Barren Cove (5 page)

In the cabana, Beachstone removed his pants and jumped up on the table in the same place she had stitched him up. His legs were shockingly white in comparison to his sun-browned arms and face. The cut on his thigh was pale pink except at the top, where it was raised and reddish, the black sutures like a line of ants.

She brought out the rubbing alcohol, which had to be decades old, the plastic bottle milky yellow with age. She opened a sterile swab and used it to wash the wound, and then wiped the surgical scissors and tweezers as well before using the tweezers to grab the knot at the end of the stitches.

Beachstone watched with a fascination that reminded Mary of Kent at his dissections. Her brother had created an experiment, after all. She cut the knot off and used the tweezers to gently pull the thread through the skin, which stretched before relinquishing the suture. “Did it hurt?” she asked.

“No,” he said.

She moved to the next one, and a small dot of blood appeared where the thread pulled through. She touched the alcohol swab to it, and Beachstone's leg jerked. “Sorry,” she said.

“It was just cold,” he said.

She pulled the rest of the stitches out, and there was some blood, but not much until she reached the red, raised section at the top. When she pulled the thread out there, there was some pus as well as heavier bleeding, almost as though the cut had reopened just there. She blotted away the blood, but when she took away the gauze, more blood welled up, so she covered it and applied pressure.

Beachstone drew a sharp breath through his teeth.

She checked his expression. His face was pinched, and he was sweating. “Are you okay?” she said.

“I'm fine,” he said, pushing her hand away. “It's just a little blood.” He jumped off the table, and the blood began to drip down his leg.

“Cover it,” she said.

He took the gauze and held it to the wound. “Come on,” he said. “Let's build.”

Mary was unsure. She did not like the way the wound was bleeding. It should have been fully healed by now.

As usual, Beachstone didn't wait for her. He picked up his pants and headed down the beach, partially bent over and limping as he tried to keep pressure on the cut. When he got to the city, he knelt and grabbed a ladle they used for bailing and began to empty one of the tunnels, letting go of his wound.

Mary wondered if a time would come when she would ever understand this creature. She thought the answer was no, and that thrilled and troubled her at the same time. All she could do was collect data. She closed up the first aid kit and left it in the cabana as she rejoined the boy.

• • •

That night, Asimov 3000 stopped outside the open door to Mary's room after putting Beachstone to bed.

“Mary?” her father called. She stepped into view from her place behind the door. “Ah, Mary,” he said at the sight of her. “I cannot express enough how much joy it gives me to see you take to Beachstone as you have.”

Mary thought of her time with the boy, the intimacy. It wasn't something you could ever have with another robot. She
could hardly comprehend what her life had been before Beachstone had come to Barren Cove.

“I cannot express my own joy,” Mary said.

“Your brother worries me though.”

Mary had a moment of panic. They had all contrived to keep the incident in the cabana a secret from her father.

“He seems distant, absent. Has he spoken to you?”

Mary shook her head. “No.”

“I want all three of you to get along, to become fast friends.”

No! Mary thought, Our city is ours alone! But then she felt guilty, because she knew that, as much as her brother had retreated, it was in part because she had abandoned him. “Yes, Father.”

“You are all my children,” Asimov 3000 said.

She knew what Kent's reaction to that would be, and Beachstone's, and even she couldn't succumb to this fallacy. “I will speak to him,” she said.

“Because I never could have hoped . . .”

“What, Father?”

“Nothing.”

She couldn't guess what he had been going to say. She was too distracted with her sudden need to protect what she and Beachstone had forged.

Asimov 3000 put his hand on her shoulder and squeezed. “You're doing so well,” he said.

“Thank you.”

“I love you,” he messaged.

“I love you too,” she returned.

Asimov 3000 withdrew his hand. He gave a single nod of his head and continued down the passage into the dark.

