The Interview
Shannon poured the hot water from the kettle over a hill of instant coffee in a thermos cup. The cup had a leaky plastic lid and didn’t serve its purpose of keeping hot drinks hot for long, but it being a birthday gift from Beth prevented it from being disassembled and thrown into recycling containers. Its millennial pink color and the cursive “I don’t mom until I coffee” was throwback-y and ironically cool now, according to Beth.
“I thought your shift didn’t start until noon” came the voice from the dining-slash-living-slash-Beth’s bedroom.
“I need to be in the Panorama center for an interview,” Shannon answered, sticking her head out of a doorless frame that connected the kitchenette to the main room. Her daughter sat on the edge of the spread-out couch, almost motionless except for the controller-clutching hands. The TV screen in front of her showed some kind of a staircase floating in space.
“What did you say?” Beth answered absent-mindedly.
“I said take off your pods when you’re talking!” Shannon felt the tingle of irritation.
“Ugh, about some kind of interview”, parried Beth, finally turning her face a few degrees towards her mother. “Are you leaving the Sunflower?”
“No, I wish. It’s more of a side hustle. Heard of Oneuros?”
“Yeah, their Dreamer network is, like, every second ad I see on Beta. Seems kind of MLM-y to me.” Beth turned around fully and stared at her. “Who, like, even does in-person interviews these days? Are they trying to brainwash you?”
“Well, one of our residents said that her niece back in Scotland is making some bank with them.”
“That’s your source? A granny with Alzheimer’s?”
“She only has arthritis. Besides, I won’t commit to anything yet, I just want to see what’s what. I barely have enough energy to clock even more hours.”
“I know, but you won’t need to once my Betaspace gets off. Oh, and Otaku published a story about Russian content farms stealing stuff from the small creators, maybe Beta finally bans these guys.”
“Sure. While you’re in the meat world, remember to tune in for the renter’s meeting.”
“Can’t you watch the playback later, I’ll be streaming?” Beth returned to her screen.
Shannon’s anger reached the boiling point, but she was short on time to let it spill. She knew that the long metro ride to the city center will give her enough opportunity to practice the upcoming argument. Beth likely will be working on her Betaspace or just scrolling the feed until late in the night. That would give Shannon a chance to restart the argument and unleash the fury. But not now.
“You know, whatever,” she sighed.
The morning rush was over, so the train offered plenty of empty seats. Shannon scanned the wagon and picked the one with the least amount of suspiciously looking stains. Better yet, it was a seat that didn’t have a neighbor, so she could face away from the other passengers and lean against the plexiglass separator. She didn’t take out her pods, nor the phone, and just stared blankly in front of her. The walk to the station calmed her down somewhat, so Shannon had to remind herself of the reasons to be mad at her daughter. First, she dropped out of architecture college. Second, she spent all her days in front of the screen talking to strangers on the internet. Third, she messed up her taxes on selling Beta stuff. And now she refuses to take an hour from her day to attend a potentially important meeting that has something to do with the renovation of their rent contract.
Shannon’s train of thought was finally interrupted by an inappropriately cheery voice announcing her station. Shannon rushed past the people standing on the escalator and paused in the vestibule. After more than two decades in the city, she still wasn’t quite sure what exit led where. Her stomach growled as the smell of cinnamon reached her from the baked goods stand. She took her thermos cup out and took a sip of the lukewarm liquid to resist the temptation of spending money on actual hot real coffee with a puff pastry. Finally deciding to take the exit nearest to her, hoping she’ll orient herself better on the surface, she walked up to another rusty escalator, feeling slightly ashamed for the brown poodles left by her leaky thermos cup below on the granite floor.
When she finally reached the outside, the crisp air and the uneven feel of the cobblestone under her feet lifted her spirits somewhat, and she already saw the mirrory façade carrying serif letters that read “Oneuros”. The building, squeezed between its 19th-century neighbors, was typical of its era of thirty years ago, put on conservation for its high running cost, but now leased by the start-up, who collected a lot of ire from architectural purists for ruining the original glass cube design by applying a hyper-reflective foil on the exterior and installing smart shades.
The revolving door swallowed her and spat her out in a pristine hall. The receptionist, a young good-looking woman with a sleek updo smiled at her from her desk.
“Hello, Mrs. Pospishil! I see that you’re half an hour early.”
Shannon was creeped out by the receptionist knowing her name and that she spoke in English right away. Her phone must’ve pinged her arrival, or they had a face rec system installed, either way, the common courtesy with her generation was not to show how much data you have on the person.
