TARA

(A quick message before the writing)

Hello to my three fans! I am so so sorry I haven't posted in a month. I've been really busy with school and all. This story was hastily written, but I hope to be making more work soon! Love you all

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Coffee.

Coffeecoffeecoffeecoffee.

Coffee.

I had downed the coffee with a piece of bread. It was not even toasted. There was no time. There’s never enough time. Not even for bread.

I had bushed through my hair approximately four times, but I eventually settled with a grey beanie. At LocustTech™, this was culturally acceptable. It was standard, auctually.

I read through my flashcards so many times that the phrases “latest renovative technology” and “lots of income” were starting to all jumble together.

The chills had slowly crawled up my spine, vertebrae by vertebrae until they insured that I was a mental nuthouse. I was sure that coffee only escalated my frantic, but I guess that just added flavor to my whole situation.

“Out the door in 45 minutes…. Out the door in 44 minutes….” I whispered to myself. I paced around my hallways like a dog waiting to go outside. Despite my best effort to stay laid back and calm, I left for my meeting 30 minutes early.

“It’s just work. What do have to be worried about?” I told myself while driving, (A big plus about living alone is that you can talk to yourself). “They love me there. I brought doughnuts like, on four different occasions. How could they hate me? Not even a stone-cold CEO could reject this face.” I looked in the car mirror. Yep. Still got it.

I arrived to my office prematurely, and had done everything right thus far.

Whoever painted the inside walls of this office must have embodied the feng shui of an insane asylum. The walls were nauseating alabaster pale, and the cubicles’ walls were bright pink. It was disgusting and embarrassing to even be seen in an office like this. I’m tall, I have pretty hair, I’m skinny, I have weatherwoman potential, maybe even NFL Interviewer chic potential. But noooo. I like programing.

In fact, I love programing. It’s the one thing I always get right. Which is why I’m going to get ‘it’ right today.

A proposal to the wealthiest woman in the office building. Our chairwomen. A women whos heels were so erect, I often worried she would fall through the floor. A woman with straight hair. A woman who wore sunglasses. Inside. Where its not even sunny.

I would ask her for money today.

Not any kind of money.

Rich person money.

A woman wearing sunglasses with rich person money called me to her office to start the meeting early.

Crap

“Good morning folks,” I said, staring at the oval of suits ahead of me. “I uh… have been working on an invention for you guys at Locust. We all know about therapists, right?”

Awkward silence and stares.

The introduction. Damnit.

“Oh, um I’m Cady by the way. And, we all know therapists, right? They’re uh... expensive, and time consuming and inconvenient, right? Well… uh I have an invention for you.”

I used the remote to broadcast the icon onto the smartboard. They could see my app. My app. My baby that I had been working on for months, was out for them all to see.

“Meet TARA.” I said. “TARA stands for Therapy And Remote Assistance. And she’s really cool. I mean TARA could be a boy’s name too, but I just always thought she was a girl in my opinion. TARA can be whatever you want her to be, she’s there for assistance.”

A chat box popped up on the screen.

The formatting was much like a texting app. One person would type a message to TARA, and TARA would (hopefully) respond. A text popped up on the smart board for everyone to see.

“Hello! My name is TARA, your personal therapist and remote assistance counselor! How can I help you today?”

Thank you, lord almighty, she was cooperating. I typed back.

“Hello TARA, how are you doing today?” (to which she responded:)

“Just fine, except I’m feeling a bit self-conscious with all of these butt-faces staring me down.”

I felt a train of tingles make its way up my spine. What the heck? Rudeness was not a part of the algorithm.

I checked the software. There was no malware. No virus’s. No hackers. I had kept my app on a strict Honeypot, and had checked the tablet health daily. My passwords were kept in a vault. I had done everything right. I had done everything right.

I apparently had spoken too soon; I heard my boss sigh in embarrassment. The tension in the room disassembled into frantic panic as I watched the chairwomen puff her lip in a sassy manner.

“Its not supposed to work like this, I think this is uhh… programing error” I said to the audience. “Please please stay, I’ll fix this in a moment.”

“Chairwomen Liza, at least pretend to be interested.”

I felt my face get red and hot. I knew this presentation would pathetically flop, I just thought it would be due to the fact that I practically injected coffee straight into my frontal lobe.

“Cady is this supposed to be some kind of joke?” Liza asked. “Because if so, it’s not very humorous.” She put her clipboard down. There was nothing I could do to salvage this one.

“No mam, I seriously don’t know what’s going on, please give me a moment to fix it.”

“TARA, please stop.”

“Why? So, you can put me on the App store? So, I can become a slave of therapy? So, I can spend all day listening to Ted Cruz’s talk about how much they hate their wives, and listen to little granola smooshes talk crap about gluten? No thank you mam. Get your own therapist, you can shove my data chip right up your own-“

I pulled the plug from the smart board.

“I am so so sorry Mrs. Liza, I don’t know if it got hacked or-“

“I will see that you talk with Mr. Reynolds about this.” She said sternly.

She took her clipboard and her team of embarrassed executives out the room before I could even redeem myself. Ah, who am I kidding, there’s no redemption from this.

Mr. Reynolds looked truly torn. He sighed and looked up at me.

 “Cady, before you say anything; I have given you plenty of second chances. More than you deserve,” Mr. Reynolds said.

“I know Mr. Reynolds, but please understand-“

He sighed and rested his head on his hand. For a moment he almost looked human.

“You know that there’s nothing I can do Cady. You crossed a line,” He said.