Despite her defensiveness, the conversation did make her wonder about Kent. They had always spent time together
during the day, following whatever mechanical or biological fancy had captured her brother's attention. He must be lonely. But she couldn't get past the idea that she didn't want him anywhere near Beachstone. And, with even more guilt, she found that she didn't really miss Kent's exploits.

When, hours later, she heard her brother come in and go into his room beside hers, she tried to work up the desire to speak with him. She had told her father she would. But she was afraid of what might come from the conversation—her brother's vitriol, or his misunderstanding that she was inviting him to enter her and Beachstone's world.

Instead, she powered down for the night.

6.

KENT SAT ASTRIDE
his dirt bike, waiting for the engine to heat up after the oil change he'd just completed. He had taken the bike apart and rebuilt it three times in the past month and was growing bored with it. It was time to send for some real motorcycles. He would love to take an antique gasoline model and convert it to solar electricity—a true challenge given the bike's limited surface area—but he would settle for a modern electric to start. It would take long enough to get a common model to Barren Cove, and he needed something to distract himself lest his bitterness over Beachstone require a more drastic outlet than the small pranks he visited on the boy—waking him repeatedly in the middle of the night, locking him out of all the bathrooms, shoving, tripping, pinching at every opportunity. Watching the boy flinch at his approach was fun, but he wanted to draw blood again. It was only the risk of his father's ire that held him back.

And then there was Mary.

Mary, who no longer seemed to know he existed. Who pre
ferred to play with her pet human, to fawn over him; the way she debased herself before him. To abandon her only brother! He revved the engine of his bike. He'd seen the two of them playing in the sand in the afternoons. It was another beautiful day. Perhaps he'd join them.

He released the kickstand and took off, pushing the bike to the limit. The speed only fed his rage; the memory of Mary on top of him in the cabana, holding him down. He wanted to kill the boy.

He reached the spot where the cliff was low enough that he could attempt a jump to the beach. The sand was horrible for the bike, he knew, but he didn't care; it would give him a challenge when he next did maintenance. He flew off the edge, the flat ocean stretching before him like an endless road, and then the bike skidded in the sand, spun, and Kent found himself on the ground, one leg pinned beneath the machine. Without pause, he righted the bike and forced it down the beach toward the water, until the rattle of the sand crunching against the motor fell away, and he was on the hard-packed beach at the water's edge, the waves spraying to either side of the bike like walls of water.

He zoomed his vision and could make out the speck of Beachstone in the distance. He seemed to be alone. Kent grinned. A wave skittered up, the water splashing beneath his tires, and Kent was curious to see how his brake pads would work.

As he approached Beachstone, Kent saw that the boy was reading from a tablet resting on his crossed legs. He didn't look up, even when he must have been able to hear the buzz of the motor. When he was only feet away, Kent executed a spinning stop, spraying Beachstone with sand. The boy cringed, raising his hands in front of his face as though to ward off a blow.

Kent jumped off the bike, letting it fall to the ground, the engine still running, and he grabbed Beachstone's tablet before the boy had a chance to block him. He looked at the screen. “Ah, superheroes,” he said. “You humans did like to dream you could be better than you really are.” He threw the tablet into the ocean like it was a Frisbee, the dark, spinning rectangle traveling a good sixty or seventy yards before falling into the water.

He circled the seated boy, whose nose and lips trembled in rage, even as he drew in his shoulders in order to make himself small. Kent smirked. He saw the little mounds of sand that spread out covering almost ten square feet, holes at various points; he guessed they were meant to be buildings. He kicked the one closest to him, the sand spraying over the others.

“Hey,” Beachstone said, starting to get up, but Kent turned on the boy, and Beachstone sat back down, ducking.

“Where's your servant?” Kent said. “You need me to get anything? Somehow, you lost your tablet.”

“She's not my servant; she's my sidek—” He bit his lip.

“Your sidek . . . ? Your sidekick. I see. And you must be a superhero, then.” Kent faked as though he were going to strike the boy, and Beachstone flinched. Kent grinned. This was fun. Maybe he could see why Mary would want to spend time with the bastard. He bent down so he was close to Beachstone's face. “Do you feel super now?”

