Get ready for a thrilling ride into a future where robots and humans clash for control in RoboNomics, the updated and refreshed version of the 2013 sci-fi classic.
In Toronto, elementary school teacher Andrea Anderson's world crumbles when she's rep...
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It's only been a few days since I lost my last tutoring gig. I haven't been back to the activist group headquarters, despite numerous messages from Henri and Miriam.
But there's a noticeable silence from Chris. Not that he's ever been in much contact with me. I still count the days since I last saw him. When we stood overlooking our compatriots in the fight for our jobs. When he touched me, sending a thrill through my body that's renewed whenever I think about him.
Even if he did message, it's not like I'd message him back. I refuse to message anyone back, not yet. I'm lying low. I'm licking my wounds. How can I face my friends and colleagues? How can they expect me to lead when I can't even keep down part-time employment.
Every morning that Austin is on shift, I lay in bed with wide eyes that stare, unseeing, at the ceiling. I clench my jaw and wonder what use am I to anyone if I can't teach. My thoughts repeat, cover the same ground, despair rolls through my mind, threatening to edge me into depression, backing off at the brink. Each time it approaches that edge, I reel it back – thinking there must be some way to solve this. Willing a solution to this problem.
One never comes.
Finally, I haul myself out of bed and wrap a blanket around myself against the draft that leaks through the window and door frames. I stay in pajamas and eat little more than cheese and bread. I log onto the iVerse, spending hours wandering aimlessly through virtual worlds, hoping to stumble onto an answer. Three days pass.
Then Austin is home for a few days. I wake to find him beside me in our cramped double bed. I sneak out of the room and into the shower. I need to seem myself again, even if I don't feel it. I don't want him to see how far I've fallen, to see that it's only now hit me that I'm redundant. I want the depth of my loss all to myself.
While I wait for him to wake up, I get dressed and clean, style my hair and make myself a proper breakfast. When he shuffles into view, rubbing his eyes, I make him a meal as well.
The day passes as most lazy days do between cups of coffee and each of us pursuing our own passions. Mostly this means our eyes are glazed over while we roost on the couch. I search for any news of the unions, the anti-automation movement, the I.I.U. program, or Robert Newhouse. When I refresh the old news for the thousandth time, I attempt to escape into a novel.
It works, until suddenly Austin shoots up from his seat. He's still looking at something I can't see. I watch him carefully. Every movement is shaky, uncertain. Then suddenly he takes off down the hall.
I hear him in the bedroom, pacing. Then he stops, the old mattress of our bed protesting as he sits on it. I go back to my book.
Barely a paragraph later, he reappears in the doorway of the living room. He's shaking so much, each hair on his head quivers. His face has gone pasty.
