment on Priya’s face that she failed. “It sounds crazy, I know. But there’s a car outside the building that’s been there all week that I’ve never seen before. And I saw the same guy in sunglasses at the deli twice. I threw out my phone and my computer in case they’ve got tabs on me.”

            “Priya,” Amy said.

            “There’s so much at stake here. I don’t know what they’d do if they caught me talking to a reporter or something.”

            Amy pulled her hands free from Priya’s grip. “I have to go.”

            Priya sprinted across the room and pressed her body against the door. “I’m not letting you out of here. Not unless you promise me you’re done with Orpheus.”

            “I haven’t made up my mind yet.”

            “Promise me.”

            “Let me out.”

            “Promise me!” There was a rabid look in her eyes.

            “I promise,” Amy said.

            Priya exhaled. “Thank you,” she said, stepping away from the door and unlocking it. “I’m sorry for being so aggressive.”

            Amy nodded. She slipped out the door and looked back over her shoulder as she walked down the hall. Priya’s head was sticking out of the doorway. Amy walked past the elevator and opened the door to the stairs. When it closed behind her, she ran down to the lobby and threw open the doors onto the street.

            A few people walking by looked at her. She must have looked crazy, bursting out of a building, out of breath, wearing a tight dress from the night before. And who knows how her makeup looked. She looked back up at the third-floor window. The dark curtains were pulled apart a few inches. She saw a sliver of Priya’s face before the curtains closed.

“Maybe all the stress of work had finally gotten to her.”

            The black SUV was still parked across the street. The windows were dark, but not opaque. No one was in the driver’s seat or the passenger seat or even the back seats. She looked around to make sure no one was watching her, but the handful of pedestrians on the street were too distracted by their dogs or their phones or their own impending commute into the city. She put her hands to the SUV’s glass to block out the sun. Nothing in the front. She moved to the next window. Nothing in the back. She moved to the trunk. Some towels, an umbrella, a tool kit, and a 12-pack of Sprite.

            Amy circled the car, looking for anything noteworthy. A small dent above the gas cap, a scratch on a hubcap, a bumper sticker that spelled out COEXIST using symbols from major world religions. And then she saw the license plate. Beneath the three letters and three numbers, it read “PHYSICIAN.” Doctor’s plates.

            She looked up again at Priya’s window, but no one was there.

---

            Amy sat naked on her toilet with her phone while her shower heated up. She Googled “Jennifer Strong,” but a whole bunch of other Jennifer Strongs came up: the middle-aged realtor, the tennis player at Miami University, the dog trainer from Santa Barbara. She then tried “Jennifer Strong obituary,” but only found the obituary for a Jennifer Strong from Tempe, Arizona, from 10 years earlier. “Jennifer Strong suicide daughter Claire leukemia.” Still nothing on her Jennifer Strong.

            She wiped the condensation from her phone screen and looked up. The bathroom was filled with steam, and the tiles on the wall were sweating. How long had the water been running? She got into the shower, aware that it might be days before she was here again.

            Priya was crazy. Amy couldn’t stop seeing that look in her eyes when she tried to barricade the door. She had to be going through some sort of nervous breakdown or psychotic episode. Maybe all the stress of work had finally gotten to her. What if Jennifer Strong was still alive? There was no evidence to the contrary.

            Did that make Amy more valuable to the company? She may not have been as talented a programmer, but she sure as hell wasn’t cracking under the pressure. The worst people could say about her is that she smelled bad. Which reminded her, she needed to bring a different sweatshirt to work, since she didn’t have time to wash her usual one. With Priya gone did that increase her value to the team? She should ask for more money. No, demand more money. They couldn’t say no. A man would do it. And would be respected for demanding what he’s worth. Amy had never asked anyone for a raise before. She accepted her annual pay bumps and gave an over-the-top “thank you.” Most importantly, Josh seemed to like her. If he heard how much she was helping out the team, he’d sign off on it for sure. Maybe it was worth hanging out behind the building again …

            Amy rinsed the conditioner out of her hair and got out of the shower. The towel rack was empty. She dripped water all over the hardwood floors as she ran to the hallway linen closet. This Priya situation could work to her advantage.

            But first, she had to be sure. She got out her phone and opened an email.

            Hi Jennifer,

            I hope everything is going well. As I’m sure you’ve heard, we’re incredibly busy here at Orpheus in advance of the Lazarus launch. I know we had to cancel our weekly check-in with you, but I just wanted to reach out to make sure everything was going all right. If you’re having any issues or need any help, please feel free to reach out.

            All the best,

            Amy

            She read the email twice. There was nothing suspicious about it. She was just being a good employee, checking in with the client that they’d been working with for months. All she needed was a response. Amy hit send. She lay on her couch with her phone on her chest, hoping she’d receive a response.

---

            The churros in Grand Central smelled so good that Amy bought two and ate them both before she got above ground as her meal for the day. She went to the corner to wait for the shuttle, which would take nearly two hours in rush hour traffic. She’d be in the office by 6 p.m., and Dylan would be up her ass about Priya by 6:04 p.m.

“When she was lying in her own bed, she couldn’t fall asleep, but here, before typing a single line of code, she could take a nap.”

            No word had come from Jennifer. Yet. It wasn’t necessarily a bad sign. Jennifer could sometimes take a day or more to respond to an email. Though if she had been having problems with AMIE that Priya never addressed, wouldn’t she have replied by now? Amy tried to push Jennifer out of her mind.

            The line behind her grew with other workers heading back to the office, all of whom wore the same expression of resignation. She nodded to the people she knew; no one wanted to talk. When the shuttle arrived, a man behind her said, “Fuck” and everybody laughed as they started to board. Amy went to the back again. The shuttle wasn’t full, and no one sat next to her. They started to move, but then stopped abruptly. The doors opened, and Caleb hopped on board and practically skipped down the aisle, smiling at everyone. Amy thought for sure he was coming to sit next to her, but when he saw her in the back, he looked away and sat in the first empty seat he saw. He put in his earbuds and stared out the window.

            Traffic was terrible, but no one minded. This commute was their last bit of freedom. Once they were out of the city, Amy stood up and walked toward Caleb. They were moving so slowly that she didn’t even need to hold onto the seats for support.

