THE NEW LIFE, THE NEW ME - an Apple Loving Individual Thriller

Chapter 1 - Trying to Make Ends Meet

Chapter 1 – Trying to Make Ends Meet

Thursday, April 26, 2046
6:48 PM
Houston, TX

Another day was coming to an end, another ten-hour shift in the can, and my three-day weekend had just begun. For starters, let me introduce myself. My name is Kimberly LeAnne Perkins. Born in Houston, in June 2023; I've been alive hearing stories of how my mother was helped by a man, four years before me and my twin brother Reagan was born. How she met my father, Dallas Perkins, who was helping a man, save women in the city of Houston back in 2019, as the two men responsible back in 2013, murdered his parents and raped his sister, Amanda, therefore impregnating her. My father owns a respectable software and AI firm, and has helped people such as Kevin Cross and Zane Galnac, save the world.

I currently work as a bookkeeper for a CPA firm. My mother, Savannah Dianne Mason worked at one time as a lawyer but left the profession a few years ago. They now reside in Pearland. I'm still in contact with them on and off.

Nowadays, I live by myself and in an apartment. Last Thursday, what I thought would be a good weekend with my boyfriend became my worse nightmare. He broke up with me and threw me out of the house because I refused to have sex with him. My brother and I parted ways and cut one another off as we recently had a falling out last year in August. Since then, I've been left to fend for myself and been earning enough to make my ends meet.

"Alright, then! Five more minutes." I was excited and finished my tasks. Then it came to be seven o'clock, in the evening. Relief came to my head. "See y'all Monday, goodnight!"

"See you, Kimberly!" said Nancy, my co-worker and also best friend.

Indeed, it felt good to be off. Was going to spend time with the girls. Yeah, I recently got kicked out of my ex-boyfriend's apartment and he broke up with me. I don't care, I got me and Sierra at home. Sierra is my robotic pet cat, my only companion in times of loneliness. Another companion I have is S.A.L.M.A (Simulated Artificial Living Mature Assistant), and by her name, you understand automatically that 'she' is actually an 'it'. And 'it' is a general artificial intelligence program, one that runs my house.

I could've opted to have C.O.R.A (Cloud Operated Romantic Assistant), or something as simple as older AI programs such as Siri™ or Cortana™, but S.A.L.M.A always as kept me company. The creator of that app named it after his mother, fifteen years ago, when the app became operational.

Arriving to my apartment wasn't hard, as my car would just drive me home automatically. It is a 2038 Honda Accord. Okay, so it's an old car but not that old. At least it runs. Eventually, I got in my car and started it, seeing no steering wheel but only the cloud-based GPS navigation system, powered by Google™ Maps.

"Hey, Google™! Take me home!" said yours truly, to the car.

The car then started and proceeded to take me home, it was then my Samsung Galaxy™ S37 beeped. I unlocked my smartphone and saw a new text message. It was a group text from Nancy and Eliza.

Eliza: Hey! 😃 Y'all down 4 chillin' tonyt @ 8?

Kimberly: More than u no, girl! C u tonight @ 8! 🙂😎 🙂😎 How bout u, Nancy?

Nancy: Sure! Of course, girls! ❤️❤️😃 Always!

Kimberly: A8 then, ❤️ 🙂😎 😃 c u l8r at 8!

Eliza: C ya! 🙂😎 😃

Finally, I arrived at my apartment. First thing I did, was order my robotic vacuum cleaners and house robots to clean up the place.

"Tidy it all up, please!" I said, then I saw Sierra. She walked up to me. "Hey, girl! You miss me?" I hugged that little mechanical cat. It's eyes, being on an OLED screen turned to heart emojis and we hugged for some time.

Then I got up to leave. "S.A.L.M.A, please keep the place clean, until I come back." I instructed S.A.L.M.A, as I left. Then I got back to my car. I was looking forward to enjoying tonight with my girls, and to be honest, not having a man for now is much better than feeling lonely with another man.