Meeting the Family

“Hi, I’m Lisbeth,” I said, holding out my hand as per the instructional video.

“Hello Lisbeth, I’m Bianca. Your mother,” said the woman in front of me.

She matched the image on my tablet perfectly; medium height, steel-grey hair cut into a sleek bob just under her strong jaw. Piercing blue eyes that according to my data file I had inherited. I had tried to look in the mirror and hold up my tablet side by side but nearly dropped the machine in the process.

“You must be Rodrick, my father,” I said, turning to the man beside Bianca.

He nodded once, his head bowing low to reveal the pink balding patch atop his red wiry hair.

Next I turned to a shorter man, supposedly two years my junior. “Brother. Christoph?”

Christoph nodded too and stuck his hands into the pockets of his ship-issued grey jumpsuit. “Apparently that’s me.”

We lapsed into an awkward silence and desperately I grasped for some information about one of them that I could seize as a conversation starter. “Mother,” I said, and Bianca turned uncertainty to me. “You enjoy the piano. Do you play or listen?”

The question seemed to catch her off guard and she instinctively lifted her tabled and scrolled through her data file. “I play,” she said finally, with a cautious smile. “Prior to suspension I was a concert pianist.”

“Lovely,” I said. “I am sure you were very good and I look forward to you taking it up again.”

“Shall we eat?” asked father.

The food had been brought through while we clustered in the corner of the room. A round table set with elegant silverware and glasses gleamed under a candelabra. The carpet was rich maroon, the walls festooned with oil paintings, giving the place an air of tradition. The rest of the ship was sterile grey; this was a family room, where those recently awakened were supposed to gather for reintegration.

Father hovered awkwardly, unsure of whether to pull out mother’s chair or not. In the end they both made for the chair at once and bumped into one another.

“Sorry,” they spoke in unison, then the ghost of a smile played on their lips.

Mother stood back to allow father to pull out the chair, then we were soon all seated at the table.

At first nobody touched their cutlery. We all brought up our data files and scrolled through, checking our culinary preferences and matching it to the food on our plates. I found that I disliked broccoli, so placed my share neatly in a napkin. Brother was apparently vegan, so ensure he took the plate without animal produce.

Once we were all settled father poured sparkling water into our glasses and we began our meals.

The clink of metal cutlery clashing against porcelain rang out in the small dining room. None of us felt comfortable using it after so many years with our limbs frozen in cryosleep. But it at least provided a conversation piece as we finally had some current common ground upon which to converse.

“Damn fork,” father said, readjusting it in his hand and frowning as it twisted slightly when spearing broccoli.

Quickly I consulted the files on father and my suspicions were confirmed. “Try swapping them in your hands; the notes say you are left-handed.”

“Oh, oh of course,” father said as if he remembered. Once the action was completed his attempts were far more successful.

“Does anyone else get pins and needles in their hands and feet?” mother asked suddenly.

“Yes, every so often it will come on suddenly,” brother answered. “I was told it was normal but it can be quite painful especially when walking.”

“I dropped my hairbrush because the tingling was so bad,” I added. My first hair brushing. I had barely had the strength to pull it through my tangled auburn locks but I had felt proud of my achievement. Until I dropped it.

Again, once this conversation topic had been exhausted we lapsed into silence, with only the sounds of cutlery scraping plates or glasses setting down on the table.

Once we were finished there was no distraction and we looked at one another in turn, averting eyes to avoid meeting gazes.

“Now what?” asked mother.

Father frowned again and consulted his tablet. “The schedule for day one says we have free time. There are suggestions of the television room for a movie, or the activities room for games.”

A pause of silence that stretched into the void, past comfortable and twisting into something awkward.

Brother was the first to voice what we were probably all thinking: “I’d rather go to bed.”

A collective sigh as those words unlocked the shackles of obligation from us all.

“Me too,” said father.

Mother nodded and I added a murmur of assent.

“It was lovely to meet you all,” brother insisted, trying to compensate for being the one to end the evening early. “I mean re-meet you all. They said that by day twenty-one our memories will be almost fully returned. The first day is always the worst.”

“Brain fog, they call it,” mother agreed. “The confusion is at its most acute today.”

We all nodded politely, the air electric with our need to get up and leave. Everyone was too polite so I stood and thanked them all for joining me. “The schedule says we meet for breakfast at seven thirty tomorrow. Have a pleasant evening.”

“You too, daughter,” father said.

He’d forgotten my name already. I supposed brother and I had it easier; we were supposed to call parents by their title. Still it stung he had not made more of an effort to remember my name. Even if I myself had forgotten it again. I’d have to have another look at my tablet.

-

I followed the navy line to the sleep habitats. The ship was pale grey; walls, floor, ceiling. All grey. Apart from the colourful lines that were designed to guide the disoriented souls awakening from cryosleep. And perhaps those that were fully awake but for who the endless maze of corridors looked much the same.

My habitat was Sigma-85. The habitat area was broken up into clusters, which made finding your room easier. My few possessions would apparently be waiting for me there, having been taken from storage by the AI bots.

It was as I was striding confidently following the line that I saw him; tall, medium build, wearing the usual grey jumpsuit. He was standing at the end of a corridor peering out of a porthole into space. The splatter of stars lit up a galaxy arm behind his profile, lighting the tips of his wheat-gold hair with an ethereal glow.