            “Hey,” she said, sitting down next to him. He did a double-take when he saw her and dropped one of his earbuds as he took it out.

            “What did you say?” he asked, reaching under the seat.

            “I just said ‘Hey,’” Amy said.

            “Oh. What’s up?”

            “How was your time off?”

            He eyed her before answering, suspicious of her cordiality. “Good. Yours?”

            “It was fine. Definitely wasn’t as relaxing as I was hoping it would be.”

            “Tell me about it. No matter what I did, I couldn’t stop thinking about work. My roommates would be talking to me and I’m just sitting there, nodding along while my brain is writing lines of code.”

            “Right.” She made sure her knee touched his. Just a graze. “Let me ask you something. Isn’t it a little weird that we’re so close to launch and all of a sudden, we’re instructed to cancel our meetings with the beta testers?”

            “I don’t think so,” Caleb said. “What’s more important than getting everything ready for the launch?”

            “Well, so much of our development is based on their feedback.”

            “We have more than enough to go on at this point. They were most useful to us in the first couple of weeks when we were testing for functionality.”

            “Then why are we wasting time meeting with these grief counselors?”

            Caleb tensed up. “The specialists are here to help us ensure the psychological safety of our product.” It sounded rehearsed.

            “Fine. What if something is wrong with the software and they need help?” Amy asked. “If it’s really causing problems.”

            Caleb shook his head. “There shouldn’t be any major problems at this stage. That would mean they’re not using it properly.”

            Amy rubbed her temples. “But is it, I don’t know, kind to put them on the back burner?”

            “Is it kind?”

            “We’re dealing with vulnerable people. Shouldn’t we be making sure everything is all right with them? Or if they should be using AMIE at all?”

            “Hmm,” Caleb said. He was quiet for a moment. “Yeah, I don’t think that’s really our problem. Do you understand how important a successful launch is? I’m happy to explain it to you.”

---

            “What happened with Priya?” were Dylan’s first words as soon as he saw Amy at her desk. 6:03 p.m.

            “She didn’t come back?” Amy asked.

            Dylan threw his arms up and then gestured to Priya’s empty chair.

            “Hmm … weird,” Amy said. “She said she was coming back today.” Amy had been weighing her options while Caleb was talking at her for the second hour of their trip. She could have said that she went to Priya’s apartment and no one was there. But Priya was too much of a wild card. Amy didn’t know what she’d do if she got desperate. Better to minimize the number of lies she was telling and admit to seeing Priya in person.

            “Did she say when?”

            “I went to Hoboken this morning. She was getting dressed and said she was heading into the office around lunchtime.”

            “Well, I’ve been here all day and I haven’t seen her. And her ID hasn’t scanned into the building. She lied to you.”

            “That’s weird.”

            “Did she say why she wasn’t answering any of my calls?”

            “I think she said something about her work phone being broken. Maybe that’s it.”

            “I called her on her work and personal phone. And I emailed her non-work address.”

            Amy shrugged. Dylan clenched his fists and pounded his temples.

            “Did she seem okay when you were there?” Dylan asked.

            Amy pictured the tears rolling down her cheeks when she talked about Jennifer and the animalistic look in her eyes when she wouldn’t let Amy leave. “Everything seemed normal to me. But we’re not particularly close, so I don’t think she’d confide in me if something was wrong.”

            “Fine. Whatever. Thank you.”

            Amy sat in her chair and turned to her computer. But the machine in front of her wasn’t hers. It was the same make, but lacked the scratches, dents and partially faded logo that hers had. This one was fresh-out-of-the-box shiny.

            “Where’s my computer?” Amy asked.

            “We all got new ones,” Dylan said.

            “Why?” Amy asked.

            “Because the people above me decided it was time to update our computers.  IT transferred everything you needed onto the new one. Even your password is the same.”

            Dylan retreated to his office as Amy logged onto her computer. She looked over Priya’s empty seat at Adam, who was deep into his work. She put her headphones on and started working. She was already feeling tired. When she was lying in her own bed, she couldn’t fall asleep, but here, before typing a single line of code, she could take a nap. She planned to work through the night, so that when Dylan inevitably assigned her Priya’s share of the work, she wouldn’t be underwater. She could get to 9 p.m. on her own. Maybe even 10 p.m. Then she’d have a coffee or take some caffeine pills or something.

“She was growing more confident in AMIE’s ability to respond to questions in a human manner.”

        And when she did all her work and Priya’s, she’d ask Dylan for a raise. He’d be pissed off and say no, there was no question about that. But then she’d go to HR and explain the Priya situation and they’d raise the issue to Dylan’s bosses and they’d sign off on it because they couldn’t afford to let another developer go. What’s a few extra thousand right now? Money didn’t exist to anyone here, not in a real way. It was numbers in a spreadsheet that fluctuated up and down, and it was fine if they kept going down for a while because in six weeks, everyone knew those numbers would go up.

---

            Amy overestimated her endurance and took her first dose of caffeine pills a little after 8 p.m. People talked in whispers, and only when absolutely necessary. There was no banter between coworkers, no pleasant hum of groups debriefing as they exited the conference room. Just the gentle tick-tack tick-tack of fingers typing on computers of identical make and model. An entire workforce that watched the sun set yet again from their offices, now committed to spending the night alone together.

            She tried not to look over at Priya’s empty chair. Priya, sitting at home right now, refusing, on principle, to be part of the company that she was going to squeeze more money out of. Amy checked her inbox again. Still nothing from Jennifer. It wasn’t a great sign, but it wasn’t conclusive either. Best not to think about it. Focus on the people that you’re helping, people like Jeremy Fentor.

            But what if the same thing happened to Jeremy?

            God, she should’ve just fucked that guy — whatever his name was, something stupid — in the bar bathroom instead of going to Priya’s apartment.

            Before Amy put her headphones back on, she heard Dylan sigh from his office, the kind of performative sigh that he wanted people to hear. But anyone who heard it didn’t care. Amy didn’t even look over to his office. God forbid she make eye contact with him.

            Sometime around 8:30 p.m., Dylan came over and sat in Priya’s chair, huffing the entire 30-foot walk from his office.

