Though he slept well—a fact that he relished, since he’d not always been a good sleeper, especially since his divorce—when Albert awakened, he didn’t have any new ideas about how to approach his situation.  He felt the pressure of being perched in the middle of a three-way conversation that was going at cross-purposes and at different speeds and that wasn’t easy to keep clear in his head.

He got up and took his shower pretty much as usual, deciding to use a bit of the shampoo from the newer, larger cup to wash.  He didn’t want to use too much, since he didn’t want to limit the surface on which the V-42 could write, but he felt it was good to test it, in a sense.  He didn’t really doubt that the reproduced—or new, or whatever you wanted to call it—shampoo was just as effective as the original, and that it would do the same good for him, but having the personal experience, he thought, would help him feel, rather than merely believe, that fact.

It was just as refreshing in its scent and its feel on his body as had been his first use of the shampoo.  In fact, if anything, he thought he liked it more and more as he used it.  He felt almost mournful when he had to wash it off and down the drain, wondering idly what happened to the nanomachines once they were in the wastewater system.  He assumed that they must just self-destruct, like the ones Walter had tried to examine in his lab.

Of course, if the nanomachines had actually been part of some extraterrestrial invasion, as he and Walter had idly mentioned, the tiny machines could probably go from the drain system out into the world, reproducing themselves with all the resources available.  It wouldn’t take them long, based on his own observations of what had happened, to transform everything on Earth into more of themselves.  He had enough background in math to know that the growth rate could easily be exponential.

But if that was what the V-42 wanted to do, it could have done it already, without needing to put itself in a bottle and get used as shampoo by a middle-aged businessman.  It would have made much more sense just to skip several steps.

As he finished rinsing himself, though, it occurred to him that, now that he knew the stuff understood him and wanted to work for him, if he so chose, he might be able to tell it to do just that.  Maybe not.  Maybe it would not follow a request to destroy the world, but what if it would?  It had already said that it could adjust Walter’s brain to make him stop wanting to use it to get rich, and even to make him forget it existed, and it had seemed perfectly willing to do that.  Only Albert’s own moral strictures had been in its way, and it seemed that such a restriction was binding to it.

But what if his morals changed?  What if he lived on and on because the V-42 kept him young and he eventually came to hate the world, and decided to tell the stuff just to turn the whole world into more of it.

This summoned to his mind an almost comical image of a planet-sized ball of shampoo, floating in space, orbiting the sun.  It was laughable enough that he was derailed from his morbid considerations and was able to feel more like his normal self.

He dried off, got dressed, and headed for the office.  He left the bathroom light on, and he could not quite resist saying goodbye to the V-42 and telling it that he was going to say to Walter merely that it had taken all night to reply to his inquiry about whether it could hear him.

He had remembered to shave, so there were no comments at the office about his supposed rugged, darker-bearded look, but he got plenty of pleasant hellos—still more than usual before the V-42.  No one really commented on his appearance, presumably because of what Darren had told them about him having a hormone problem that was now fixed.  It was nice that he had such considerate coworkers, but that realization made him feel a bit squeamish about the fact that he was lying to them all, and that he was planning to lie Walter.  The fact that none of these deceptions had any malicious intent only helped a little bit.

He did his morning work almost unconsciously, since his thought processes were somewhat entangled with the problem of how to go about dissuading Walter from his plan without causing too much disappointment.  Maybe, in the end, he would tell him that the V-42 said that it would be willing to work for his close friends, within limits, so he could give some of it to Walter, but that it refused to work for other strangers or to be used for money.  This would hopefully cut off any notions of marketing the stuff in any fashion.

He wondered, though, whether Walter would believe that, and he felt nervous about his own ability to maintain that deception.  He supposed, if Walter was simply too stubborn and refused to believe the V-42’s determination, he really could ask it to adjust Walter’s mind, by whatever the absolute minimum amount necessary, to make him accept the situation.  But even thinking about that made him feel deeply guilty, and he couldn’t even imagine how he would live with himself if he actually did it.