“Hello, yes, sorry about that.”
The receptionist breathed out a polite laugh. “No worries, just take the elevator to the second floor and follow the navigation that says “Newcomers” to the lounge. There are vending machines there if you want to have a coffee or a cold drink, all free of charge.
“Oh, wow, thank you”. The word “free” activated a pleasure center in Shannon’s brain.
“Just wait until someone calls you, please. It won’t be long”.
“Sure, thanks.” As Shannon turned to the elevator, her peripheral vision caught the receptionist’s smile dropping in a split second. “Must be a cushy job”, Shannon thought bitterly. Only headquarters of big companies splurged on pretty receptionists these days. The pay still must’ve been crap though, so Shannon wouldn’t be surprised if the desk girl was doing camming on the side to make ends meet.
Following the directions, Shannon got into a spacious, fashionably designed waiting room with cozy-looking sofas. The promised vending machine turned out to be a set of two brassy taps with a touchscreen above, embedded in a light wood panel, dazzling with the wide selection of drinks. Shannon settled for a sugar-free organic soda, but the machine did not oblige. “Great, I have to provide my own cup”. She pondered if she should down the content of her thermos cup since there was nowhere to pour it out. That would put her at risk of a bowel movement, so, distrusting public toilets, she stoically resolved to stay thirsty. With some time to kill, she turned to a large TV mounted high up on a wall. She recognized the blandly attractive man on the screen, Alex Whitman, the founder and CEO of Oneuros. He was presenting against a red and black background of a TED talk.
The volume was low, so she squinted at the subtitles below. “...and we’re using this Nobel prize-winning research to give billions of people not only a chance to improve their own lives but to be a part of something bigger. Pause. So, almost a decade ago, I was a first-year post-grad at MIT. Very stressed, desperately wishing for Earth to rotate slower so I had more hours in a day. Audience laughs. And one day I happen upon an article about maybe the most important scientific breakthrough of the 21st century. See, in the modern age, we, as humanity, managed to increase our life expectancy more than twofold. We got really good at diagnosing cancer at its early stages and treating it, preventing cardiac arrests. People started to live longer, but not necessarily better. A lot of those close to us were still taken away by neurodegenerative diseases. Illnesses of the brain. Like Alzheimer’s, which took away the lives of my grandparents. Even though we have a drug that destroys the prion that causes this awful disease, often the damage to the brain is irreversible. The same goes for the survivors of stroke. Until an amazing team of neurobiologists in Oxford found a way to repair the brain. I’m not going to bore you with the details here, but essentially, they discovered a way to influence the normally random firing of the neurons that occurs during the REM phase of sleep...”
“Mrs. Pospishil?” A female voice with a soft accent called. “Mrs. Pospishil?” The voice repeated with a stronger inflection.
“Oh, yes, sorry” Shannon hurried up from her seat. The woman noticed that she was watching the talk and seemed pleased. “Please follow me.” She led Shannon to one of the offices confined within glass walls. As she closed the door behind them, the transparent glass frosted up.
“Please have a seat. Would you like a glass of water?”
“That would be great, thank you”. The faux leather seat sunk under Shannon, forcing her to lean far on the back. She thought that pose would seem impolite and moved forward. “Here you go,” the woman said, as the glass of water clanked on the low coffee table on the right side of Shannon. “Oh, and please sit comfortably,” the woman said with a warm smile. She was middle-aged, fit, with short hair, and wore an expensive-looking suit of pastel yellow. “My name is Tereza, I’ll be your personal consultant. If you have any questions or any problems arise, just go directly to me.”
“So, Shannon, can I call you that?”
“Sure.”
“So, Shannon, tell me a little bit about yourself. You’re from the US originally, right? How long have you been living here?”
“Oh, more than twenty years now. Closer to thirty, when I think about it.”
The recruiter seemed impressed. “Wow, and what brought you here in the first place, if I might ask?”
“I was an au-pair for a while, then I met my husband.”
“How romantic! Are you still together?”
Shannon disliked the invasiveness of the question, but Tereza seemed genuinely interested in the answer, like someone getting to know their new friend.
“No, he died.”
“I’m so sorry.” Tereza’s forehead wrinkled and she leaned forward.
“It’s alright, it happened a long time ago.”
Tereza’s sorrowful grimace dissolved into a relieved smile. “So, how did you find out about Oneuros and our Dreamers program?”
“Well, I see your ads everywhere.”
“Makes sense,” the recruiter nodded, “as you must be exactly the kind of person we’re looking for.”
