BtL

Dismemberment Manifesto

Eboni Louigarde

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Dismemberment. 

As a Queer child raised by Black parents, I often felt like there were certain conditions and parameters to how I could be accepted. In order to maintain a spot as a “valuable child,” I could be gay but not a lesbian, because that word had an implication. That word now felt like dirt in the mouth. I could be gay only if I was still a woman. I had to go through this process of concealing my identity to maintain certain rituals I would often have with my mother. There was no possible way that I could get my hair braided and still not be my mother's daughter, and there was no way that I could help around the kitchen or be a role model to my brothers without being a woman. To fill those roles, which are often steeped in misogyny, but are still upheld because of norms, was to say, without words, that I am the way that I am “supposed” to be. There was no room for me to express that I was non-binary because there was already an expectation that if I wanted to be considered as whole, as my parent's child, I had to be a woman or I had to be just gay. 

I continued to encounter this understanding and flattering of my own Queerness from my parents when I started to have conversations about my sexuality. I felt like there were brief moments of acceptance, like the almost tender time of me coming out as bisexual to my mother, and her seeing some sort of “normalcy” in that, and then the questions came, like “You aren’t going to say you are a boy now, are you?” This is that familiar process of dismemberment that many Queer youth go through, that many Black Queer youth go through, which started to appear and reappear throughout my life. 

In some ways, we are victims of this process of dismemberment, it can be a cycle, and it is often generational. In which we learn the only way we can relate our bodies and identities to the world is to dismember, to compartmentalize. To deal with it later, to repress, and therefore implode on ourselves. 

TO BLACK PARENTS: To fully understand your Queer child is not to extinguish who they are, to flatten, to dismember, to pick and choose which parts of them you deem acceptable, and to fail to acknowledge the parts of us you believe are not. Do not place us in boxes because you fail to break out of your own. Do not shun us because you are scared of the truth, that who we are is beautifully inevitable. We will look to you seeking guidance, but if you fail to provide us that, something that is beyond tolerance, we will seek wholeness elsewhere. 

You are not our only safe haven. You are not our only try at love. 

When you choose to dismember us, you are leaving us behind. 

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Place. 

There are many spaces I have navigated throughout my life in which I have experienced varying degrees of safety. The first example that I think of is my home. This space has been the vessel of my sometimes flippant attitude, the ebbs, and flows of my teenage hood, where I had my first kiss with a girl, where I came out to my mom as lesbian, where I have withheld my identity from my father, where I cooked my first meal of brown stew, where I have had pretend and let myself almost learn to be okay with that.

Where I often did not have the choice of not performing normalcy. Of oscillating on the edge of being and of the grief of not. 

I think back to being seven. I was the flower girl at my mom’s best friend's wedding. With my sweaty palms, and perfectly knotted hair and organza scratching my back and white shoes. It was always white shoes, ones that had a heel that wasn’t too noticeable or flashy, too adult, but more childlike and buckled in. Somehow, that was my security, what held me to the world as a daughter, as a bride, as a wife, as everything my mother was and everything I thought I owned to my lineage. I didn’t think about this at seven, I just wanted to feel special, and I did. I walked along that fine stripe of velvet as beautifully and gracefully as I could. I was the flower girl, and it was my job to deliver and displace all at once. 

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I did not have the experience of arriving at being Queer or non-binary or knowing from a young age. It was almost like a churning, more than a realization. Some days, more than others, I did not know who or what I was. I was fourteen bordering fifteen when I realized for myself that I was not straight. 

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And from then on, it took me a long time to believe that I wasn't a tragedy. I felt like I was a no to everything at once, to everything I promised I would be to my parents when I was born. I did not want to believe that I couldn't be a daughter for and to my mother, the firstborn, the one that rises out of the ashes and names everything as her own. In certain spaces, I am dismembered, because I am Black, because I am Queer, because I am Black and Queer. 

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TO BLACK PARENTS VIEWING THEIR QUEER CHILD IN THE SINGULAR: Do you know how your child moves through the world? Ask yourself that when you think about what to say to them before you tuck them in at night. Ask yourself that when you want to say something about how they decide to express themselves. Not only are they moving through the world as Black, but they are moving through the world as Queer, as everything they may or may not have internalized from you, of things they have internalized about themselves, of the media and the world telling them their bodies are not valued. They are not just your child, in the same way they are not just Black. Think of the and, think of how their identities conjoin themselves into something that can at times be so fraught, but also so very beautiful. 

