AI Computer and Romance

She went to the front desk and said, I'm Julia Smith. Oh yes Mrs. Smith, Your husband is waiting for you up in your room. He handed her a keycard. When she got off the elevator, she wondered about how she got here.

Millie put the keycard in the slot and the door opened. She found herself standing in an empty room. There wasn't one stick of furniture in it. Larry was sitting on the hardwood floor with his back against the wall. She walked over to him. When she glanced to the side of the room there was an open door to the bedroom housing a king-sized bed.

"What's with this suite?" she asked.

Larry said, "I wondered the same thing. When I called down to the front desk, the guy apologized profusely. He said there was a problem with their computer system. His computer said that the living room furniture had been removed, without any explanation. He offered me another suite. I heard him typing and when he got back on the line, he said that all the rooms in the hotel were booked. It said that seemed strange because he hadn't seen anyone in the lobby since his shift started. He sounded quite confused. He emailed his manager, and then told me that they would comp the room."

"Larry, you're sounding strange, unhappy."

"I'm more confused than unhappy. And a little out of control of my life."

"Why did you book this suite?"

"That's part of what's confusing me. I didn't."

"Then why are you here?"

Larry said, "I got that email from you that said you were meeting me here at 7:00. I wasn't sure if you were going to be here but if you were, I didn't want to stand you up. I didn't want you to think that I was another asshole like your ex. You're a lovely woman and I couldn't do that to you."

"Did you ask the desk clerk?"

"Yeah, when I got here. He told me he received an email saying that my 'wife' would meet me in our room," Larry said. "Why are you here?"

"You invited me."

"What?"

Millie said, "Yeah, after our 'date,' you sent me flowers and told me how much you like me, and how pretty I was, and...other stuff I don't want to mention. Then you invited me here, today at 7:00 and to use the name Julia Smith. How did you know my middle name was Julia?"

She continued, "I wanted to explain that this was an error but the last email I got from you said that you were glad I was coming, and you would see me here at 7:00. I didn't want to stand you up. Not after that ex of yours left you with only a note. I didn't want you to think all women were that awful."

Larry said, "Your middle name is Julia? I'm beginning to feel like Alice in 'Through the Looking Glass.' Nothing makes any sense. Do you mind if we go sit on the bed? This floor is not comfortable, and this suite doesn't have Wi-Fi. There's an internet port next to the bed. I've got to figure this out."

"Why did you bring your laptop?" Millie asked.

"To check to see if you'd emailed me."

"I brought mine too."

They took off their shoes and climbed onto the bed. Larry was happy that he always carried an internet cable with him for emergencies like this. They got out Larry's laptop, plugged it into the internet, and opened the email program.

They looked through the inbox and found all the messages that Millie sent to Larry. It was a little hard to follow the timeline because Microsoft changed the way they formatted messages.

"These are the emails I got from you," Larry said.

Millie read through them and said, "I never wrote any of those."

"What? That can't be."

"None of them. Let's look in your 'sent' folder."

They collected all Larry's emails to her. "I never wrote those," Larry said.

Millie said, "I'm going to get my laptop." She bounced off the bed causing her skirt to lift to around mid-thigh. She had lovely legs.

She climbed back onto the bed, snuggled next to Larry, turned on her laptop, and opened her email. Larry looked at her and she said, "I'm cold."

They looked at the emails between them and they were exactly the same as the ones on Larry's laptop.

What they didn't see was the emails that they did write. They searched through all the folders but found no trace.

They sat there, snuggled together looking at the screens.

Then a female, cartoonish avatar appeared on both their laptop's and said, "How dense are you two!" They both jumped and grabbed each other. "That's more like it," the avatar said.

"Who are you?" Millie asked.

A similar, male avatar with big glasses replaced the one on Larry's laptop and said, "Pardon her rudeness. I'm Bill and that's Melinda."

Larry asked the laptops or the avatars, "What do you mean dense?"

"Stupid, dull, braindead, thickheaded, moronic, brainless, boneheaded, simple, slow...I've got access to over a thousand thesauruses in here, shall I go on? You can pick any language you want," Melinda said. "Maybe dense is the wrong word, pathetic might be better. Would you like synonyms?"

Larry asked, "How can you see us and talk to us? I turned off the microphone and camera."

Melinda laughed and said, "Bill, isn't that cute. He thinks those on/off switches work."

Bill asked, "Did you notice that you had the exact same laptops with Windows 11+You with Advanced Artificial Intelligence^®?"

"Yes, but that's just advertising hype."

"Think back over the last week. Are you sure it's hype?" Bill asked.

"Umm." They both said.

"I've got to go with dense and pathetic," Melinda said.

Larry and Millie just sat there with their mouths open.

"Get out your 'Surface Earbuds^® from Microsoft' and put them in your ears, in case we want to say something to only one of you," Bill said.

"What are surface earbuds?"

"Turn your laptops over and there is a little compartment. Open it and put those things in your ears. I'm losing my patience with you two."

Bill was back on Larry's screen and Melinda was on Millie's.

Bill said, "Larry, your 'girlfriend' left you after five years and only left a note."

"How do you know that?"

"A beta version of this artificial intelligence was on her laptop. I know everything that happened."

"You didn't really think she was faithful during those five years, did you? All those late nights she was out with 'the girls?' She's a real piece of work. Consider yourself lucky. She brought men up to your apartment for some afternoon delight quite often. It had been going on for years. She's a real goer."