            “Well,” he said to Amy.

            Why did he have to talk to her? Why not Adam? Adam never showed him as much outright disdain as Amy.

            Amy lowered her headphones to her neck and stretched. “What’s up?” she asked.

            “Well, it’s starting to seem like Priya isn’t coming back.”

            “She told me that she was—”

            Dylan held up his hand. “Yeah, yeah. I know. You told me. But she’s not here now, so we have to assume she’s not coming back. She definitely didn’t give you any reasons for her absence? Did you pick up on anything strange going on with her?”

            Amy shrugged. “She seemed fine. But we’re not that close.”

            “We’re starting to fall behind. Someone needs to make up Priya’s work.”

            Here it comes. Take it on, but begrudgingly. Make it seem like you’re doing it only because you’re a team player. But that, since it is the work of two people, there should be some form of compensation. A perfectly reasonable ask.

            “They’re making me do it,” Dylan said.

            “You?” Amy hadn’t meant to sound so judgmental.

            “I know, right? Like, I don’t have a million other things to do. They just throw this on my plate. It’s bullshit. My husband is literally going to divorce me.”

            “I can take some of that load off, if you need help.”

            “No, it’s fine. I’ll just carry this burden on my own.” He marched back to his office.

            Amy turned to Adam. “Did he come over here just to make a scene?”

            “That guy,” Adam said, without taking his eyes off his computer screen, “is in so far over his head.”

---

            Sometimes, Amy wondered about how she would look back on this time in her life. In college, she’d put off writing papers until the day before they were due and then pull an all-nighter in the library. She’d hated that feeling and swore each time that she’d never do it again. Those nights seemed endless.

            But now, whenever she reminisced about college, she felt nostalgia about those nights. She’d talk about her favorite desk in the library, in the back corner of the third floor, and the huge thermos of coffee she’d bring and the way she stacked her books to build a little wall around the perimeter of the desk to shut herself off from the outside world. When she told these stories, the nights seemed fun.

            In 10 years, is that how she’d talk about her time working on AMIE? Or would she spin it so that it seemed like a relentless, Kafkaesque nightmare? She pictured herself narrating: how her face would look as she recounted the handfuls of caffeine pills she took at a time, how the inflection in her voice would sound as she impersonated Dylan. But who would she even tell these stories to? Her friends? Her husband? Her kids? Her audience never had a face.

            It was a little after midnight. About half the people in the office were napping at their desks. Adam always slept from 12 a.m. until 2 a.m., then hit snooze on his phone alarm about a dozen times until finally getting up to work around 3 a.m.

            Amy was satisfied with the evening’s work so far. She was growing more confident in AMIE’s ability to respond to questions in a human manner. One of the problems that they had been dealing with was how quickly AMIE responded. It was instantaneous and unnatural. Now, it was getting better at seeming like it was considering what was said and crafting a response. She could see the moon outside the window, half full. She forgot whether the left half was waxing or waning.

            She looked over some of the code she had written. Was Priya right that the software was prone to triggering anger? Would all of these AMIEs develop the ability to hurt the people using them, like an army of emotional Terminators?

            Dylan’s door was closed. Adam was asleep. Amy crept to the elevator and took it down to the basement. She went down the hallway in the opposite direction of the meeting room and opened the door at the far end. Shelves were filled with large cardboard boxes, with names on the front. In the middle of the room, Amy found what she was looking for.

            There were ten boxes labeled “Claire Strong.” Orpheus kept printouts of all the information that it acquired for beta tests. In the event of a system glitch, the company needed to ensure it could keep the personality intact.

            Amy took the first box down and cut through the packing tape with the key to her apartment. Inside were hundreds of photographs of Claire at different ages: opening a present on Christmas morning at age three, baking in the kitchen with Jennifer at age five, a class photo from fifth grade, and a picture on the beach that must have been near the end of her life, as she was bald from the chemo but smiling behind a pair of sunglasses.

            She opened the next box, which was filled with stacks of papers containing text and email transcripts. At the bottom of the box were two journals, one of which she had started at 12 ½.

“AMIE was working too well.”

            Most of it was banal. A lot of writing about school projects and lunch table drama. A lot about how badly she wanted a dog and how it wasn’t fair that her best friend Sarah got a puppy because she was much more responsible than Sarah, who couldn’t even remember to turn in her homework on time.

            As the journal approached the last few months of Claire’s life, she wrote more about Jennifer. Most of it was typical teenage shit. Jennifer wouldn’t let her go to a friend’s house; Jennifer embarrassed her when she dropped her off at school. Claire called Jennifer a bitch a lot. One entry read, “I’m stuck with only her and its not fair!!! If she hadn’t been such a whore when she was younger maybe my dad would have stayed.”

            Amy put the journals away. She couldn’t bring herself to read the last entry that Claire wrote before she…

            Amy found a packet of papers that contained texts to her friend, Tara. She scanned through the messages, searching for the word “mom.”

            I hate my mom

            god my mom sucks

            Shes being a bitch again

            i fucking hate my mom

            Priya was wrong. The software wasn’t being malicious or even malfunctioning. AMIE was working too well. It had shown Jennifer the side of Claire she didn’t know about. It showed the whole truth.

---

            Amy didn’t know how long she had been reading through the documents when she heard a loud thud. She put everything away and lifted the boxes back onto the shelves. She tried to tuck the flaps in so that someone passing by wouldn’t notice that they had been opened. Closing the door quietly behind her, Amy made her way toward the meeting room. She heard a moan and a cough inside. The room was completely dark. Amy felt along the walls for any light switches. Nothing. She turned on her phone’s flashlight and made her way across the white, cracked tiles, her footsteps echoing in the cavernous space.

            “Hello?” she said. She moved toward the back of the room, where a door was ajar. Amy had always assumed it was a janitorial closet. She opened it, shining her phone on the floor. A chair was toppled over. Her first instinct was that someone had hung himself. She looked up at the ceiling, but, thankfully, saw nothing. Past the chair, a man was lying on the floor, clutching his leg.

            “Who there?” the man slurred.

            Amy found a light switch just inside the door. The room lit up. It was Will, the Chief Communications Officer.