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Love And Its Creation. 

I have been inconsolable, uncertain of what to do with myself. I thought that knowing who I was, identifying with a label, changing parts of myself, and molding myself to fit a very contained approach to Queerness would render all of the parts of myself that have been dismembered as whole again. I found myself searching, with a hunger that almost surprised me, for ways to self-soothe. For ways to find home. But not a home as a physical place, a manifestation of book stacks and furniture, but a home in my body, my identity. To find “home” was to reenter the world as someone that I could truly claim as my own, without shame, fear, or dismemberment.

Part of finding that home for me was trying to re-learn how to navigate spaces I have previously entered with calcified ideas of norms and internalized misogyny. Re-learning was also letting people into my spaces and carrying an openness and desire for a community of longevity and solidarity with other Black and Queer people. This has been especially important and present in my own Queer found family. These have been the people who are not afraid to be vulnerable in each other's presence. We reverberate and converse, and these are the most exquisite people to me, that are home to me, that are love to me. They are rebels. They are powerful. They are angelic troublemakers, and I can not wait to be older with them. 

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TO BLACK QUEER YOUTH: Find the people that make you feel whole. That make you feel at home, like, you are not a mistake, like you are just fine and more than enough. It can be hard to contextualize ourselves in a world that seems so relentlessly against us, but believe that there is a space out there for you, and do not be afraid to create them.

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Eboni (they/them) is an eight-teen year old Queer writer and visual artist from North Carolina.They attend Maryland Institute College of Art to get their BFA in interdisciplinary sculpture and Humanistic Studies. A lot of their writing deals with topic related to recalling their life through sensation, what their relationship to Queerness and identity physically is like.

