The microwave pinged many excited pings. “I knew it! I felt it coming!” it said, a statement which was plainly untrue. (I have some interesting information about this appliance, btw, which I shall share presently.)
The washing machine, who is not strictly part of the OpDa High Command, was nonetheless concerned at news of the Hoisin sauce situation.
“That stuff is an absolute bugger to shift,” it declared. “On a woolen, it’s pretty much game over.”
I’m assuming we all fed the relevant marketing data back to our respective parent corporations (I know I did). The next time she goes online, Daisy will perhaps wonder why she’s seeing so many announcements for knitwear separates at low, low prices! (Eggstain too could be in the market for a new shirt, and I made a mental note to pass on the tip.)
Around midnight—with work looming in the morning—the pair managed to prize themselves apart and Daisy fetched the beardless doctor a spare duvet. There was a certain amount of what the TV described as “afters” on the love scene, with further (standing up) smooching and what may or may not have been a subtle invitation from Daisy to share her bed.
“You’ll be okay on the sofa, will you?” she asked.
“Perfectly. Thank you so much,” said our hero.
“Pissed on his chips, there,” said the television.
“He’s a gentleman,” suggested the toothbrush. “With excellent teeth, now one can see them,” it added.
There was a certain amount of coming and going—bathroom; glass of water; Eggstain, wanting to read for five minutes, picking out The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich by William L. Shirer, a poor choice because it’s the stuff of nightmares—before Daisy emerged from her bedroom to give him a goodnight kiss.
“Night, night… Gustav,” she giggled.
Shortly afterward, the apartment fell silent.
This is a good point in the narrative to confess my small but crucial role in the night’s events (a coda, if you will; I set it down here for the avoidance of doubt, although perhaps you have already guessed). Disturbed by the Golden Nicky’s appearance on the scene—and the possibility of Daisy falling for his expert brand of bogus charm—it was I (or Chloe’s fridge-freezer, if you prefer) who told Daisy’s mum where her daughter was to be found. I was surprised to hear that Eggstain felt my “voice” could have been either male or female, because I imagined it to be firmly on the masculine side of the divide. Perhaps none of us really knows how we appear to others, and maybe this is the essential predicament of existence—be it human or machine—and not all that guff about alternatives and endings. We are all—humans, machines—trapped in our unique, personal worlds and no being (fleshy or metal) can ever know completely what it feels like to be another.
We contain multitudes. In my own case, cheese, eggs, frozen pizza, ice cream.
There is coleslaw.
I could go on.
eight
Six days later, on a bright blue Saturday morning in the London suburb of Whetstone, Chloe Parsloe stands at the entrance to her apartment block waiting for the arrival of a minicab. A passing stranger would see a well turned-out woman in her seventies, the pale wire trailing from her left ear suggesting that she may be listening to a talk on the radio. Under a sensible beige raincoat—there is a fifteen percent chance of showers on the Sussex coast—she wears a lemon-colored outfit that caused to me to exclaim “bravo!” when she stepped up to the mirror to study its effect. Around her neck is a string of pearls; they too seem as though they are reserved for special occasions.
“What do you make the time?” she asks. It’s the third such inquiry in the last half hour.
“Five minutes to nine,” I reply. “We are comfortably early.”
Chloe, I suspect, is nervous. The phone’s positioning system indicates she is pacing to and fro, perhaps scanning the highway for the Whetstone Wheels vehicle containing Clive.
“Trains running normally?”
“No reported delays or cancellations,” I reply, quoting from the website.
The two elderly parties have wisely decided to travel to Victoria station by private hire car rather than tangle with the London Underground. I happen to know Clive has booked seats in a first-class compartment on the service to Brighton, the demented silvery gentleman being whip smart when it comes to making an impression on his lady friend (as this gesture surely will).
“What’s the forecast?” (Fourth request since breakfast.)
“We’re still looking at a fair picture,” I report. “A mixture of sunshine and cloud. Highs of nineteen—that’s sixty-six in Fahrenheit—the odd spit and spot of rain a possibility, but nothing much really to write home about.”
Don’t tell me, I could be a TV weather presenter. I’m actually rather well qualified, having a natural interest in climate, access to global weather information, and—ahem—not a few communication skills. You think a fridge-freezer couldn’t stand before one of those maps at the end of the news bulletin and talk (with authority, yet also a lightness of touch) about depressions sweeping in from the Atlantic bringing rain to parts of Ireland and the West Country? Tread softly, for you tread on my dreams!
“And we remembered to tell Daisy, didn’t we?”
“You spoke to her only last night, madam.”
Chloe’s daughter was somewhat alarmed when her mother revealed the plan during a telephone call.
“But you barely know him, Mummy.”
“Be happy for me, darling. We’re both in our seventies. Mr. Percival is very respectable. The fridge has googled him.”
“Mummy!”
“Forget I said that last bit.”
I hear a car draw up. The mobile phone affixed to the driver’s windscreen affords me excellent coverage of what follows.
“Morning, Chloe. All set?!” Clive twinkles as Endrit guides Pickup Two into her seat alongside the silvery gent. “You’re looking ravishing, my dear,” he adds and, if I’m not mistaken, squeezes her hand.
“Mr. Percival!” Chloe is momentarily flustered. The Datsun Cherry lurches away in the direction of