“Hello. I’m Lisbeth,” I said confidently, having checked on my tablet again.

My voice startled him and he turned rather awkwardly, with an equally strange smile. Like he didn’t quite know how to do it. Mine probably looked the same.

“Hello Elizabeth.”

Close enough.

“I’m…um…a bit lost.”

“Do you have your tablet?” I prompted.

“No. I left it in my room. I’m four days awakened, I foolishly thought I could make my way without it. But I had a memory lapse and now…”

I nodded in sympathy. We had been warned that sometimes although we feel we are progressing we may experience small lapses in our memories and revert back to day one or two for a brief period. That was why the importance of keeping your tablet with you was stressed over and over. I decided not to lecture him; underneath that weird smile he looked genuinely confused and terrified.

“You’re on a ship bound for our new home world, you’ve been asleep for over a thousand years,” I said carefully, reciting the text on page one of the awakening document loaded onto each tablet. “We should find an AI to help reorientate you.”

He nodded quickly. “Thank you. That would be best.”

“Come with me, I will use the map on my tablet to locate a help point.”

I tapped the app that brought up a colourful interactive map of the ship’s interior. Instantly the locator dot glowed bright orange, indicating where I was in relation to the rest of the ship. I was three corridors away from the family rooms, where I had come from and twenty corridors away from the habitat section.

“Here, there is an AI panel just left down here. Let’s activate it and ask for assistance.”

“Thank you,” the man said.

He followed me obediently as I padded softly down the corridor, my soft-soled shoes whispering across the cold hard floor.

We were going against the navy habitat line, getting further from my ultimate destination but soon we came cross a recess in the smooth grey wall, where there was a large screen and a touchpad keyboard, that lit up with a warm yellow glow as we approached. The figure of a smiling smartly-dressed man appeared on the screen.

“Good evening, how may I be of assistance?”

“Hello, this man has forgotten his tablet and suffered a memory lapse. He needs to know his name and ID number so that he can find his habitat and return for rest.”

For a moment the figure on screen smiled warmly at us while the AI processed my words and ran them through the algorithm.

“You require an ID service. Please answer yes or no.”

“Yes,” I said, happy with the output.

“Please stand close to the screen and look directly at the red dot for the duration of the tone.”

I stood aside to allow the man access. He stood tall and straight ad didn’t blink while a small beep issued from the panel.

Another pause while the AI searched through the databanks. “Welcome, crewman 7382, Antony Maldova.”

“Antony, yes that’s right. How could I forget?” the man murmured, a sigh escaping his lips. “So frustrating.”

I nodded in sympathy again, wondering if I too would suffer these horrible lapses even once I thought I had remembered fully. Did anyone every remember fully? If you forgot some memories, or things you liked, who would know if they were gone? If it was a secret you held deep in your heart that nobody knew, what happened if it never came back?

“Antony Maldova, your habitat is Sigma-85.”

My eyes blinked once. Twice. Then I checked my tablet.

“There must be a mistake,” I said. “I must have been standing too close and the scan was confused. Your room can’t be sigma-85, that’s my room.”

Antony’s eyes widened and he sighed again. “I’m so sorry, I must have done something wrong. I’ll try again, please stand a little further aside to avoid confusion.”

“Of course.” I stood a good few steps away, far out of range of the computer screen.

“Please perform an ID check,” Antony said.

The AI scanned him again. “Welcome, crewman 7382, Antony Maldova.”

“What is my habitat number?” Antony asked.

“Antony Maldova, your habitat is Sigma-85,” spoke the AI’s smooth synthetic voice.

“Oh. Thank you,” Antony said, then turned to me. His sea-green eyes were even more confused than when I found him.

With my brow creased I scanned through my files. I had not had time to study further than my immediate family who I had been due to meet for dinner and my likes and dislikes of foodstuff as I had been afraid of biting into something I would find unpleasant.

The silence was poignant and with my finger hovering ready to scroll further for a clue on my habitat arrangements, I happened to glance up and saw Antony’s face begin to change.

“Oh. Oh now I remember…damn memory lapse…”

“What?”

“My notes say I’m in a relationship. That I was to expect a room mate.”

I looked down at my notes, the page that had just loaded was headed “relationship” and at the top was a small file photo of Antony next to the word “fiancé”.

All jewellery had been removed during the sleep and I expected I would find my engagement ring among my possessions waiting for me at my – our – habitat.

“Oh, okay then,” I said, desperately aware that something more profound was required but unable to formulate the words.

“Shall we…go together?”

“That would be best,” I said, turning back so that we could follow the navy habitat line in the correct direction.

For a long time we didn’t speak but our cushioned footsteps soon fell into a rhythm, matching pace and stride.

Just before we turned into the habitat area, Antony’s hand reached out for mine. The backs of his fingers brushed my soft palm, seeking permission.

I considered it. I didn’t know this man. And yet apparently I did.

Throwing caution to the wind I curled my hand around his fingers. When I looked up, he was smiling down at me. And this time there was nothing awkward about it. When I returned the smile, it felt natural. The first natural reaction since awakening.