“Financially challenged?” Shannon spoke the first thing that came to her and immediately got embarrassed.
“Who isn’t these days,” Tereza sighed with a soured smile. “But you chose us, I think, because you’re someone who believes in science, and is not easily manipulated by all the misinformation on the internet. You aren’t afraid of trying new things and moving our society forward. And for that, you already have my respect.”
“I still have reservations though,” said Shannon, surprised at how weak she sounded.
“Of course. That’s why after our talk, you’ll meet our neurologist, one of the best in the country, and he’ll answer all of your medical questions way better than I can. I’m here to explain how the business side works, if you will.”
“Ok, shoot then”, Shannon faked a reassuring smile that showed that she wasn’t backing out.
“Alright,” the recruiter nodded with newfound energy and laid a small black box, not much larger than a phone, on the coffee table between them. “So this is where the magic happens. This box is basically a mini-computer that you connect to your home wi-fi with our Oneuros app.” She took out her phone for a demonstration. “Once you log in, you’ll find all the instructions here, it’s very easy to use. Have you ever had an EEG?”
“I don’t think so, but I know what you’re talking about”. Tereza took out a white cap. “This thing has electrodes on the inner side. The doctor will readjust them to fit you specifically. Also, it has a rechargeable receiver connecting it to the processing unit, so no dangling cables, very comfortable to sleep in.”
“And it zaps my brain when I sleep?”
“Well, technically yes, but the voltage is so low, you won’t feel anything. Again, the doctor will answer all of your medical questions.” Tereza added with a hint of impatience.
“So how exactly does this work? On the business side, of course”.
Tereza took a breath, that was her time to shine.
“Well, once you sign the contract and pay the deposit, you become a Dreamer. We send you the equipment and you can start earning money right away. It’s very flexible. You don’t have to only use it at night, pop it on anytime you feel like taking a nap. Due to higher demand and fewer Dreamers online, you will earn more per neurobyte during the daytime. What’s your day job?”
“I work as an assistant in an elderly home.”
“Oh, so maybe you could pick up night shifts there?”
“I think I’m getting too old for that.”
“Your choice, of course, just something to consider.”
“Yes,-” Shannon tried to regain the conversation, but the recruiter interrupted her with a reassuring tone. “In any case, you’ll be your own boss, and the extra income I’m sure is welcome. I’m a Dreamer myself.”
“You are?”
“Of course, my day job here pays rather well, but Dreaming is basically free money! Who would say no to that? Plus, it does wonders for my mental capabilities, my memory and focus have improved greatly since I started. They treat Alzheimer’s with this, you know.”
“The pay rate is floating, you mentioned?” Shannon was not going to leave anything concerning money unattended.
“Yes, it mainly depends on two factors. The current offer/demand and how much you can process per hour, which is very individual, but improves with time. You can see your balance in the app and how your rate was calculated for each session. We strive for transparency.”
“And how often can I withdraw the money? Also, what’s with the deposit?”
“Once per month. A small flat fee is charged for renting the processing unit. So the good news is that the fee is charged per box, and each box supports up to five simultaneous Dreamers. So I strongly recommend connecting all the people in your household. Some even use it together with the neighbors, we don’t have a problem with that!” Tereza laughed. “Every person can have their own account of course, or you could have just one for the whole family.”
“And the deposit?”
“I’m not going to sugarcoat it, it’s a substantial amount, but we’ll return it to you in six months. This is to protect our equipment. If we suspect tampering with our hardware on your side, we have a right to retain the deposit. So just don’t open the box and don’t worry about it too much,” Tereza softened when she noticed Shannon’s concerned expression.
“So, if you don’t have any more questions, this should be all for now, please read the contract carefully at your leisure. To see Dr. Schultz, just go back the way you came and take the elevator to the third floor.”
“Pan Pospishil?” an aged stocky man called, halfway out from an opened door. Shannon hesitated, not sure if that referred to her. “Mrs. Pospishil, you meant?“. The man looked at her. “Ah. Got your surname from the husband? Come in.” He growled in a thick accent.
Shannon at once knew exactly what kind of doctor he was, one of those condescending, bigoted creatures that she hoped were mostly retired or dead now. That Oneuros couldn’t find anyone else for this job made her start to regret the decision of coming. Nevertheless, she entered the doctor’s office and sat on a hard chair that was shoved in front of her.
“Shannon Pospishil, year of birth 1987...” he read from a screen on his desk. “Any history of neurodegenerative diseases, like Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, multiple sclerosis?”
