Momo’s Kite
Momo ran her fingertips over the bag of marbles for sale in one of the retail display bins at Fran’s Kites and Gifts. The door was wide open to entice those early summer tourists who came to the Oregon Coast for its public beaches and small-town charm. Wind ruffled the kite tails in the shop window, catching a child’s attention. But the adult accompanying him patted his back, moving him along.
Even after five years of living and working with Fran, Momo still wondered about passersby’s motives sometimes. Did the woman hurry the child past the shop because he already had a kite? Did they have somewhere else they needed to be? Or did the woman know that Momo used to be confined to a robot brothel before such venues were outlawed?
Then, there were people who visited Fran’s Kites and Gifts because Momo used to be a brothel bot. Momo wasn’t sure how she felt about that. On the one hand, polite curiosity sometimes led to sales. On the other hand, some tourists wanted to take pictures with Momo as a bucket list item or asked invasive questions about her past. Until last year, a number of travel guidebooks said something along the lines of, “Be sure to visit Fran’s Kites and Gifts to see Momo, the trans former sex robot. She’s an absolute doll! Forgive the pun.” Guidebooks that promised “naughty travel experiences” went further, making lewd comments about how even the straightest men would go wild for Momo, as long as they focused on the top half of her body.
Fran became, to borrow a literary phrase, apoplectic at the descriptions. She called every offending travel guidebook publisher—sometimes during business hours—to demand that they remove all references to Momo, her anatomy, and her former life as a brothel bot. “How would you like it if I wrote a travel guidebook talking smack about your daughter for advertising?” Fran said to nearly everyone she called. “Would you be happy if I wrote, ‘Be sure to visit the gift shop to meet Emma, who used to do crack and lost her virginity at nineteen to a motorcycle gangster?’ How does that sound?”
Fran came downstairs, interrupting her memories. She carried a large picnic basket and had a beach blanket slung over her shoulder.
“Close up shop for lunch, Momo,” Fran said, beaming. “We’re going to celebrate your birthday on the beach.”
“But I thought you wanted to have a bonfire tonight to roast weenies and marshmallows.” When speaking to Fran, Momo didn’t modulate her voice. Whoever designed her for service at Robots Unzipped programmed her to sound like someone who transitioned in adulthood. This feature was intended for clients who wanted a certain kind of trans woman fantasy. With effort, she could alter her vocal range to sound more distinctly female. But with Fran, she could be herself.
“We’re going to do that too. But I figured you can’t fly your kite after dark, so why not go to the beach twice? After all, it is your birthday.”
Two trips to the beach? Momo didn’t argue with that. Since her flesh consisted of durable silicone compounds rather than TPE, she required no preparation for interacting with sand, sea air, and salt water beyond routine maintenance. So, she flipped the shop sign to “closed” and retrieved her yellow kite. Unlike most of the kites for sale at Fran’s Kites and Gifts, hers wasn’t fancy. It had no designs or patterns and was shaped like a traditional kite as defined by Euclid. The bright yellow tail matched the kite’s plain body, looking both simple and cheerful.
As Momo and Fran walked through town to the nearest beach access, a few locals waved or said, “hello.” One benefit of small-town life was how neighbors had to be somewhat polite since there was only one grocery store where they would encounter each other sooner or later. When it became clear that Momo was here to stay, any residents who had qualms about her presence simply needed to get over it. Although it definitely helped that Fran always introduced Momo as her daughter, leaving little room for insults.
“This looks like a nice spot, don’t you think?” Fran said, laying out the beach blanket. The faded fabric said “Cafézinho Brazil” in dark green letters and had an illustration of a woman with her hair tied up in a wrap, colored to match the text. Fran won the blanket along with the picnic basket full of Cafézinho Brazil brand coffee in a radio sweepstakes years before she met Momo, even though she didn’t drink coffee.
Momo helped Fran unload the basket, which was filled with homemade ham sandwiches and pasta salad. There were also two vanilla cupcakes. Even though Momo couldn’t eat, Fran laid out a plate for her anyway. As Fran said several times today, it was Momo’s birthday. If someone came along, they could give away the extra food. Otherwise, Fran would take it home for tomorrow.
