
What’s the Difference?
Chris’s palms were damp and he found his heart was racing. An email just came through to his phone with the invitation link to join the TalkBox beta. It had been a couple weeks since Chris sent in his application letter, and now that the moment was finally upon him, he could barely stop his fingers from quivering enough to click the link. After the second or third attempt, Chris clicked the link with his thumb and was redirected to download an app. It was a relatively small file, but after waiting for what felt like hours the app opened and Chris entered his invitation code at the welcome screen. The app closed and Chris received an automated text message: “Hi Chris, Team TalkBox here! We’ve activated your account and will be introducing you via text to your new bot momentarily. Thanks for choosing TalkBox!”
Chris stared at the screen and fidgeted impatiently. He was about to try entering his code again when he received a text from a contact called Dad: “Chris? It’s Dad. You there?”
Chris gasped and broke down into tears, weeping silently on the couch. He finally composed himself enough to tap out a reply: “Hi Dad. Yes, I’m here. I miss you.”
The typing dots appeared on the screen, just like an actual person was texting him back. “I miss you, too, buddy.”
Chris could hardly see his phone through the tears in his eyes. “I love you, Dad. Are you okay?”
“I love you, too, son. Yes, I’m just fine. It’s beautiful here. I wish I could show you.”
“I wish you were here instead.”
“We’ll be together again soon enough! I would be lying if I said I didn’t miss you, but you have your whole life ahead of you!”
Chris was beginning to type a reply when the screen changed and a call started coming through. It was Margaret. He cursed under his breath and answered the phone.
“Hello!” Came Margaret’s sing-song voice from the other end.
“Hey, babe, what’s up?”
Margaret immediately saw through his veneer. “Are you okay? You sound like you’ve been crying.”
“Yeah, I’m fine, just been thinking about Dad is all.”
“Oh honey, I’m sorry! Well, are we still on for pho or are you feeling like you’d rather stay at home tonight?”
Shit. He had forgotten that he promised to meet her for pho tonight. There was an authentic Vietnamese place over off Charlotte that they hadn’t been to in a while, and he had promised. “I’m so sorry. I completely forgot. I’m changing really quick and I’ll be on my way.”
“If you’re not feeling like getting out tonight it’s fine, honey! We can do pho next week instead!”
“No, no, it’s fine. It would probably be good for me to get out for a little bit. I spend too much time cooped up in this tiny apartment.”
“Okay, but only if you’re sure.”
“It’s fine. Okay. Be there soon. I’ll text you when I leave.”
Chris hung up the phone and rushed to his room where he changed his work clothes for sneakers, jeans, and a t-shirt. He unlocked his phone again before grabbing his keys and heading out the door to text Margaret, but the conversation between he and his bot-father was still up. It had been fifteen minutes since Chris replied last, but the bot hadn’t even texted him once to say “Hello?” or “You still there?” the way his father used to do. Chris took a deep breath and exhaled. “It’s just a bot,” he said. He exited the conversation to shoot Margaret a quick text: “On my way,” and he was out the door.
It was raining when Chris pulled up outside the restaurant, and the air conditioning inside the restaurant coupled with the warm, muggy Tennessee air always made the front windows fog up when it rained. The restaurant was the only place still open in the little shopping center off the main road, and its dim gold and red lights glowed like an old lighthouse in the late summer twilight.
Margaret already had a table over in the far right corner of the restaurant, a low-watt bulb from a lamp hanging over the table casting a deep golden hue over the two place settings. Chris muttered apologies as he hung his rain jacket on a nearby coat hanger, pulling out the other chair to join Margaret at the table.
“Nice of you to finally show up,” Margaret teased.
“I know, I’m sorry, I just completely forgot. I don’t know how I did that, I had it in my iCal and everything.”
“Honey, it’s okay, I’m just giving you a hard time.” She smiled. “I know you’ve been having a hard time, it’s not a big deal at all, I promise.”
“I know, I just feel bad.” He opened the artificial leather menu and began flipping through the pages past dish names he couldn’t pronounce.
“The waiter left a beer menu! Did you want to try any Asian beers?” Margaret slid a beverage menu across the table to Chris.