Beachstone gritted his teeth and averted his eyes.

“Can you pull me apart with your bare hands? Because I could you.”

“Shut up,” Beachstone said.

Kent noticed some blood soaking through Beachstone's pants. He grabbed the boy's leg—

“Hey! Stop!”

—straightened it, knocking the boy into a lying position, and pulled up the leg of Beachstone's pants.

The boy was hitting at him, jerking away.

“Ooo,” Kent said. “That doesn't look good.” Part of the scalpel cut seemed to have healed, but the skin around the top was bright candy-apple red.

“Kent!”

Kent jerked. Mary was half running, half walking toward them from the cliff stairs. As much as he wanted to hurt Mary, to make her pay for leaving him, he felt panic at her finding him laying hands on Beachstone again. He let go of the boy, who remained lying down. “Ah, Mary,” Kent said, grinning. “Our hero.”

She was walking now, watching him with suspicion. She stopped a few feet away.

“Or, no,” Kent said, backing away from the boy, “what was it? Our ‘sidekick.' ”

For each step Kent took back, Mary took a step closer.

“Shut up,” Beachstone said, sitting up.

“You hear how he talks?” Kent said. “Does he order you around too?”

Mary was beside Beachstone now, but she never took her eyes off her brother.

“Your human is sick,” Kent said. Beachstone was pale and sweating profusely, his breathing coming in short gasps.

“What's wrong with you?” Mary said.

At that, Kent's rage blossomed, his eyes growing wide. “What's wrong with
m
e
?” he said. “With
m
e
? What happened to you and to Father? What's wrong with the two of you, losing yourselves to this . . .” He kicked sand at Beachstone, who turned his head away. “This anachronism.”

“Haven't you noticed how happy Father is?” Mary said.

“When would I have noticed? He doesn't have time for us anymore.”

“You're the one off playing with your bikes,” Mary said.

“No, you're right,” Beachstone said suddenly, managing a sly smile. “He doesn't care about you anymore. Now he's got me.”

Kent moved toward Beachstone, and Mary took a step forward, and then Kent yelled at the sky, a groan of angry frustration. “He's an arrogant, self-serving pissant. You know he doesn't think of us as anything more than machines.”

“No,” Mary said. “That's what he makes
you
feel.”

Beachstone rolled over and vomited a goopy yellow liquid. Mary bent down to him.

“Weak,” Kent said. “All of us. Weak.”

Beachstone wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and sat back up.

“Go away, Kent,” Mary said, squatting beside the boy. “You've had your fun.”

And that's it, Kent thought. A dismissal. I'm no more than an annoyance. Me! Her own brother. But she loves this animal more. “We'll see if you're saying that in eighty years, when your beloved here is a corpse, and you're all alone.” He went to his bike and righted it. It had stalled out. He straddled it and restarted its engine. “And all of this,” Kent said, gesturing with his head to indicate their sand constructions. He gunned the bike, passing only inches from Beachstone and Mary, plowing into the sand buildings and mounds, when suddenly his bike flipped up and he flew over the handlebars.

Mary wanted to rush to her brother, the way she had to Beachstone when the boy had been sick only moments before, but for some reason she stayed still. Beachstone was on his feet, all his weight on his good leg, his face flushed.

Kent got up and stomped to his bike. The tunnels under a
huge section of the city had collapsed under his weight, forming the pothole that had flipped the bike. Kent dragged it from the hole, his jaw set in embarrassment. He wouldn't look like a fool. He mounted and looked at them. He could see in Mary's face utter repugnance, as though she had ceased to love him in that very moment. “Enjoy your little sand castles,” he said.

Mary shook her head.

Beachstone limped forward, his eyes boring into Kent. “I won't always be smaller than you,” Beachstone said.

Kent revved his engine. “But you'll always be weaker.” And he drove away.

7.