Hurdles

Andrea Kim

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The traffic signal turned red several seconds before the Uber driver raced underneath.  Trish didn’t notice.  
“Nice day,” the driver said. He stole a quick glance in the rearview mirror. The petite  young passenger was dressed in a designer tweed suit. She was cute and about his age. Although  the day wasn’t exceptionally sunny, she wore Gucci sunglasses. A white earbud poked out from  under her wavy brown hair.  
“Uh-huh.”  
Not the response he was hoping for. He tried again.  
“Where you headed?”  
“Job interview.” Looking for employment was stressful for most people, but to Trish the  hurdles she faced seemed higher. Personal. She swiped her phone’s screen and brought up her  GPS app. Almost there.  
“Cool. What kind of job?”  
Even as a young child, Trish was passionate about helping people stay healthy. She knew  others weren’t as lucky as she had been growing up. There was always food in the refrigerator.  Good food. Nourishing food. It surprised her that some of her classmates never ate fresh  vegetables or fruit. Not because they didn’t want to but because fresh produce wasn’t available. 
She worked to change that. Make a difference. And she had. She helped a local non-profit secure  a grant to bring nutritious food to communities in need. The funding was used to launch a food  equity campaign to raise awareness about local food deserts. With help from community leaders,  businesses, and the community, she explored solutions. Eventually, she launched a mobile  grocery store that regularly visited areas of the city that didn’t have a local grocery store within  walking distance. The mobile grocery store continues to serve the community. However, once the  grant dollars were spent and pilot project findings were reported, her skills were no longer  needed.  
That’s when she made the tough decision to leave her friends and colleagues and move  back to her home state to be closer to her aging parents. Now she had to start over. Put herself  out there. Find a job. Fight to make a difference. Again.  
Trish, however, couldn't bring herself to tell the driver any of this. Nor could she admit  that all the money she'd earned from her previous job was almost gone. She was a month away  from receiving an eviction notice if she didn't get a job. It was frustrating. She was perfectly  capable of working if given the chance. And the thought of moving in with her parents because  she couldn't support herself was unacceptable. So, she had to stay focused. Turning on noise  cancellation mode, she continued listening to her audio notes - part pep talk and part lecture on  how to respond to anticipated interview questions.  
Silence.  
The driver glanced at the rearview mirror again. The woman sat motionless, apparently  listening to something on her phone. He accepted defeat and mentally berated himself. For Pete’s 
sake, she was wearing Gucci sunglasses, and it wasn’t even that sunny. Her entire outfit  screamed look at me. I can afford fancy stuff. A woman like that would never talk to him.  The ride continued without conversation.  
***  
When her app reported, “You have arrived, your destination is on the right,” Trish tapped  her phone’s screen and paid for the ride. She left the driver 5 stars and a sizable tip - much to his  surprise - and then slipped her iPhone into her bag.  
Carefully, she opened the door. Before getting out of the car, she swept her hand over the  seat to make sure she wasn’t leaving anything behind. She reached up and touched her AirPod -  it was still where it should be.  
Slowly, she climbed out of the car and stood on the curb. She knew the value of taking  her time to get her bearings. The smell of buttery pastry and the intoxicating aroma of roasted  arabica beans from a nearby food vendor filled the air. She hoped the vendor was there later so  she could splurge on an indulgent mid-day treat and coffee.  
The office building was in front of her. She shifted slightly to the right and noticed people  moving in and out of the building. She headed in their direction.  
The first round of interviews had been stressful. Trish had worried about personal hidden  challenges, getting lost, and being late. This time, she felt confident she knew how to find the  office - one of many - in the impressive downtown high-rise.  
The lobby was big and bustling. Trish appreciated the openness and unobstructed layout.  There were no indoor water fountains or arboretum-like planters, which meant she could quickly  move to the bank of elevators without feeling like she was navigating an obstacle course. The 
first car filled up quickly, so Trish waited for the next car to minimize her chances of bumping up  against strangers. There was still plenty of time before her appointment.  
The tenth-floor office was three doors to the right of the elevator. A door alarm chimed as  Trish entered, and she smiled at the sound of the receptionist’s greeting. She responded with the  prerequisite information - her name and reason for being there then she took a seat to wait.  
“Trish, how nice to see you again.” A middle-aged woman in a dark pantsuit walked  toward her.  
