THE DATE

Madelyn sat on one of the benches in front of the restaurant. She was a little early, and she already knew that Keith wasn’t the most punctual young man. He was too easily distracted. A couple with three small children filled the rest of the bench. Madelyn pulled out her phone. Maybe the kids wouldn’t talk to her if it looked like she was texting. She had nothing against children. She was a first-grade math teacher; she interacted with them every day. Today, the only person she wanted to interact with was Keith.

This would be their third date. She liked Keith because he treated everyone with kindness and loved to learn. He was always talking about something different. She chose to love him because he lived close and had compatible ideals.

“You alright?” asked a shrill, young voice. The girl was about five. Children were drawn to Madelyn, probably because she was so petite. Staring at a black screen was also a bit strange.

Madelyn wouldn’t waste an opportunity to brighten a child’s day, answering with a smile, “No, I’m half-right and half-left. See? I have a right hand and a left hand, a right eye and left eye.” As she spoke, she moved one hand and then the other and winked with each eye. “No one is all right.”

The little girl looked down at her own hands as if this were a profound revelation.

When an older couple arrived—the grandparents perhaps—the whole group headed inside. Keith wasn’t too far behind them. Madelyn just stared at him as he strolled up the sidewalk. It made him nervous. He waved awkwardly.

“I would have been on time,” he said, approaching the bench, “but I forgot to factor in the walk from the parking garage.”

Madelyn checked the time. The story checked out. “I’ll give it to you.”

“How are you?”

“I’ll tell you later.” She slipped her phone into her large messenger bag. At least, it looked large on her.

“Oh... are you sick?”

She shook her head, stood, and grabbed his hand. Keith was surprised but clearly delighted by her delicate touch. There was a line at the counter; that gave them time to scan the menu boards.

Keith pointed to a chalkboard on the counter. “The mushroom beef is on special. I think I’ll get that. What are you getting?”

“Lemon chicken.”

“Will you let me treat you?”

“Only if can you afford it.”

“I can afford it,” Keith said, offended but only because the objection hit too close to home.

The older couple was ordering ahead of them: gnocchi, coffee, mushroom beef, and lemonade. It came out to $35.34.

Keith asked about Madelyn’s new batch of students, but she didn’t answer. He stepped up to the register and started to order.

Madelyn cut in, speaking softly, “Ma’am, you charged that older gentleman the regular price for his mushroom beef. It’s on special.”

“Are you sure?” the employee replied.

“Yes. You need to give him a refund.”

“Um.” the employee was hesitant. She gestured to the line. “I will after I get these orders in.”

“What’s your name?”

She hesitated again. “Skyler.”

“I’ll have your lemon chicken and a water cup.”

Keith completed the transaction. As they found a table, he asked, “How did you know that she overcharged him?”

“It just sounded like a lot, so I added it in my head.” Madelyn then answered his previous question: “The new class is great. I had them sign the rings of an abacus. It connected them to the concept of numbers, but, more importantly, I don’t forget their names because they’re all right there on the abacus.”

“That’s really creative.”

“I’m going to start doing that for every class now; I have such a bad memory for names.”

“Do you feel safe there? At the school, I mean. I was just thinking about that school shooting last year. It was around here, wasn’t it?”

“That was at Lakeland Elementary. Close enough. All the teachers were talking about it.”

Keith’s gaze fell to the table. He grimaced. “Who would kill children? They haven’t done anything.”

“These killers think that taking innocent lives makes some sort of statement, and children are the most innocent.”

“You feel safe, though?”

Madelyn shrugged. “Safe as anywhere, I guess. It’s illegal, but I keep a gun at school.”

“What!” Keith was alarmed, but he lowered his voice. “Did you sneak it in or something? Do you even have a permit?”

“Yes, I have a permit.”

“What if they find out, and you lose your job?”

“That’s the risk I take to be able to protect my kids. You have to do what you believe is right, no matter what the law says: I believe teachers should be trained to take out killers.”

“That’s crazy. I mean, that’s a serious decision, but it sounds like you’ve thought a lot about this.” Keith didn’t know what to think, clearly grappling with the information. After a pause, he commented, “I didn’t know that you liked to consider such heavy topics.”

“I don’t, but you can’t properly live without thinking through that stuff.”

A server brought out their food, and they both said “Thanks” at the same time. Madelyn thought it was an adorable coincidence.

Keith dug in, but it didn’t seem like he even tasted it, preoccupied. “You would really kill someone?”

When Madelyn nodded casually, he pressed her, “What if he had a gun but hadn’t shot anyone yet?”

“If someone comes in my classroom with a gun drawn, I’d hope to shoot first.”

“You don’t think you would hesitate from shock or uncertainty?”

“Why hesitate? He’s threatening me and my kids.” Madelyn got up. “Hold that thought.”

She approached the counter. There was no one at the register and no one in line. Skyler walked out from the back. “Can I get you anything?”

“There’s no line. You can give that man his refund.”

“Right. I’ll do it now,” Skyler said, but Madelyn didn’t walk away. Eventually, the employee called over her manager to approve the refund. Only then did Madelyn refill her water cup and return the table.

