After the minor incident on her way to the pet store that led to Lauren feeling actual emotions for the first time upon waking up, she expected that to be the turning point. Perhaps that was all she needed: one single event that would trigger her limbic system to begin working properly again. However, over the days following the accident, no emotion she felt was as potent as the anger targeted toward the insufferably idiotic girl that caused her body to shake and her fists to clench. Not even the sight of her new Corgi puppy, Cooper, elicits much of anything from her. Sure, the sight of the little fluffy ball of energy running toward her on his tiny legs with his tongue sticking out makes her smile, but the moment of joy passes as quickly as it came. Puppies used to make her squeal with joy--she would giggle as she would pet and play with them for hours. She loves Cooper and she will make every effort to make sure that he lives a happy dog life in her apartment. Yet, it's a major indicator that her emotions are still out of touch.
Maybe it was a one time incident. Maybe her emotions will spike randomly and she will suddenly be able to feel again. Maybe there are certain events that will trigger her feelings, and maybe this will be the only way she will experience emotions for the rest of her life. If that's the case, it's going to be shitty. And she's going to have to either deal with it and adapt, as she has been doing for the past month, or try to "wake herself up." In her first phase of life, she would find herself wishing to be able to turn her emotions off a lot, especially during hard times, like a breakup. Feelings can be exhausting. But not feeling anything is surprisingly even more exhausting. What's the point of living numb?
Lauren tried to trigger another angry response when she realized that her feelings were back to their broken condition. She attempted to seek out her biggest pet peeves and every single thing that used to annoy her to unbelievable extents. This ranged from heading out to the city to purposely get stuck behind slow walkers to browsing conservative communities on the Internet that would discuss their racist, bigoted views. Normally, these behaviors would infuriate her. She can't even recall the amount of times she almost got into a physical fight with someone over their close-minded opinions that degraded other people. But as she immersed herself in these activities, she felt barely anything.
So then she developed another possible theory. Perhaps the spikes of feelings occurred with one emotion at a time. Maybe she had to build up enough of one emotion for the hormones and chemicals to actually release throughout her body. To test this, Lauren continued to attempt to force herself into the emotions by immersing herself with everything that used to induce those feelings in the past. For sadness, she reread books and rewatched movies that used to never fail at making her cry. She looked up sob stories and even seeked out a list of the saddest videos and documentaries of all time. Yet not a single tear was produced in her eyes. She repeated this personal "experiment" with fear, embarrassment, and happiness--they all resulted in the same nothingness.
Laying on the couch in her living area, face down, head buried in a pillow, and one arm around Cooper, Lauren is certain about one thing: these emotional experiments only succeeded at making her tired. She's physically and mentally exhausted. Fatigue plagues her body, causing all of her bones to feel heavy. The mere thought of attempting to elicit another emotion from her numb, inadequate brain is enough to make her gag.
Though her mind lacks the energy to process too many thoughts at the moment, there is one thing that she left her brain for the past few days: Camila. Occasionally she will unlock her phone and stare at the contact information that was synced from the other girl's phone to her own, contemplating whether to tap on the message button and take her up on that date. No matter how long her finger hovers, Lauren never musters up the will to bring it down to the screen. But as she stares at Camila's contact on her phone now, the urge to text her is stronger than ever.
At the moment, she has three sole contacts: Ally, a help line created specifically for the test subjects, and Camila. Her social life is admittedly tragic. At this rate, her existence won't even be significant since no one will know that she is alive because she never leaves the house. She doesn't have any acquaintances besides the ones assigned to her. This is a decent opportunity to meet someone new.
It isn't that she's scared to go on a date. Her emotional numbness prohibits that anyway--it's more of a pride issue. During their last encounter, Lauren was unbelievably rude to Camila. Her attitude and harsh, stubborn behavior drove the poor girl to tears. She treated the concept of spending any more time with her as a barbaric idea that only a pure imbecile could have thought up. Texting her now to ask if the offer to go on a date is still valid would be a complete 180. But perhaps that would be the proper action to take. She does recognize that how she treated the other girl was a bit unfair. Yes, the girl should have never run into her car, but it was an accident that was definitely caused by the malfunctioning solar roadways. Lauren's anger was displaced and she owes Camila an apology.
She wanted to look Camila up on the Internet to see if she's secretly a convicted felon or something, but when the girl's contact information synced to her phone, she was only given her first name. However, she seemed relatively normal, so it's not like that's a huge concern.
