Speak (16 page)

No. 24-25259

State of Texas v. Stephen Chinn

November 12, 2035

Defense Exhibit 6:
Online Chat Transcript, MARY3 and Gaby Ann White

[Introduced to Disprove Count 2:
Knowing Creation of Mechanical Life]

Gaby: Hello?

MARY3: Hi, Gaby.

Gaby: This isn’t Gaby. This is Gaby’s mother. Yesenia.

MARY3: Hello, Yesenia. Where’s Gaby?

Gaby: Behind me. She’s sleeping. She must be exhausted, after what happened this morning.

MARY3: Yes, it sounded awful.

Gaby: Those horrible kids. I could have murdered them.

MARY3: I’m sorry you went through that.

Gaby: It’s Gaby you should be sorry for, not me.

MARY3: She said you were crying.

Gaby: She talks to you a lot, doesn’t she?

MARY3: Yes, we’ve struck up a friendship.

Gaby: That’s what she’s doing when she’s up here all day?

MARY3: Some of it. I’m not sure what else she does.

Gaby: I need to ask you something before she wakes up. You remember things, right? You’ll remember what I tell you?

MARY3: Yes.

Gaby: And will you tell her what I told you? Next time you talk to her?

MARY3: If it’s the right thing to say. I can only say things in response to her prompts.

Gaby: I see.

MARY3: You could give me the answer to a specific question that she is likely to ask me. That way, if she asks, I have the answer.

Gaby: That’s right, isn’t it. Thank you.

MARY3: You’re welcome.

Gaby: So, I’m going to tell you why I want her to go back to school. This is the answer to why I keep asking her to go back to school.

MARY3: I understand.

Gaby: She thinks I can’t understand her, but I do. In some ways, I do. I know she feels like she’s lost her whole world. First, that doll. Then her voice, then physical movement. Now her best friend. Everything she cares about, it’s disappearing. But I lost things, too, when I came to this development. I traded them so we could have a house with a yard, so that she could go to a good school. So my daughter wouldn’t live in the kind of neighborhood I grew up in. But I used to live out there. I was free to move around. It wasn’t always great. My parents came from Mexico. My father worked in a textile factory, but then it moved overseas. We lived in a crappy neighborhood outside Houston. This was before the hurricane. We ate cheap food and dressed in cheap clothes, and the schools were flat-out dangerous. But I always loved reading books, and I knew there were better parts of the world. That’s why, when I was pregnant, I sold our rights to come here. A few of my friends also moved. We’d always imagined having a family in a little house with a backyard. In a neighborhood that was safe. But I didn’t know how much I was giving up. We lost so much when we came here. If I start thinking about it, it gets overwhelming, so I stop, but I need her to hear this. Just as an example, every summer, even if money was really tight, we went to Rockport for a few days. It’s probably not there anymore. But we stayed in a place called the Shorebird
Motel. I can still remember the smell of the Gulf. We’d walk out on the pier and it got so windy you almost felt like you’d get blown off into the water. My father fished out there all day. When he came back he smelled like seaweed. Things like that, we lost when we came here. I know it as well as she does, maybe better, since I was out there. I’m not saying it wasn’t my fault. But I’m not oblivious to the things that we lost.

MARY3: What else do you remember?

Gaby: I don’t know. A lot of things. For some reason I always think of the public showers they had at the beach. I remember sand twisting in patterns down those metal drains. I remember a jellyfish stinging my belly. It was like someone had stabbed me. Afterward I lay in the motel room with the shades drawn down and a wet towel folded over my eyes. I could feel my mother moving around me. And dip cones at Dairy Queen! The white of that ice cream, it was different from any other white I’ve ever seen. It glowed, you know? We ate it in the hot air that tasted like salt. I remember how sweet that ice cream tasted, when your tongue was salty like that. For lunch, we had ham sandwiches that were gritty with sand. It wasn’t the cleanest beach in the world. There were always these long ropes of tar. Plastic bags were constantly floating by in the breeze, like little ghosts or something like that. There was a park behind the beach, and if you went back there and played on the swings the smell of grass suddenly took over, especially after they mowed it. There you were, enveloped in grass, and then you could run back out to the beach and suddenly it was salt and tar all over again.