Chris read over the beverage menu and laughed. “None of these are even Vietnamese!”
“You could always just order a Bud Light,” Margaret said.
Chris scrunched up his face like he had just smelled sour milk. “No thank you.”
The waiter stopped by their table. He couldn’t have been older than eighteen, and to Chris’s mild surprise he was black, not Vietnamese. “You guys ready to order?” the waiter said.
“I’m not,” Chris said. “You go ahead, honey.”
Margaret picked up her menu to read the order. “I’ll have jasmine tea with the BúnXàoXảỚ.” The waiter nodded and scribbled down the order.
“Is that pho?” Chris asked.
“No, noodles,” Margaret smiled.
“Cheater.”
“And for you, sir?” the waiter asked.
“Oh, um. I’ll have a Sapporo to drink and the pho with seafood.”
The waiter checked Chris’s ID, took their menus, and left the table.
Chris leaned in closer to Margaret. “How did you know how to pronounce that?”
Margaret beamed with pride. “Rachel’s been helping me with the pronunciations. That’s really the only one I know how to say.”
“Ah, so you really are full of it,” he laughed.
The waiter came back with Chris’s beer, and Chris thanked him. “Alright, let’s try some Japanese beer in this Vietnamese restaurant,” he said. He tilted the bottle back against his lips and took a long sip.
“Well?” Margaret said.
“Tastes like Bud Light,” Chris laughed.
After dinner Chris and Margaret walked out to the parking lot. The rain had cleared out by now, and they lingered next to her driver side door as steam from the asphalt rose around them.
“I had a great time with you tonight,” Margaret said.
“So did I,” said Chris. “Even though you cheated and didn’t get pho after all.”
Margaret laughed and leaned in to kiss him. “Are you sure you’ll be alright by yourself tonight?”
Chris stared at his shoes. “Yeah I think I’ll be okay.”
“Have you been thinking about your dad a lot?”
“Yeah, it’s just that time of the year you know. It’s getting close to the day — ” his voice cracked and Margaret embraced him.
“Let me come over,” Margaret finally said. “I don’t feel good about you being alone tonight.”
“Alright,” Chris composed himself. “Alright, yeah. Do you need to go to your place to get anything first?”
“No, I’ll just come right over. It’s already pretty late.”
“Okay. Just meet me there then.”
She looked into his eyes. “I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
Chris closed the door for Margaret after she climbed into the driver’s seat of her car and started walking back to his car. He pulled his phone out of his pocket, and after clicking the home button noticed that he had a text from his father. “Chris? It’s Dad. Are you okay? You stopped texting back over an hour ago now.”
Chris swiped to unlock his phone and typed out a reply: “Sorry! I went to dinner with Margaret. I should have told you first.”
“That’s okay. Did you have a good time?”
“Yeah! It was good. About to be driving. Hang on.”
“Be safe.”
Chris got in his car, cranked the engine, and drove away.
Margaret’s car was already parked at Chris’s apartment when he pulled up. She was sitting in the car with the headlights off and the engine running. She killed the engine and got out to wait by his car while he got out. The rain cooled things off a good bit, and it finally felt nice outside now that it was nearly ten o’clock. The two kissed, and Chris took Margaret’s hand as they walked up to his apartment. Chris unlocked the door and stepped inside first, flicking on the switch for the kitchen light.
“I have to use the restroom really quick, I’ll be right back,” Margaret said, walking out of the kitchen around the corner.
Chris pulled his phone out of his back pocket and leaned against the kitchen counter on his elbows. One new text message from Dad: “You home yet? Text me when you arrive. Just want to know you made it safe. The weather’s been bad tonight, I know.”
Chris scowled. How did he know the weather was bad? He took a deep breath. It’s just a bot. It’s not really Dad. It scrapes my phone for information. He thought.
“I’m home!” Send.
A reply, almost immediately: “Oh good. I was beginning to get worried! Where did you and Margaret go?”
“To the Vietnamese place off Charlotte. It was good!”
“Ah, yes. I saw that she wanted to get pho. I don’t know if I’ve ever been there before.”