As her finger continues to hover over her screen, she contemplates what her parents would advise her to do in this situation. Clara would probably slap Lauren on the arm for behaving so rudely to Camila and force her to apologize. Mike would probably agree that the smaller girl should have been more careful, but he would also chastise Lauren for her behavior. The thought of her deceased parents causes her to feel mixed emotions, mostly of which are dulled sadness and guilt.
After an eternity of indecisiveness, Lauren finally concludes that she is going to go through with this. If not for her own social well-being or redemption for her outlandish behavior, she will do it for her parents. She knows it's what they would want. She might not be able to turn back time and make them proud how she wants to, but she can do this at the very least.
"Call Camila," Lauren speaks to her phone that operates almost solely on voice recognition. A ringing tone resonates from the small device as the screen switches to the calling display. Her heart rate speeds up a bit; are these actual nerves? Is she experiencing an emotion from the mere action of calling the girl?
After four rings, the dialing tone stops and Camila's smooth voice emits from the speakers. "Hello?"
Contrary to the physical stress response that had been building up before she answered, her heart rate slows down and the sound of her voice soothes her body into equilibrium once again. For once, Lauren wishes that her heart was still pounding. She wishes that her palms would be clammy with anxious sweat. But it becomes obvious that this isn't going to be happening any time soon. Huffing a sigh, Lauren contemplates hanging up, then decides that she's already made it this far. She might as well follow through with it.
"Hey, is this Camila? It's Lauren."
Silence. She begins to wonder if the girl on the other side hung up, but she can vaguely make out the sound of her soft breathing. Then Lauren remembers that she never introduced herself to Camila- she was too busy yelling at her.
"Sorry, it's the girl you uh...from the accident the other day."
"Oh, yeah!" Camila exclaims. "You know, I thought that's who it was but I almost couldn't tell because your voice sounds a little different when you aren't yelling. I like it."
Lauren instinctively rolls her eyes at the somewhat backhanded compliment. From her short interaction with her the other day, she could tell that the girl was a bit socially awkward. She probably doesn't find anything wrong with what she just said; trying to avoid another fight, Lauren chooses to ignore it and get to the point of why she even called in the first place.
"Look, I'm sorry about how I reacted the other day. I was just...really fucking pissed off. I had a bad day," Lauren begrudgingly moves past her pride in order to apologize. Usually getting an apology out of this girl is difficult. "You offered to take me out on a date, and I want to take you up on that. That is, if it's still on the table. I was really rude to you so I get if you don't want anything to do with me anymore."
"No no, of course it's still on the table! Really, don't feel bad about the other day. If anyone should feel bad about it, it's me. I made the stupid mistake," Camila quickly shuts down any indication of Lauren blaming herself. "I'm free tomorrow night. Do you want to get dinner?"
"That sounds perfect. What time?"
"Does 6:00 work for you?" Camila asks.
"Yeah." Lauren doesn't add how she has practically no social life. She doesn't want to ruin her chances with this girl before they can even begin.
"Cool," A smile can be heard in Camila's voice from over the phone. "I'll pick you up? I swear my driving isn't always shitty, it was the roads."
"Sure," Lauren grins. "I'll see you tomorrow."
"Can't wait, byeeee!" Camila's cheery voice emanates before the sound of a click that indicates that she hung up already.
Lauren is still grinning. If her emotions were fully working, her cheeks would be flushing and her heart would be pumping faster. Though it's nothing like it used to be, she feels the trace of something that she hasn't felt in a long time--happiness.
The trace of happiness washes away quickly. Perhaps it's because of her inability to hold onto emotions for an extended period of time. Or perhaps it's because the faint sense of nervousness takes its place.
Fuck. She's about to go on her first date since waking up. Hell, it's her first actual human interaction with someone besides Ally. Dates would always be a large source of her anxiety in the past, but now it's even worse because she's afraid that there are drastic changes in dating norms in this day and age.
It's been about two hundred years since the last time she went on a date. Is it now customary for people to have sex on the first date? Or do most people hold off until a few dates later?
What if Camila can tell that Lauren isn't from this time period? What if she can tell that something is very off about her, but can't place her finger on it, and thus loses interest in the girl?