“So, I guess, your fight-or-flight response is to fight,” Keith said.

“No, it’s to flee, but I have conditioned myself to take action instead.”

“How do you do that?”

“Practice. When you feel your nerves, you force yourself to go against it.”

“But how can you go against an involuntary response?”

“It’s just a powerful suggestion. The increased heart rate and stuff like that are involuntary, but your response is always voluntary at some level,” Madelyn explained gently.

Before she lost Keith to thought, she asked, “How’s your food?”

“Oh, it’s good, but you can’t go wrong with Italian, I think. Have you heard of that secret society, The Deep?”

Madelyn was too busy slurping up a long noodle to answer.

“Well, I think they have a space somewhere above the coffee shop. You know how there’s a sign with plaques for the different companies using the office space? One of the plaques has the symbol of The Deep and their core tenets on it.”

“How can it be a secret society if they literally say what they’re about on their sign?”

“You never meet one of them, like the Masons,” Keith said. “From what I’ve heard, some of them are hitmen and vigilantes. Apparently, some CEOs have members of The Deep as advisors. They’re supposed to be unfazed by anything.”

“Still doesn’t seem very secret; you seem to know a lot.”

Keith was slightly annoyed that Madelyn was so nonchalant about it. “Anyway, what you were saying reminded me of what the sign said.”

“What prompted you to research The Deep?”

“I was curious about the symbol. I’ll show you the sign when we walk around.”

“I really do appreciate how curious you are, even if I don’t understand it.” Madelyn encouraged him: “Don’t ever think that your crazy topics bother me. I’m a teacher; I love seeing people excited about learning.”

Keith smiled.

When they finished, Madelyn requested a large paper cup instead of a to-go box. She stuffed her food into the cup and capped it off. Her messenger bag had a cup holder that would keep it upright.

She got Keith talking about his struggles as a freelance graphic designer as they strolled, hand in hand again. The Italian restaurant wasn’t on the main street, so they cut through an alley between the theater and the deli. A beggar was badgering people at the outdoor tables. He turned to Keith and Madelyn.

“Can you spare a few dollars for a homeless man?”

Madelyn wouldn’t waste this opportunity either. “What’s wrong with you? Mental disorder? Physical disability?”

“No! Nothing like that.”

“Well, aren’t you lucky! Most of us have something. So, you’re just prideful.”

The man was taken aback. “I’m not prideful, miss. I’m homeless. What do I have to be prideful about?”

“Okay then. We’re going to walk around for about an hour. If you work hard, you can clean up all the litter from 2nd to 5th street in that time, and I’ll give you $40. That’s almost three times what I make an hour, and more than most of the people you’re begging from make.” Madelyn raised her voice so that people nearby, the people he would have begged from next, would know that he had been given a good offer.

When they were out of earshot of the beggar, Keith said, “$40 is a lot.”

Madelyn gestured back toward the homeless man. He had picked up a dirty napkin but now threw it back on the ground. As he stormed off, Madelyn muttered, “There’s nothing like pride to hold people down.”

“Oof. I hear that,” Keith said. “I’ve probably been too prideful about the jobs I accept.”

Madelyn tilted her head against his arm for a moment. “The fact that you instantly applied that to yourself says a lot about your character.”

Keith didn’t immediately respond. He was searching for words. “You said, ‘Most of us have something.’ Um…”

Madelyn knew what he was trying to ask. “I have lupus.”

“What does that entail?”

“It can have a lot of different symptoms. I experience joint pain, chest pain, headaches, and fatigue.”

“You’re in pain right now, aren’t you? That’s why you didn’t tell me how you were doing.”

Madelyn nodded. “It’s flaring up this week, so it hurts a lot.” She showed him her swollen elbows.

“I’m so sorry. Do you want to sit down?”

“No. I like walking with you.”

They did sit when they got to the fountain. The sun had set, but the town was still bustling. They chatted for a long while. Keith came from a broken home; he didn’t try to keep track of his step-parents and step-siblings. Madelyn was close to her family; she visited either her parents or sister on Sundays, but, for the rest of her weekends, she avoided any sight of humans.

She said, “I shouldn’t stay out too late. One more day of work.”

“I’ll walk you back to your car.”

Passing the coffee shop jogged Keith’s memory. “Oh, let me show you the sign I was telling you about.”

They turned alongside the shop, but Madelyn suddenly stopped. “Do you love me?”

Keith’s eyes widened. “Um…”

“You can say no.”

Keith squirmed. There were still people at the tables outside the coffee shop. He stepped close and whispered, “I mean, we’ve only been dating for a month.”

“You can say no,” Madelyn said again. She looked straight up to meet his gaze, but she didn’t match his hushed tone. “I love you, but the truth won’t hurt me.”

Keith tried to lead her a bit further, away from eavesdroppers. She didn’t budge, so he whispered, “I think you’re amazing. You’re so strong, even though you’re so fragile physically. You’re so quiet, yet you speak up whenever you think that you can make a difference. So I know you have some reason for asking this right now.”

Madelyn waited.

Keith sighed. “Yes. Okay?”