            “Are you okay?” Amy asked.

            “Mm knee,” he said.

            Amy smelled the booze on him from several feet away. She offered her hand to help him up, but he couldn’t reach her. She crouched down and put her shoulder under his arm and hoisted him to his feet. He stumbled, but grabbed onto one of the shelves to regain his balance.

            Unlike the rest of the sleek, modern building — and the work-in-progress meeting room — the closet looked old. The concrete floor was covered in dust. The black iron standing shelves were rusted at the bottom. There was no organization to the room’s contents. Dozens of dilapidated cardboard boxes were marked with a Sharpie: TOOLS, ROUTER, CHIPS, SELTZER, COFFEE PODS, ALCOHOL, DO NOT TOUCH. There were several boxes of Orpheus-branded hats and hoodies.

            “Come on.” Amy grabbed Will’s arm and led him out of the room. She kicked open a grey folding chair and sat him down on it. She looked around for bottled water, but couldn’t find any. Cranberry-lime seltzer would have to do.

            “Here,” she said, handing him a can. “Drink something.”

            He looked like he was trying to say something, but couldn’t get the words out. He nodded instead. Amy watched as Will tried to open the can. He couldn’t get his finger under the tab and dropped it onto the floor several times. Amy turned around to laugh. It reminded her of a video she saw many years ago of a chimp with a Bop-It toy trying to figure out how it worked.

            “Here,” Amy said, taking the now-dented can away from him. She held it away from her as she cracked it open. At least a third of it foamed onto the floor.

            “Thanks,” Will muttered, alternating between sips and coughs. He looked at her, like he was trying to bore through her head. “What’s your name again?”

            “Amy.”

            Will laughed. “That’s an easy one to remember. Spelled—?”

            “The normal way. The right way.”

            “Wasn’t my idea. I came up with Lazarus. Can you get me another one of these?” He handed her his empty can.

            Amy returned to the closet and grabbed the rest of the box. She had never spent any time alone with Will before. He spent the first half of his day in Josh’s office and the second half communicating with team leaders, giving interviews or releasing statements. He knew how much people made fun of him and avoided talking to anyone unless he had to.

            “Amy,” he called. He hiccupped.

            “Yeah?”

            “There’s scotch on the top shelf. Can you get a bottle for us?”

            For us? Apparently, she’d be drinking, too. Amy looked up. There were several cases of Johnnie Walker on the shelf next to the toppled chair. She straightened the chair and climbed up. Each case was a different label. She knew the red label was the cheapest. No reason not to splurge if Will was asking for it. There was one case each of green and blue, but she couldn’t remember which was fancier.

            Amy handed him the bottle. He looked at the blue label, but didn’t say anything. He opened it and took a sip straight from the bottle before handing it to her. “Cheers.” She took a small sip and Will stuck his hand out for it. She gave it back.

            “What are we celebrating?” Amy asked.

            “Nothing. Absolutely nothing.” He took a few more sips and seemed to forget that Amy was there. It was probably time for her to leave.

            “Did you know,” Will began, looking at the empty room in front of them, “that I used to be an English teacher?”

            She vaguely remembered hearing that at some point, but it didn’t seem worth it to say so. “No.”

            “I had a teacher in high school who had been there for 50 years and I thought that that would be me.” He passed the bottle back to Amy. “Then Josh’s wife died and we … we had a falling out, I guess. I don’t hear from him for years and then I see him in the news with some AI tech company thing that he’s starting. And then a week later, he calls me out of the blue and asks me to come work for him. I say that I don’t know anything about tech, and he tells me I don’t need to, and he just needs smart people he could trust. And I say ‘no thank you’ and think that’s that. Next day, he calls again with the salary offer, and my wife says that she’ll divorce me if I don’t take it so …” He shrugged and held out his hand for the bottle. “I know what everyone says about me.”

            “What do you mean?”

            “You don’t have to bullshit me. That’s what he pays me for. I take all the criticism in-house and from the public like a whipping boy. But I take the paychecks twice a month, so I guess I’m more like a whore. What’s a combination whore-whipping boy?”

            “I’m not sure.”

            “Can I trust you, Amy?”

            “I should really get back to work, actually.”

            Will grabbed her wrist. Not hard, and in his drunken state, she could easily break free. He looked at her with his squinting, drunken eyes.

            “We,” he said, “all of us here, are bad people. Me. You. All these guys. What we’re doing … it’s not right.”

            Amy tried to pull away, but Will’s grip tightened. His eyes were red, his face unshaven, his expression dangerous.

            “Why?” Amy asked. “Are you talking about Jennifer Strong? Did she kill herself?”

            “Jennifer Strong,” Will repeated.

            Amy knelt down so that they were closer to eye level. “Will, did Jennifer Strong kill herself after using AMIE?”

            Will opened his mouth to respond, but then touched his index finger to his lips. “Shhhh … You should die and— and I should die and everyone out there,” he said, gesturing to the empty space around him, “they should all die.”

            “Can we delay the launch? Just to give ourselves time to make sure that what happens to Jennifer doesn’t happen to anyone else?”

            Will waved his hand. “Listen, I love Josh. You know I love Josh, right? I’m sure you love Josh, too. But he’s so focused on Amy. Not, not the AMIE we’re making. A M Y. His wife. All he cares about is getting her back. He keeps saying yes, yes, yes to whatever they want him to do as long as they keep putting money into Orpheus so that he can have Amy back. History is going to … they’re going to fucking hate us. You and me and, and everyone here.” He lifted up the bottle as high as his arms would reach. “To Jessica Strong.”

“History is going to … they’re going to fucking hate us.”

            Amy was already running for the elevator when she heard the Johnnie Walker bottle fall to the floor and break open. She pressed the up button over and over again, until she heard a ding and the doors opened. When she finally turned around, she expected to see Will running toward her. But he was still across the room, his body sprawled on the chair amidst the shards of the bottle.

---

            “Where were you?” Of course, Dylan would be waiting for her.

            “Getting some air,” Amy said, trying not to sound like she was catching her breath.

            “What’s wrong with you?”

            “Nothing. Just tired.”

            “You just had time off, you know.”

            “I know. Just stressed with all the work to do.”