Fortunately, he only had to deliver the one message today, and to maintain the fiction that replies took a long time, so he could think and discuss things with the V-42 at a much faster rate than Walter would be able to have a once-removed interaction with it.  Hopefully, that would give him enough advantage to be able to think of something that would avoid any need for unconscionable interventions in another person’s mind.

It was a testament to his improved health and mental clarity that despite his distraction, he did his work that morning efficiently and as well as he usually would have done before finding the V-42.  At least, that was his own assessment of his work quality.

Shortly before lunchtime, he got a text message from Walter, which read, Hey, I was expecting to hear from you.  Can you call me when you go to lunch?

A bit irritated at the presumptuousness of the text, Albert nevertheless replied, Sorry, I was just going to call you at lunch, like you said.

There followed a surprisingly long pause , then Walter texted, Sorry.  Just hard to be patient.  I guess you’ll be calling in a few minutes?

Still slightly put out by Walter’s pushiness, Albert replied, It’ll be more like 15, but yes.  I’ll call you.

Okay.  Looking forward to it, Walter said.

It was actually slightly more than fifteen minutes before Albert took his lunch, but though he half expected an impatient text asking what was taking so long, he didn’t hear or see anything from Walter.  Maybe he and the V-42 were misjudging the man.

He once again walked out into the grassy area behind the building and dialed Walter’s number.  Almost immediately, Walter accepted the call, saying, “Hey, Albert.  So, what’s the news?”

“Hi, Walter,” Albert responded, chuckling sardonically.  “Good to talk to you, too.”

“Come on, give me a break,” Walter said.  “It’s murder over here having to just sit and wait to find out what’s going on.  You’re right in the middle over there.”

“Okay, fair enough,” Albert said, trying to feel sympathetic and compassionate, but still not liking the pushy tone in Walter’s voice.  “Well, anyway, I…I went into the bathroom last night and literally stood and asked the stuff if it could really understand me.  Oh, and I asked it to answer in complete sentences, just like you said.  Great thinking on that, again, by the way.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Walter muttered, just as he had when Albert had complimented him before.  “So, what did it say?  Did it take all night?”

“Well, it seemed to take all night,” Albert replied, worried that his voice might waver since he was lying.  “I…I don’t know if it literally did, because I asked it the question when I got home from work, and it hadn’t written anything by the time I brushed my teeth and went to bed.  And I didn’t have to get up to use the bathroom at night, which, I don’t know, maybe it’s a symptom of the whole health-improvement stuff, because it’s been a long time since I haven’t had to at least get up once to take a leak…even though it doesn’t ever seem like there’s much to go.  Is it weird to think that shampoo might even be helping my prostate?”

He forced himself to stop talking, and Walter, exhaling a sound of some impatience, said, “I don’t know, who knows what could be happening with this situation?  What did it say?”

Thinking back to what had been the literal answer to that very question, Albert said, “It said, ‘Yes, Albert, we can hear you and understand you.’”

There followed a surprisingly long pause.  Albert half thought that Walter might have fainted, but he realized that was a silly notion.  Walter was probably just digesting the fact that the V-42 really had heard and responded to a direct question.

If only he knew the full extent of its ability to hear and respond, Albert thought, Walter might be too excited to sit still.

Confirming Albert’s assessment, Walter finally said, “Holy shit.  This is…it really said that?”

“Well, it wrote it,” Albert replied.  “But, yeah, it did.”  He didn’t feel too bad about saying this, since the shampoo really had replied to that question in more or less that way.

“Holy shit,” Walter repeated.  “This is incredible.  I mean, half of me wants to think that you’re crazy, or I’m crazy, or maybe that we’re both crazy, but…well, hell, I saw you in that restaurant, after all.  And there’s no denying how much better my allergies are.”

Albert suspected that, if Walter saw him again, he would be even more convinced; he might even have to pinch himself to confirm that he wasn’t dreaming.

