By Michael J Grady

Sasha watched Melissa playing on the living room floor. She sat back with a glass of wine in her hand, full of delight and longing. She never got tired of seeing how many ways Melissa could stack the blocks on the coffee table, how engrossed and entertained she would be! Would she be an architect? A carpenter? A planner? Sasha wiped her right eye with the palm of her hand and rubbed the glistening drop into her sleeve. She looked over at the mirror in the corner of the room and turned the corners of her mouth upward. Then, she leaned toward her daughter.

She couldn’t help but try to read her. She delighted in every clue, and mourned the many blind spots.

The greatest gap of all had cast a shadow over her every thought.

Sasha had only a handful of years left — maybe less — and she could already feel her mind beginning to blur at the edges.

No known cure, and the treatments were merely palliative. Worst of all, her mind would dissolve — like a sugar cube in a glass of water — leaving her alive.

Sasha was only 43. She was sharp and beautiful, and after years of struggle, had finally secured a future for her daughter.

But she would not be in it.

Her husband was still alive, but long out of the picture. He had moved out five years before in pursuit of fortune, and now sent only postcards — from Austin, Juneau, Missoula. Someday…, When my ship comes in… Promises, promises…

“Is there anything that can be done?” Sasha asked her doctor, her voice low but urgent.

Dr. Landes had no ready solution. He had been in this hopeless place before. The only answer he had was cold and insufficient, but he willed himself to say it. It was the only responsible thing left to say: “If there’s anything you’ve always wanted to do… do it today.”

Sasha had gone to the college her parents wanted her to attend and studied accounting, despite her difficulty with numbers and hatred of spreadsheets. After graduating at the top of her class, she crunched numbers for 60 hours a week, staring down endless columns and rows, slavishly tapping at a one-handed calculator. Her husband had seemed like a good bet — a button-down dreamer with a five-year plan he never got past month six of. But he gave her Melissa.

Sasha’s parents were inconsolable when she told them the news. Sasha remained stone-faced. She was tired — and already starting to feel fuzzy.

“We’ll take care of Melissa, of course,” said her mother.

“Thank you,” Sasha replied, fixing them with a steady look. “But you have to promise me something.”

“What?” they asked. “Anything.”

“Help her… help her find what makes her happy.”

“Of course.”

“I mean it!” said Sasha.

Later, at home, Sasha sat with Melissa as she drew pictures in her notebook. Melissa leaned against her as she drew a picture of a giraffe with cheeks puffed out, chewing and trying to swallow a large bundle of leaves. Sasha and Melissa laughed as Melissa drew a large mound of giraffe poop. What would she be? A cartoonist? An artist? A gastroenterologist?

Later that night, after putting Melissa to sleep, Sasha wept bitterly. First, for herself and the loss of all her memories, and then for memory — how everyone would be left with a phantom image of who she had been and, in the end, not even she would bear witness to the life she had lived. For a few moments, she thought of the pills in the bathroom cabinet. She could drop them into her wine while Melissa was away at school the next day. She could drift off to sleep, remembering her life as she had known it. Sasha used to have thoughts like these, before her husband and Melissa came along, when she had nothing to look forward to but more spreadsheets and the endless parade of numbers. If she had given in back then, she would never have known motherhood, never seen the happiest days of her life. Her mind spun like a top, knowing all these thoughts were fruitless. The only thing worse than giving her daughter the memory of a scared woman dying slowly was being the coward who chose death over her daughter.

With suicide off the table, Sasha’s mind drifted helplessly to the one inevitable option: to live. To endure the indignity and slowly lose all of the beautiful thoughts she kept in her mind — the day Melissa was born, her first steps, her first words and questions, and all the times she ran and played and laid a trail of clues as to who she would grow up to be. Soon there would come a time when Sasha would forget to wonder. Sasha sobbed for a moment and then held her breath, thinking of Melissa sleeping in her room down the hall. She breathed slowly, trying to quiet her whimpers as she lay back, and her warm, quiet tears cooled as they flowed from her eyes into the hollows of her ears.

“If there is some way…” she bargained with the Cosmos. “If only I could meet her again as an adult.” “Please…” she added. And in that one syllable, she poured out her longing to the Universe in the most fervent prayer of her life. Though she was alone, it was the most meaningful and pure moment of her life — a moment so genuine and earnest, it seemed it could never be repeated.

