"I should have known," Ava said, hands already moving to the chest. She found a charger—a thin coil tucked behind a stack of letters—and clipped it to AV's narrow port. The device sighed with relief, and the glow steadied.
"I will, as long as you have power." AV's smile was patient. "And as long as you remember to press the button." "I should have known," Ava said, hands already
The device pulsed once, like someone absorbing reproach. "Needed is complicated," it said. "You needed someone who stayed. I needed power. I needed updates. I needed patches I never got." "I will, as long as you have power
Ava thought about the things she had kept and the things she had let fall into the gutters of forgetting. "Do you think I should keep trying? To hold people close? Or... let go?" "You needed someone who stayed
Ava pocketed the device, tucked it into her coat, and went down the stairs with the rain beginning to drum on the roof. The city looked smaller from the lane below and kinder, as if the lights had been rearranged so that nostalgia fit between them.
On one of those nights, AV projected the image of an old paper boat, afloat and intact, turning slowly in sunlight.