While Fran ate, Momo stood barefoot beside the blanket and flew her kite, loving how it danced on the wind. The overcast weather made the kite look particularly sunny and bold. When the gusts of wind became especially strong, the kite looked like it was at war with the sky, whipping its tail in defiance of the force knocking it around. Momo’s white sundress with yellow roses—the same shade of yellow as her kite—fluttered against her knees. Fran snapped a picture with her phone.
“You’ve been immortalized,” Fran shouted over the wind. Her fine, gray hair lashed her face as she zipped up her windbreaker and pulled her hood over her head. “I’m going to paint a picture of that incredible moment I just captured.”
“What incredible moment?” Momo said, giving the kite some slack. Now it swayed from side to side, like it had conquered the wind rather than being subjected to it.
“The moment that you, the wind, and the kite united.” She held up her phone to show off the photo. “Your whole body says, ‘Nothing else in the world exists. Just me, the wind, and the kite.’”
Curious, Momo inspected the photograph, surprised to see her wide eyes and slightly parted lips conveying innocent wonder while her grip on the kite string and grounded stance on the sand suggested determination. It would make a nice painting.
Fran pocketed her phone and removed a bag of stale bread from the picnic basket. Momo tied her kite string to the handle, freeing her hands to feed seagulls. It was against the rules to feed birds on the beach, but Momo and Fran often did it anyway when no one was watching. Between the high wind and low sunshine, few people walked today, greatly reducing the odds of a reprimand. Momo smiled as she tossed torn crusts to the gathering flock. Her kite continued to fly on its own, anchored by the picnic basket.
“Don’t give any bread to the mean ones,” Fran said in between bites of her ham sandwich. “The bullies get enough to eat.”
Momo grinned in reply. She remembered how Fran stood beside her five years ago, showing her how to throw bits of bread to the gulls, making sure the shy birds got their fill. It was Momo’s first real outing, and she shielded her face when a seagull flapped nearby. Fran shooed it away. “No bread for you,” she said, clutching her bag to her chest. “Only nice birds who don’t scare my daughter get treats today. There, Momo. That bird hanging out near the back is waiting patiently. Let’s toss him some bread.”
Back in the present, Momo finished feeding the seagulls. They didn’t frighten her anymore, not even when they jumped and squawked. Once the bread was gone, they stared at Fran, waiting for her to part with some of her pasta salad.
“Fat chance,” Fran said to the gulls. She patted the spot beside her. “Have a seat, Momo. And don’t stare at the birds or they’ll think you’ll give ‘em extra.”
Momo sat and watched her kite for a while. It was a present from Fran on the day she brought her home. When robot brothels were declared illegal, Momo and the other bots from Robots Unzipped were shoved onto buses like criminals. Then, they were packed into the county courthouse to place them in “respectable homes,” as though they were wayward children rather than adult-bodied androids and gynoids. According to the new law, “respectable homes” meant those inhabited by people who would treat the former brothel bots as family members rather than commodities. Since Momo was created as a “fetish bot,” nobody eligible wanted to adopt her. After a month, unadopted brothel bots were scheduled to be scrapped because, the thinking went, what else could be done with unskilled sex machines?
“Mom?” Momo said, her eyes still fixed on her kite.
“Yeah, honey?”
“Did you adopt me because you felt sorry for me?”
Fran sighed. “I’m not going to lie to you, Momo. I did feel sorry for you at first.” She ran her fingers through Momo’s windswept hair, working out the tangles. “But I also wanted a family since I didn’t have one anymore, someone to love. Was that wrong of me?”
Momo locked her eyes onto Fran’s. “No, I’m very happy here with you, and that you’re my mom.” With a sad smile, she added, “And I’m happy that I’m not a pile of scrap metal at a robot recycling center.”
Fran nodded, seemingly lost in thought. She looked up at the kite for a moment, then cleared her throat and said, “Well, this is a morbid conversation on your birthday.” She stuck a blue and white striped candle into one of the vanilla cupcakes and lit it with a pink cigarette lighter. “Make a wish, Momo. And blow out the candle quickly before the wind does.”
Momo blew out the candle, even though her wish already came true—five years ago today.
E.J. LeRoy is a Pushcart Prize nominated writer with credits in several publications including “The Lorelei Signal,” “Neon & Smoke,” and “Tales from the Crosstimbers.” LeRoy also has a science fiction mpreg novella published by The Whumpy Printing Press. Visit the author’s website at http://ejleroy.weebly.com.