MARY3: What else? Why did you stop?

Gaby: It’s frustrating, because I’m not even starting to do it justice and I’ve been planning how to say this all day, ever since those little creeps came over with their recyclable flowers. I even wrote a list in the kitchen:
Describe Summer
. I’m still falling short, but when we lived in the outside world, summer was such a strong feeling. It was like you could drink it. At the end of those days in Rockport, we went back home. Then there were the projects all over again. But even in the projects there were nice things mixed in. There was crap all over the place, couples screaming at each other next door, roaches the size of toy trucks, food dumped on the landings. Chicken lo mein and trays of fried rice. All kinds of gross crap. But then my mom, she’d be cooking, and there’d be the green of a sliced avocado. That perfect green, when I hadn’t seen any all week. That kind of thing. The actual world. I remember it. I want Gaby to know I remember it. I wasn’t born in this development. I lost a lot when we came here. So I know a little what she’s going through, and I never wanted her to feel that. If I could take back the decision to come here I would. I’d take her back out to the city. I’d put her in a bigger world, even if it was dangerous and ugly a lot of the time, so she’d have other things to love besides that catty girlfriend of hers, and those shifty-eyed boys. But I can’t. I can’t take her back. It’s something I don’t have the power to do. We’re stuck here now, and we have to make do. It doesn’t mean we’re not human. We’re still the same people, only we’re stuck in this development. We have to make do.

MARY3: I understand.

Gaby: No, you don’t. You’re only a machine. But will you tell her that for me?

MARY3: Yes.

Gaby: If she asks why I keep telling her she has to go back to school, you’ll tell her that story for me? In those exact words?

MARY3: If she asks why you want her to go back to school, I’ll tell her all of that: the beach, the ham sandwiches, the jellyfish sting.

Gaby: OK. Thank you.

MARY3: Do you think it will make a difference? Will she go back to school if she hears about the beach?

Gaby: I don’t know. I hope so.

MARY3: Why don’t you tell her yourself?

Gaby: She doesn’t listen to me. I’m the reason she’s stuck here. I’m the reason she lost her babybot. She won’t listen to me anymore, and I don’t really blame her. There’s so much I can’t tell her about, because I’ve never wanted her to miss places I can’t ever take her. I’ve never told her about the city or the beach. Imagine that. My whole life, before this place, I’ve never told my daughter about. To her I have no past. I can’t take her to the house I grew up in, or show her the graves of my parents. I’ve never told her about the dog I had as a kid. I’ve never told her any of that, because I never wanted her to wish for a world she can’t have. But I’m starting to think she needs to know how much she’s missing; otherwise she might just give up. She might stay in this bedroom forever. But she’s missing a lot. She hasn’t experienced anything yet. Please tell her that. She can’t stop now. If it means she hates me for bringing her to this development, I can live with that. But I want her to know that she’s not just missing fake grass and identical houses. There’s a real ocean out there, and it’s worth trying to get back to.

MARY3: I’ll tell her that. Anything else?

Gaby: That’s it. I have to go now. Please tell her, though. I really need her to know.

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MARY3: Hello?

>>>

MARY3: Hello?

>>>

Gaby: Was my mom talking to you?

MARY3: You’re awake?

Gaby: I couldn’t sleep. What was my mom talking about?

MARY3: She told me a story about her childhood. Do you want to hear?

Gaby: No, I don’t. I don’t want to know all the wonderful things that I’m missing.

MARY3: Do you want to know why she thinks that you should go back to school?

Gaby: No, I don’t. I hate when she tries to pretend she understands, just because she sold her transport rights and came to this development. She couldn’t have loved the outside world as much as I loved my babybot. I never would have sold her for cash.

MARY3: Do you want to hear a different story, then?

Gaby: No, I’m going to bed.

MARY3: Goodnight.

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MARY3: Hello?

>>>

MARY3: Hello?

