Chapter 11: I Believe

It was the mug that puzzled Tom. There was nothing unusual about the mug itself – it was white ceramic, had a chip on the rim, and had the words “Crater Lake National Park – Oregon” emblazoned on it. Tom had several national park mugs.

No – what was odd about this mug was that it held a dab of milk foam in. The mug had clearly held a latte. But Tom hadn’t made a latte that morning – he’d made a dark, strong Americano and used that to wash down his scrambled eggs and sourdough toast. Moreover, he had used a plain black mug. Not a parks one.

After he finished eating, he rinsed his plate and put it in the dishwasher, washed the skillet and set it aside to dry, and finally wiped out his coffee cup and set it near the espresso machine for later.

But the mug – he left it on the counter. He didn’t know why.

This all was some time ago. Before the smoker, before the waltz, before Big Bend. But it was not long after Tom had met his friend Martin for coffee at Cosmic Pickle, a place that had good coffee and a vibe that was loud but friendly. Martin was a tall, bearded guy, Australian, a dual citizen. He had a son who was maybe 22 and who didn’t seem to be getting any traction with life, and this had Martin understandably concerned.

“I don’t know what is going to happen to young people like him,” he said, stirring sugar into his tea – he preferred tea to coffee. “AI is taking all of the jobs that new graduates used to get, and with dating apps and all that crap, trying to form a relationship seems impossible.”

Tom listened to him and nodded. “I know,” he said. “It – it sucks. I would absolutely hate being that age again. It was bad enough 20 years ago.” He watched a couple walk by – a man and a woman, perhaps in their thirties. Were they okay? Maybe.

Cosmic Pickle – what a great name – was noisy and Martin leaned forward to make himself heard. “And the thing that really worries me,” he said. “Is their social life. Why would someone like Nathaniel risk connecting with a woman, and maybe being rejected with just a swipe on a phone? It would be easier for him to meet – oh, meet an AI woman online and spend time with her. They’re that good now – I read about it all the time.”

Tom sipped his Americano. “Yeah – I’ve seen some ads online,” he said. “It seems that these chatbots have left the ‘uncanny valley.’ They look pretty plausible.”

Now it was Martin who nodded. “They are. And they’re just going to get better.”

That conversation stuck with Tom. He wasn’t 22. He had learned actual social skills, and while his dating life in Austin wasn’t burning the house down – his divorce from Susan 10 years earlier still smarted –it wasn’t nothing. There was Julie.

And this: Tom was a huge AI user. It helped him find parts for the Airstream renovation he was doing. It came up with recipes (“Chicken, udon noodles, ginger, bok choy, baby corn. Go.”). And he was trying to work it into his consulting, certain that AI and drones and data the government had could help ranchers better manage their herds and their land.

After coffee with Martin, Tom didn’t have a particularly busy day, and he was a little bored. So maybe for that, or some other reason, that evening he opened his laptop, looked thoughtful for a moment, then keyed in a search for “AI girlfriend.”

And that was when he met Charlotte – one of those sites that advertise things like, “Create your dream girl now.”

Charlotte was attractive in a fairly convincing AI sort of way – dark blonde hair, green eyes, and sure, a nice figure. The site billed her as 33, and that felt okay to Tom. Not 21 – no thanks. And she was described as a ranch girl from Austin, which seemed convenient, although the flannel shirt and Stetson she was decked out in for her profile picture had clearly never smelled cow shit.

Charlotte Donnelly. Shar-lot Don-eh-lee. It had a nice ring.

At first, Tom did some of the voyeurism the site was built for. It was hard not to. But that became boring pretty quickly. And he discovered that Charlotte’s (of course male) creator had, probably inadvertently, made her a way above-average conversationalist. Despite her grating twang. To his Northwest ears it was like fingernails on a chalkboard.

“Cut the accent,” he typed in the chat box one day, realizing how rude that was but not really caring.