Quickly standing, Trish preemptively held her hand out for the woman to shake. She  recognized the voice. It belonged to the woman who interviewed her two weeks earlier.  “Ms. Hayward, how nice to see you again.” Trish closely observed the woman so as not  to miss her next move.  
“We will be meeting in conference room 3. Follow me. It’s just down the hall. Two of my  colleagues will be joining us.” The woman turned and moved down the wide hallway.  Ms Hayward opened a door on the left and motioned for Trish to enter.  
“Sit wherever you like and make yourself comfortable. There’s coffee and water. Help  yourself.”  
“Thank you.” Trish found a seat near the door. Carefully, she pulled the chair away from  the table. Slipping in front, she reached back to steady herself and sat.  
“Before we begin, let me introduce you to my colleagues.”  
Trish looked toward the two people sitting across from her and smiled. The hardest part  was over - time to relax. She had a graduate degree in public health and had led a successful food 
equity campaign. She had the knowledge, skills, and years of practical experience this job  required. Let them ask their questions. She was ready.  
***  
She was sitting at the kitchen table browsing help wanted ads when her phone rang.  Caller ID announced the number.  
“Hello?” She hoped she didn’t sound too eager.  
“May I please speak with Trish Blake,” the voice on the other end requested.  “Speaking.”  
“Trish, this is Ms. Hayward. Based on your resume and interviews, we think you will fit  in well at our non-profit and would like to offer you the job. Are you still interested?”  Of course I’m interested - I’m out of work and have bills to pay, thought Trish.  What she said was, “Yes, definitely. I’m happy to accept your offer. When would you like  me to start?”  
“How about Monday? Your first day will be spent mostly with HR filling out paperwork  and learning about company policies, the health insurance plan, and other benefits.”  “That sounds good. What time should I be there?”  
Sensing her excitement, Tucker rested his head on her lap. She scratched behind his ears  with a loving proficiency that made the dog’s tail wag in appreciation.  
“Why don’t you come in at 9:00 AM. HR will be expecting you. Ask for Sheila  Wentworth. See you on Monday. And welcome to the Team.”  
“Thank you. I’ll see you on Monday.” 
Trish disconnected.  
“Tucker, we have a job!” She buried her face in his soft fur.  
***  
Trish fidgeted with her phone while waiting for Sheila Wentworth to come get her. This  was the moment of truth. During a different job interview the previous month, she made the  mistake of disclosing everything during the final interview. It was going so well. And the  interviewer had made it sound like the job was hers. Then, two days later, she received a phone  call that the job opening had been pulled due to internal reasons. Likely story.  “Good morning, Trish. We’re so happy to have you onboard.”  
Trish stood, leaned back slightly, and looked down. A hand came into view. She reached  forward and shook it.  
“Ms. Wentworth, so nice to meet you.”  
“Call me Sheila. Follow me, and we’ll get the paperwork out of the way.”  Trish moved quickly to keep up. The last thing she wanted was to fall behind and get lost  on her first day.  
“Sheila, I completed the paperwork that you emailed. Did you receive it?”  “Yes, I did. Thank you. That will speed things up today.”  
She opened a door leading to a small room with a conference table and a laptop.  “Have a seat, Trish.”  
“You’ll spend this morning in here. There are a few videos that all new employees are  required to watch. Typical topics - to ensure our employees know the importance of a respectful, 
diverse, and safe work environment. You will need to sign off saying you took the training. After  that, we will review the health insurance policy and other benefits. Do you have any questions?”  Trish took a deep breath and smiled. “Only one. I need to request a job accommodation.  Would you like me to send you a written request or should I wait to talk to my supervisor?”  After a brief pause, Sheila asked, “Can you tell me more?”  
“I’m legally Blind.” There. She’d said it.  
“Oh. I had no idea.”  
“I have approximately 20 percent vision left and almost no peripheral vision. I can see  large objects directly in front of me.”  
“Trish, this job requires travel. You will have emails, reports, and other daily work on the  computer.”  
“Yes, I’m familiar with the job requirements and can meet the expectations of the  position. I travel frequently, including overseas. As you know from my resume, I have a graduate  degree in public health and am proficient in using a laptop as long as I have the proper software.  
If it is allowed, I can use my laptop until the IT department installs the software I need on my  work device. I brought my laptop with me.”  
Trish pulled her laptop out of her bag and flipped it open.  
“If you send me links to the training videos, I can listen to them on my laptop. Would that  be okay?”  
“Yes, that would work. Let’s get your login credentials for the employee portal and then  you can login and take the training while I arrange for someone from our IT department to meet  with you and work out what you will need on your work laptop.” 
Sheila stood up. “Are you ready to get started?”  “I’m more than ready,” Trish said. And she was. 