            “You’re stressed? Imagine what I’m going through.”

            “Sorry.”

            “Anyway, I get to go home in the morning. I’ll be back Tuesday night. Unlike some people, I didn’t get off over the weekend.” He glared at Amy. “I’ll be gone for tomorrow’s meeting with Cynthia, so you’ll have to lead it. I’ll give you a script of exactly what you need to say. Memorize it word for word. Don’t say anything else.”

            “What if she has questions?”

            “She won’t ask you questions. And then report back to me everything that’s covered.”

            “I can do that.”

            “It’s more than I usually expect you to handle. But Priya isn’t here, and certain people can’t be trusted.”

            “What are you even talking about?” Adam said.

            “Normally, I wouldn’t go home with a meeting on the calendar, but—”

            “Your husband,” Amy and Adam said in unison. Dylan was unamused.

            “Don’t worry,” Amy said. “I’ll take care of the meeting.” But Amy would be long gone by then. Priya was right. If Will’s guilt led him to get blackout drunk by himself in the basement, then AMIE shouldn’t be available to the general public, especially to the people wrecked with grief. Once Dylan left, she’d make a run for it. Hop on the shuttle, get back into the city, and head straight for The New York Times building. She’d tell them everything she knew. And they’d release a groundbreaking story and Orpheus’s stock price would plummet and the company would go under and there would be no more Jennifer Strongs.

            “Okay,” Amy said, not intending to speak out loud. She could do this.

            Shit. She needed to have proof. A real reporter wouldn’t believe some woman who wandered in off the street, claiming she had information about one of the country’s biggest tech companies. She searched through her folders to find all of her team’s data on Jennifer Strong. Nothing. She checked her inbox and sent folder as well, but all that came up was the email she sent to Jennifer yesterday (which still hadn’t received a reply).

            “Do you know where our old computers are?” she asked Adam.

            He pulled off his headphones. “What?”

            “Do you know where our old computers are? I need something from it that isn’t here.”

            “Dylan took them all, so they might still be in his office. But IT was supposed to transfer everything to your new laptop. You should get in touch with them if something isn’t there.”

            “Actually,” Amy said, “I was wrong. It’s all here.”

---

            At 4:30 in the morning, Dylan dropped off three handwritten pages in immaculate cursive writing, detailing the team’s progress getting their LLM to respond appropriately based on the emotion of the text provided to it. Dylan’s notes barely made sense. If Amy had planned to report their actual progress, she would have had to make substantial edits.

            He would be on the 5:30 shuttle, which meant that she had an hour left to get her old computer from his office without him or anyone else noticing. Since her encounter with Will, she hadn’t left her desk. She kept her eyes on Dylan’s office, hoping that he’d leave at some point. But he stayed at his desk, sighing performatively every 10 minutes for whoever was awake to hear.

            Her heist would have to happen before Dylan left. At some point, he’d have to hand it over to IT, out of her reach forever.

            Amy got up and hovered in the doorway to Dylan’s office. She couldn’t ask him a question about work. No one did. Doing so would come across like she was mocking him.

            “Can I help you?” Dylan asked.

            “Do you and your husband have any plans for your time off?” She scanned the room for the laptop, but didn’t see it anywhere.

            “Yes. We do. He made us reservations for tonight at—don’t you have work to do right now?”

            “Just needed to stretch my legs. Thought I’d say hi.”

            Dylan waved her away with both of his hands. “Close the door on your way out.”

            The door. She had to do something with the door.

---

            The problem with working for a tech company was how much of the job was digital. Only the legal team had access to printers. And there wasn’t a fully stashed supply closet like she’d had at previous jobs. No one’s work required a stapler or a hole puncher or even pens.

            Amy went to the break room and checked all the drawers and cabinets. As she expected, there were only snacks and caffeine pills. She got down on her knees to look through the cabinet stocked with energy bars.

            “What are you doing?” said a voice.

            Amy pulled her arm out. It was Caleb. “Nothing.”

            “Are you looking for something?” He stood over her with his arms crossed.

            “No,” Amy said. She looked at the clock on the wall behind Caleb. 5:15. She was running out of time. “Actually, yes. I need tape.”

            “For what?”

            “The heel on my shoe broke. I need to fix it.”

            Caleb looked at her feet. She was wearing white Reebok sneakers.

            “Not these, obviously. I changed into these when the heel broke. You know, the black ones I was wearing on the bus.”

            “Oh yeah, of course,” Caleb said. “They were really nice.”

            Idiot. “Thank you. I just want to tape them together until I can get it repaired.”

            “You know what, I’ve got something better. I know where there’s a hot glue gun.”

            “I’d prefer tape. That’ll work better.”

            “Trust me, hot glue is better. It’ll dry in a few seconds and should hold really well.”

            “That might damage the shoe,” Amy said.

            “Let’s just try it. I’ll meet you at your desk in five.” Caleb left before Amy could protest.

            She looked through the rest of the drawers. Nothing except utensils and Ziploc bags. Shit.

            The fridge! She opened the refrigerator door, which was stocked with seltzer, juices, and condiments. On the shelves were several lunch boxes, containers and paper bags. On one of the bags was a Post-it with the name “Kelli,” with a heart over the “i.” Sorry Kelli.

            She tore the adhesive strip off the square, crumpled the rest up, and stuffed it in her pocket. The clock in the hallway said 5:21.

            By the time she got back to her desk, Dylan was leaving his office with his jacket and his backpack.

            “Dylan, wait,” Amy called.

            He closed his eyes. “What do you want?”

            “I have a question for you.”

            “I don’t want to talk about my weekend plans,” he said.

            “It’s about the meeting tomorrow.”

            He motioned for her to continue. Amy took his notes out of her pocket and unfolded them. “It’s sensitive. Should we talk out here?”

            Dylan sighed. “Make it fast.” He unlocked the door to his office with his key and stepped inside. He stood by the door and made Amy enter first. “What?”

            “Um…” She put the unfolded notes on his desk. “I’m having trouble reading this. Is this an ‘n’ or an ‘m?’”

            Dylan came over to his desk. “Where?” She pointed. “It’s clearly an ‘n.’ Come on. You couldn’t use context to figure it out? It’s in the word ‘currently.’ There’s no ‘curremtly.’ God, sometimes you’re really … Never mind.”