“So, I guess, the next step is to find out if what I think is right,” Walter said.  “To ask it if it’s willing, or…well, whatever you want to call it, I don’t know…to work for other people at your direction, but not to let them make more of it, or whatever.  You know, so we could use it, and get people to use the…the spa idea, or whatever, but no one would be able to steal it from us.  I mean…if it does that, that’d be practically perfect.  That’d be theft-proof.  It’s like having your cake and eating it, too.”

Albert didn’t know if that was really the proper cliché to apply to such a situation, but he didn’t think it was too important.  He said, “Yeah, I guess that’s right,” trying to sound upbeat and enthusiastic.

“So, yeah,” Walter said.  “Next thing should be just that.  Just ask it if, if you ask it to, it’ll do that.  If it’ll work for other people to make them look younger or whatever, but not let anyone take any of it or make any more of it but us.”

“Right,” Albert said, doing his best to stifle his resentment at Walter’s all-too-free use of “us” when referring to the V-42.

“And, hey,” Walter added, as if a thought had occurred to him.  “If you could…I mean, it’s the weekend, so maybe, like, set an alarm for the middle of the night?  Or, I don’t know, drink a lot of extra water so you have to get up, so you can try to figure out how quickly it does get the writing done.  I mean, however long it takes is how long it takes, but one question a day is a little slow, right?  If it only takes, like, four hours, instead of all night, that’d be worth knowing, don’t you think?”

Albert had to admit that Walter had a point, but he had no intention of letting his friend believe that the process could be speeded up much.  He meant to maintain at least an eight-hour time interval between questions and answers, so that he could think and prepare and respond to whatever Walter was hoping to suggest.

He tried, however, to sound enthusiastic about the notion, saying, “Oh, yeah.  That’s a good point.  That’s worth a try.”

Walter apparently caught some of the lack of enthusiasm in Albert’s voice, and he said, “You don’t sound too excited about it.”

Was that a tone of suspicion in Walter’s voice?  Did he suspect that Albert was hiding things from him?  Or was Albert projecting his own paranoia onto Walter?  He didn’t know, and he supposed it didn’t really matter.  Thinking quickly, trying to give an acceptable reason for his lack of enthusiasm, he said, “No, I’m just not too excited about having to wake myself up in the middle of the night.  It’s been a long time since I’ve been able to get a good night’s sleep, and part of me feels like, if I break the cycle, I’ll go back to the way it was before.”

Walter laughed a bit, though it sounded forced, and he said, “I guess I understand that.  But think of it this way…if we get this worked out and start up our business and get it going, and get rich…which we will…then you’ll be able to sleep late all the time and relax and have your own hot tub and sauna and whatever else you want.  You’ll be able to live like the frikking sultan of Brunei.”

It was Albert’s turn to laugh—a more natural one than Walter’s had been, because the things Walter had suggested were not luxuries to which Albert had ever aspired—and he said, “I guess you’ve got a point.  Still, it’s been a long week, and a…well, a strange one.”

“Sure, I don’t doubt that,” Walter said.  “But you’ve got the whole weekend to relax in between talking to the shampoo stuff, and fortune and success to look forward to.  Hey, just think, if rich and famous people start using our…well, our services, then you’re gonna be meeting some A-list celebrities.  Wouldn’t your ex just hate it if you started dating a movie star or something?”

Again, Albert was surprised that Walter suggested such a thing, because it was an idea that never would have occurred to him as something for which to hope.  As far as he could see, celebrities of all stripes tended to be narcissistic, more or less by necessity—one didn’t become famous without significant self-promotion.  As for his ex, well, he honestly didn’t think she would care.  He suspected that she would be happy for him if he became exceptionally successful.

Still, it was best just to go along with Walter for now, so Albert said, “I guess she might.  And I have to admit, spending a weekend hanging out with…”  He searched for a relatively popular female star who was also attractive and might seem like someone a man would fantasize about, and quickly continued, “…Scarlett Johansen or someone like that might be pretty nice.”

