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Sad Girl Novel
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27.08
Wednesday
His favourite time of day was getting home from work and becoming, once again, the father of Joy. Arthur, the girl’s twin, had long since had the means to move out, working as he did with computers. The aspiring poet, thankfully, would be with him for some time still. His daughter seemed to stay in her room longer and longer each day, producing shorter and shorter lines of text for classes that were becoming more and more expensive. He’d been on an installation job across town, so it was later than usual when he pulled into the drive and leant on the horn. When she didn’t appear immediately at her window to signal she was coming down, he figured he had time to go inside for a refreshment. Standing at the open fridge, he weighed up the idea of cracking a beer while taking his daughter for a driving lesson, and decided instead a few slugs of Tropicana juice could be consumed straight from the carton quickly and privately. The drink spilled onto the logo of his navy and yellow work shirt—three lowercase letters and a halo of dots in the shape of the country, intended to signify connection. He called out her name. On the counter he noticed a book, open, face down, cracked at the spine. As he wiped his mouth, he read a line, both highlighted and underlined by Joy. As he heard her coming down the stairs, he read it again, this time out loud, as he often read street signs out to her, for no reason other than to annoy, and this, like drinking from the carton, was a small privilege he thought he should be eternally allowed.
‘Currently, we are headed towards extinction in a shiny, driverless car and the question is, how do we exit this car?’ She smiled wanly, rounding the banister at the bottom of the stairs. He smiled back. Her pants had gotten somehow larger. He hoped this car ride would be like others of late, where Joy, usually so succinct and impenetrable, would start monologuing, almost as if she couldn’t help it when distracted by the task, so new to her, of steering them into their very near future. A few minutes in, she rolled down her window and began to vape and he consequently pulled out one of his tailored cigarettes. She changed lanes unnecessarily, he observed silently. A few more minutes, then she said, ‘It’s funny, that Rachel Kushner line. I went looking for it, because I saw this video, of this Waymo—that’s like a robotaxi, a driverless car—that went rogue today, in San Francisco, it took a passenger on an unplanned detour into a closed in parking lot full of other robotaxis, just this underground garage of autonomous vehicles. He was the only human in there, and he didn’t know how to get out. He was just taken to robot land, without any say in the matter. Eventually he got out, and they offered him like, two free rides, so.’
She read his mind in the pause that followed. ‘Yeah, they’re already a thing. People use them all the time. I guess it’s easier, they prefer not to have to talk to the driver, not to talk to anyone in real life. The same reason everyone uses all technology I guess. People keep rushing towards it. With gay abandon. They’re even outsourcing thinking to it now. Like thinking isn’t the best part of being alive, so.’
He tried to prepare some I think therefore I am pun (I don’t have time to think, therefore I don’t have time to … am?), but Joy spoke again. ‘Well, it’s not true there’s no resistance. There’s also protests, right now, in another city, to try and stop Waymo from going there. But in general, they seem dangerous, and people use them anyway, so. It seems that people want danger, maybe? Like the first tool that humans ever commandeered was fire, which separated us from primates, forked us off into neanderthals. And on that same page of Creation Lake, where you read that quote, she also says that the first man to discover fire was likely also the first man to use it to smoke tobacco. So like, from the moment we discovered a tool, we immediately figured out how to kill ourselves with it too. Whether it be slowly or not.’ He made a thinking noise, impressed. He was looking for a gap to appear between her speeding thoughts, into which he could merge, and offer something helpful. But she moved too fast, spoke again. ‘And I guess the tech industry is a lot like the tobacco industry, in that, they know they’re killing people, and they’ll be happy to do it as long as they can get away with it. Until someone steps in and regulates.’ He made a different thinking noise, saddened. They were stopped at a light. She hadn’t noticed it turning green. He wanted to blow out his chestful of smoke and tell her to fang it. Just go somewhere, anywhere. Don’t overthink it. But then she flicked the radio on, pre-emptively shushing him. It was on the hour. The news was starting.
Done reading