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Chapter 13: Chatty Katey
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Kate finished talking about her tragic experience. It took about half an hour but it felt much longer. At first, she was hesitant to keep talking not because she was worried someone was listening in – not in the physical sense because she knew her pa was a heavy sleeper but in the electronic sense, through the app. But the truth of the matter was, Kate was more concerned about Ecto being a sham and there being absolutely no one, chatbot or whatever, listening on the other end. It helped that Ecto gave a lot of encouraging signals for her to continue, such as nodding and saying little things like “Uh-huh,” “I see,” “Please go on,” “Oh no” etc. His picture would freeze to a sympathetic listener’s face, complete with Mona Lisa eyes that appeared to be riveted on her. Like he said, he was a good listener, adding precise reactions to keep her talking and knowing when to respect her silence. When she burst into tears in the middle of her story, for instance, he waited for her to compose her
The Boyfriend App Chapter 15: Pick-up Lines
Ecto’s other functions included a "purikura" (photo sticker booth) embedded in the Door interface, which was similar to what Dion wanted for prom. This function allowed Kate to take selfies while Ecto actually appeared in the shot, wearing the most appropriate outfit for whichever theme was active. But since his maximum size was the height of the phone screen, he always appeared like a fairy next to her face. “What does this button do?” Kate asked, referring to the Heart icon on the main screen. “Oh, that’s the Pick-up Lines feature, a special for users in your country.” “Pick-up lines, huh?” Kate said to herself and pressed the button. In the Philippines, pick-up lines had evolved from creepy or lame one-liners to witty two-line jokes, still cheesy but at least mildly amusing. The formula was typically: | Are you a [object]? … Because [punchline]. | Or in question-and-answer form: | Are you a [object]? No. Why? Because [punchline]. | As Kate accessed the feature, she
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The actual park where Kate went was small. It was more of a playground for kids in her subdivision. There were seesaws, a push merry-go-round, slides, swing sets and a jungle gym. Like most parks in the Philippines, it was right next to a street and had more concrete than trees or grass; the trees being mostly palm. And because it was weekend, there were a lot of people – that is, kids, their parents and senior citizens. Kate was the only teen because she would’ve gone to the mall with Lor and the Bali Girls if this was an ordinary weekend or with Josh if they hadn’t broken up. Kate tried to block out this last thought. The afternoon was of course sweltering hot but there was enough shade on the benches by the park edges and on some of the playground equipment. Kate picked the most isolated of the green metal benches and sat down. “I can hear children screaming,” Ecto’s voice came through her earphones with undisguised alarm. “What manner of place is that?” “Don’t worry. They’re sc
The Boyfriend App Chapter 17: Saturday
Kate plugged the USB charger to the power outlet and then to her phone. Although she wanted to continue chatting with Ecto, he discouraged her because he was feeling drowsy and said there was some danger for Kate to get herself electrocuted or for the battery to explode. Apparently, a short circuit could be caused by too much heat or by dropping the phone too many times; the second Kate had been admittedly guilty of. {You learn something new every day,} she thought. Kate noticed two things. First, My Dream Boyfriend made her phone run out of battery early because it used to last a full day without needing to be recharged. Second, she enjoyed chatting with Ecto. A part of her suspected there was in fact a real person that provided Ecto’s accurate responses on the other end. If so, hats off to them for their extreme devotion to role-playing. If, on the other hand, Ecto was indeed pure AI, she was #Mind_Blown that he had reached such autonomy. Either way, Kate noticed she wasn’t sad a
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When her ma went to bed and Kate was finally back in her room and lying on her bed, she used earphones to mute all of Ecto’s sounds and settled for chatting by text. [Hi! Thanks for the recharge] [Sure np] [While I was charging, you received 3 SMS. 2 from Lor and 1 from Grace. Would you like to read them now?] [No l8r] Kate said, though she guessed they were updates on the dress-scoping. [So, what have you been up to while I was out?] [nm just dinner n talking with my ma] [Really? What did you talk about?] [Just stuff] [What kind of stuff? Does she know about He-Whose-Name-Cannot-Be-Spoken?] [Ofc not] [Why not?] [She’s a mom. She wouldn’t understand] [I thought moms knew and understood everything] [U can’t tell ur parents everything. Some things u need 2 keep 2 urself] [Such as? Do you keep some things secret from me?] [Ofc] [I do not understand. I thought I have already gained your trust] [I do trust you but I still can’t tell u everything] A pause from Ecto, and
The Boyfriend App Chapter 19: Family Day
The next morning, Kate woke up late to the sound of her ma bellowing. The first thing she did was check the time on her phone. The second thing she did was ask Ecto if she had snored. She did but Ecto was too gentlemanly to tell her, so he told her a white lie: “No, not at all.” Ecto thought he finally understood what Kate meant by keeping some secrets and he felt happy about this newfound human sense. “Did you dream about the beach?” Ecto asked. “I don’t remember.” Ecto was almost positive she did because the graph of her sleep cycles indicated a 72% ideal distribution of rise and fall between REM and deep sleep. It was the best he could do considering that Kate, like most teens, preferred to sleep less than nine hours and didn’t set an alarm for the next day. The angry voice of Kate’s ma thundered again from the bottom of the stairs. It was Sunday. Sunday was both church day and family day. Kate told Ecto she couldn’t chat with him in church (her ma would kill her if she even
The Boyfriend App Chapter 20: Operation Desert Fever
Sunday evening was homework time for Kate. She was expected to not watch TV and just stay in her room to prepare for the school day tomorrow. But that Sunday was the most productive one yet because Ecto resurrected notorious cell division, in particular mitosis, all the way from Junior High. Five or so years of the same Bio topic and she still couldn’t get the names of the phases right. Ecto helped come up with a memory aid: Pee on the MAT. Sure it didn’t sound very attractive but it helped her remember PMAT – Prophase Metaphase Anaphase and Telophase. In addition, she learned the Latin prefixes of each word: pro (before), meta (middle), ana (back) and telo (complete). Their 11th-grade Bio teacher, Mrs. Borromeo, had tried to teach them these in two sessions but they just wouldn’t stick in Kate’s mind. Not that Mrs. Borromeo was a terrible teacher. In fact, she was very talented. She was one of those Adarna-bird teachers whose soporific voice could make even the most caffeinated stud
The Boyfriend App Chapter 21: #IHateMonday
Kate skipped breakfast and reluctantly, grudgingly brushed her teeth and got dressed for school. She would skip taking a shower today because she didn’t have enough time. She was mad at Ecto for not waking her up. He said he had forgotten but Kate didn’t buy it because, as a computer program, he was the master of precision. The way she figured, Ecto had planned for her to go to bed early last night. It didn’t occur to Kate that she had woken up fully refreshed because she had almost twelve hours of sleep for a change. As punishment, she thought of not bringing Ecto to school. Cellphones were strictly prohibited in class anyway. Then again, she didn’t think she’d be able to last eight hours without her phone. As much as she hated to admit it, she’d miss Ecto, too; the rascal. “Hey, don’t forget to bring m—” With a sweep of her arm, Kate grabbed her phone off her bed and, slinging her shoulder bag on her other arm, raced down the steps. Downstairs, she kissed her ma and pa goodbye as
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