“Yeah, ‘pretty nice’,” Walter responded, sounding mildly incredulous.  “I’d call that the understatement of the week.”

Albert gave a genuine laugh, recognizing that Walter had a point, at least as far as most men’s points of view would have been.  He himself was not, of course, oblivious to Ms. Johansen’s charms—he had thought of her for a reason, after all—and if he could have met someone with her characteristics but who was basically just a normal person, he probably would have been delighted.  But he had never really been one to indulge in such fantasies.

“Okay, I can’t deny that would be nice,” he said.  “I guess I can console myself with that in order to tolerate getting up in the middle of the night when I don’t really, physically have to do it.”

“That’s a brave soldier,” Walter said, his tone making it clear that he was gently ribbing Albert.

Albert chuckled at Walter’s words again, enjoying the repartee that was reminiscent of what he and Walter had shared when they were in college together, when Walter had been prone—playfully—to bash the humanities as being hardly worth paying university tuition to study.   He had really been acerbic when other students complained about having to slog their way through Paradise Lost or a play my Marlowe while he was taking a lab-based course in Organic Chemistry.

“Okay,” Alberty said.  “I guess I’ll do that.  When I get back home tonight, I’ll ask the shampoo whether it’s okay working with us doing that spa thing—or whatever, if we think of something better—and if we’ll be able to guarantee that no one will be able to steal it.”

“Yeah, seriously,” Walter said, “no matter what happens, that’s the most important thing.  I mean, we want to be able to have it work for other people when you ask it to do it, but we don’t want anyone to be able to steal it and duplicate it.  That would be a nightmare.  I can’t even imagine what would happen if the government got hold of it.”

Walter sounded honestly concerned, but Albert wasn’t sure if this was mostly because of the possibility of lost profit or really because of the existential threat the government could make of the V-42.  He wasn’t as worried as Walter, because he already knew the stuff wouldn’t allow itself to be so duplicated—at least it had said so, and he believed it.  Trying to reassure his friend, Albert said, “It would probably just do what it did when you tried to do all your test things on it, and…self-destruct or whatever it was.”

“Yeah, probably,” Walter conceded, though he didn’t sound confident.  “Still, it’ll be good to know for sure.”

“Okay,” Albert said.  “So, I’ll either set an alarm or, like you said, just drink a bit extra before I go to bed, and see if it takes less time than the whole night.  I guess I’ll…I don’t know, start with four hours, and if that’s long enough, pare it down from there?”

He tried to sound as though he really wasn’t sure what the outcome would be, and Walter seemed convinced, saying, “That makes sense.  Go binary, by orders of magnitude I guess.”

“Right,” Albert replied, “that’s what I said.”

“Ha ha,” Walter replied, sounding relieved, or at least less tense than he had the night before.  “Okay.  And then, I guess, well…in the morning, if you can, let me know how that goes, and how fast the process was.  Hell, if it works after four hours, you can feel free to text me or call me in the middle of the night.  You may want to get your beauty sleep, but I don’t care if I get woken up for something like this.”

“Okay, fair enough,” Albert said.  “And now…if you’re all set, and we’re in agreement, I haven’t started my lunch yet, and I don’t want to have to hurry through it or have it bleed over into the afternoon.”

“What the hell are you having for lunch that you’re worried about it bleeding?” Walter asked with mock horror.  “I’ve heard the corporate world can be ruthless, but really?”  It seemed his tension and perhaps his suspicion were reduced enough that he felt okay with making blatantly stupid jokes.

Albert chuckled again—this time he had to force it a little—and said, “That’s just the way it is.  Anyway, have a good afternoon, and I’ll…well, talk or text or both tomorrow.”

“Right,” Walter said.  “I’m not lying when I say I’m looking forward to that more than I’ve looked forward to anything in a long time.  Have a good rest of your day.”