She can't reveal that she's actually from the 2000s to Camila. Even if it weren't classified information, she probably wouldn't do that on the first date anyway. Camila would probably end up thinking that she has something wrong going on in her head and not call her back for a second date.
Instead of pacing around her room and thinking about every single thing that could go wrong, Lauren realizes that there's a better option: she can go to Ally for advice. Her caretaker is sweet and will definitely want to help her.
It's convenient that Ally lives next to Lauren. She simply exits her apartment and the girl's door is right there. Knocking on it, she is greeted by the girl within a matter of ten seconds. "Hey Lauren!" she beams up at her.
"Hey, do you mind if I come in? I need some...help," Lauren says in an almost ashamed tone.
"I'll never mind, Lauren. My home is your home, come right in," Ally steps aside for her to walk in and shuts the door behind her. The two sit down in her living room on the couch, positioned adjacent to one another. "What's up?"
She can tell that Ally is concerned. The older girl tries to mask the worry in her voice, but it still bleeds through. It's for a good reason, though--nine of the participants total so far have committed suicide. She's probably worried that Lauren is at that point as well.
"I have a date tomorrow," Lauren reveals. "And I'm pretty nervous. Well, I mean, as nervous as I can get, given my physical state. But, um...yeah. I just had some questions."
"A date?!" Ally perks up, her eyebrows raising and her eyes lighting up with joy. "Who's the lucky guy? Or gal? Wait, you don't need to tell me if you don't want. Laur, I'm so excited for you!"
The small girl is practically bouncing in her seat, and Lauren smiles at her excitement. Ally may actually be more excited for this date than she is herself.
"It's the girl who accidentally hit my car the other day. Her name is Camila. She offered to take me out on a date but I was so angry in the moment that I refused. I changed my mind and called her today," Lauren tells her. "We're going out to dinner. I'm just a little nervous. This is my first real interaction with anyone besides you and I don't want it to be blaringly obvious that I'm technically older than her great-great-great-great-grandparents."
While Lauren will have ventured out into the world a few times prior to the date, she was not out long enough to detect any major differences in how the world works. There are new innovations and technologies, as she already noticed by the cars, roads, and phones. But, as far as she could tell, nothing else changed too drastically. The people of this age don't have a new accent or new lingo. They don't have strange evolutionary developments on their bodies like a third breast or anything. She's nervous that she just hasn't been observant enough, and she'll give something away that is a major tell to her secret.
"Hmm...well, what do you want to know specifically?" Ally struggles to think about how she can help with such an open-ended problem.
"Have there been any huge advancements in technology or behaviors that I should be aware of?" Lauren inquires. "Like, the other day, Camila pressed her phone to mine and I had absolutely no idea what was going on but apparently it transferred all of her contact information to mine with just a touch. She talked about it like it was common sense."
"Behaviorally, we're virtually the same as the people who lived in your time. As a whole, we're a lot more accepting of minorities. Technology obviously advanced a lot though. There's too much to cover but it'll be quick for you to catch on and adapt to it. The biggest advancement would probably be that workers in simple jobs are almost all AIs. Artificial Intelligence machines, like robots. They look almost perfectly human, but you can tell by their eyes that they aren't," Ally explains. "Do you remember when we went out for breakfast? Our waitress was an AI."
Lauren's jaw drops as she recalls the waitress in the breakfast cafe. She would have never guessed that it was actually a robot. "Holy shit. No fucking way. Dude, they make movies about this shit. They're going to take over the world."
"There's a social movement against AIs for that concern," Ally laughs. "Yeah, they're very realistic. It's almost scary. They've been around for about twenty years though. Anyway, when it comes to technology, you'll catch on quickly. There isn't anything other than that which would be a huge tell to her. Even then, she'd probably just think you're extremely sheltered. I promise it won't harm your date."
"Why hasn't everything changed drastically? It's two hundred years. Shouldn't we all be replaced by AIs or some crazy shit like that? It feels like I just woke up ten years later with a lot of new technology," Lauren frowns, the prospect of the future not being extremely different frustrating to her. "Between the 1800s and 2000s, so much changed. Like, they were completely different worlds. This isn't that different though...as far as I can tell."
"When Normani explained it to us, she gave me the specific name of the theory why that happened... I can't quite remember it," Ally furrows her eyebrows in thought, attempting to recall the name of the theory. Not being able to remember, she shakes her head and continues. "The gist of the theory is basically that humanity hit a wall in terms of behavioral advancement. Something about how a species can only evolve so far before advancement peaks and plateaus. As humans we aren't going to advance or change drastically because of this theoretical wall. I think we hit it around...2050? I don't really understand it myself, honestly. You can probably Google it for a better explanation."