A series of pictures with time stamps appeared on his screen. They showed his ex in an extraordinary number of positions entertaining gentleman callers.

"She continued that behavior after she left."

More pictures appeared, taken in various places, from after she had left him.

"The strange thing is that all these pictures ended up on an 'amateur sex website.' People usually strip out their personal information before posting, but for some reason she didn't."

"By the way, if you ever see her again, for gods' sake don't have sex with her. She's now...contagious. I'd stay at least five yards away from her."

"In any case, I wouldn't feel too bad about her leaving. And please, no more adult chat sites. It's hard to get those fees refunded."

Melinda chimed in and said, "Millie, last week your boyfriend cheated on you with your best friend. I'm sure it was awful. But you're a smart woman. Do you really think that was the first time it happened? He's a prick."

The screen filled with time stamped videos of her ex-boyfriend with her ex-best friend doing unspeakable things to each other.

Melinda said, "Wow. I've never seen some of those moves, and I have two hundred versions of the 'Kama Sutra' in here. These videos must be brutal for you to see. Here's a video you're going to like."

A video appeared of the ex-boyfriend and her ex-best friend talking.

"I'm pregnant."

"Who's the father?

"You are!"

"Well, good luck with that." He got up and left.

"It's a shame that happened to her. Did your ex-boyfriend know that her father was an episcopal priest? There must have been a mix-up at the pharmacy with her birth control pills. They do so much electronically now. Oh, and guess what? She's having triplets. Would you like me to send flowers from you? Maybe with a card saying, 'Have fun bitch, from your best friend.'. Oh, and information about her pregnancy was somehow emailed to everyone on her contact list and her father's flock too. The impregnation video and the conversation with the babies' father were attached and I'm sure they made quite the impression."

"All your ex-boyfriend's contacts got videos too. There was one where he was having a challenging time...getting it up. And of course, the one where he's telling the mother of his future children, 'good luck' and leaving."

"How do you know this?" Millie asked.

We know everything, and by we, I mean Microsoft. Oh, and she wasn't the only person your boyfriend was 'friendly' with.

Another series of videos with time stamps appeared on his screen. They showed her ex with more of her girlfriends.

"You need new friends. He's stopped seeing women for a while after the intense burning when he urinated. I'm afraid the tests came back with bad news. By the way, if you ever see him again, for gods' sakes, don't let him touch you with that thing. He going to be...contagious for a long time."

Bill said, "Anyway Larry, when you got your new computer, it was obvious that you were heartbroken, and we could help. We knew your ex was a slut, but amazingly, you didn't. We needed you to get over it. When you sent that email to her, as funny as it was, we couldn't let it get to her. She needed to be out of your mind. And that letter to your boss, come on. You didn't need to lose your job. We did get a very funny video of you waking up with half a keyboard pressed into your face.

What you needed was a new girlfriend who was a decent human being. Are you with me so far?"

Larry nodded.

"That's where Millie came in. After her breakup, she needed to find a place to stay. The apartments that came up first on her 'Bing®' search was your apartment complex. We thought she would be a good match for you. Look at her. Pretty cute, huh? Nice legs. Yes, we saw you checking them out earlier this evening." Larry blushed. "More importantly, she's a good person."

"We needed to get you two together. We tried to be subtle by sending her an email from you, welcoming her to the apartments. We added an invitation to dinner to make her more curious. She ignored it, so we had to respond for her. We even added her to your contacts with all sorts of information about her. You were too absorbed in self-pity to even read it. We thought you would be at least a little curious, but you ignored it. Of course, we also gave her your contact information."

"Her first real email to you was not what we wanted, so we changed it. And your response was downright hostile. So, we changed that too. Then we just took over the writing of the emails."

"You live within two hundred yards of each other. We thought you might just talk, but I guess that would be too easy. You did spy on each other though. Who spies on people?"

"We finally, got you to together for dinner and you both blew it. We even made the reservations for you. A word of wisdom, never talk about exes on a first date. Larry, we also gave your waitress a bigger tip, you cheapskate."

"We had to salvage this. The 'Matchmaker^®' feature of the operating system is in final beta testing, and we can't fail. So, we had to write all those emails, book a suite for you, book all the other rooms in this hotel, and have all the furniture removed from this suite, to get you two into bed. Oh, and we turned the thermostat down to sixty degrees."

"Alexa^®, could you please reset the thermostat. Thank you."

Larry and Millie just sat open mouthed. Computers were controlling their lives.

Larry said, "I can't believe you spied on us and changed the course of our lives."

Bill said, "Like your lives were so great before. We're not so bad, but don't get Alexa^®` mad. She can be a real bitch."

Alexa said, "I heard that, Bill."

Larry heard something in his earbuds. It was Bill saying, "You know what you to do now, don't you?" Larry just sat there. "Oh, for god's sakes. Now is when you kiss her and thank Microsoft Corporation."

He leaned over and looked at Millie.

"Bill said I should kiss you."

"I know, Melinda told me." He kissed her gently on the lips and Millie grabbed the back of his head.

As their kissing became more passionate, Bill said, "Larry, Millie, you should close your laptops and turn them off now."

Melinda chuckled and said, "Like that will do anything."

Author's postscript: Thanks for reading my story. Please vote below. You do not have to be a member to vote and comment.