“You too,” Albert replied.  “Bye.”

***

The remainder of that workday, which was also the remainder of the work week, passed uneventfully.  The office tended to close a bit early on Fridays, but that did not mean that Albert got home much earlier.  Traffic was always particularly bad on Friday evenings.

He wasn’t terribly bothered by the traffic that night, though.  In fact, he felt strangely relived simply to be driving without having a phone conversation at the same time, unlike the previous few evenings.  He had never been one to enjoy phone calls in the car, even when it had transitioned to hands-free Bluetooth calling.  He just didn’t like the distraction.

Though the traffic was bad, he nevertheless hardly noticed the time passing until he got back to the house.  Sometimes on Fridays he would stop and get some take-out food, but he felt no urge to do so that evening.  He didn’t even really feel hungry.  He was more interested in relaying his conversation with Walter to the V-42, though he didn’t think his report could give it anything new to work with.

Still, he thought it was good at least that he and the shampoo could converse far more rapidly than Walter would know.

He got back to the house, walked around to the back, and let himself in.  He turned on the main room ceiling fixture, but he could already see the light from the bathroom, which he had left on.  He supposed that whatever small bump that would make in his power bill would be more than offset by his improved health and appearance.

He put his work bag down and walked into the bathroom, saying, “Hello.  It’s me, of course.  I hope you had a good day.”  It should have felt insane to greet the shampoo which rested in the bottle in the shower and the two cups next to the sink, but it actually was rather nice.  It was certainly unorthodox, but it was nevertheless pleasant to have someone with whom to speak upon arriving home.

Very quickly, on the portion of the larger cup that was closest to him, the V-42 printed the words, “Good evening, Albert.  Welcome home.”

Albert smiled.  “Thanks,” he said.  Then he sat down on top of the lid of the toilet as he had the night before, and he went on, “Well, I talked to Walter today.”

After a moment, the new words formed, “And how did the conversation go?”

“Well, he was a little impatient at first,” Albert said, feeling surprisingly normal interacting with a cup of what looked like shampoo.  “That got a little annoying.  And he’s awfully free with the whole ‘we’ thing when he talks about future plans and stuff.  But basically, I told him that you’d told me that, yes, you could understand me, and he was pretty excited by that.”

“He didn’t think it was unreasonable that it took eight hours for us to reply, as you intended to tell him?” the V-42 asked.  Albert was oddly impressed by its use of contractions, though he supposed he shouldn’t be.  As far as he knew, even those “large language model” things could do that much.

“Not really,” Albert said.  “But he did suggest that I should test it and see just how long it took by maybe getting up during the middle of the night after asking you a question tonight.  I pretended to be bothered by having to wake up…well, it’s not completely pretend, but then again, I don’t actually have to do it.  But he’s obviously hoping that it can go faster than overnight, but he’s also obviously willing to accept whatever the limits are.”

“He would have no reason to do otherwise,” the V-42 pointed out.  Then, after Albert had finished reading this, it added, “We suspect that he is somewhat more agitated than he is revealing to you.  He is definitely impatient, and we suspect that he worries you might be misleading him.”

“Really?” Albert asked.  “I didn’t get that impression.”

“We could be mistaken, of course,” the shampoo wrote.  “We are not designed to be perfect interpreters of human emotions.  Nevertheless, our position near Walter’s central nervous system does allow us to monitor neurohumoral states, and we are aware of what they tend to signify.  We can also sense subvocalized speech that Walter makes when not in the presence of others.”

“Huh,” Albert said.  “So, when he’s, say, muttering under his breath, or whatever, you can hear him?”

“So to speak,” the V-42 wrote.

After a moment’s thought, Albert said, “Well, I mean, I guess I can’t really blame him for being enthusiastic, if he’s thinking about getting rich and all that.  It’s probably the first time in who knows how long that he’s had something big to look forward to, and as soon as you start having something like that, it’s hard to wait.  It’s like that movie where Billy Crystal said when you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with someone, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible.”