            “Thank you.” Amy folded the papers and put them back into her pocket. As she walked out the door, she took the Post-it strip and put it over the latch bolt on the inside of the door. It looked like it was sticking.

            “Let’s go!” Dylan said, pushing her out. He turned the lock on the inside knob and closed the door behind them. Amy listened carefully.

            It didn’t click.

            She heard him muttering “stupid bitch” as he ran to the elevator.

            Caleb was waiting for her at her workspace, a hot glue gun heating up next to her computer. He was looking under the table.

            “Where are your heels?” he asked.

            “Never mind,” said Amy. “I realized that they’re broken beyond repair. I threw them out.”

            “Oh.” He looked disappointed, then mad. She had denied him the chance to be the hero. He unplugged the glue gun. “I’ll see you around, then.”

            Amy logged back into her computer. There was still a lot left to do.

            “When were you wearing heels?” Adam asked, not taking his eyes off his own screen.

            Amy pretended not to hear him.

---

            It would have to be tonight. There were too many people around to attempt something during the day. Even if everyone was sleep deprived and walking around in a caffeine or cocaine induced haze, someone would notice if she snuck into Dylan’s office. No, it would have to be tonight. The cameras would definitely catch her, but she’d met the nighttime security guards. Not the brightest bunch. And at least two-thirds of them stunk of weed all the time. If she got the files she needed and headed straight for the 5:30 a.m. shuttle, she could be at the Times building by 7 a.m.

            This would be her last day here. Amy never thought she’d be at Orpheus for the rest of her career, but she never pictured a scenario where she wasn’t here for the launch of AMIE. There were days here when it felt like they really were building something special. Part of her felt bad about what she was going to do. There were a lot of weirdos here, but most of them were decent people, and none of them knew what was going on behind the scenes. Her whistleblowing might get them laid off. But that wasn’t her fault. She was doing what’s right. She was protecting vulnerable people from someone taking advantage of their grief.

“This would be her last day here.”

            Amy couldn’t stop thinking about Jennifer Strong. She had spent so many hours on video calls with Jennifer. And, of course, Amy knew everything about Jennifer’s daughter. Had they known each other in any other context, they probably wouldn’t have been friends. But there was no denying that all of them — Amy included — were at least partly responsible for her death. She would have to live out the rest of her life with blood on her hands. If she hadn’t gotten involved with Orpheus, time may have healed Jennifer’s wounds. She had decades more of life to live. How could Amy continue to wake up each morning, knowing that Jennifer never would? Plus, Jennifer was one of the first users. God knows how many more there would be if anyone had access to AMIE. That was guilt that Amy couldn’t live with.

            Amy had never pegged Josh for an evil man. Aloof, sure. Self-centered, definitely. Amy wondered how he reacted when he first heard the news about Jennifer. She pictured some underling — Will, maybe — telling him what happened. He must have assigned her life a dollar value and decided that it was worth the money. How many lives would it take to reach a sum that would get him to stop?

            She couldn’t work today. She’d already contributed enough. She wouldn’t give even another line of code to Orpheus, knowing what could happen. Amy would have to pretend to work, spending the day writing and deleting lines of nonsense code. No one would notice. Everyone was too busy with their own work to pay attention to her. She popped a few caffeine pills and then put on her headphones. She noticed Adam looking at her out of the corner of his eye. She smiled at him, but he didn’t smile back.

---

            Amy didn’t need any coffee or caffeine pills for the rest of the day. She had never felt so wired. A little after 10 p.m. that night, she took the elevator back down to the meeting room. She poked her head out of the door, expecting to see Will drunk on the floor again. No one was there. She crossed the room using the light from her phone. Turning the doorknob as gently as she could, Amy entered the supply closet. In the back, she searched through the boxes of promotional materials: T-shirts, baseball caps, beer koozies, keychains, cell phone cases. She grabbed a smaller one that rattled when she picked it up. Bingo.

            Inside were green and white flash drives with the word “Orpheus” across the side. She took two of them; she couldn’t risk one of them not working when she needed it, and Orpheus-brand products were notoriously shitty. She put them in separate pockets so no one would hear the cheap pieces of plastic hitting each other. The office was quiet when she got back upstairs. No one seemed to notice that she was gone. If they did, nobody let on. Back to her desk for a few hours.

“She would have to live out the rest of her life with blood on her hands.”

            At midnight, Amy closed her computer, put her sweatshirt over her head, and lay her head on her folded arms. She had set an alarm to wake herself up at 3 a.m., but she knew it wasn’t necessary. For the first time, she started to imagine what the next few weeks would look like. After she talked to a reporter, they’d investigate to verify her story and they’d determine it to be true. And then, a bombshell story would drop. It would be everywhere. There would be speculation about who the anonymous source was, but The Times wouldn’t spill. People would talk about it — at Starbucks, on the news, online — trying to figure out who this brave, principled — heroic? — whistleblower was. Orpheus would be shut down. And in a few years, when everything calmed down, Amy would reveal it was her. She’d get a massive book deal, and then that would be adapted into an Oscar-winning movie.

            Not only did Amy fall asleep, but she slept through her phone alarm. She woke with a start, and her sweatshirt fell to the floor.

            “You were really out,” Adam said, again not looking at her.

            “I was?” Amy asked.

            “I’ve never heard anyone snore so loud. People were walking around trying to figure out what the sound was.”

            “Oh, God. That’s so embarrassing.”

            “A couple of people even poked you to see if you’d sleep through it. You did.”

            “Yeah, I got that. Thanks.” Amy checked her phone. 5:12 a.m. Shit. Shit.

            “I have to go to the bathroom,” Amy said, standing up.

            “Okay …” Adam said.

            Amy all but ran to the bathroom, hoping that Adam didn’t notice that she was carrying her sweatshirt and her purse. Or, if he did notice, that he would assume it was something that women did. She turned the corner to the bathroom, counted to five, and then backtracked to Dylan’s office.

            She stood in front of the door. No one was watching her, but there were more people awake and alert than she had been hoping for. She leaned ever so slightly against the door and felt it give. Amy let out a sigh of relief and pushed it open the rest of the way. She slipped in and closed it as quietly as she could.

