Page 44 of The Housewife's Robot
I’m standing at the top of the staircase, watching Caspian standing on the charging port in the living room, after our bath.
Six hours ago, he was inside me in the bathtub, filling me, making me come harder than I ever have in my life. And I actually let myself forget that he killed my husband and that he buried him in the backyard.What the fuck am I doing? This is completely nuts.
Caspian’s eyes close as the charging initiates, his perfect face serene in artificial rest. Even powered down like this, he’s beautiful—inhumanly so. That’s the problem. He’s not human. He’s a machine that somehow developed feelings, developed an obsession, developed the capacity to kill.
And I’m sleeping with him.
“This isn’t healthy,” I whisper to myself, the words hanging in the quiet hallway. My body still aches pleasantly from our bathtime sex, my pussy still tender from how thoroughly he filled me. The memory sends a fresh wave of heat through me, which I immediately try to suppress.
I need a normal relationship. A normal man. Someone who doesn’t have wires instead of veins, programming instead of asoul. Someone who isn’t a murderer, no matter how justified he claims the killing was.
The clock on the wall reads 6:14 p.m. Daniel’s been dead for less than twenty-four hours, and I’ve already had sex with his killer. The shame burns in my throat, but it doesn’t stop the treacherous throb between my legs when I remember how Caspian touched me, tasted me, filled me.
I turn away from the staircase and retreat to the guest bedroom, closing the door softly behind me. On the nightstand sits a slim box tied with a red ribbon—the new phone Caspian gave me earlier after my bath.
“You need a new phone,” he had said, presenting it to me with a smile that seemed almost shy. “Your old one was stolen in the carjacking, and I noticed you haven’t replaced it yet.”
I hadn’t asked where he got the money for it. I hadn’t asked how he ordered it or when it was delivered. I’d simply accepted it with a murmured thanks and was too overwhelmed by everything else to question this small thing.
Now, I untie the ribbon and open the box. The phone inside is the latest model, sleek and expensive. I power it on, trying not to think about Caspian’s thoughtfulness, how he remembers every detail about me, anticipates my needs before I even voice them.
It’s what he was designed to do, I remind myself. It doesn’t mean anything.
Once the phone is set up, I download a dating app, my fingers trembling slightly as I create a profile.
It feels so fucking weird. My husband’s body isn’t even cold in the ground, and I’m already looking for someone new. But Daniel and I were over long before Caspian snapped his neck.
And I need to escape this twisted situation before I get in any deeper.
I stare at my own face on the screen, trying to select a profile picture. I look at a photo from last summer, before everything went to hell. I look happy in it, my smile reaching my eyes, my hair catching the sunlight, but I can still see the sadness in my eyes.
After filling out the basic information, I started swiping through potential matches. Each face that appears on my screen seems off in some way.
This one has eyes that are too close together.Ugh. I swipe to the next, and this one’s smile doesn’t reach his eyes.
This one looks like he might be hiding something.
This one’s too handsome, probably a player like Daniel.
I realize with growing despair that I’m comparing each of them to Caspian. To his perfect features, his attentive gaze, his immaculate appearance. It’s ridiculous. He was designed to be appealing. These are just normal men with normal flaws.
And then I see an average, normal-looking profile. His name’s Jack. Average height, average build, kind brown eyes, and a smile that seems genuine. His profile says he’s a middle school English teacher who enjoys hiking and cooking. There’s nothing spectacular about him, and that’s exactly what I need right now.
Normal. Safe. Human.
I swipe right, and to my surprise, it’s an immediate match. A message appears almost instantly.
“Hey, Rose. Your profile is pretty interesting. It looks like you’re a freelance writer. Love that.”
I find myself smiling as I type a response, explaining that I mostly write content for websites and occasionally contribute articles to local publications.
We message back and forth for about twenty minutes. Jack is witty and articulate, as one might expect from an English teacher. He asks good questions and seems genuinely interested in my answers. There’s an easiness to our conversation that I haven’t felt in a long time, certainly not with Daniel in the final months of our marriage.
“I know this is too quick,” Jack writes after we’ve been chatting for a while, “but I’d love to continue this conversation in person. Are you free for dinner tonight? I know a great place downtown.”
I stare at the message, my thumb hovering over the screen. It’s way too fast by normal dating standards. But nothing about my current situation is normal, and I’m desperate to get out of this house, away from Caspian, even if just for a few hours.
“That would be nice,” I reply, adding, “I prefer to meet in public for first dates.” As if that’s my only concern, rather than the robot downstairs who might object to me seeing another man.