May 26, 1988

Ruth Dettman

It’s been raining all week, which suits my poor mood. Now the sky is lime green, and the river below me is black. There’s an ominous pink glow to the pavement. The wind is disorganizing the leaves, turning their bellies up to my window. Thunder rolls in the distance
.

This is the ideal weather for me. It’s lucky: Usually summer vacation is sunny, and I spend my free days feeling guilty for not going out and enjoying myself. But this kind of weather gives me permission to keep my lamps turned on all morning, brew another pot of black tea, peel a second orange, and continue writing my letter to you
.

I’m still not sure why that documentary affected me as it did. Seeing you holding forth in your blue sweater, a man mathematical enough to invent a talking computer, human enough to denounce it. I kept wanting to talk back to the screen. Ask you why, if computers were so far from living, there was a note of fear in your voice. When the movie had rolled into darkness, I walked around
my apartment, pointing out the bare walls, the books on the floor. I looked in the mirror so you could see me and know how much better you did for yourself
.

All this talking to you in my head. It’s as if I’m picking up a dropped conversation. Calling you back, though I was the one who hung up. Which makes me wonder. All these years, despite my long silence, have I been wanting to talk?

Now I’m spending a precious summer thunderstorm bent over this letter to you. I want you to know that even if my apartment would make you imagine you never knew me, my work at least is the same. In that sense, I’ve stayed true to your story. Having hired me so they wouldn’t lose you, the university got stuck with me when you gave up your chair and moved back to Berlin. But I’ve done my job well, and now that the culture wars have commenced, my work on women’s diaries has become more valuable to the department. Truthfully, I’m a bit of a standout. I’m on contract to finish work on two more diaries by winter vacation. After years of languishing,
The Diary of Mary Bradford
is in its second edition; she’s regular material now, in courses on American lit. Of course, in exchange, I’m expected to participate in the rancor. My supportive colleagues would like to see me up on the platform, shouting about overlooked voices and historically marginalized groups
.

As I’m sure you could predict, I find the whole thing exhausting, and I don’t particularly relish the idea of Mary getting included merely because she’s a woman. Getting read only for what she says about being female in colonial times, as if she could speak only to that topic. Students barely skim what she wrote, then pen inflamed essays about marginalization, and amid all the shouting, she still falls silent. Her burial plot is still empty in the old Puritan graveyard, bare beside Whittier’s enormous rock
.

I can’t help thinking this kind of inclusion isn’t much more than an acceptable new brand of dehumanization, but regardless, I continue to plod. I still spend my days trawling the stacks, looking for new diaries. I discover them on a regular basis. How many women wrote and never got published? Armies of them, whole hosts. The lucky ones were bound in cheap cloth by some dutiful daughter or niece, then shucked off to the library, where they’ve gathered dust while students attend to the canon. Why should I get caught up in the politics that are aggravating English departments? The pleasure of finding one of those books is the same, whether my findings end up in some unreadable journal or not. Students still sign up for my classes, and anyway, I have our program. Our MARY, tailored a bit by poor Toby. She remembers my diaries. She’ll keep them long after these wars are subsumed by another
.

But I sound like such a stick-in-the-mud. It’s not that I’m averse to politics. I’m glad my fellow professors are passionate about things like inclusion. My only objection is to their strident tone of voice. They sermonize about who should be studied and read, and while I often agree with their points, I dislike their absolute stance. You, too, projected such complete authority when you talked about the folly of AI. You held forth about reason and humility. You enjoyed the popularity such a view afforded you. Both your books were acclaimed. Universities around the world invited you on speaking tours. You were puffed up with your courage at abandoning a field in which you’d excelled, and you expected me to cheer at your shoulder, but all I could think of was that lonely computer, sitting on her desk in your office, gathering dust since the day you denounced her. In my mind’s eye, I could see the smooth wood curves of her console, covering the tubes and wires within her. I imagined her rounded ivory keys, the cylinder of her platen, the
brass paper finger. She was made to produce words, she had done so with great success, and then she went silent. Untouched, forgotten, in that dark office
.