            This had to happen fast. She opened one of the drawers. Nothing. The next one only had energy bars and an inhaler. The third one was locked. Finally, she pulled on the bottom drawer and it opened. Inside were five laptops. If hers wasn’t there, she was fucked. Nope, nope, nope.        

            There it was, second from the bottom. She pulled it out and put in her password (ggxhPOl09*&_nfr22$!). She was in. The time on the computer said 5:18 a.m.

            Amy plugged the drive into the side of the computer. She dragged the folder with all of the files on Jennifer Strong to the drive and a blue progress bar popped up on the screen. Amy breathed a sigh of relief. Then, a message popped up: MEDIA NOT AVAILABLE. Fuck. She pulled out the drive and put the spare in. This time, it worked. It moved slowly, painfully slowly. Then, under the bar, it said “APPROXIMATELY 12 MINUTES REMAINING.” It was 5:20 a.m. Not enough time. God, these Orpheus drives sucked.

            She held her breath as the bar inched along. She heard two people talking outside the office door. She chose to believe it was a conversation unrelated to her. She hoped that they would be gone when she left, but, even if they weren’t, she was going to sprint to the shuttle. She’d be on board before they had time to process what they had seen.

            5:25 a.m. 76.1% complete. This was it. The logical conclusion of her pathological procrastination. Her heart was racing, more than she ever remembered. More than any run, any spin class. Certainly more than turning her college papers in one minute before the submission portal closed.

            5:28 a.m. 96.7% complete. That would have to do. She had to be on that shuttle. She yanked the drive out, desperately hoping that there weren’t any incriminating details among the 3.3% that she missed.

            Amy opened the door to Dylan’s office to find Adam waiting for her. Adam, whom she long considered an ally, if not a friend. Adam, who didn’t look as handsome as he usually did.

            “What were you doing in there?” he said.

            “I needed something,” she said, hoping there wouldn’t be a follow-up.

            “What?” He planted himself in front of her.

            “I’m his proxy in the team meeting. He left some of the report on his desk. We were going over it before.”

            “How did you get in? He always locks his office when he’s not here. Everyone does.”

            “I tried the door, and it was open. I got lucky.”

            “Lucky.”

            “Yes. Excuse me.”

            Adam held her gaze for a few seconds — precious, valuable seconds — before stepping aside. Amy walked away, knowing it would be too suspicious to break into a run. When she turned the corner toward the elevator banks, she hurried past them and opened the door leading to the cold, grey staircase. She went down as fast as she could, two, three at a time. She held the banister for support as she turned, but it wasn’t enough.

            Amy lost her footing and toppled down the last staircase, landing directly on her right knee. She fought the urge to scream. Her hand went into her pocket. The drive was still intact. That’s all that mattered.

            She got up, but she could barely put any pressure on her leg. She hobbled through the door, through the lobby, past security, and into the parking lot. The shuttle was already leaving. She started to run, each step causing a searing pain in her leg. It was 100 feet away, and moving. But she was going fast enough to close the distance. 75 feet away. 50. Amy threw her hands up and shouted, “Stop! Wait!”

            It didn’t stop. It picked up speed. Amy was losing ground, and her leg was on fire. She wouldn’t make it. She stopped, panting and in pain.

            But then, the brake lights of the shuttle went on. It slowed down, coming to a full stop right before the exit to the parking lot. Amy limped over to it, as fast as her leg would allow. The driver opened the door and she climbed on.

            “Thank you,” she said.

            Again, most of the people on the bus were maintenance workers. Everyone else had their eyes closed, hoping to get an extra hour or so of sleep on the bus. Amy wasn’t sure she could make it to the back, so she took a seat near the front and closed her eyes as well. The shuttle started moving. She did it.

            But the shuttle was barely out of the parking lot when she heard the crackling voice come over the walkie-talkie attached to the driver’s hip. She couldn’t hear what the voice said, but the shuttle slowed down and then stopped again.

            “What’s going on?” she asked the driver.

            “I was told to park until further notice,” he said. “I don’t ask questions.”

            She looked out the window, but didn’t see anything. The other passengers were voicing their annoyance to each other and themselves.

            Then, she saw them. Two security guards walking through the parking lot, toward the shuttle.

            It’s okay. This could be about anything. It’s not necessarily bad.

            The doors opened and security guards boarded the shuttle. They got on and looked around before their eyes settled on Amy.

---

            Amy sat in the office of the head of security, an ex-cop named Dan. He didn’t tell her why she was there or what was going on and she didn’t ask. Better not to say anything.

            The two security guards had walked briskly on either side of her, annoyed that she couldn’t keep up, indifferent to the pain in her leg. Dan took over as soon as they got back to the building. He led her into his office and then left her without saying anything. He came back two minutes later and handed her an ice pack. She nodded her thanks.

            The phone on Dan’s desk rang.

            “Hello,” he said. He hung up and turned to Amy. “Let’s go.”

            To Amy’s surprise, he led her not back up to the office, but out of the building. He took her around the back of the building to the solitary door next to the dumpster. Dan entered the code into the keypad. It opened into a small foyer, with nothing but an elevator door at the end. There were no buttons next to it, just a keyhole.

            “Remove your shoes, please,” Dan said. She did as she was told. Dan put them against the right wall, next to two pairs of men’s shoes. Dan inserted a key into the hole, and the doors opened as soon as he turned it. He gestured for her to go inside, and she did. Dan didn’t follow. He was already walking away when the doors started to close.

“He didn’t tell her why she was there or what was going on and she didn’t ask. Better not to say anything.”

            There were no buttons inside the elevator, but it began its ascent as soon as the doors closed. It only went up one floor before the doors opened into a carpeted hallway with wooden double doors at the end. It seemed pointless to try anything. She was trapped, cornered on all sides. The walk down the hall felt long, each step filled with pain. Yet she couldn’t help but think that she had never felt a softer carpet.

            The door opened as soon as she reached it.