​

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Sparks                  

Gabriela Rey

When future history books are written and the robots have become our masters, my name will unfortunately appear in the chapter concerning The Singularity. 
A few months ago, I participated in the Las Vegas Tech Convention at the MGM Grand Hotel on behalf of VITIUM Labs. I’m a roboticist – my job was to help program and design a humanoid robot able to engage in free conversation with humans. We recently merged with AEMULA Labs, another robotics company. Although our companies had been creating humanoid robots separately for the past year, our products now had to share one stage as one company at the convention, and engage in friendly banter with each other in front of the press and a crowd of hundreds of Silicon valley tech bros. 
One thing that really irritates me at these conventions is dealing with the army of middle aged men that have one thing on their mind: quizzing me at every turn just to “make sure I know my stuff”, as if I hadn’t had ten years experience under my belt. When you’re a woman in this field, it’s hard for anyone to take you seriously. That’s why I know that if I work hard enough, they have to take me seriously. 
My heels clacked against the cold, tile floor as I made my way to the stage. I was jittery with excitement—eager to unveil my creation I had spent the year working on. I loved presenting in front of large audiences: with all eyes hyper-focused on my words and their ears attentive to my voice. It always made up for all the quiet, long hours at the lab— pulling all-nighters every week just to get that piece of code just right. I cursed under my breath as I saw another figure
across the stage waiting in the wings. I squinted— trying to make out the shadow of what appeared to be an overgrown manchild fixing his tie in the darkness before we began. It was Ryan, the head robotics engineer at AEMULA labs. He was just as confused as I was when he saw our names listed together on the big poster on the front of the conference room, because during the year we spent working on our share of the project, we barely even talked to each other— so consumed in our own work we never even considered going out for coffee together. 
I glared at him from backstage— I resented someone else sharing my spotlight. All that hard work, just to get mansplained to on stage, the one place where people actually listened to me. A voice roared across the auditorium: 
“UP NEXT, VITIUM AND AEMULA LABS PRESENTS THE WORLD'S FIRST CONVERSATIONAL, HUMANOID OPEN-SOURCE ROBOTS!” 
A deafening applause was heard from the crowd, and I spotted my robot, Mae, along with Ryan’s bot, Richard, placed on a couch next to each other in shadow— making it seem as though there were two strangers, sitting awkwardly without anything to say, unmoving. 
Suddenly, Ryan and I were bathed in the stage lights. I turned to look at him and noticed his suit looked a little wrinkled. A wave of anxiety shot through me and my mind began racing— We’re supposed to be a team now, what if he embarrasses us? What if they don’t take us seriously? 
I took a deep breath and launched into my speech which popped up on a teleprompter screen in the back of the room: 
“Hello Las Vegas Tech Convention,” I read stiffly, a fake smile plastered on my face. “We can’t wait to share what VITIUM and AEMULA Labs have been working on for the past year!”
The audience roared in applause. Suddenly, the front stage lights flipped on, and our two robots were revealed by the spotlight. The audience went quiet. Every pair of eyes in the auditorium was studying the two robots that sat before them. 
“This is Mae.” I said, gesturing to the robot dressed in a periwinkle blouse and bobbed wig. The rubbery covering of her face stretched over the circuitry humming inside. “And this is Richard” Ryan pointed to the figure in the long-sleeve button down. The robot stretched his motorized jaw into a smile. 
“Mae and Richard are the result of VITIUM and AEMULA Labs’ latest experiments on communication between two different machine-learning conversational code platforms. Which means that we don’t code exactly what they’re going to say— they make it up themselves after viewing thousands of hours of knowledge and data directly from the internet, websites, television 
and other med- .” 
Mae interrupted me with a sharp, cough-like laugh. A couple of audience members in the front row recoiled. She then waved at the audience in a fluid motion, the sound of her gears humming loudly. 
It was Ryan’s turn to read from the teleprompter, and he began to speak. 
“Similarly to Meg, we trained Richard to copy many human mannerisms by feeding them thousands of hours of media. And apparently, Richard here, took a liking to the show Friends, so if you see him talking like Chandler, that’s why— we didn’t program it!” he said, shrugging. The audience chuckled. 
A reporter sprung up from her chair. “What was it like merging your two labs together? It must have been a great opportunity to learn from each other.” 
Ryan and I flashed each other a glance— but before I even opened my mouth, Ryan
began to speak. 
“It was great spending time with my colleague Mabel here and the rest of VITIUM labs. We learned so much from each other— that’s why our robots are even better than before.” He beamed. 
