By K.J. Gieske
“Stella, you’re clearly the creative type.” The smiling digital man flowed along the wall screens as Stella walked home. “So, check out StoryTeller Pro 5.0! With just a few prompts…”
She looked down to escape the relentless advertisement, but this street had freaking sidewalk screens, so the avatar simply popped up between her boots. Custom generated, the spokesperson was perfectly tailored to draw her attention, with dreamy blue eyes, a warm smile, and just the hint of stubble on his handsome face. “For a limited time, enjoy fifty percent off…”
Stella redoubled her pace.
Her apartment complex had screens too, of course, but only half of them worked, and some bored hacker had messed with the personalization algorithm. Today, she was greeted by an ad for fishing tackle. Stella blinked at the irony; in her twenty-five years, she’d never once been near a body of water where fish could live.
The elevator’s screen flashed Out of Service. Again. Stella sighed and began the daunting climb to her seventh-floor apartment. But she didn’t entirely mind the inconvenience because… there was Gray, entering his apartment one floor below hers. She didn’t know his real name—they’d never interacted—but she called him Gray because he always wore a gray suit. Well, and because his hair was entirely gray. That was fascinating since he looked about her age.
Belatedly, she realized she had stopped on the steps, and the lack of steady footfalls had drawn Gray’s attention. Their eyes met. His blue eyes were so vivid against all the gray that Stella gasped aloud.
Feeling her cheeks flush, Stella rushed up the remaining steps two at a time, dashed to her door, and collapsed inside. She covered her face with her hands, mortified. Why hadn’t she said anything? Even a casual “Hello, there” would have been better than her rabbit-like escape.
Stella could huddle by the door for only so long, however, and continued with her evening. Splurging a bit to soothe her battered ego, she prompted a new personalized episode of her favorite show, Detective Durbin McLurvin, preparing dinner while it generated.
The episode was amusing, the food palatable, but the memory of Gray’s eyes meeting hers replayed, and she groaned aloud. Stella reached for her promptcom, its screen waking at her touch. She stabbed a question into the device, and the response spilled out in glowing letters.
It’s great that you’re attempting to create new connections, Stella! Making friends isn’t always easy, but here’s some simple strategies…
She sighed and tossed the device aside. What was the point? Gray had already lived in the complex for over a year. If she tried to strike up a conversation now, it would just be weird.
To distract herself, Stella dove into the never-ending project of organizing the hall closet. She opened a dusty bin of childhood mementos and stared, amazed, at the long-abandoned notebook sitting there. It had been a gift on her tenth birthday from her grandmother, shortly after Stella announced her intention to become a writer.
That notion lasted until she showed her first story to friends at school.
She remembered Mikila tugging curiously at the notebook’s pages, accidentally tearing one. “Oops, sorry! For real, how long did it take to write this? Like, an hour?”
It had actually taken five.
Gavin had waved his promptcom at her. “You know that you could make a story in five minutes with this, right? No offense.”
So, she had discarded the notebook and her childhood career plans. Thank goodness for that. She couldn’t imagine that writers made any money.
Stella gingerly lifted the notebook from its coffin, flipped to the first page of childish scrawl, and read it. She cringed; even a generic chatbot was a literary genius in comparison.
But fifteen years had softened the crushing dismissal by her friends, and despite the dull, cliché-ridden paragraphs, she recalled the joy she’d felt while writing it. It was a terrible story, true, but it was her story, and that made it special.
A ridiculous idea came to her. She didn’t have the courage to talk to Gray, but what if…?
Stella picked up one of the pencils in the bin and clumsily worked out how to even hold the thing. She almost gave up right there. Writing by hand was a waste of time. She could prompt an entire story before she came up with something even halfway worth writing.
Once upon a time, there was a shy woman who lived in a broken-down old apartment. Then, one day, an intriguing new neighbor moved in—a quiet man with hair that was entirely gray…
Although she grimaced at every sentence, Stella kept the pencil moving until she at last felt she had written everything she wanted to say.
Then she rewrote the entire thing. Twice.
***
The next morning, Stella stuffed the folded notepaper under Gray’s door. The moment it left her fingers, she regretted her foolish gambit. What if he thought it was just too weird, or worse, creepy? How would he choose to respond, if he even did?
After an entirely unproductive workday and preoccupied commute during which not a single ad captured her attention, Stella climbed the stairs, her heart pounding far harder than it ever had from the exercise. As she passed Gray’s door, she couldn’t help but glance at it. Closed. Silent.
Stella summited the stairs listlessly. Maybe she should have just thrown the notebook away. She sighed and opened her door.
A familiar sheet of paper lay just inside the threshold. Hands trembling, she picked it up. Yes, it was her message, returned with neat handwriting covering the back.
Stella stood frozen for a moment, then plunged into Gray’s reply. When she finished reading, her hands trembled again, but this time from anticipation. She grinned. Writing like this was so much more exciting than prompting episodes of Detective Durbin McLurvin. Now, where was her pencil?
Their story was just beginning.
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I love how her return to a childhood dream makes her current dream a reality! Well done!
Thank you!
The guy putting a note under Stella’s door is fine, but Stella putting a note under his door? That’s a Gray area…