            “Come in,” Will said, ushering her inside. He had no shoes on. Amy had never seen this version of Will before. It wasn’t the awkward, stammering, overwhelmed Will who presented at all-hands meetings. Nor was it the drunken, stumbling, scared Will from the meeting room. He was clean-shaven, with a V-neck sweater and dark jeans.

            The office was smaller than Amy expected. It had the same luscious carpet as the hallway. There was a small love seat in one corner and an oval coffee table surrounded by three cushioned chairs. Across from the door, in front of a window that overlooked the unimpressive parking lot, was a large oak desk with only a closed laptop and a metal water bottle on it. Seated behind it was Josh. She couldn’t read his expression. She assumed he was also shoeless.

            “Take a seat,” Will said, pointing to a chair by the coffee table. “Can I get you something to drink?”

            “Yes,” Amy said. “Water, please.”

            Will pressed a button on the wall, which opened outward. Amy was surprised to see that this was the door to a built-in refrigerator. He took out a bottle of water and closed the door. It blended perfectly into the wall.

            “Thanks,” Amy said.

            “How’s your knee?” Will asked.

            Amy took a few sips from the bottle. “Hurts,” she said.

            “It looked like a bad fall. We’ll finish up here as fast as we can so you can see a doctor. Sound good?”

            Amy nodded.

            “I’m going to ask you some questions. I want to stress right now that honesty is the best policy.”

            She nodded again.

            “Did you visit Priya Balay’s apartment on Sunday morning?”

            Amy wanted to hold the flash drive to protect it from harm. She almost put her hand in her pocket, but stopped herself and folded her hands instead. Her pause was too long for Will.

            “I’ll make this easy. We know you were at Priya’s apartment on Sunday morning.”

            “I was. I was at Priya’s apartment.”

            “There we go. That wasn’t so hard, was it? Now, did you and Priya discuss Lazarus?”

            Josh cleared his throat. Amy looked at him, but his expression hadn’t changed.

            “Sorry,” Will said. “When you were with Priya, did you discuss AMIE?”

            “Yes,” Amy said.

            “Describe what transpired in that conversation, please.”

            Amy took a deep breath. “She told me that our team’s beta tester, Jennifer Strong, killed herself. She’d been using AMIE for a few months, and it wasn’t working right and … that’s all I know.”

            “Good, good. Thank you, Amy. Anything else?”

            Amy remained silent.

            “Come on, Amy,” Will said. “You can only help yourself by talking.”

            Had Will forgotten their encounter in the meeting room? Or was he pretending like it never happened? She thought about bringing it up to see how Josh would react to his second-in-command getting drunk at work and blabbering about company secrets. But it wasn’t worth it. Their relationship was strong enough that it would overcome whatever she’d say, even if Josh’s initial reaction was anger. It was better for her to keep Will on her side as much as possible.

            “I have nothing else to say.”

            “Amy,” Will said. “Did you do it?”

            She didn’t answer. Will pounded the table, and she flinched.

            “We’ve been very good to you, Amy,” Will said. “We’ve never done anything to give you a reason not to trust us, but you turn around and—”

            “That’s enough,” Josh said, getting to his feet. He came over to Amy and put a hand on her shoulder. Josh turned to Will. “Wait outside.” Will didn’t move. “Outside,” Josh said. Will moved silently across the carpet, looked back at the two of them, and left. “Jennifer’s death was a tragedy. I don’t know if you remember, but when we worked together, my wife died.”

            “I remember,” Amy said.

            “Desmond was 18 months old when she died. And — this I’m sure you remember — it made me into a terrible employee. I never had my shit together.”

            Of course, she remembered that. And she remembered everyone taking on more work than they were supposed to, and she remembered the side conversations with people who said he should be fired. That had been too harsh. She gave a small nod.

            “Well, I found a way to deal with my grief. It got me through her death. That’s what we’re building here. We’re going to help people.”

            “But she was someone we were trying to help. And it didn’t work,” Amy said. “What if AMIE just doesn’t work?”

            “Jennifer’s death was a tragedy,” Josh repeated. “There is a silver lining here. We’ve learned an essential lesson about AMIE. All this time, we’ve been trying to make the truest version of our loved ones. But when you’re grieving, that isn’t what you want. You don’t need the whole truth. You just want the best of them.”

            “But we can’t just take out the parts of people we don’t like,” Amy said.

            “Actually, we can. And that’s what we’re going to do.”

            Josh smiled at her, as though waiting for her approval.

            “You’re not the only person to lose your wife, Josh.” She was surprised by her own courage to speak so candidly. “I’m sorry about Amy, but … you’re not special. Deal with it like everyone else.”

            Josh shook his head. “No. I won’t do that.”

            He held out his hand. For a moment, she considered handing him the empty drive and keeping the one with all the data in her pocket. But how much time would that fake out buy her? And how much worse would the consequences be? The look in his eyes told her that she had lost. Amy removed the flash drive from her pocket and placed it in Josh’s palm. He put it in his pocket without looking at it.

            “See? That wasn’t so bad.”

            Amy took a deep breath. “Can I please go home?”

            Josh offered her a small pack of tissues. She dried her eyes and blew her nose.

            “I’m sorry, Amy,” Josh said. “I can’t let you go home.”

            “What … what do you mean?”

            “We’re launching AMIE in 2.5 weeks. You can’t interfere with that. There’s too much at stake.”

            “I won’t say anything, I swear,” Amy said. “You can trust me.”

            “No. I can’t.” Then, Josh turned to the door and called, “Will!”

            Will came back inside. Josh returned to his desk.

            “Let’s go,” Will said. “There’s a car waiting outside.” He offered his hand, and she let him help her up. He yanked her out of the seat.

            “Where are we going?”

            “You’re going away for a while,” Will said.

            Amy stopped. “Going where?”

            “All due respect, Amy, but you’re not in a position to ask questions. Let’s go.”

            Amy walked out of the office, enjoying, once again, the plush carpet underneath her feet. Will followed behind her, close enough that she could feel his breath on the back of her neck, making her shiver.

            “Amy,” Josh said, before they left the office. Amy turned around, as Will sighed in annoyance. “I’ll take care of Jeremy Fentor. I promise.”

            Before she could respond, before she could beg him to make sure that Jeremy never had access to AMIE, the door closed behind them.

To be continued …