Read a New Short Story About the Peculiar Challenges of Raising a Robot

Each month, Future Tense Fiction--a series of short stories from Future Tense and Arizona State University's Center for Science and the Imagination about how technology and science will change our lives--publishes a story on a theme. The evening before you sign and take delivery of your son, you call Charlie and tell him you think you've made a huge mistake. "Let me come on over and split a few with you," he says. "I haven't seen the fire pit yet." Charlie--a short, compact man with green eyes and a shaved head whom you met when he delivered groceries the first few weeks you were housebound--brings over a six-pack. You walk out into the complex's community garden together. It used to be a parking lot, and the path through the mushroom gardens under the solar panels is still faded gray asphalt and leftover white lines. You're careful with your right foot; you still haven't gotten used to the way your prosthetic moves. You and Sienna from 4B have a fire pit and stone circle dug out in your combined lots, and she's grown a privacy wall of rosebushes that surround the relaxing space. Charlie sits on one of the cedar benches as you fiddle with twigs to make a fire. This beats the awkwardness of sitting down to talk right away. Your parents didn't raise you to be direct about feelings. Neither did the army, nor the warehouse you drove a forklift in. Charlie will, if you let him. Making a fire gives you a moment to sort out all your feelings. Or maybe it just gives you an excuse to delay talking about them.