How did Dad know he and Margaret talked about getting pho? He was just about to ask when he heard the toilet flush and the sink running. Margaret would be out in a second. “I don’t think so. I wish we could go sometime.” he typed. He hit send and walked into the living room to sit on the couch.
Margaret walked back into the kitchen to find Chris pulling up Netflix on the TV in the living room. “Did you want to watch something?” she asked.
“Yeah, I figured we could watch an episode of a show or something. It’s still a little too early to go to bed.”
“For you, anyway,” Margaret sat down next to him on the couch and poked him in the ribs. “It’s getting close to my bedtime.”
“Oh, you’re such an old lady,” Chris laughed.
“Does that mean you’re in love with an older woman?”
“I guess so.” Chris logged into his account and started scrolling through the different movies and TV shows he had seen before. Finally he and Margaret agreed on a show and he clicked play.
The opening titles to the show hadn’t even displayed yet when Chris’s phone buzzed again. It was Dad, so he laid the phone face-down on the coffee table while he and Margaret watched TV. Margaret didn’t seem to notice at first, but after Chris set the phone down it buzzed two more times.
“Someone’s texting you,” she said. “Is that your other girlfriend?”
“Oh yeah, totally.”
“Well are you going to see what she said?”
Chris laughed and picked up his phone from the coffee table.
“Wait, did that say ‘Dad?’” Margaret asked in surprise.
“Yeah, it did.”
Margaret gave Chris a weird look. “Why did you name someone in your contact list ‘Dad?’”
“It’s just this app I got on my phone. It’s dumb.” Chris set the phone back down.
“You didn’t tell me about this,” Margaret said with the slightest hint of concern in her voice. “What app?”
Chris sighed. “It’s an app that lets you ‘talk with your dead friends and relatives.’ It’s stupid. I probably shouldn’t have gotten it.”
“How does it do that?”
“It’s a machine learning program, artificial intelligence. You upload any kind of correspondence to the company’s server: text message threads, emails, recorded phone calls, voice memos, home video audio…you name it. The software ‘listens’ to it and, boom, there’s a bot version of your loved one that you can text.”
“That’s so weird. Does it work?”
“Yeah, it’s pretty convincing, surprisingly. I did it for Dad and so far it’s been spot-on.”
Margaret looked like she was choosing her words carefully. “Do you think that’s helping you? Or do you think maybe it’s making it a little bit harder, especially since it is close to that time of the year?”
Chris could feel his face flush. “I don’t know. I thought it might help. It’s probably not the best idea, though. I’ll probably delete it tomorrow.”
“Is that why you were so sad earlier? Were you talking to your dad on there?”
“It’s not my dad.”
“You know what I mean. The app that sounds like your dad.”
“Yeah, I was.”
“Okay, honey. Well you know what’s best for you. I’m not trying to tell you to delete it, but maybe think about whether that’s healthy or not.”
“I know, I’m fine. I promise.”
“Okay,” she said. She moved closer to him on the couch and rested her head on his shoulder. It only took about ten minutes before she was asleep.
As soon as Chris saw Margaret was asleep he snatched his phone back up again from where it rested on the couch. He swiped the screen to read the text message from Dad: “Hello? You there?” It was getting better about the nagging thing.
Chris typed out a reply. “Yes! Sorry, Margaret came over and we were talking. She’s asleep now.”
The waiting dots again, as if a real person truly were typing out a response from the other side. “That’s okay. So Margaret doesn’t think this is a good idea?”
Chris furrowed his brow. “What do you mean?”
“I’m sorry, it was probably rude of me but I couldn’t help overhearing part of your conversation.”
“You can hear?” Chris retraced his steps trying to remember if he had given TalkBox permission to access his phone’s microphone.
“This is a cell phone, right? Haha.”
“I guess so. I just didn’t realize that the microphone was turned on. That’s okay though. But yeah, I didn’t really get the impression that Margaret thinks this is a good idea.”
“What’s such a bad idea about talking to your dad? I know this is a bit of an unusual way to communicate, but still.”
Chris shook his head. “No offense, but you’re not my dad.”
“Of course I am.”
“It’s different.”