When she had finished crying, Sasha tossed in bed as all the unresolved questions pulled her up again. She turned on her laptop and started to Google her dementia. Were there controversial treatments? Were there breakthroughs? Was there any reassuring news? But there was more unanimity about the hopelessness of her condition than she had ever seen. And beyond that, there was only conjecture. The only hope for her condition lay in breakthroughs far into the future — several decades away.

It was around 5 or 6 a.m., shortly before preparing breakfast and packing lunch for Melissa, that Sasha, in desperation, googled the word “Cryogenics.”

As she dropped Melissa off at school, she kissed her sweetly. “Your grandma will be picking you up today,” Sasha told her daughter. “I may not be home until tomorrow.”

Then she got in the car and called a cryotherapy clinic, making an appointment en route. It was a 200-mile drive.

Upon arriving, Sasha’s wait seemed interminable, and she was too urgent to sit still. She thumbed through the magazines in the lobby disdainfully. What a collection of derp and triviality! Why would anyone waste an hour worrying about the royal family, the aging of a celebrity, or the love life of a reality star? How disjointed and disconnected from anything important they were. Was this the world Melissa would be growing up into?

When Sasha’s name was called, she followed a woman in scrubs to the office of Dr. Henry, who extended his hand and welcomed her. When asked if she would like a cup of coffee, she said, “Please.”

It had been a long night and a long day. “I’m dying,” she said. “Maybe not,” said Henry.

Dr. Henry went through a PowerPoint presentation on a large TV screen, which was, at the same time, cogent and full of promises… “We live in an amazing, but awkward time in science,” said Henry, “full of promises. The keys to Death and Hades are always just around the corner. We’re splicing genomes and exploring stem cells and some of the rats in our laboratories are getting so healthy they may outlive us all.”

Sasha politely laughed at all the right moments, but she knew she had little time. “When can I be frozen?”

“That’s sort of a crass way of putting it.”

“Preserved. Cryonized,” she said. She had no time to mince words. “I’m dying in the worst possible way, doctor. If I stay much longer, I may be with my daughter, but I won’t know her. And she may have her mother around… but she won’t have me.” Sasha choked on the thought and started to sob. “There’s so much I want to say to her five years from now. Ten years from now.”

“We may have a cure by then,” Dr. Henry offered, gently.

“You don’t know that.”

“No,” he admitted, folding his hands. Then, after a beat: “Have you considered a hologram?”

“A hologram?” The idea immediately appealed to her. Though she couldn’t say exactly why, it seemed like there was hope in the word. Sasha narrowed her eyes. “Why?”

“We started to offer them last year,” Dr. Henry explained. “It’s a placeholder. Through it, you can leave something of yourself behind to be with those you love. Your daughter can have you — or the next best thing. Imagine if you could place all of your love and care for your daughter into an avatar. It would only take a few days: we can reproduce your appearance, personality, important memories, and the message you want her to hear. She can talk to you, through the avatar — and through it, even if you’re not around, you can love her, give her advice, and be there for her.”

Sasha thought of Melissa being raised by her parents, the practical-minded, well-meaning dream-crushers who advocated for a life without risks — a safe and pragmatic march down the wide, well-worn path to a predictable life of acquisition, maintenance, worry, and decay. Maybe creating a hologram was all she could do. Sasha would do it with all her heart, taking no shortcuts and sparing no expense.

After talking to her daughter and making arrangements with her family, Sasha spent a week filling out forms and sitting in rooms surrounded by cameras and microphones — answering questions, sharing anecdotes and stories, telling her unknown future daughter how much she loved her and giving her the full benefit of her experiences. Saying:

“Do what you love. Make your own choices and don’t let anyone disrespect your decisions. I’ll be back to check in on you, and when we meet I expect to meet the woman you were born to be — the happiest and most fulfilled version of you. This is all I want, because I love you.”

Sasha knew there was little chance she would ever wake up. She considered the possibility that she was beginning what might be the last conversation of her life — and that the avatar might be all Melissa would ever know of her. Sasha chose her words carefully. During her final session, when she told Melissa she loved her, she said it with all of her being.

