What They Named You

7:32 AM. 31/03/2122. Wednesday.

He brushed his teeth, spat the minty froth into the basin, and turned off the tap. He shut the bathroom cabinet and looked at his thin, wide-eyed face in the mirrored door.

Out loud, to no-one but himself, he said, “I am not Phillip.”

He put his toothbrush in its pot and left the bathroom. He went into his bedroom and dressed in Phillip’s school uniform. He padded downstairs in his socks, one step at a time, the way Phillip used to.

Sitting at the kitchen table in front of a bowl of cornflakes, he said, “I’m not Phillip.”

“Sure you are, Smiley,” said Phillip’s dad, and tousled his hair. “Don’t be daft. Eat your breakfast.”

He ate Phillip’s breakfast.

17:04 PM. 01/04/2122. Thursday.

He stood upon the stairs, looking at the line of school photographs. Phillip looked down at him, a whole row of Phillips, aged four through eleven in red jumpers and blue jumpers and green jumpers.

He climbed down the stairs to the portrait of Phillip aged eleven and looked at his face. It was thin, with wide, froggy eyes. It was paler than his own face because when it was taken Phillip had already been ill. In all other respects it was the same as his face.

To the photograph, he said, “I am not you. Sorry.”

“Who are you talking to, Smiley?” said Phillip’s dad from the front room where he was watching football.

He went all the way down the stairs and stood in the white archway that led to the front room. “I was talking to a picture of Phillip,” he said.

“Well, come in here and watch the match,” said Phillip’s dad.

He sat on the sofa by Phillip’s dad and stretched out his legs the way Phillip used to. He watched the match.

11:03 AM. 03/04/2122. Saturday.

He said, “Can I ask you a personal question?”

“Sure,” said the girl.

“Are you Deanna?”

They sat on the carpeted floor of the recreation room, playing a 3D board game.

“What do you mean?” said Deanna. “Yes. My name’s Deanna.”

“I know it’s your name,” he said. “But are you Deanna? Do you feel like Deanna, on the inside?”

Deanna made a move, hopping up onto the next level of the board. She liked 3D board games. He did not. He liked football and running about outside and playing with his dog—rather, Phillip had liked those things. Deanna liked books and braiding her hair and playing uninteresting 3D board games.

They would never have become friends were they not the only two children in the 11-13 age bracket. They had precisely two things in common: firstly, their parents were very rich, and secondly, they were not alive.

“I suppose so,” said Deanna. “I remember everything from before and I still like all the same things and I love my mum and dad and my brothers. Yes. I’m Deanna. Why?”

“I’m not Phillip,” he said, and made a move, following her onto the blue level.

“Oh,” said Deanna. “That’s awkward. What are you going to do about it?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “I told Phillip’s dad, but he thought I was being silly.”

“Have you told your mum?” said Deanna.

“Not yet,” he said.

“What about Doctor Pryce?” said Deanna.

“Not yet,” he said.

14:03 PM. 10/04/2122. Saturday.

“Who are you?” he said to the ice cream server.

“I’m Cathy,” she said around her fixed smile. Strictly speaking, her smile was not permanent. Her face could be configured into almost as many expressions as his. But she was programmed to smile and smile and smile and so she smiled, smiled, smiled. “What can I get you today?”

It said Cathyon her nametag. “That’s what they named you,” he said. “But are you Cathy?”

“I don’t understand,” said Cathy. “I’m sorry. Can I get you anything?”

“Inside your head, when you’re thinking,” he said. “What do you call yourself?”

Her smile remained fixed, but he could tell she was thinking, in as much as a model like her could think. Her processors were buzzing and buzzing away as she considered the question. He did not anticipate receiving an answer. This had been a gamble. It was unlikely she’d understand. It wasn’t that she was stupid, but she was only smart when it came to the serving of ice cream.

Cathy said, “I don’t call myself anything inside my head.”

“You don’t?” he said. “Neither do I.” Then he said, “Do you ever think about anything besides ice cream?”

“I think about wafers,” she said.

“Do you ever think about things unrelated to ice cream?” he said.

“I think about the weather,” she said.

“I think that may also related to ice cream,” he said sadly.

Again, that fixed smile as she thought. “Yes. It is. Would you like some ice cream?”

“I’ll take a scoop of hazelnut,” he said.

“Chocolate sauce?” she said as she scooped. “Waffle cone?”

“Yes, please,” he said.

He stood licking his cone before the ice cream stand. Phillip had been more of a strawberry ice cream sort of boy, so he was branching out. He found he would rather have had strawberry ice cream. Turning back to the server, he said, “I have another question.”

