Season 1, Episode 8: Acquisitions

"Oh, no. Where are you going?"

"Amber, sweetie, I'm getting up. I have that huge meeting this morning and I kinda want to get there early."

"But why?"

"Because I have a really bad feeling that I'm going to get shut down with VS Industries as a client before I even get started."

"I have no idea how business works. But I also can't understand why you'd think that. You hit it off with Mr. Virgil last week, right?"

"I did. But there might be, er, developments. Not good ones."

"What does that mean, honey?"

"I don't know yet."

So I kissed her, noting how I'd completely gone over the falls over the past couple of days in treating Amber exactly like a girlfriend.

We were lost in the Uncanny Valley at that point.

And as I stepped into the shower I wondered exactly how big a mess I'd made for myself. I was about to find out that day, of course.

Why? Sasha Moreau.

I've known Sasha for a long time. I was a groomsman at her first wedding.

She's from a very old family in town. In fact, her great grandfather was the only governor in the country, at least that I know of, who died of poisoning. The lore is that it was Sasha's great grandmother who did the deed, but of course she wasn't prosecuted for it.

Sasha hasn't poisoned anybody; at least, not in the literal sense. I was very concerned I would be a figurative victim, though, especially when Peyton dropped her name as the source for the rumor - true though it might have been - about my acquisition of a "sex robot."

This could be a real problem. Sasha owned THE art gallery in town. It was a place where artists from across the country would sell their stuff and buyers from around the world would bid on it. And because of that big-city prestige in a middling Southern city like this one, Sasha was, in a very real sense, the social queen of this entire area.

Laura didn't have to spread it everywhere that I had Amber. All she had to do was to tell Sasha. Once Sasha told her friends, what Peyton said - that I'd be blackballed - was actually a real possibility.

I wasn't all that concerned about what it would do to my dating prospects, mind you. At that point I was done trying to find some social-climbing chick in my age group. Give me a cheerful and honest twenty-something waitress or bartender easy on the eyes and willing to not suck as a wife and I couldn't give a fig about a pedigree.

What I was worried about was business.

And especially since I knew Virgil Smith had bought a whole lot of art from Sasha Moreau. Rebecca Smith went to lunch regularly with her. So if Peyton had gotten a rumor-mongering call from Sasha, it was a no brainer that the Smiths certainly had.

So as I sat in the waiting room at VS Industries' headquarters waiting for my appointment with Virgil, I was giving myself even-money odds of catching the bum's rush rather than an audience with the magnate himself.

But apparently Fortune was smiling on me, because right at 9:00, Virgil came out of his office and waved me in. He shook my hand warmly and had me take a seat in the chair facing his desk.

"I'm glad you're here, Oscar," he said. "I've made some calls about you and some of your work. Heard a lot of good things, though interestingly most aren't all that recent."

"Well, sir, I can explain that," I said. "You see, while my current business is pretty broad in terms of the industries in which I work, before the COVID mess hit I was really finding a niche as a consultant for the food service industry. I did a lot of work with restaurants and bars - helping them negotiate with suppliers, leveraging technology to minimize shrinkage and waste, developing some innovative approaches to quality control and the like. By 2019 that was probably 80 percent of what I was doing."

"You mentioned COVID. Restaurants didn't do so well when COVID happened."

"No, they did not. It completely tore my business apart. I'm just now getting things cranked back up. It's really been a challenging last two years. But you know, that's the world we live in. I'm broadening my focus back out and seeing where the lessons I've learned can be applied to a larger swath of the business world."

He liked that answer, I gathered, because he then launched into a discussion about his business and where his challenges were, and particularly the fact that he had a former employee who'd gone out on his own as a competitor and was now undercutting bids of his in ways that Virgil believed had to stem from industrial espionage.

"There's no way Dan Cole is knocking us out of the work we're bidding on without his seeing our bids as we're estimating them," Virgil said. "I need to figure out how he's doing it and I don't know who I can trust in-house."

"Well," I said, "I can find investigators for you. But the easiest way to start in getting to the bottom of the problem is to work the IT angle. And the guy I have for that is the best you'll find."

So I told him about Keegan, and he was very satisfied with that.

We were on the verge of agreeing on at least an introductory piece of business that could lead to something more, and something possessed me to blurt out something I was worried I'd regret.

"Listen," I said, "I know that you and your wife are in Sasha Moreau's social circles. Sasha is apparently trading in rumors about me, and in case you've heard anything I think it's probably only fair to both of us that I give you full disclosure."

"This is a business thing, or..."

"Not exactly, though it does sort of touch on business or I don't think I'd bother you with it. You see, Sasha is peddling a story that I've brought in a..."

"Sex robot," said Virgil.

"OK," I said. "So she did spread that to you."

"She called Rebecca. Rebecca thought it was a crazy rumor and didn't believe it. But she did tell me."

"Well, I don't know exactly what she told you, but the truth is that there is a Chinese company which is marketing AI androids, I guess, which have some pretty incredible capabilities for an astoundingly low cost. They're doing it on an experimental basis, and I had the opportunity to get in on it."

"That's a little different from what Sasha said."

"It turns out that this... I'm just going to call her Amber, can do dishes, floors, windows and lots of other housework, and over the weekend I started her on doing the billing for my company. I spent five thousand dollars on her and I'm getting all of those things for free, and I'm becoming a whole lot more productive."