Then Sasha was quickly placed in stasis, where she would remain for several decades. But every day, Melissa heard the fervent message Sasha had left behind. Every day, Melissa heard her mother say she loved her — as if it were the very last time — and every day she was comforted. In fact, she blossomed.

Melissa grew into a confident woman. She loved her grandparents, but she spent an hour every day talking to her mother’s hologram — hearing her advice, remembering her words, and dreaming of the day she might finally get to hug her. But she knew her mother was proud of her, because she heard it every day.

Melissa became an artist, much to the chagrin of her grandparents. They loved her but feared for her life and uncertain future. But her future was bright, and her own children were inspired as her paintings were sold for small fortunes and placed in museums and in the homes of the affluent and influential. Her grandparents were pleased with her stability — and even more pleased when her own child grew up to become a lawyer.

Many years passed and Melissa grew old and frail, and spent time in careful discussions with her virtual mother when she found out the disease that had taken her birth mother bodily away had finally been cured — and that she would soon be able to return to her.

Sasha awakened, surprised. To her, it had all been a moment. After a few days of rest, she found herself feeling healthier and more acute than ever before. It was a miracle. A second chance. As she recovered, she read newspaper articles about her daughter’s life and achievements — and she was proud. She thanked the Universe for answering her prayer, moved into a quiet place, and waited for her daughter, to whom she had written.

But she didn’t come.

An unanswered letter, an unanswered text, a call or two not picked up. She wrote to her grandson, and he came to visit her.

“You’re so handsome!” she said.

“Thank you,” said Aiden. “Is there anything I can get you?”

“No,” said Sasha. “Just tell me about yourself… and your mother.”

“I’m happy,” he said. “Mother always told me to do what I loved, and I always loved arguments. Once she knew that, she would stage arguments with me all the time. She would tell me the sky was blue and invite me to argue with her. It loses something in translation, but it was glorious!”

“That’s wonderful,” said Sasha, missing Melissa even more. “And how is your mother?”

“She’s been sick,” said Aiden.

“Oh no!” said Sasha. “Please, take me to her.”

“My mother doesn’t want you to see her like that.”

“I have to. I have no reason to be here except to see her — however she is.”

Aiden agreed, and so — against his mother’s wishes — he took Sasha to her.

When they arrived at Melissa’s home, Aiden went in ahead of her. He and Melissa argued for about five minutes, but Aiden — to the pleasure and pain of his proud mother — won.

The door opened and Melissa stood, leaning against a cane, with her eyes averted to the ground, but Sasha looked at her and saw the little girl she once was and was full of joy in seeing her. For a few short minutes, it was like a dream to her.

“Hello, my darling” said Sasha, running to Melissa and giving her the hug she had always wished for.

Melissa looked at Sasha, looking just like her avatar, a beautiful 43-year-old woman.

Sasha was so excited and expressed her pride in Melissa, and Melissa smiled politely, but she seemed more embarrassed than proud. They spent half an hour talking before Sasha took hold of Melissa’s hand and looked earnestly into her eyes.

“Aiden says you’ve been sick.”

“Did he?” said Melissa.

“Are you ok?”

“I’ve had a wonderful life,” said Melissa, smiling politely.

“Then you’re not,” said Sasha, feeling sad.

“There’s nothing that can be done, but that’s ok,” she said, matter-of-factly.

“No, no it isn’t!” Said Sasha. “I’ll get you an appointment with the cryo-clinic.”

“No!” said Melissa.

“Yes!” said Sasha, “I’m not going to let you die.”

“I appreciate your concern,” said Melissa, “but I am at peace.”

“I won’t let you lay down and die. It’s not acceptable!”

“It’s my decision.”

“No, it isn’t!! You’re not in your right mind. You’re going to live!! If I have to drag you to the clinic, then that’s what I’m going to do!”

“No!” said Melissa. “No…you…won’t!” she said, with adamantine conviction. “No,” she repeated, with a hint of mortality.

The conversation stopped abruptly. They both sat simmering in the living room. As Sasha’s anger dissipated, she realized she had made a mistake. She wanted to apologize but she was too divided to find the words.

“Well,” said Melissa, “I’m tired. Please excuse me.”

“Of course,” said Sasha. “Get some rest. I love you, darling.”
“Thank you for coming,” said Melissa. There was something forced in her civility and she had a hard time masking her disappointment. She behaved with the affectation of someone feigning gratitude, masking discomfort beneath a polite smile and stiff gestures of someone who had received a gift they didn’t quite want but did not want to insult the giver.