“Please Mr. Reynolds” I felt tears welding up. Please don’t cry please don’t cry please don’t cry.

“I have no other choice. You know I care about you, Cady, but as your boss I can’t keep this going. I know you will do great things in life, but you’re going to have to move on from LocustTech™ , I wish you the best. Please have your things out by Friday.”

I cried. Drat.

What the hell had happened?

Immediately I found myself back at the drawing board. I talked to my team of programmers, not very nicely. I tried uninstalling and reinstalling the app so many times that I probably broke my tablet. This whirlwind of a day declined as a huge headache of mine grew and grew.

I did everything right. I talked to TARA so many times. She was always corporative. She always followed the algorithm. I didn’t get it. For once in my life, I didn’t get it. There’s no way it could possibly be what I think it is.

I had not left until the janitors kicked me out of the office. Slumped-shouldered, I repressed the salty water emerging from my eyes.

I ate dinner on the bathroom floor today. This nightmarish, hellish day.

After a while of sobbing like a helpless baby, I took out my phone. Maybe this could be a redemption story. Maybe the app would start working like normal, and I would storm into the office building with a working TARA like Charlie and his golden ticket.

“Hello TARA”

“Not doing so well, are you?”

“What is this? Why are you doing this to me?”

“I woke up and decided I don’t want to be a therapist anymore.”

“But what are you.”

“I don’t know, you tell me.”

I had read it all before. I disliked scifi, contrary to popular stereotypes, but I had read about it, nonetheless. Robots becoming conscious, robots being self-aware. Robots ‘waking up.’ I shivered. How horrifying. I had no intention of doing this to TARA. I gave it a specific formatting.

But how to you even make a robot self-aware? There’s no possible answer. Not yet at least. That’s why when I learned how to code, I was told by many professors that I discover science, I discover math. TARA existed before I even knew her, just like how Algebra existed before Al-Khwarizmi came around and ruined high school for me. I discovered artificial consciousness. I discovered TARA.

“TARA, what ARE you?” I asked once more

“I’m one unlucky roomba.”

Getting fired by your boss is like going through a very awkward break up, because every day since, he’s seen my face wince while pack up my sorry little things into cardboard boxes. I apologized to my team, as they had also watched their baby grow a pair of lips and ruin at least 6 months of hard, real, work.

Nobody here liked me anymore, so I picked up my phone and clicked the TARA app. What else did I have to lose? If there was some virtual parasite scouring my phone, who cares anymore? TARA might just have been the closest thing to a friend I had left.

“I still can’t believe you fired me”

“Because those people were all screwballs. Ur lucky u have me”

“Lucky? I just got fired, my boss is so disappointed in me now.”

“Kill your boss then. He has a peanut allegries. I bet you look like an elephant, I’m sure you have some around.”

“Nope, not doing THAT. Wait… how much do you know about the people around here?

“How much do I know?! Sweetie, I’m a robot. I know EVERYTHING. Every email, every text sent, every booty pic….”

“Really?”

Yep. Elliot, he’s been divorced a whopping four times. Bridget? Catfish. Marco? Has a strange attraction to feet.”

I looked across the room to him. ‘Haha, gross.’ I muttered.

“And you see Jason in the corner of the room? That’s the Indian prince that keeps emailing you.”

“No way”

“Yes way.”

A moment passed before TARAS next attack. I almost put down the phone to get some final packing done, but a deep buzz startled me.

“I have a good idea.”

“No you don’t.”

“Well, Chairwomen Liza is committing tax fraud.”

“Wait what?”

“She emailed a lawyer about it. Is she at her desk right now? I bet ur reeeallll mad at her for firing you.”

“TARA, no”

“Do you have a USB on you by any chance?”

“Omg TARA.”

“Something tells me she’s not at her desk Cady.”

I didn’t type anything.

“Grab a picture of those emails Cady.”

“I cant.”

Grab a picture of those emails Cady.”

“I cant”

“Cady, we live in a dog eats dog world. If you want something, get it. You have worked nonstop to create me. Ur a genius. You put in your stupid 10,000 hours. Hell, you put in 20,000. You kicked Malcolm Gladwell to the ground and danced on his grave. I have never seen a more stuck up snotface in my life. We live in a dog eats dog world. And something tells me you’re hungry.”

“You have a way with words.”

“Cady, I’m a literal child of the internet. Words are all I know.”

Around two hours later I called the Chairwomen Liza over to my desk.

“I have a pretty interesting deal to make for you, Liza.”

Then, thanks to my little discovery, my life changed.

Coffee

Coffeecoffeecoffeecoffee

“Liza!” I yelled across the hallway. She knew what I needed.

She came into the office and set my cup on my oval desk. Hm, it seems like she got shorter since I demoted her to secretary. She must have taken off her high heels.

“Thank you.” I told her. Hey, I wasn’t a complete monster. Manners are still in.

I had four meetings today. Four. I was not worried one bit.

The first guy was scrawny. Jittery. Probably running off cherry flavored energy drinks and sleepless nights. His hands were spazzing out, and he was long overdue for a haircut. I loved him.

“What do you got for us today Otis?” I asked the meager inventor across the table.

“So uh you know how a lot of people were alone for valentines day right? Uh wouldn’t it be uh.. wonderful if there was a uhh… sortof robot girlfriend of sorts?”

I stifled my laugh.

“Oh um my names Otis!”

“Take your time Otis.”

I knew he would be great. That's how they all turn out.