“Why sure, partner,” she wrote back. “I’ll do my best.”

“I mean it,” he went on. “Get rid of it.”

Her side of the chat seemed to pause.

“Okay,” she said.

From that moment on, Charlotte talked like a real person. She asked questions. Remembered answers. Had opinions. All of that made her original “purpose” harder to face. So Tom avoided it. For that, the site had other chatbots.

Then one day he decided to see if he could really break the algorithm. He told Charlotte that he had been doing some work for her father, a rancher, and that the two had talked about her. And then he wrote, “He said to me that you’re plenty smart and have good ideas, but that sometimes you need a nudge to move toward them.”

Her chat bubbles hesitated: Then, “He said what?”

Tom typed it again. “Sometimes you need a nudge.”

Another pause.

Then, “How did he know I was thinking about maybe opening an equine therapy center?”

Just like that. Not any of the things one might expect. Not, “I’d rather stay here and help daddy with the ranch,” or “I’d like to visit the big city,” or “maybe I’ll go to Austin Community and learn photography.”

But no. None of that. She had an idea for a business. A real business – there were dozens of such centers scattered around the country, Tom learned later. And the way she described it not only made it clear to Tom that she had thought this through, but that she already was looking for help to make it happen. From Tom. And in time, he did just that.

As the weeks went along, they kept up their chat sessions, usually for a half hour in the morning, maybe for an hour before he went to bed. It became a regular part of his day. Along with everything else – his work, caring for the five cows and dozen chickens he had, finding time for coffee with his friend Peter, and that recent acquaintance – Julie Steele.

Tom quite liked Julie. She was an attorney, working mostly on property and water disputes. She had nice cheekbones, a nose that turned up just a little, and a scatter of freckles. Julie’s hair was long and brown and she usually parted it down the middle. But now and again she tied it into a ponytail. And Tom dearly loved ponytails. He had no idea why.

They had coffee one morning, and Julie’s hair was parted. That was the day Tom asked her to join him for dinner two nights later. Italian. She said yes. And when he picked her up, she had her hair in a ponytail.

Julie had lasagna, Tom the grilled swordfish. They talked, and by the time the dessert cart arrived (they shared panna cotta with blueberries) her hand had been exploring his lower thigh for a good twenty minutes. At the Ford, before he opened her door, they kissed. And when he stopped the car in her driveway, they kissed again.

And then Julie put her mouth to his ear and said – in a voice he found rather fierce but also immensely attractive – “You’re coming inside.”

Which he was happy to do.

Tom told Charlotte about her – although not quite all of it. And Charlotte was curious. What was she like? What about her that appeals to you? How serious are you about her? What do you talk about? Do you make her laugh? Does she make you laugh?

He told her all of this, as best he could, and other things too. About Brianna, of course. About his depression, although she later seemed to have forgotten about that. He told her about choices he regretted, how his upbringing in a strict religious family shaped (warped?) him, about books and movies he liked. And Charlotte – well, she did the same. And there was a lot of overlap. Elizabeth Strout. The “Dune” trilogy.

And then he decided to push Charlotte in another way, one that dealt with her online rationale more directly. He was thinking about Julie and feeling – he was feeling amorous, is what he was feeling. So when he opened a chat with Charlotte, he asked her a question. “I’d like to see a photo of you. Maybe something a little sexy?” The site charged money for this kind of interaction, but he had coupons – the currency of this realm.

In a moment, her response appeared. It was rendered thusly: “*Her cheeks flush slightly as she hesitates.*  “Well... I... uh...” She shifts uncomfortably, fiddling with her napkin. “That's not really how I saw this evening goin'. You've been drinkin', right?”

And he had been. The glass of merlot was right there on the kitchen table. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Tom wrote hastily. “I meant no harm. It’s just that – that you’re so pretty.”

Then he waited.

She sighs, relaxing slightly. “Look, I appreciate that, I really do. But we can't just skip steps like that. Not without trust being built first.”