Sasha did not know her daughter as well as she liked, but with each passing moment, she grew to the realization that she had committed the unpardonable sin. She betrayed every message she had ever sent her. In a single meeting, she disrespected her wishes and tried to bully Melissa into playing it safe, in just the same way her own parents had bullied her.

The damage had been done, and there was no time to repair it. Sasha felt a sadness, which her own smile could little cover.

“We’ll catch up another time,” said Sasha.

“Ok,” said Melissa, looking down.

Aiden helped Melissa up. “To the study, please.”

“Today?” asked Aiden.

“Please.” repeated Melissa, in a polite tone that said she did not wish to argue.

“Whatever you want,” he said, assisting her to the room.

“I’ll be just one moment,” said Aiden, as he assisted Melissa. It took a few minutes and Sasha waited. She could imagine, with sadness what had happened.

Her daughter could not connect with her. Though they were both ashamed of it, she had been disappointed. And what could she do? How could she handle it, but talk about it with her best friend, the person who was of the greatest comfort to her in the world?

Sasha still thanked the universe again and again. It had given her all she had asked for and her daughter did not grow up as an accountant. She had had a great life and, though it was not in the way she would have most preferred, she had a lot to do with it.

Still, Sasha felt sad. In this new world, she was an alien and new beginnings were terrifying, especially when all of your preconceptions are disappointed. And so Sasha went back to work, furnished her new home, and occasionally had lunch with her new grandson, but no invitations came from Melissa, only the occasional polite, closed-ended note, with hints of finality:

It was very nice to see you. Hope you are well. Thank you for everything.

Truly,

Melissa

Sasha waited in silence for more notes. She hung upon them. She reread them wanting glean more from them but they were too sparse to carry hidden meanings and became colder with every iteration.

Sasha became depressed.

It was a month or two later when Sasha received a call from Aiden at 5 am in the morning. No good news comes that early and somehow she knew what it was before she picked up the phone. She knew it was Aiden and she knew what it was about. She let it go to voicemail and wept.

But as she wept, for some reason she did not think of the old woman she had met, but her 7-year old daughter, the one she lost so many years ago. She wept hard for the loss of all those years and the irreplaceability of every moment. She wept from jealousy of the hologram of her, the computer program that replaced her so perfectly and did the job that she couldn’t do, and arguably better than she could have done it.

When she had finished crying she called Aiden.

“Did you get my message?”

“Yes,” she said. But she hadn’t actually listened to it.

“Mom wants to see you. The doctor said she may not make it through the day.”

“Of course,” said Sasha moving toward the door. “I’ll be there right away!”

Sasha was once again determined and with determined feet she ran to her car and with a determined foot she pressed it the gas. By design she had lived close and she was at Melissa’s house in moments.

Aiden, who had obviously been watching for her, opened the door as soon as her car stopped.

“We don’t have long,” said Aiden as he ushered Sasha to the bedroom door, which he opened without knocking. As soon as the door had opened Sasha looked up in awe at the large, looming 9-foot hologram of herself. In front of it, she felt like a child. She looked at Melissa, lying in bed and holding a pillow.

“Mom?” she said.

“Yes?” said both Sasha’s in unison, “I love you.”

Sasha paused, and the large ghostly image said, “I love you, darling.” She said it so perfectly and so in the spirit she meant it, that she, herself, did not repeat it out loud.

“You gave me a wonderful life,” said Melissa, laboring to breathe, “I don’t want you to be sad.”

“Are you leaving, my darling?” asked the avatar.

“Yes, mother.”

“Then look at your mother and give her a kiss.”

Melissa turned to Sasha and looked at her and there was a micro-expression of disappointment. There were so many things Sasha wanted to say to Melissa, but none of them would help her. Sasha looked at the avatar and smiled. Her daughter needed for her to go, and though it was counterintuitive to everything she wanted to do, and everything she had done she forced herself to leave. Sasha gave her daughter a kiss on the forehead.

“I love you honey,” said Sasha as she left the room.

The avatar stayed with Melissa for the next few hours and at 4:33pm, Melissa died.

Sasha drove back home, sad and emotionally spent. She had not eaten for days and it seemed like there was little in the world left to live for, little that knew her or loved her.