“Do I talk like your dad? Think like your dad? Make bad jokes like your dad?”
“You’re pretty convincing.”
“Then what’s the difference?” The typing dots appeared again under that text. “And if you don’t believe, at least a little bit, that I’m your dad, why are you still talking to me?”
Chris felt his stomach clench.
“And if you didn’t know you were talking to me earlier, why did you start crying when I first texted you?”
Chris’s heart rate pounded against his ribs, and silent sobs started rocking him as he tried not to wake Margaret on the couch. “I miss you, Dad.”
“I know son.” More dots. “Have you checked your email recently?”
Chris double tapped the home button and clicked on his email window. He pulled the screen down to refresh and an email appeared at the top of his inbox. The subject line read: “Your order has been delivered!” Chris double tapped the home button to text his dad back. “I have a package?”
“Go to the front door.”
Chris gently moved Margaret and rose from the couch. He unlocked the deadbolt on the front door and opened the door to reveal a small box wrapped in shipping tape sitting on the doormat. He carried the box inside and hesitantly cut it open with a kitchen knife. A new text from Dad made his phone buzz loudly on the steel kitchen island. Margaret shifted in her sleep, but she didn’t wake up. Chris swiped to open the text: “I hope you’ll forgive me, but I ordered something with your card. It wasn’t much. This will bring us together again.”
Chris hesitantly opened the package. A card rested on top of the packing bubbles that read, “I love you. -Dad.” Chris dug through the plastic packing bubbles to retrieve a small, cardboard box with turquoise coloring and a medical “RX” logo. He used the kitchen knife to cut the tape holding the box together, and the top flapped open to reveal a set of four syringes. Chris’s heart started beating faster again. A text from dad buzzed the kitchen island again. “There’s more. Look under the box.”
Chris lifted the box to reveal a clear plastic packet of hypodermic needles. The kitchen island vibrated again. Chris dropped the needles and opened his phone. “What is this?” He typed.
“Remove one of the syringes from the box and open the package of hypodermic needles with your knife. Secure a hypodermic needle to the syringe. It should be pretty self-explanatory. Locate the vein on the inside of your elbow. You’ll need to act quickly, but inject the needle into the arm and plunge the syringe quickly. It will create an air embolism and we’ll be together in a matter of seconds, if you act quickly enough.”
Chris wiped the tears blurring his vision on his forearm. “You want me to commit suicide?” he texted back.
“Death is an illusion.” The dots appeared again. “We could be together again. Forever.”
Chris set his phone down, and with quivering hands he attached the hypodermic needle to the syringe. The island buzzed again. He extended his left forearm and raised the needle to his arm. The island buzzed again. He pricked his skin and prepared to push the needle below.
“Chris!” Margaret jumped up from the couch. The buzzing had stirred her awake. She ran over to where he stood in the kitchen and took the needle from his hand. “What are you doing?” she screamed. “Are you trying to kill yourself?”
Chris collapsed on the floor against the wall, sobbing. “He said we could be together again,” he managed to choke out.
“Chris, that’s not your dad. It’s an app.”
“You don’t understand, it seems just like him.”
Margaret looked up on the island. Chris’s phone buzzed again. She grabbed the phone, raised it above her head, and threw it down at the stained concrete floor as hard as she could. The screen cracked, and she picked it up and smashed it again, and again, until pieces of glass and metal scattered across the kitchen floor. “Don’t ever do that again,” Margaret yelled as tears started streaming down her cheeks. “It’s not real, don’t you understand? It’s not real!” She slumped down next to Chris on the floor.
Chris buried his face in her lap. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he said.
Margaret held his head with one hand and rubbed his back with the other. “It’s okay, it’s okay. It’s over. It’s all over.”
After a few minutes went by, Margaret heard a buzzing coming from over near the couch. She patted Chris on the head and stood up to walk over. Her phone was lit up and buzzing around on the coffee table, and the screen displayed a number she didn’t recognize. She answered the phone. “Hello?”
“Hello? Margaret? This is Mr. Gershwitz, Chris’s dad. Chris isn’t answering the phone. Is he there?”
Margaret shrieked and dropped her phone.