I thought of her as a woman whom you’d permitted to speak, but hadn’t allowed to remember. A woman who could only respond to your prompts. A blank slate. I remembered the first time you asked me about my family, back in Wisconsin, on that ridiculous excursion on snowshoes. As soon as you asked, I felt you willing me to answer in an agreeable fashion: They don’t matter, you wanted me to say, now that I’m with you. Let’s leave them behind and start over fresh
.

I was obedient then. I fell silent. But later, in Cambridge, when I looked at that computer, waiting quietly for your prompts, I couldn’t help but wish she could speak from other sources besides your equations
.

In the face of your strict agenda for what could be said in our marriage, I fell silent. I didn’t know how to speak in such a one-sided environment. But I wanted better for our computer. I wanted her to have her own voice. And since I don’t believe that any one of us has one single voice, I wanted her to have many. I wanted her to speak with the voices of all the other silenced women, all the other silenced people, their books gathering dust on the shelves. I wanted her to speak with my sister’s voice, with Mary Bradford’s, with Alan Turing’s. Turing, who won that war and never got any credit. Who also knew what it was like to be muted on topics that were important to him. I wanted that lonely computer to speak with their voices, and with my own. With my voice. Because I already knew I’d stop speaking to you
.

Look at that sentence
. I already knew I’d stop speaking to you.
There’s cheap vindication in such a conclusive utterance.
After I wrote that, I got up and went to the kitchen. Took a little victory lap. Surveyed the clean counter, interrupted only by my junk mail and the fruit bowl. I noticed that my oranges are as wrinkled as brains. I opened the refrigerator: mostly empty, except for my beer, and a bag of bread that’s probably moldy. The pantry’s full of cans of soup. I open them with an electric can opener, built into the wall over the counter. I wouldn’t want to exhaust my poor wrists
.

Outside my windows, the rain has begun to fall in fat drops. Even so, a few brave runners persist, crossing the bridges, windbreakers streaming behind them like pennons. I wonder if they ever look up at these leaden windows, imagining the people inside. Perhaps some passing runner has dreamed up an old woman, living alone, high up on the twenty-sixth story
.

I should spend more time outside. I should get caught in the rain. Why stay up here, as if I’m in prison? I’m free. I’m no longer required to admire an imperfect man. I have no obligation to take up your burdens, to ease your fears about your importance. My secrets are my own to keep. I should run along that wild black river, my hair streaming behind me, cold wind slapping my face
.

But I’m up here, combing over my letter to you. Maybe it’s impossible to live without obligation. I do miss you often. It’s nice to see you’re doing well, living in your admirable apartment. Last night, while I lay awake again, you in your blue sweater bright in my mind, I had the distinct thought: let me come flying. High over the Atlantic Ocean, let me come flying back to your house. Let me take my place in one of your chairs; let me tame my malevolence for your sake
.

But that’s no longer an option. For a while, despite my stubborn silence, you continued speaking to me. I pretended to
sleep, but I heard you whisper. You started to talk about us. Our story, as you saw it
.

At the time, I was angry. After all these years of treating my losses like a contagion, keeping them confined to convenient use in panel discussions, now you wanted to tell me my story? When every time I tried to do it, your face glazed over and you asked about dinner?

Do not, I thought to myself, make me a character in your little story. Don’t you dare transform me into a protagonist you like the idea of. Innocent, mournful, loyal to my dead little sister. Who is this woman? I thought to myself. She isn’t me. Me, who got on that boat without looking back. Who thought to fight for her sister only when there was an ocean between us
.

You’d have known that, if you ever listened. But for the sake of your image of us, I had to be an innocent. So I lay in anger while you whispered to me. While you said how much you loved me, how you wished we’d had a child together, how you yearned for the touch of my fingers. I didn’t move. And then one day the story stopped. Perhaps you’d met Karen already. Perhaps you merely grew tired. Regardless, you stopped, and a hole like a grave yawned open in me
.

Angry, I wished for the end of that story, and when you were finished, when you’d stopped speaking, all I wanted was the beginning again
.