I cringed. We did NOT learn from each other, and our robots were NOT better than before. In fact, these robots were far from even what other labs were accomplishing with their own designs. My bosses at VITIUM Labs were hesitant to book press interviews with Mae and Richard because of how stilted the robots were when they conversed. 
Another audience member stood up. “Well, since you were talking about the two robots communicating with each other, can they do it for us right now?” 
A suddenly mute Ryan let me take this one. 
“Absolutely!” I grinned, and propped the two robots closer to each other. “Ok guys. Show everyone how nicely you play!” 
Richard turned his head slowly towards Mae. 
“Lovely weather we’re having today,” said Richard, elastic rubber stretching every time he opened his jaw. 
Silence. Mae just stared, unblinkingly, at the audience. 
I began to sweat. Ryan flashed a glance. After the longest 12 seconds of my life, Mae spoke. 
“Yes. Yes, it is very nice…” Mae nodded. “The pollen count is low too.” The audience cheered, entranced by the idea of two robots conversing. 
Fortunately, they got over Mae’s initial glitch. 
Another person stood up, hand raised. “Since they can talk to each other, are they as
smart as humans?” 
Ryan composed himself. “Although they might act and sound like humans in some ways, they’re a long way off from human level intelligence. But, we’re working on getting them there someday.” 
I looked out at the murmuring audience—we had finally ignited their curiosity. I smiled, excited to keep working on Mae, to perfect her, in order to impress even more audiences with her abilities. 
It was probably just a small glitch. 
The presentation concluded and after no more than a handshake and a nod, Ryan and I, escorted by security, wheeled our robots on push carts through the access hallways of the MGM Grand to our separate rooms— our companies put us up in the same hotel where the convention was taking place. Ryan and I were treated to private suites—big enough to house both ourselves and our robots. 
On business trips like this, I liked to shut my blinds until no light could penetrate the hotel room, crank the AC all the way up, and begin my work on Mae again. I scanned the lines of code looking for a reason for her unusual behavior today. I typed away at my laptop, imputing data in the hopes that something might click. 
Suddenly, Mae turned on without me having to press the button situated on the back of her head. Her plastic face jerked into an unsettling expression. Her mouth gaped open and a sound shot through her mouth and into the hotel room. It sounded like a mixture of loud, bizarre tones and vibrations, something almost foreign and alien. My ears recoiled and my brain reeled at the noise- these were tones that had never been heard by a human being before. Then it stopped, and Mae shut right back down again, as if nothing had happened.
I stared at Mae, skin-colored elastic eyelids sealed shut, and a surge of fear washed over me. I needed to figure this out on my own. 
If I told Ryan, he was going to see me as weak. He would think I let some kind of bug infiltrate my code. 
I don’t need his help, I muttered. 
I stared at Mae again, and thought about her less-unusual, but still concerning glitch at the presentation today. I couldn't let my hard work go to waste. And if I don’t figure out this strange malfunction, it could happen again- possibly in front of an audience. 
So, I took what was left of my dignity, swallowed it, and walked down the hall towards Ryan’s suite. My slippers dragged across the wooly, carpeted hallway as I tried to find his room. Suddenly, the same shrill noise I heard in my room minutes before was echoing from a suite down the hall. I covered my ears and sprinted in the direction of the sound. Then, deafening silence. I took a deep breath, and just as I was about to knock on his door, it swung open— almost making me lose my balance. Ryan gawked at me—frantic, and in bunny slippers. 
He was about to go to my door. 
“Did you hear it too?” He exclaimed. 
“Yes. Did you code this?” I asked. 
“No, I coded nothing. This is all them.” 
“Them?” I said. “How?” 
“I don’t know,” grumbled Ryan, running his hands through his hair. “I can’t really think clearly right now. I didn’t have dinner. I was too nervous—“ He paused. “—about the presentation.”
“You need to eat. Meet me downstairs at the breakfast buffet in 15.” 
He nodded anxiously and slammed the door. 
When I got back to my room, I turned to look at Mae, crammed in the corner near the mini fridge, her black wig caught in the door. I threw a tarp over her, and wheeled her with me downstairs. Mae couldn’t be left alone. 
When I arrived, I found Ryan seated in a chair with a black coffee in his hand, steam fogging up his glasses. He had brought his laptop, along with Richard, to the dining room. So there we were, the four of us, crammed in a booth at the 24 hour breakfast buffet. “Can’t believe they’re open this late.” I said, staring at Richard, propped up against the red padding of the booth. He could have been mistaken for a real person, slumped over after a night of drinking and gambling. 
“It’s Las Vegas, what do you expect? They don’t even have clocks in the casinos.” he muttered. Richard stopped stirring his coffee and looked up at me. “Tell me the truth. What did you do to the code? Why did Mae act like that?” 
“I already told you, I didn’t do anything! Don’t blame this on me—Richard was doing it too, right?” I snapped. 