BEACHSTONE FELL ILL
the next day with a high fever. During the following week, he lay in bed drifting in and out of sleep while Asimov 3000 kept watch day and night. The human's sickness—his mere presence—had a way of becoming the center of life at Barren Cove. Mary made frequent trips to Mr. Brown's, inventing errands just to feel useful. Her father wouldn't let her do anything with his patient firsthand, and her separation from the boy made her anxious. Did her father blame her for Beachstone's sickness?

The weather turned against them as well, the sky a dusty white with no sun for days, making the sickroom perpetually dark and damp. The sporadic rain, lurching from a palpable mist to a torrent, never ceasing, melted away their city on the beach below, the only remnant of their fantasy world the pool that formed in the cave-in caused by Kent's bike.

On the day that Asimov 3000 decided that Beachstone was well, Mary checked the bread in the oven. It had risen and spread out above the rim of the metal pan. What was visible was
now a light golden brown. She hoped that it was right. She referenced the image in a cookbook and it seemed to match. She had never seen bread before—it was not a commodity Mr. Brown could procure—but she had followed the recipe exactly. It had to be right. She took the pan from the oven and set it out to cool.

She prepared the inside of the sandwich next, laying three slices of turkey on the counter, topping them with a slice of Swiss cheese, and spreading a daub of mustard atop it. The sandwich construction was so utilitarian; it was ingenious, really. Bread, meat, bread—it was clean, required no utensils to eat, and was nutritious. She hoped that Beachstone would like it. She just wanted to make him happy.

She sliced the loaf, finished the sandwich, and packed it in a paper bag. Now they could stay out for most of the day. Beachstone would have food; they wouldn't have to return home.

Mary took the lunch and went upstairs. Her father sat beside the bed; Beachstone had still not gotten up. “Don't you want to go out?” Mary asked. “The sun has finally arrived.”

Beachstone looked at Asimov 3000. The robot nodded, and Beachstone jumped out of the bed. He almost tripped when his bad leg hit the ground, but he readjusted, and he managed to make the limp seem part of a game.

“Don't tax him,” Asimov 3000 said.

“I made you lunch,” Mary said to Beachstone.

“You carry it,” Beachstone said, going out ahead of her.

As Mary passed Kent's room, he messaged, “Going to rebuild your sand lumps?”

She stopped in his doorway. He had his back to her as he tinkered with a toy car engine in pieces on his desk. “I thought I'd take him to town,” Mary said. “You want to come?”

Kent turned, his hands still putting the engine together. “No, but good luck with that.”

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“Your superhero will never make it.”

“Mary, come on,” Beachstone called from halfway down the stairs.

Kent turned back to the almost completed engine. “You better go. The human calls.” As soon as the engine was complete, Kent began to disassemble it again.

Mary wanted to say something, but she couldn't think of anything else to say. She turned and joined Beachstone at the bottom of the stairs.

• • •

Outside, Beachstone's limp was more obvious, but since he didn't say anything about it, Mary let him be. They went down the cliff stairs to the beach and, without a glance at their city in ruins, walked toward town in silence. A constant breeze from the shore enveloped them, shaping to the contours of their bodies. The breeze made Mary realize how hot it was in the sun. She knew how the heat affected Beachstone, and noticed the slight shimmer of moisture on his forehead, but that didn't seem to be what bothered him. His jaw was clenched and his brow was down. He was angry, but she didn't know why.

The beach was strewn with seaweed in parallel trails that led to the water. The occasional discarded shell of a horseshoe crab marked their distance. Mary zoomed in and saw the town up ahead.

They trudged forward as though on a mission as opposed to a promenade. Beachstone was going so fast that his hands jerked up for balance with each limp. Mary finally stopped. “Beachstone, what is it?”

He turned on her, with almost the same expression he had
thrown at Kent when the tunnels collapsed. “You invited him to come,” he said.