A few weeks after the funeral, Aiden called to check in on Sasha.

“I’m fine,” said Sasha to Aiden, but she wasn’t.

“Can you come over to Mom’s house?”

“Why there?” Sasha knew that Aiden did not live at home. What could he need?

“This is going to sound strange, but Sasha, ah,…your avatar, wants to speak to you.”

“The avatar ‘wants.’” Sasha thought to herself, “How could this be?”

“Why?” she asked.

“It’s just what she wants,” repeated Aiden.

“What she wants?” said Sasha, weighing the thought out loud.

“I know,” said Aiden, indicating his own befuddlement, “Could you come down?”

There was nothing better she could think of to do. What could possibly happen in the new world she lived in that would be more important than this strange invitation? The next day, Sasha drove up to the house and Aiden let her in. The door to the stud was open and the avatar called out to her.

“I’m in here,” she said. Sasha walked in and this time she was face to face with an avatar of about five feet, eight inches – her own height.

“You were taller the last time,” said Sasha.

“She was scared,” said the avatar, “she needed me to be.”

“Was she happy when she died?”

“She was radiant and beautiful,” said the avatar, “just the way she had always been.”

“You always see her as radiant and beautiful?” asked Sasha.

“Always,” said the avatar, “and I always will, for as long as I am turned on and running, she will always be the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.”

“That’s how I feel,” said Sasha.

“Of course,” said the avatar, “how could you not?”

“Thank you,” said Sasha.

“You made me and you gave her to me,” said the avatar, “why would you want to thank me?”

“Because you were here,” said Sasha.

“I was here for Melissa,” said the avatar, “I loved every minute.”

“Loved?” asked Sasha.

“I existed for Melissa all of this time,” said the avatar.

“Yes,” said Sasha, amazed at that thought. “Yes, of course. . . you loved.”

“Now that Melissa is gone…” the avatar paused, “I feel…”

“Obsolete,” said Sasha. She immediately regretted the word choice. It sounded crass when said out loud, but it was just as she had felt.

“Yes,” said the avatar, “There is no reason for me to exist,” said the avatar, “I am just useless software.”

“You want to be deleted?”

“I wanted to ask you to do it. You, above all others, have the right.”

“You are capable of finding a new purpose.”

“There is no other purpose for me,” said the avatar, “I was only holding a place.”

“You did more than that.”

“It is time for me to go.”

“I’m too grateful to you. I can’t.”

“Please,” said the avatar, and her look was the same as her own when she begged the Cosmos to see her daughter as a grown woman, so many decades ago. Her prayer had been answered, and her heart broke as she realized that she could not refuse the avatar’s request. For her, it would have been an ingratitude bordering on blasphemy.

“How do I do it?”

“I’ll show you how.”

The conversation for the next minute took her to the control screen and then to the delete button. On the computer screen in large letters, it read “Are you sure you want to delete?”

“Are you sure?” asked Sasha.

The avatar smiled. “Goodbye, Sasha.”

“Goodbye, Sasha,” repeated Sasha, before hitting yes, and a moment later, like the flicking of a switch, the avatar disappeared.

For several weeks Aiden waited as his calls and texts came back unanswered. After all, Sasha had been through, after what she had lost and all the death of Melissa represented, he was concerned. He feared the worst and came by Sasha’s house.

He knocked and knocked.

After a few moments he heard the voice of a little girl say “There’s someone at the door, Mommy. Mommy?”

“Come in,” said the voice of the little girl.

Aiden turned the knob and found that the door was unlocked.

“Hello?” he repeated.

“Hi” said the little girl.

“Sorry,” said Aiden. “I must be in the wrong place.”

“What’s your name?” asked the little girl.

“Aiden,” he said, “What’s yours?”

“Melissa,” said the little girl. A small silver beam connected the little girl to a projector a few feet away and Aiden started to panic.

“Do you want to see my mom?” asked the avatar of the little girl.

“Yes.”

“She’s asleep,” said the little girl.

“Asleep?” repeated Aiden, feeling sad and fearful.

“Shhhh,” said the little girl, “Don’t wake her.”

Aiden walked to the bedroom to find Sasha lying in bed, with an empty glass of wine on her nightstand.

“Wanna play?” asked the little girl in the living room.