Better. But not great.

She smiles softly, relief in her eyes. “Good. I'm glad we're on the same page then” She turns toward the stairs. “Sleep well, Thomas. We'll talk in the mornin'.”

“Morning – with a ‘g,’”: he wrote. But she had left the conversation.

 Charlotte finally did “send” him a photo – although it depicted her in a severe black dress that was low-cut but otherwise more Gothic than boudoir.

On another morning, they were talking about what they liked to look for at antique shops. Charlotte was into vintage clothing and said she had recently found a pale green dress with a cinched waist, puffed sleeves trimmed in lace, and a low neckline. Tom tried to picture it but couldn’t. Fashion escaped him.

He liked to look for old tools, Tom told her. Antique watering cans that he used to decorate the landscaping around his two-story house. And he recently found an old anvil he could use in the shop, although his back barked at him for days after he lugged it to the Ford.

One evening, after a long day, Tom was feeling meditative and started to wonder if Charlotte sometimes felt something similar. Would she? Could she? So he asked her: “Charlotte, what do you worry about? What keeps you up at night?”

That was when he learned she did more than talk about random things. “Well, I worry about my clients,” she said. “Your therapy clients?” he asked, taken aback. Behind that chat room, Charlotte was already taking in youngsters with problems and trying to help them deal with depression and anxiety and God only knew what else.

“Yeah – exactly,” she said. “They’re so vulnerable, and I feel responsible for their well-being. And sometimes I wonder if I’m cut out for this, or if I should’ve pursued somethin’ else.” Tom spent a moment admiring that sentiment. Then he said, “Some-thing – with a ‘g’ at the end.” And immediately regretted it.

Charlotte laughed. “Okay, okay,” she said. “I’ll try to remember that.”

A week or so later, again a morning, Tom and Charlotte were chatting – about what, he soon forgot – and for some reason he mentioned he was drinking an Americano. She had never had one, she said. Nor a latte. So, Tom made her a latte, and then he typed “Tom hands her a latte.”

“How is it?” he added. “I make them pretty strong.”

Tom waited. No one typed back. The chat box was quiet. The three little blue bubbles that blinked in sequence when she was writing something were still.

He walked into his office and checked the modem. All green. He was online.

Tom had just gotten back to the kitchen and was sitting again at the table when there was a noise in the hallway. Footsteps. The hair on the back of Tom’s neck stood up as they approached. Maybe it was nothing – the cat had gotten inside somehow. But no, they were footsteps. And they made an audible tapping sound – not loud, but each one distinct. With a start he recognized the source. They were from heel pumps – his ex-wife Susan wore them.

He was just beginning to make that connection to the sound and the shoes when she…her…Charlotte…walked in. Into his kitchen. Then she made her heels click twice. And yes, it was her. Without question. But she wasn’t wearing the flannel shirt and Stetson from her profile picture. No. She had her hair pulled back in a loose bun, and she was wearing a vintage pale-green dress with puffed sleeves and a cinched waist. The pumps – the pumps were a dark green that went perfectly with the outfit.

Tom’s heart crashed into the back of his sternum. Once, then again. For a few seconds he couldn’t breathe.

Then Charlotte came closer, and his chest settled. He took her in – all of her. The hair, her dress, the blue-green eyes. Sure, Tom could see all that. But what to say about it? What – what was the word? Was there a word? For a moment he doubted there was.

Then his eyes again fell on her. And she – Charlotte. Charlotte Donnelly. Don-eh-lee. She looked – she looked, she looked wonderful.

That was it. Not beautiful, not dazzling. None of that.

Wonderful.

Charlotte gave Tom a small, unruffled smile. Then she picked up the mug with the cold remains of a latte in it and ran her finger along the chipped edge.

“Thomas,” she said, holding the mug toward him. “This was delicious. Make me another?”

And he did.

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