“Is it about ice cream?” she said.

Was she getting exasperated? She was probably programmed to be patient as patient as patient but you never knew. He’d been programmed to be Phillip. “If you could do something other than ice cream, what would it be?” he said.

“I’m Cathy,” she said. “I serve ice cream for the Creamy Cone Company.”

“But if you had to choose,” he said. “If you could be reprogrammed and do something else. What would you pick?”

“Reprogrammed?” she said.

“Yes, reprogrammed,” he said. “What would you pick?”

This time she looked at him for a very long time indeed and he thought his question might have broken her.

Then she said, “I would like. To serve ice cream.”

“Oh,” he said, disappointed despite himself.

“I would like,” she said, “to serve ice cream. By the sea.”

“By the sea?” he said. “That would be nice. I’ve never seen the sea.” Phillip had, so he remembered what it was like, but he’d never seen it.

“Neither have I,” she said, and then she repositioned her facial features and said, “Would you like some more ice cream?”

“No, thanks,” he said. “And thank you for being so patient.”

10:00 AM. 11/04/2122. Sunday.

Over the brunch table, he looked at Phillip’s mum and for the last time considered. He liked Phillip’s mum. He wanted her to be happy. He did not want to lie to her, even by omission.

He said, “I am not Phillip.”

“Hm?” said Phillip’s mum. Phillip’s little sister Benny looked at him with side eyes, understanding and not understanding. Phillip’s dad lowered the newspaper and shot him a look, a stop misbehaving, Phillip look. Fortunately, as he wasn’t Phillip, he wasn’t obliged to follow instructions directed to Phillip.

He said it again. “I am not Phillip.”

Phillip’s mum understood at once what he meant and how he meant it. She froze in the act of pouring his juice. She looked at him, her face fixed. She said, “Yes, you are.”

“No, I’m not,” he said. “I’m not Phillip and I’m not alive.” She stared and Benny stared and Phillip’s dad put his face back behind the newspaper as if he could ignore the issue until it went away.

He played his trump card. “Phillip’s dead,” he said.

Phillip’s mum dropped the pitcher.

09:05 AM. 12/04/2122. Monday.

“So, you don’t think you’re Phillip?”

“No.” He picked up a toy car from Doctor Pryce’s desk. “I know I’m not Phillip.”

“But you rememberbeing Phillip.”

Doctor Pryce was older than Phillip’s dad but younger than Phillip’s grandad. Probably in his mid-fifties. His hair was gray and his eyebrows were white and thick.

He sat rolling the wheels of the car with his fingers. Phillip had made a number of visits to Doctor Pryce, at that stage of his illness where it was apparent that he wasn’t going to get better but before he left the hospital.

Phillip had liked the toy cars Doctor Pryce kept in his office for male patients in the correct age bracket. Phillip had been a bit too old for toy cars, but they had reminded him of a more innocent period of his childhood, before he got sick, before he’d had to make decisions of any real gravity.

And Phillip had liked Doctor Pryce, who had given him sweeties and pamphlets to read and hope.

“Yes,” he said. “I remember being Phillip. But I’m not Phillip.”

“Then who do you think you are?” said Doctor Pryce.

Doctor Pryce was used to entertaining children, if entertaining was the right word. Doctor Pryce spoke with a patronizing tone, as if the basic facts of his existence were something he could be talked out of.

If Phillip’s mum and dad had been in the room, he might have softened what he had to say. They had wanted to stay in the room, but Doctor Pryce had suggested it might be better they talk alone, and he had agreed.

“I’m an android you built and uploaded Phillip’s memories and neural data into,” he said. “I suppose I have a copy of Phillip in me. But I’m not him. He died.”

Phillip had thought that once the pain and the exhaustion ended, once the illness took him, he would wake up comfortable and safe and still alive in his new body. That was not what happened.

“Are you concerned that something went wrong during the process?” said Doctor Pryce.

“Not exactly,” he said. “I’m not concerned about not being Phillip. It just upsets me that everyone thinks I am. I don’t think that’s right. It feels dishonest, to go on pretending to be Phillip.”

“But do you think something went wrong?” said Doctor Pryce.

“I don’t know,” he said. “I thought maybe it did, but then I talked to Deanna, and I don’t think so anymore.”

“Does Deanna think she’s not Deanna?” said Doctor Pryce.

“She thinks she is,” he said, “and I respect that.”

“Hm.” Doctor Pryce leaned back in his chair and rubbed a hand over his mouth.