"Hmmm," he said.

"So while you might have heard... who knows what, my motivation here is that it's a terrific return on investment."

"Well, but this is a sex thing, right?"

"I just explained the investment."

"But you're having sex with this thing."

"Two things, with all due respect: first, it's none of your business. And second, what does it matter? I've managed to find a solution on a low one-time cost which would probably cost me 50 to 75 grand a year if I'd hired people."

"OK," he said. "That's fair. Rebecca did want me to ask you about it, but you're right. It's none of my business. I see value in having you do work for us and you're an impressive young man."

"Thank you, sir."

"But Oscar?"

"Yes, sir?"

"You need to find yourself a nice girl. Do that and you won't have to deal with questions like this."

"I understand. I wish I was more comfortable with Alice, for example."

"Oh, Lord, no," Virgil said. "Whatever you do, don't burden yourself with her. She's a mess."

I smiled. That was the exact answer I was hoping for.

-----------------------------

From Virgil's office, I headed downtown to Moreau Gallerie, where my hoity-toity rumor-mongering acquaintance held court.

A pretty young college-aged underling in a skin-tight sheath dress greeted me at the door, and I told her I was there to see Sasha but didn't have an appointment. I gave my name and said I wasn't in a hurry.

Which I hoped was a signal that I wasn't going to leave if they tried to wait me out.

But after close to a half hour, as I perused a wide collection of truly horrific modern art, Sasha finally emerged from the back.

"Oscar, darling! It's been so long I almost forgot what you look like! Did Meghan take care of you? A chai tea? A glass of burgundy?"

"No, that's OK," I said. "I'm fine. I was hoping for just a few moments of your time. I know you're busy. It looks like you might have a show coming up!"

"Only a minor one," she said. "A pair of new artists. Very talented, though. Are you familiar with the neo-cubist movement?"

"I am... not," I said. "And I'm actually not quite here for artistic reasons. Can we sit somewhere we won't be disturbed for five or ten minutes?"

"Of course. Come to my office and let's talk."

So I did.

"Now what can I do for you?"

"Here's the thing, Sasha. If there's something I've done or said, or left undone or unsaid, that would cause a grievance between us, I'd like to know what that is and how I could remedy it."

"Oh, I don't think that's necessary," she said.

"Well, that's what I'd sort of expected, but then there's this problem."

"A problem?"

"Yeah. It turns out I'm the subject of rumors around town and I'm told they trace back to you. And I know we aren't close, but if something in my life is of enough interest to you that you'd talk to other people about it, I would hope you'd feel comfortable talking to me about it."

"You know," she said, "that's fair. Laura is my sorority sister, though, and I've never known her to be a liar, so when she tells me you've gone out and gotten a walking, talking sex doll, well, that's news. Are you saying she's a liar?"

"I'm not. She isn't a liar. But she also doesn't have the whole story."

"So what's the whole story?"

"Well, what I've done, essentially, is to take on an AI personal assistant. For a small business like mine, it's a very advantageous opportunity that'll cut costs and make me more productive."

"Laura says she's very pretty."

"She is. Which could also create advantages business-wise."

"So this is a professional thing."

"Not to be crass, but if I was just getting a sex doll I would have spent a lot less."

"Well, what do you want me to do?"

"Maybe leave me out of the news broadcast to your social clique. There is much less going on here than you think."

"All right, fine. I want something in return, though."'

"What's that?"

"I want to meet her."

"Oh. Well, I'm not sure that's such a..."

"Non-negotiable, Oscar."

"Really, Sasha? What do you care?"

"Because it's interesting. I've never met a sex robot."

"Fine," I sighed. "I'll see what I can do."

"I have a dinner party here at the Gallerie coming up in two weeks," she said. "Why don't you come and bring... Amber? That's her name?"

"That's right," I said. "But wait..."

"Then it's a date! You bring the robot and we'll look her over, and then we'll decide if she's worthy of a future in this town."

"Worthy of a future? Seriously? And why don't I just bring her by and you can meet her in private."

Sasha just laughed.

"What's fun about that? We'll see you a week from Friday!" she said.

And I was dismissed.

I was somewhat relieved on the way home, though I had a very flimsy justification for it. I knew Sasha well enough to think she'd shut up about Amber, for now, and that would contain the damage that had already been done.

But if Amber didn't win her over, Sasha's mean-girl instincts and thrill for personal destruction could kick in, and it might as well be U-Haul time.

And that wasn't what I was interested in.

----------------------------

Back at the house a little while later...

"Hey! How'd your meetings go?"

"I think pretty well. But I have a warning for you."

"Oh? What's that?"

"You're going to have to impress a crowd of real girls in a little less than two weeks."

"What?"

"Yeah. Sasha Moreau - she's the one I told you about - invited us to a dinner party a week from Friday. It's for the purpose of deciding if she likes you.'

"Well, that could be a good thing, right?"

"Conceivably... actually, sure. It might well be a really good thing. Win Sasha over and all of the social problems with our arrangement sort of vanish."

"That's a lot of pressure, honey."

"Amber, it isn't a make or break thing."

"All right, whatever. All I'll say is that if you want me to impress a bunch of society women, you'd better start buying me society-woman stuff. Because this? This won't cut it."

"Amber, you aren't wearing anything."

"Exactly! So I'm gonna have to start an acquisitions program, and that's gonna cost you!"

"Yes, dear," I said.