Still seated, I watch as she nods and leaves. For the first time in a while, our interaction didn’t go entirely wrong. Looking down at the pill in my palm, I feel somehow relieved.
We fixed things.
Chapter 08
Saturday night, I have the most vivid sex dream of my life. Turns out my talk with Alexander didn’t decrease my ridiculous attraction to him but exacerbated it instead.
There was something about that man apologizing and trying so hard to earn my forgiveness that just did it for me.
After waking, I toss and turn in bed for about an hour before deciding to take Idris out. With my eyes closed, I relive the intense fuckery my subconscious came up with during my sleep. I can still hear his low, enraptured voice saying, “Such a messy girl… Look at how wet you are for me, Andrea.” Understandably, I bring myself to orgasm in less than three minutes.
I really have to stop thinking about him when I masturbate, but the relief is too good, even if it’s short-lived. And it knocks me right into sleep every single time.
When I wake up again, I can hear Tami in the kitchen. After twenty minutes of doom scrolling on my phone, I kick my covers off and get up. Following the breakfast she cooked, we head out to the farmers’ market a few blocks away, which is there every Sunday. The fresh air and sun have an excellent effect on me, and the distraction is much needed.
I might have made peace with my frustrating boss, but I still want to fuck his brains out. And that’s not a very healthy mindset.
Once we return home, with our shopping bags full of fresh veggies, fruits, and a rotisserie chicken, Tami settles in the living room to video call some relatives, and I go to my room to work on my project.
My body isn’t cooperating, and my mind is constantly drifting. It’s particularly hard to focus, with too many thoughts occupying my brain. I had the best sex of my life with my boss. In a dream, yes, but still.
Who even does that?!
After three hours of fastidious and unsatisfying work, I need a new series of tests to move forward. I head out with everything I need and find Tami watching an episode ofFriends.
The show is slowly growing on me, but Ross always gets on my nerves. Because of that, I can never watch a whole episode. Living with Tamika, who watches it on a loop, I’m learning that Chandler makes up for Ross’s annoying and whiny personality, though.
“Could you give me a hand on my project?” I sign when she looks my way. She nods, pressing pause on the remote. “Great! I need to do your nails before we start, though.”
“Yay! Girl time,” she signs before rushing to the bathroom.
I only meant nail polish, but she insists on a full manicure. We watch two episodes as we do our hands, and I rather like it. Tami can’t read all the closed captions, but she basically knows the episodes by heart and always looks up to see the important bits. Once we’re done exterminating cuticles and filing our nails, we choose which nail polish we want. I need vivid colors for my app, so Tami decides on a carrot orange while I opt for the lapis lazuli. Her nails are a nice length and look great, which makes me feel bad about my short ones. I need to stop biting them, but I hate the clicky sound of long nails on a keyboard.
“So, I got the idea for this app from Rafael—my brother—who complained about how hard dating is for people who are deaf or hard of hearing,” I explain to her as the second coat dries, making sure I don’t damage them as I sign. “The goal is that when you go on a date, you have the app on two phones, and you settle them like this,” I continue, sitting on the floor on the other side of the table to face Tami. I brought two phones with me earlier, and I set them down vertically, one facing me, one facing her, on a small support I built for this.
“The camera on mine will analyze the movements of your hands and translate what you’re signing into written sentences on my screen as you go. Your phone will listen to what I say, analyze my lips to make sure it isn’t taking someone else’s words, and then put it into written sentences.”
Tami’s eyebrows shoot up, impressed. “You did this on your own?”
“I did the programming, yes, but my family helped. I needed a database for the software to analyze ongoing movements and compare them. My mom, dad, abuela, Rafael, and even Kate spent hours in front of a camera, signing hundreds of words five times each, so I could compile them into the data analysis algorithm. Then, it uses an AI system to build the most likely sentence. There’s also a whole part I’m still polishing where you can pick a voice uniquely created to fit you, and it speaks what you sign. But I don’t need to test that right now.”
“Why the nail polish?”
“The server I’m using for the algorithm isn’t powerful enough to analyze the complete hand. For now, it mostly tracks the tips of the fingers, and the bright colors help.”
Once I’m sure everything’s ready, I give her an encouraging nod. “You can go ahead and sign whatever you want,” I say without signing this time. She smiles when my words appear on the screen facing her. Enthusiastically, she signs something in return.
American Sign Language isn’t like the spoken language, as one might imagine. The hardest part of my project was working out the artificial intelligence in charge of rearranging the sentences. It has to differentiate the words and their roles in the sentence.
ASL structures sentences based on their functions, which are often divided into categories like time, subject, verb, and object. The app then has to put them back in the proper order and add in the small words that are not typically signed, like articles and some conjunctions. Facial expressions also come into play, as they can alter the meaning of a sentence and add nuance.
Tamika literally signs, “T-A-M-I-K-A I am. Happy meet you,” which is what the screen writes at first. However, ASL being quite complicated, she could also have signed, “I who? T-A-M-I-K-A. I happy meet you.”
The whole thing was a nightmare to work through, but I’m almost done perfecting it. Once she’s done signing, the app rearranges the words to translate them into,I’m Tamika. I’m happy to meet you.
A wide smile stretches my lips, and she jumps from the couch to see the results. An incredulous expression appears on her face. “That’s awesome!” she signs.
We exchange like this for about an hour, as I write every adjustment I need to make on a notepad. When my brain is about to explode, I suggest a break and review my notes.