Lauren nods slowly. The pieces of the puzzle are still not fitting together easily, but she understands the basics. "Hmm....okay. That makes sense, I guess. What about science? Any big changes?" Deep down, she hopes that aliens were real.
"Still no aliens, but if you're a billionaire, you can live on the moon. If you don't want to live there, you can take a trip, but that costs a good $500,000 for 3 days," Ally shrugs.
Internally, Lauren curses civilization for not having found the existence of aliens in the universe. She also wonders if she could get a free all-expenses paid trip to the moon from the government. It's the least they can do for what she's been through. "That's dope. Is there anything else you think I should know before tomorrow night?"
Ally places a comforting hand on top of Lauren's. "Breathe. Smile. You're gorgeous, you're going to be fine. She's going to love you, and if she doesn't, then she was never the right person in the first place."
Lauren sighs, feeling her stress dissipate from her caretaker's reassuring words. Though she still feels like she's in the dark about the new world, she's confident that if anything will make her fuck up this date, it won't be her ignorance of how things work. It'll be her own personality, which is somewhat more comforting than the idea of her identity as a test subject being exposed.
"Thank you so much, Ally. You'll be the first to know how tomorrow goes," she wraps her arms around the tiny girl, pulling her into a warm embrace and rubbing her back. She mutters under her breath, "Not like there's anyone else for me to tell."
"Any time," Ally smiles. Lauren stands up and begins to walk toward the entrance before her exit is interrupted by the other girl's voice. "Oh, and if you wanted to read more about the theory I was talking about, I just remembered the name. Cabello's Filter Theory."
Lauren nods, making a mental note of the name for later. Bidding farewell to the girl, she heads back to her own room for some mental preparation and further research for her date tomorrow.
***
"Day 35
Well, I did it. I took Camila up on that date.
I figured I don't have anything better to do with my time. If I weren't going on the date tomorrow, I'd just be sitting in my apartment again, alone with Cooper, watching the mind-numbing TV again for hours.
I couldn't keep myself isolated for so long, and that's exactly what I had been doing for the past month. It's not that I've been scared...I've just been so apathetic to everything, I didn't even care about the fact that my social life was equivalent to a 40 year old virgin living in his mom's basement. I didn't particularly care about life or anything at all, so why should I try to connect with other people who will never be able to connect with me? I guess I could technically try to connect with other test subjects on that social network thing, but I feel like we'd just bring each other down. Too much apathy going around.
It's a paradox. Attempt to form meaningful relationships with strangers who will never understand what I'm going through, or attempt to form meaningful relationships with other people who probably disregard life as much as I do?
I'm not usually a dreamer but this past month may have turned me into one. I feel like there's something different about Camila. She got me to feel intensely for the first time five days ago. Maybe she can do that again. (Hopefully not with anger though...)
I know I'm being irrational. There's probably a more logical explanation. My frustration likely just got bottled up and happened to explode because of the accident. If it had been some old man who hit me, I bet I would have blown up too, except I wouldn't be accepting his invitation for a date.
My original plan was to do more research about that Cabello's Filter Theory thing but I didn't end up doing anything because I figured I'd just freak myself out further. I need to relax. Whatever happens tomorrow, happens. Maybe we'll click. Maybe we'll be friends or maybe there will be the opportunity for something more. Or maybe there won't...maybe we'll be disgustingly incompatible, even as friends, and never want to see each other again.
God, I hope not. I want this to amount to something so bad.
I want a reason other than my guilt to live."
----
A/N: I know it's literally been 6 months. I'm shit for not updating. A lot came up in my life where I just couldn't write anymore because my priorities were elsewhere, and when I finally did get free time, I couldn't write because I shared many ideas of this story with someone who intended to hurt me, and did. Maybe that's TMI but I feel like I owe you guys an explanation.
My motivation to write returned when I started reading The Iceberg Method, which is a wonderful fic, but I couldn't help but want to murder Lauren in every chapter. So, my muse for this fic resurrected on the sole need to want to create a Lauren that isn't completely insufferable.
Leave feedback and comments because I'll appreciate them always. :)
-M.