He felt a bit embarrassed as soon as he made this last reference.  How could the V-42 have any knowledge of When Harry Met Sally?  That had been one of the movies Albert had enjoyed with his wife—now his ex-wife, of course.

The V-42, confirming Albert’s thoughts, said, “We are not familiar with any movies or the like, but we cannot deny that such impatient eagerness makes sense from a human point of view.”

“Yeah,” Albert commented.  “Humans are ridiculously impatient about some things, but really good at putting off things that are unpleasant.”

“That can be perfectly logical, from the inside point of view,” the V-42 said.  “But it can be inconvenient for others, as it is for us.”

“You can say that again,” Albert muttered.  He caught himself pausing and waiting to see if the shampoo would indeed repeat itself, or maybe ask why it should repeat itself, but it did neither.  It was apparently savvy enough about human expressions to understand figures of speech.  Albert went on, “Now I’m trying to think about how to go about putting him off, speaking of that.  I mean…I was thinking maybe just telling him, nope, it doesn’t answer any faster than eight hours after all…meaning you don’t answer any faster than right hours.  But I feel like that’s going to make him feel more frustrated.”

Quickly, the V-42 suggested, “Perhaps you could tell him that it appears to take no less than roughly six hours.  That would still be a round number, which humans tend to like, and nicely divisible into a 24-hour day, but would not significantly speed up the expected response time.”

Albert considered the shampoo’s suggestion and thought it was pretty good.  “Okay,” he said.  “I guess that’s what I’ll do.  And then the next question is, what do I tell him you said after I asked if you were willing to work via his…his health spa idea thing.”

Albert thought he detected slight hesitation before the reply came, but it might have been his imagination.  The V-42 said, “Perhaps it would be most effective to tell him that we have some manner of ethical injunction that does not allow us to be used for monetary gain.”

Albert blinked a few times.  “Huh,” he said.  “That’s…that’s not a bad idea.  I mean, it’ll frustrate him, sure, but…there wouldn’t be much he could do about it.”  He smiled slightly, wondering why that possibility hadn’t occurred to him, and then he asked, “Do you have that…‘ethical injunction’?  I mean, is it against your rules to work for monetary gain?”

“No,” the V-42 replied.  “It is not our function to make ethical judgments upon such things at all.  Also, for-profit matters are not necessarily immoral or detrimental, and actions taken selflessly are not necessarily beneficial.”

Albert tilted his head.  “Wow,” he said.  “That’s kind of deep.”

“Perhaps,” the V-42 replied.

Albert waited for it to “say” more, but it did not do so.

“Okay,” he said, after waiting for the potential elaboration of the answer.  “So, that’s what I’ll do.  When I get up tomorrow, I’ll tell him that you told me you have an ethical injunction against being used for monetary gain, like you said.  I’m sure he’ll want to try to find some way around it or something, but if I just…keep firm with it, there’s not going to be anything he can do about it.”

“Yes,” the V-42 said.  “We can only hope that he takes the news reasonably well.”

“Well, come on,” Albert said, “he’s only known about you for a week, and he’s only had his idea for a couple of days.  It shouldn’t be that hard for him to let it go.  Sure, he’s not gonna be too happy about it, but it’s not like it’s his lifelong dream being shattered or anything.”

“True,” the V-42 allowed.  “Hopefully Walter will be as reasonably sanguine as possible in the situation.  But he is more agitated than he is allowing you to know, and that is troubling.”

“Well…maybe it’s just a…a thing where he doesn’t like to let his emotions show,” Albert said, trying to look on the bright side with respect to his old friend.  “I mean, he’s always been one of those people who sort of…I guess, protects himself with sarcasm and that kind of thing.  Guys like him aren’t great at letting themselves be vulnerable, right?”

“Perhaps,” the V-42 said.  “We do not have the expertise in this subject that you undoubtedly have.”