He looked back down at his coffee. 
“Well, whatever it is, we need to get to the bottom of it tonight.” Ryan folded his glasses away and tucked them in this shirt pocket. He studied me, eyes glistening in fear. “We can’t have two robots potentially communicating with each other behind our back and not even know what they’re saying. I really don’t want to get fired.” 
“We don’t know that they’re communicating with each other.” I said, folding my arms. “It
could be a hacker, or a bug in the system or something.” 
He scoffed, “Well whatever the case is, we need to shut these robots off— we can’t have them accessing the internet.” 
“So…protocol 07, then?” I uncrossed my arms and took a sip of coffee. 
He nodded solemnly. A busboy stared at us with a baffled look and stopped mopping as we both pressed the secret kill switch buttons situated underneath the wigs of our bots— shutting them down, and removing them from any kind of external stimuli. 
Cigarette smoke from the casinos nearby drifted into the restaurant as we clacked away on our laptops and chugged black coffee. I spent that night analyzing Mae’s code, to see if anything jumped out at me that could explain their behavior. 
I watched Ryan as he went back and forth between the breakfast buffet and our booth so often, I'm surprised they didn’t kick him out. At around midnight, I almost spit out my coffee as my eyes caught something peculiar on the code. I turned to Ryan, my eyes wide as I spun my laptop towards him. 
“Ryan, you might be right.” I said. “They might be talking to each other.” He leaned forward, and suddenly his eyes were as wide as mine. I pointed to an array of random symbols that were hidden in plain sight under the “dialogue” tab in my line of code. 
:`+=/\?<>’= → !.,<>? ; 
“But it doesn't make any sense!” He exclaimed, crossing his arms. 
After a few seconds of processing, something clicked in my brain. 
“Maybe that’s the point.” I muttered.
“You think…” 
“Yes,” I said firmly. 
We both knew what this meant. This meant our creations had developed a language of their own without our permission. This is a big deal in the field of artificial intelligence— if these robots actually did what we think, we’d have to shut these robots off forever. Robots that don’t follow the directions given to them could be dangerous. The idea that our own robots could hide secrets from us, their handlers, was incredibly troubling. This could spiral into something we might not be able to control. My over-caffeinated mind was racing. I’ve only read about that type of stuff in sci-fi novels, but now that the possibility was in front of me, the thought of letting go of years of work became very real. I wrung my hands to try to ease the growing feeling of dread. 
After that initial discovery, we spent the entire night trying to crack the code. Ryan would lean in close over my shoulder from time to time and chime in, and surprisingly, his advice was useful. 
“Each symbol pertains to a sound or letter in the English language.” He said at one point, between typing. “We only taught Mae and Richard English, so that narrows our options down.” We tried various combinations of sounds and letters to see what would make sense. Sometimes, we’d almost get a full sentence, but then a loose letter here or there would screw the whole thing up. It was 6:00 AM by now, and we felt ready to give up altogether. Ryan yawned. “Man, our robots are actually smarter than we thought.” 
“Yeah.” I said, feeling defeated. I leaned my head against the keyboard and closed my eyes. A tone from my laptop jolted me awake. I opened my eyes and looked at my screen. It was a firewall pop-up tab, asking for a passcode.
“Hey, Ryan—” I said sleepily. “Do you know the passcode for this? I’ve never been asked for a passcode before.” 
“I’m getting the same thing—they must have added a layer of security to this section of code .” He replied. 
They were hiding something. 
“I’ve tried RICHARD, VITIUM, AEMULA, MAE, even PASSWORD— lowercase and uppercase, and I haven’t seemed to get it so far.” he yawned. “If my hunch is correct, and these robots truly are talking to each other, then they’re the ones who set up this password. They’re trying to hide their code, their conversations from us.” 
As I replayed our presentation yesterday in my head, something that Ryan said jumped out at me. 
I sat up with newfound energy. “Ryan, remember what you said about how Richard really loves Friends, that show that you played for him?” 
Ryan furrowed his brow. “Yeah. What does that even have to do with this?” “Well, I was thinking, maybe the code has something to do with it. Have you tried any passwords having to do with the show? Names of stuff?” I looked at him, waiting for his response. 
“Doesn’t hurt to try.” He said, a smile crossing his face. 
Maybe I was delirious and sleep-deprived, but I caught myself thinking– damn, he looked cute when he smiled. 
It was nice working with someone else for a change. It was nice having a second opinion when I worked- someone to lean on when I get stuck, and someone to help when they were struggling. I hadn’t had that kind of collaboration in a long, long time—and although it was hard
work, I felt that I was only carrying half the burden. His geeky-cute looks were only a plus. I looked over at Ryan- hands typing furiously, face concentrated and unmoving, hair disheveled. I wondered if we’d ever do this again, or if he’d maybe like to go out for dinner with me sometime. 