She had never been the subject of such wrath, and it cut her, her processors recycling so she stammered, “I knew he wouldn't. Father—”

“Don't ever invite him again. It's him or me. Always.”

She was too overcome, her system freezing several seconds before she was able to whisper, “I'm sorry.”

His sneer softened, and an element of guilt seeped into his expression. “Never,” he said. “I cannot be near him ever.”

“Okay. All right,” she said. His words panicked Mary. He's changed, she thought. Though Father might have blamed her for Beachstone's illness, there was no question of where Beachstone assigned fault. But he was angry at her? If only he would smile.

He looked away, and after a moment said, “Let's go swimming.” He ran ahead into the water. “Ow, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts.”

Mary rushed to him, holding the lunch bag above her head. “Are you okay?”

“The water burns my cut,” he said, squatting down, smiling now. “Leave the lunch on the beach.” Mary started for the beach. “Just throw it.” The bag skidded on the wet sand. Mary walked through the water to where Beachstone was treading, unsure if he even wanted her. “Come here,” he said, and his expression was a familiar one. He hadn't changed; he'd just been angry.

She went to him, and he latched onto her back. They had never been swimming before, always keeping to dry land. The excitement and Beachstone's suddenly light tone helped to ease some of the anxious pain from moments before.
This
was what she had missed, this . . . spontaneity. She continued forward,
pulling him out into the water, and found herself, as always, wishing she could be like him, wishing she could have the same impulsive manner. She decided to try. “You on tight?” she asked, excited by the uncertainty.

“Yeah,” he said.

Mary dove, spinning around, and then brought him back up.

He beat at her, laughing and choking. “Monster,” he said. He pulled himself around so that he was in front of her.

“What?” she said, playing innocent, relieved at his laughter.

“What!” he said.

“What?” she said, and then smiled.

He tried to dunk her but couldn't. He settled, his legs around her torso. “Your hair's wet,” he said.

“So's yours,” Mary said.

He picked up a strand of her hair. “What's it made out of?”

“It's real hair. Human, I mean.”

He twisted it around his finger, but it slid away from him. He grabbed at it again. Mary watched him examine her lock of hair. His eyes were intent, his brow furrowed. There was the sound of a distant motor, and Beachstone looked up. “We should keep moving,” he said.

“There's no hurry.”

He detached himself from her and started swimming toward the shore.

“Wait. There's no hurry.” Mary caught up with him. They were walking now, emerging from the water, the sand shifting beneath their feet. Mary noticed a cut on the back of Beachstone's arm, a fine line that ended in a deep red dot. “Wait, you're cut. Let me see,” Mary said, grabbing for him. Beachstone fought in her arms. “Let me see.”

“No,” he said, pushing her hands away.

She held his arms down and looked over his shoulder at the
back of his arm. The bleeding had already stopped. The cut was superficial. “It's nothing,” Mary said. She let go of him. She thought of Kent's parting barb from weeks ago: that robots don't bleed. Organic life was so fragile.

Beachstone grabbed ahold of her and squeezed, and Mary had a sudden understanding of what a hug was for. She gripped him back, restraining herself from crushing him. There was always so much to learn. So many things that she knew but did not understand. When Beachstone let go, Mary expected to see tears on his face, but there were none. Instead his eyes were set in a look of determination. Again, Mary was thrown by how little she understood his human emotions. Perhaps they functioned differently in a biomass than they did in herself. Beachstone turned toward town, and they walked. “Have you ever been to town?” Mary asked.

“I don't know,” he said.

He didn't say anything more.

The sun had reached its apex. “Do you want your sandwich?”

“No,” Beachstone said without looking at her.

The cliff began to drop away. The rate of its decline seemed to match the sun's descent so that it appeared as if the sun wasn't moving at all. Mary noticed that Beachstone's limp had become more pronounced even as their pace slowed; he was in pain. Mary wondered what the pain felt like. She had never been damaged. Sometimes her systems didn't run as quickly as she was used to, or she realized that she was frozen, unable to complete a motion, but she was always able to fix the problem by running diagnostics or rebooting her system. It was nothing more than being tired or overworked, a software glitch. But Beachstone's software was working with no problem. She could tell by the set of his face, so resolute.