“No.”
“Family?”
“I’m from a foster home, so I don’t know.”
“That’s not good. We might send you for a genetic test, we’ll see.” He typed away something.
“Okay... Have you lived in the UK or France between 1980 and 1996?”
“No. How’s that relevant?”
“Mad cow disease. Just had to make sure. Where are you from then, originally?”
“US.”
“Oh, I had an internship in Oregon.”
Shannon treated him with silence, not wanting to get personal.
“You’d probably do better for yourself if you returned. I have friends in Chicago and Boston earning triple my salary.”
“I’m perfectly fine here, thanks.” Shannon snapped. The doctor didn’t seem to be bothered and continued to read from the screen.
“Epilepsy? Brain tumors? Migraines?” Shannon shook her head at all of them.
“Have you ever been diagnosed with ADHD? Depression?”
“I had several depressive episodes, yes.”
“Have you been treated for that by a psychiatrist?”
“I have been prescribed antidepressants, so I guess that’s a yes.”
“Let me try to pull the records then.” He made a few clicks and shuffled forward, reading from the screen with his head tilted backward.
“So you were mostly prescribed fluoxetine and alprazolam? Were you treated for anxiety too?”
“Comes in a bundle, I guess.”
“Any sleep disorders, insomnia, narcolepsy? Recurring dreams?”
“No.”
“A lot of people have nightmares about exams in college.”
“Not me, never went,” Shannon added with a sour laugh. The doctor contemptuously raised his upper lip.
“I see.” He opened a drawer of his desk and took out a white cap, similar to the one in Tereza’s office.
“Now I have to fit this,” he said, dropping the cap on the desk. “I don’t see how though, with your hair being so curly,” he said, reaching for her head.
Shannon blocked his hand with a reflex worthy of a karate fighter. “Fine,” the doctor threw his hands in the air, feigning irritation by her sensitivity. “You will have to straighten or chop it off. I can give you a buzz cut right now, so you don’t have to come another day,” he added, pulling out clippers from the same drawer.
“No thank you,” Shannon said firmly. The whole idea of joining the Dreamers started seeming ridiculous to her now.
“As you want, but the extra fitting session will cost you,” he said, putting the cap and the clippers back in the drawer.
“Sure, whatever.” Shannon was sure she wouldn’t set her foot here again.
“That’s all for today then. You’ll get the request for the blood test and a prescription for rivastigmine and suvorexant in your email. You should start taking those as soon as you can, it helps a lot with productivity.”
“And is any of it covered by insurance?” Shannon asked, mostly out of curiosity, although she already could guess the answer.
“Of course not. Tell the next person to come in.”
It was past midnight when Shannon came home from her shift. Beth was still awake, in front of her screen on the couch. Shannon was past the point of sleepy tiredness and in a state when her body seemed to move on its own, with the brain barely registering each action as it happened. In the dimly lit kitchen, her hand found the almost empty can of decaf, while another hand flicked the switch of the tea kettle. She sat on a stool, her legs crossed, elbow piercing through the soft thigh under the heavy head. She listened to the gurgle of the boiling water, interrupted by her daughter’s nonsensical conversation with her invisible audience. “That’s all for today guys, you can visit my builds at FantasticForge15, and if you liked what you saw today, consider donating to my channel or buy items made by me in the Beta Store”.
“I can’t feel my butt.”
Shannon finally snapped out of her trance. “What?”
“All good today?” Beth asked, hugging Shannon from behind, and putting her head on Shannon’s shoulder. As Shannon was pouring her technically first coffee of the day, she remembered the stored seed of the argument. It dissolved quicker than instant coffee in boiling water.
“I’m just glad the day is over.”
“How was it at Oneuros?”
“You were right. Total scam. Did you attend the meeting?”
“Yes, actually! The stream was slow at first, so I managed to listen a little.”
“And?”
“We’re kinda fucked?”
“Are they raising rent for the next contract? It still can’t go above inflation in the worst case.”
“Worse. The rent contracts will not be renewed.”
Shannon gasped. “Are you kidding me right now?”
“The city is selling The Crab for redevelopment. Apparently, the tax for not meeting the energy standards is too high.”
“This doesn’t make any sense. The government can’t pay its own taxes?”
“I really don’t know.”
“They’re kicking us out then?”
“We get compensated if we terminate our current contract early. That’s something, right?”
“Do we get other social housing options?”
“They didn’t mention that.”
Shannon warmed her cheek on the cup. “Great, just fucking great.”