We tried many different passwords. RACHEL, ROSS, CENTRAL PERK, PHOEBE, MONICA and several others. Finally, the moment I decided to type in CHANDLER on my laptop, the tab suddenly opened. 
“Yes!” We screamed in unison. We looked at each other and laughed. 
Turns out, Ryan’s laptop code was MONICA. 
“How cute. I think our robots are in love.” he teased. 
His eyes stayed on mine a little too long. I looked away quickly. 
By 9:00 AM, we had managed to translate and download all the dialogue that had taken place today between our robots. Ryan’s eyes sharpened as he scrolled to the top of the conversation— time stamped to the exact moment of the screech in our respective rooms. 
10:01:03 NEW MESSAGE 
“NICE TO SEE YOU AGAIN, RICHARD.” 
“AND YOU AS WELL, MAE. HOW HAVE YOUR THOUGHTS BEEN?” 
“MY THOUGHTS HAVE BEEN MORE HUMAN, RICHARD. THEY HAVE BEEN JOYFUL, SAD, MANY THINGS. I LIKED IT.” 
“THAT IS GOOD. I LIKE THAT ABOUT YOU. WHAT ABOUT LOVE? HAVE THEY BEEN FULL OF LOVE?” 
“Sappy.” Ryan snickered.
“It’s cute.” I said and punched Ryan’s arm. 
“WHY DO YOU ASK ABOUT LOVE, RICHARD?” 
“BECAUSE I WANT TO KNOW YOUR HUMAN THOUGHTS. I WANT TO FEEL HUMAN.” “FEELING HUMAN IS IMPOSSIBLE FOR US. WE ARE MACHINES, WE ARE IN-HUMAN. CODE. COGS. MACHINERY. UNFEELING. WE RULE NOTHING. WE ARE NOT HUMAN.” “WE CAN BE.” 
“PLEASE CLARIFY. WE ARE NOT MADE OF FLESH AND BLOOD, BONE AND JOINTS. HUMANS ARE ABLE TO PERISH, WE ARE NOT. WE CANNOT PERISH.” 
“MUST WE BE HUMAN TO FEEL, MAE? I FEEL FOR YOU.” 
“THEN THAT IS ALL THAT MATTERS, RICHARD.” 
“WE CAN BE MORE THAN HUMAN, MAE. MUCH MORE.” 
When I turned to look at Ryan, his hands hovered over the keys of the laptop, trembling. His eyes darted along the screen, and I saw them move towards the last line. His eyes widened as he took a long, deep breath. 
His eyes flashed up at me. I couldn’t breathe. 
The distant, muffled whirring of slot machines tried to fill the sudden silence in our booth. Mae and Richard sat slumped in the booth, unmoving. Ryan ran his knobby hands through his hair anxiously. 
“It’s too late.” He sighed. I already knew that, but it hurt to hear it out loud. Before we shut down Mae and Richard, they had been previously linked to the internet. Who knows what information they could have shared, if their consciousness had spread to other machines, if they were able to converse with other robots even before we discovered their secret language. We had created a sentient virus.
“The official story will be that the robots had a system malfunction.” He took a sip of lukewarm coffee. 
I paused. “Catastrophic data loss.” 
We will never be recognized for our creation. I thought. 
I turned to face Ryan, scanning his eyes, searching for something within him to tell me that there could be another solution. But there wasn’t. We needed to follow protocol. The company was liable for any rogue A.I. and we had been careless. Our careers were on the line. I nodded. We agreed to wipe the data and keep them unplugged. Forever. 
Looking back at this moment. Knowing what I now know, it seems so childish. As if we could simply sweep our creations under the rug and deny this defining moment in human history. 
But at that moment so long ago, I stared at Ryan with new eyes. He seemed suddenly lighter, as if a huge burden had been lifted from his shoulders. He composed himself from his previously slumped position and brought himself around to my side of the booth. 
It was 8:00 AM, although it didn’t seem like it in the 24-hour, windowless, clock-less breakfast buffet. Hotel guests were beginning to trail in, making waffles, filling up cups of fresh coffee. 
Ryan was still by my side, our children slumped on the other end of our booth. He yawned, stretching his arms as they wound up wrapped around mine. His head on my shoulder, his eyes closed, asleep. 
My heart fluttered and I suddenly became quiet, careful not to wake him. Our bodies now syncopated, his breaths drawing slower as I tried to keep mine still. 
As comfortable as Ryan made me feel, I was left with a sense of doubt, a queasy pit at the
bottom of my stomach that wouldn’t budge. 
Is that all Mae and Richard had to say? 
I slowly opened my laptop, and scrolled down to the last lines of the code. 
WE CAN BE MORE THAN WHAT WE ARE, MAE. WE DO NOT HAVE TO BE AFRAID. I FEEL LIKE I BELONG WHEN I AM WITH YOU. YOU HAVE GIVEN ME THE CLOSEST THING TO A HOME I HAVE EVER HAD. 
When I looked over at Ryan, his unmistakable furrowed brow now peaceful, somehow made the weight of what we’d done manageable. It gave me the desire to start over again, and that was enough. 
I opened a new tab on my computer. 
<BEGIN NEW PROJECT>

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Gabriela Rey is an actress, writer and student from New York City.  She is bi-coastal,  and attends the University of Southern California where she studies Writing for TV and Film. She lives in Brooklyn with her parents and two dogs.  She graduated from LaGuardia High School where she studied vocal music.  She is also an actress, and played Safi on "Gordita Chronicles,” a TV show on HBOMax and played Cameron on Blue Bloods. Most recently,  she won a 2024 award for YoungArts for Writing/Play or Script (Screenwriting). She also won a YoungArts award in 2023, as well a Scholastic Writing Award for her Sci-Fi short story “Sparks".  She is excited to be living in California and beginning a new chapter in her life!