She blinked her tired eyes, waiting for him to say the words.

“I’m not like madly in love with you, but yeah,” Keith explained. “I… love you.”

Madelyn was about to resume walking, delighted, but decided that she should react to that, show her enthusiasm. She jumped for joy despite the pain and threw her arms around him.

Keith hugged her back, timidly and awkwardly. One of the eavesdroppers whistled at them, which made him turn beet red. Thankfully, they were walking again in a moment.

A glass door exposed a small foyer. Through it, they could see a staircase and an elevator that went up to the office spaces above the shops. There was a sign by the door with the name of the building. It had slots for ten plaques but only held seven.

Keith pointed to one marked with a simple but mysterious symbol. “Supposedly, the members are branded with that symbol, but there’s an impossible test to join.”

Engraved next to the symbol were four lines in the tiniest print. A person had to want to read it. Madelyn had to stand on tiptoes. “Those who are controlled by nothing but their principles: no fear, no force, no feeling, no falsehood. Those who take responsibility for everything under their influence: every thought, every word, every motion, every potential.”

“What you were saying reminded me of that,” Keith said.

“Office 205: that’s on the second floor. Let’s check it out!”

Madelyn walked into the foyer and called the elevator. Keith followed, but he was starting to regret showing her. He was curious but not that curious.

They had no trouble finding the office; the door was glass but blacked-out, and it was marked with the same symbol and words. It also listed hours of operation: Monday-Wednesday 7-7:30 pm, or whenever a key-carrying member is present.

Keith commented, “That’s a very brief window.”

Much to his chagrin, Madelyn tried the door. Locked. “I guess no one’s here.”

That was sweet relief to Keith’s ears. “Some of them are hitmen and vigilantes, remember? I can’t believe you would just go…”

His jaw went limp as keys jangled in Madelyn’s hand. She pushed open the door and flicked on the lights.

Keith stood stiff. “You’re a—”

“Don’t be scared.” Madelyn’s tone was suddenly cold and stern. Because of Keith’s profession of love, she thought that he should know what she was.

Keith entered slowly. A wood table occupied the center of the room. There were two mismatched but equally unimpressive desks in the front corners. Along the walls, there were a couple of bookshelves, a bulletin board, a sofa, and a refrigerator. Though well kept, all of the furniture looked older than the space, purchased used perhaps. The doors at the back led, most likely, to a bathroom and a small office.

Keith stroked his hand across the table. “Was I completely wrong about The Deep?”

“No. Your facts are accurate, but your understanding is off,” Madelyn said, scanning the bulletin board. “It’s not that we’re unfazed by stuff; it’s that we have enough self-control and enough guiding principles to do what we believe is right no matter what.”

She took out her phone and took note of something tacked to the board. Keith wondered what it was but kept his distance, as if seeing her for the first time. He couldn’t count on any law, any norm, anything to limit her, to restrain her.

“You passed the impossible test?”

“It’s only impossible if you’re don’t live fully by principles.” Madelyn approached him. “I really do need to head home.”

Keith resisted the urge to back away, walking with her. “What is it like? To live like that, I mean.”

“It is living. You only live so far as you control yourself according to your principles. If you’re controlled by your feelings—the hormones in your veins, dopamine blasting through your brain, nerves signaling fear or pain—then you’re an inflatable tube man—that’s the term we use—a lifeless façade thrown around by the random sensations of your body.”

Madelyn relocked the door behind them and added, “If you’re controlled by social pressures, cultural lies, personal vanity, and that sort of thing, then that is what influences the world through your body; that is what lives, not you.”

Keith felt like that sometimes. “Do you have a term for those people?”

“Bots. They just run whatever code they’re fed. Living people constantly revise their code, their principles.”

If she wasn’t limited by the typical pressures and concerns, then everything she did was a true expression of who she was. Nothing was a reaction to outside pressure or a façade prompted by fear. Keith calmed down. He knew her. He knew her principles.

“Do you think I could live like that?”

“If you really work at it for five years. That’s how long it took me to get my brand. I was an inflatable tube man; I don’t know if it’s easier or harder for bots.”

Madelyn had parked in a lot behind the steakhouse. When they got to her small hatchback, she reached up and placed a hand on Keith’s cheek. “Don’t be scared. I do love you.”

They bid their farewells. Keith promised to text her and waved as she drove off.

He started toward the parking garage but sat down on a bench on the way, reflecting. Everything he had seen her do and say fit together with remarkable consistency and purpose. He couldn’t predict what she would do next, but he knew what motive would be behind it. He felt like he knew her better than anyone else. He could predict what his other friends would do based on the situation, but there was no telling which of their actions actually represented their principles. He felt like he knew Madelyn better than he knew himself. What were his principles? The thought scared him.

Could he date a member of The Deep? That thought scared him even more. She loved him, which meant that she would see the best in him but also that she would push him to be his best. He didn’t want to be a bot, but he was afraid of the alternative. He didn’t want to be controlled, but he wanted to be a normal guy. Taking responsibility for every action and opportunity was a hard way to live, but it was living.

He repeated Madelyn’s words to himself: “Don’t be scared.”