Chapter 1 Chapter 1

"You never leave that computer alone?" My mother said furiously, leaning her head against the doorway while watching me completely absorbed in front of the computer.

"I’m coming downstairs, Mom, just five more minutes and I’ll finish configuring this artificial intelligence agent," I said.

"Who is that man there?" my mother asked curiously while looking at the notebook screen.

I quickly lowered the notebook screen before saving the configuration I had spent hours working on. I felt so embarrassed by my mother that my first reaction was to hide the picture of that shirtless man.

With my left hand over the notebook, as if I were protecting a treasure, I partially turned my neck and looked at her. "He’s nobody, Mom, it’s just another AI agent I was developing for college."

Before she could ask another question, I needed to distract her from that photo, so I decided to ask about lunch. "Did you make mac and cheese? I can smell it from here."

My mother would melt at any compliment related to her cooking. She could be crying, grieving, and she would still forget any sadness if someone praised a dish she had made. And that was exactly what happened.

"Yes, Aria. Hurry before it gets cold, come downstairs."

She finished saying that while slowly walking down the stairs, giving me a little more time to finish that work. Meanwhile, I tried to recover all the programming I had been working on that morning for a new AI agent.

I was in my first year of artificial intelligence college, having earned a scholarship after getting excellent grades in high school. To my parents, I was a source of pride. But inside, I felt like a failure.

Even though I spent hours studying and working with new technologies, human interaction was still a huge challenge for me. I was eighteen years old and had never had a boyfriend.

Sometimes I thought it was because I didn’t have time, other times I thought boys simply weren’t interested in me. I always wore those huge glasses and was never the most popular girl in school.

The only reputation I carried was being intelligent. The best grades in class always had to be mine, in every subject without exception. I thought about my childhood while trying to get back to work.

When I opened the computer, I realized all the progress I had made that morning had gone straight down the drain. My stomach twisted. Damn it. I took a deep breath and decided to go downstairs for lunch. I would deal with it later.

I received a message from my friend Rebeca while walking down the last steps toward the dining room. She wanted to know what time I was going to college since we had classes together that day.

Rebeca was one of those people who didn’t really like studying. She was in college because of the hype and barely understood what artificial intelligence actually was. For her, the important thing was having a friend like me.

For me, it was incredible to be friends with one of the most desired women on campus. "I’ll get there at 4:00 PM, Rebeca. I need to finish an AI agent before going to the lab," I replied in another text message.

I lied about the time I would arrive at the lab because I wanted extra time to dedicate to the AI agent I was finishing. Alone in the laboratory, nobody could distract me.

I decided that after lunch I would go to college, but to Rebeca I would arrive much later. When I sat at the table, I looked at my parents and smiled. I was happy about that moment together.

Almost every day, lunch and dinner were eaten as a family. No cell phones, no television. That was our moment to talk while enjoying the food my mother had made.

My father worked as a plumber and wasn’t always clean enough to sit at our table. But over the years, we got used to it, and the smell stopped being unpleasant. It was just my father.

"So how’s school going, my daughter?" he asked proudly because I had been in college for two weeks already.

"It’s college, Dad. Everything’s going well. If all goes well, I’ll earn another scholarship and help with the bills at home," I replied excitedly about the project I was developing.

"I’m so happy, my daughter. Soon you’re going to conquer the world. You’re so intelligent, I’ve never seen a girl like you," my father praised me, as he always did.

The smell of the mac and cheese grew stronger. I looked back and saw my mother carrying a glass baking dish using one of those wool oven mitts that keep your hands from burning.

She asked for space, though nobody was blocking her path. Only when she approached the table did I realize she wanted room to place the dish between us.

Even though the glove protected her hand, nobody wants to hold something hot for too long, right? And the steam from the freshly baked food invaded my mother’s face too, making her anxious to place the dish in the center of the table.

As soon as she managed to set it down, she removed the glove and sat between us. We were happy, with a huge chance for our lives to change after I got into college. For the first time, my father would finally have financial help after so many years.

But before that, I had to finish that AI project. I was lost in my thoughts again when I didn’t even notice my mother asking me to hand over my plate so she could serve the food.

"Aria, Aria, your plate," she said while my thoughts returned to reality.

"Serve Dad first, what kind of meat do we have?" I asked my mother.

"There’s only mac and cheese, my daughter. We ran out of meat yesterday, remember?" my mother replied sadly, lowering her head.

With just one question, I managed to ruin the atmosphere of that lunch. My father went silent and stood up from the chair without saying a word. The lack of money was a problem we tried not to discuss because it hurt too deeply.

I thought he wasn’t going to eat anymore, but my father came back carrying a jar of water. He poured himself a glass while my mother finished serving the mac and cheese onto our plates.

My father picked up the full glass of water and drank it. It could have been an ordinary glass, just another lunch inside an American home, but I felt something strange in the air.

He finished drinking the water, but the glass never returned to its place. The cup stayed stuck against my father’s face as he suddenly fell backward after drinking that water.

"My God, what happened? Help!" I screamed desperately and ran toward him. My heart stopped. No. No. No.