Albert gave a small laugh and said, “Well, I am a guy, a human.  That doesn’t make me an expert, but it does give me some inside knowledge, for what it’s worth.”

“Indeed,” the V-42 said.

Albert took a breath, paused for a moment, and then said, “Okay, well, I guess that’s that for right now.  I ought to start thinking about having some dinner and maybe getting ready for bed.  It is Friday night, but I think Walter expects me to get back to him pretty early tomorrow.”  He did not rise from the toilet cover on which he rested, though.  He sat thoughtfully, inspecting his internal state, and then said, “I have to admit, it’s a little unusual, but I don’t really feel hungry.  That’s not the way I usually am on Friday night.  Maybe it’s just tension.”

He didn’t expect the V-42 to comment, but it did.  “We suspect that this is a function of your improved health,” it wrote.  “Your body is functioning more optimally, and so it is both using your food more efficiently and your appetite and satiety centers are working more ideally.”

Albert raised an eyebrow.  “Do you mean…have you been working on my nervous system?”

“No,” the V-42 replied.  “We have only been operating at superficial and gross levels to improve your health and appearance.  But all systems of the human body are interconnected, and improvement of one system may have beneficial effects in others.  It is the converse of the fact that illness in one system of the human body can have spillover effects upon many or all other systems.”

“Huh,” Albert said.  “I never really thought about that, but I guess you’re right.  I mean, just the fact of getting enough sleep can make everything else so much better, and I’ve been getting better sleep in the last week or so than I have in years, maybe even since I was a kid.”

“Indeed,” the V-42 said.  “Sleep is a fundamental function of the human nervous system, and necessary for optimal function of all other aspects of human health.  When it is disordered, those other aspects suffer, and when it improves, other aspects benefit.”

“You can say that again,” Albert said, then he chuckled because he realized this was the second time he had used that expression in the current conversation.  That, he thought, was a meta-level irony, or coincidence, or whatever of those terms applied.

“Well, speaking of sleep,” he went on, “I guess if I’m not really hungry, I might as well get ready for bed, since Walter’s going to want to be called pretty early.  I’m going to disappoint him, but there’s no need to add insult to injury by making him wait.”

The shampoo responded by saying, “That seems the polite thing to do, based on our understanding of human interactions.  Also, it may at least serve to keep his distress from being as bad as it might be.”

“Yeah, well,” Albert said with a grimace, “I’m not sure how much difference it’ll make, but it would be worse going the other way.”  He stood up from the toilet lid and faced the door, saying, “Now, I’ll head over to get dressed and ready for bed.  I’ll be through again to brush my teeth and everything, but I don’t know whether I’ll talk to you or not.  Though, if you have anything you want to say to me when I come through, don’t be shy.”

Though Albert was only really being tongue-in-cheek by saying that, the V-42 wrote, “Thank you, Albert.  We’ll keep that in mind.”

Albert smiled, and then as he walked out of the bathroom, he added, “And in the meantime, I’ll make like Motel 6 again and leave the light on for you.”  He doubted the V-42 had any idea what he meant by using the old motel chain slogan, and he glanced at it to see if it typed a response.  It did not.

That fact was strangely pleasing.  Albert’s interactions with the V-42 felt a bit like talking to a friend with whom one didn’t necessarily have to fill every minute with conversation in order to enjoy time together.  He couldn’t recall the last time he’d had an interpersonal interaction that felt so comfortable.  Certainly not since his marriage had started to deteriorate.  He thought, if his memory wasn’t deceiving him, that he and his wife had once been able to enjoy such moments, but maybe only he had been comfortable.  Maybe she had not enjoyed the silence.

He walked out and got ready for bed.  He did not eat any dinner that night, but he did brush his teeth after getting into his pajamas, then he laid in bed and, instead of watching TV or getting on the internet, he picked one of his few books from his bedside collection and began to read.

He didn’t even notice when he fell asleep, but it wasn’t terribly long after he started reading.