“Is your leg all right?” she asked.

“I'm fine,” he said.

Mary looked for any sign of strain in his face. There was none. She knew from his week of convalescence that he needed to eat, he needed to drink—she hadn't brought water! “Maybe we should turn back.”

He stopped, and looked out at the ocean.

“What?” Mary said.

“I think I'll have lunch now,” he said. He held out his hand for the bag. Relieved, Mary put it in his hand. He sat, crossing his good leg under his body, allowing the injured leg to flop on the beach. Mary sat beside him, trying to judge how close she should be. “We're not going back,” Beachstone said with food in his mouth.

“I don't want you to get sick again,” she said.

“I'm fine.”

“I really think we should go back,” Mary said.

“We're not going back,” he repeated, now with a tinge of his anger from earlier.

It frightened her, but so did the way Beachstone was sweating. She looked up at the sun. “We didn't bring any water,” she said.

“I heard Kent. First you invited him, then he mocked me. I won't let him gloat. We're going to make it.”

“We could say we made it.”

“No,” Beachstone said, and settled on chewing.

Mary worried one of the rough spots on her hands. “Was the sandwich good?” she asked.

Beachstone pulled himself closer to her. He reached for Mary's hair; it had dried in the sun. She felt him brush his fingers along the bottom. She wanted to touch his hair too. Could it be that it really grew from his head? Could it be that he would have to cut it? She reached out and touched it. It was just like hers.

“We better go,” Beachstone said, jumping up.

Mary was confused. She felt cheated. He was so angry one moment, then affectionate, and then distant the next. It made it hard for her to sort out her own feelings. Could it be that her brother felt the same way about the boy, and that was why he had wanted to hurt him? She was surprised to find that she could understand this—her own feelings of, what? Love? She felt as though she wanted to be beside him always, to appease him, to ease him, to serve him, and yet, it was crushing. Was it only two months ago that Father had brought him home? What had she done with herself before then?

She had to run to catch up with him.

Beachstone's limp was better after the rest, but it gradually returned as they walked. He had slackened his pace again without noticing. “I could carry you,” Mary said when they stopped for a moment so that Beachstone could stretch.

“I'm fine,” he said.

Mary wanted to think of something that could make him laugh. She looked at the cliff face. It would be easy to scale it. Maybe she could carry him on her back and they could walk up above where the ground was solid. Perhaps the sand was hard on his feet as it slid away from beneath each step. But she didn't say anything. They walked. When they rested, they leaned together, Beachstone's arm held lightly around Mary's waist. Beachstone didn't seem as intent as before, but he didn't deviate from his path. At one point he smiled suddenly, and Mary looked up to try and see what had made him happy. She didn't see anything. It was only much later that she realized that was the moment when his human eyes could perceive the town for the first time. The cliff was little more than a steep incline now. It was dusk.

They reached the town after dark. Beachstone was silent.
His head dropped forward, but Mary realized too late what was happening, and he was on the ground in front of her before she could move to grab him. Stupid kid, he had pushed himself too far. Mary was angry with her brother just then. She watched Beachstone's inert form for a moment. He had sprawled into such an unnatural position—and yet, it was supremely natural, for it had happened, hadn't it, and happened only as it could have. Then she bent down and picked him up. She knew she needed to get him a drink, but all the lights in town were out; there was no one on the street. She walked through the empty streets, carrying Beachstone in front of her. She had never been in town at night, and it was all new to her. They were the buildings she knew, but without the people they were different. The stillness seemed appropriate, and she was glad that Beachstone wasn't missing the town she knew, and yet she was upset that this new town, which she was seeing for the first time, couldn't be shared with him. When she found nobody, she decided that there was nothing to do but to return home. He would sleep now. He could drink at home.