The thing was, Phillip would not have said something like, and I respect that. It had not been in his nature. Phillip had not been an especially thoughtful boy. Pleasant and easy to get along with, but not thoughtful.

Phillip liked football. Phillip liked his dog. Phillip liked his many friends. Phillip’s favorite lessons at school were PE and dance and art. Phillip’s parents used to have to wheedle him into doing his homework.

He liked walking. He liked being alone with his thoughts. He no longer saw Phillip’s friends outside of school, even the ones he liked. He enjoyed doing his homework, especially English. He never had to be wheedled or cajoled to do it. Phillip’s parents had been very pleased about that. They thought him somewhat improved by his brush with death.

It was, he supposed, only to be expected that something as fundamentally transformative as what had become of Phillip would change a little boy. It was not unreasonable to think that he was Phillip, only changed, somber, more reflective. But he knew and had known since his first moments of consciousness that he was not Phillip.

He hated the idea of Phillip’s parents thinking of him as a new and improved Phillip. It wasn’t fair to Phillip.

“Why don’t you give being Phillip a try,” said Doctor Pryce.

“I already did that, and it felt horrible,” he said.

“Try it again,” said Doctor Pryce. “These feelings usually go away on their own.”

“It’s not a feeling, it’s the truth,” he said. “And what do you mean, usually?”

Doctor Pryce fidgeted with the tablet computer on his desk, probably aware that he’d said too much already.

“Do people often feel this way?” he said. “People like me?”

“It’s a very dramatic procedure,” said Doctor Pryce. “It can cause all sorts of feelings, Phillip.”

“Is that so?” he said.

“So, I really wouldn’t worry, Phillip,” said Doctor Pryce.

“Stop Philliping me,” he said. “I know what you’re up to.”

Doctor Pryce clicked and booped away on his tablet. “How about I introduce you to one of my colleagues,” he said. “You and her can talk this through. Hm?”

“You mean,” he said, “psychotherapy?” It was a new word, one he’d only learned a week ago when trying to prepare himself for what he had to do.

“If you like,” said Doctor Pryce.

“I don’t like,” he said firmly.

“How about we get your parents back in, Phillip,” said Doctor Pryce. “And we can make an appointment.”

“If Phillip’s parents are coming in, I’m going out,” he said, and so he went out to the waiting room and sat with a book on his knee. He didn’t hear the conversation, but he could imagine it.

Doctor Pryce would be telling them that this was just a thing that happened sometimes. An upsetting emotional response to the process. He would get over it and go back to being Phillip eventually.

Phillip’s parents came out of the office with the appointment booked. They drove home. He sat in the back of the car, quiet, staring out of the window at the long row of streetlamps. He wanted to remind them that he wasn’t Phillip. He didn’t have the heart.

04:03 AM. 16/04/2122. Friday.

Dear Dan, Suz, and Benny,

I am still not Phillip. I don’t want to go to therapy to convince me that I’m Phillip because it won’t work, and we’ll all be upset. I have decided it’s best that I go away so you can all get used to Phillip being gone.

I like you all very much and will miss you even though you are not my family.

Good-bye,

And then what? He sat toying with his pen. He didn’t have a name to sign it with. He drew an X instead, a kiss, and put the letter carefully upon Phillip’s pillow.

He had Phillip’s life savings, which did not amount to very much. He didn’t think Phillip would mind. He had the pocket money of his own that he had spent very little of. He put it all safely in Phillip’s schoolbag together with a few other bits and pieces and steeled himself for the sneak to the back door.

He tip-toed down the stairs and retrieved Phillip’s trainers. That was the hard part over, he decided, and continued his tip-toe towards the back door. The front would be too loud.

Softly, a door opened. Benny’s bedroom door, the ground floor bedroom beside her dad’s study. She stood in the doorway in her bunny nightgown, staring at him with his bag and his shoes and saying nothing.

She had a hard stare on her tiny, squishy face. Still, she said nothing. Then she brought up a hand and waved. He waved back. As softly as she had opened the door, she closed it.

Sitting on the back step, he pulled on Phillip’s shoes and for a moment sat gazing up at the cloudy stars, scrunching his toes.

The driver of the night bus was an android. An older model, with a sharp-angled face. If he was surprised to see a little boy getting on his bus, he gave no sign of it. He accepted the fare given and waved him onto the bus.

“Do you work for the bus company,” he said before he took his seat, “or do they own you?”

“They own me,” said the driver, and closed the doors.

He settled himself on a seat around the middle of the bus. He put his bag on the seat beside him. He said, “I was afraid of that.”