Total pages in book: 142
Estimated words: 134725 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 674(@200wpm)___ 539(@250wpm)___ 449(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 134725 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 674(@200wpm)___ 539(@250wpm)___ 449(@300wpm)
My bladder reminded me I really needed to go, so I carefully put it back as it was and stepped back inside. A large, waist-height blue cylinder was barreling toward me. I sidestepped and it kept going. What on Earth was that? No, not on Earth. What on Phallyx was that? A robot? Right, a robot. They talked about home automation in our orientations. It turned a corner. I kept walking. The next door was open an inch or so, so I stepped in. Ah. Bingo.
The bathroom was large and entirely tiled with golden shiny hexagon tiles separated with gold flecked black grout. The shiny black toilet was low but large and tilted backwards just slightly, like a recliner. The space was vast yet contained only the toilet and a fountain-like sink. I shut the door and twisted a lock, relieved that so far, most things seemed similar enough between our planets that I could get by alone.
After using the toilet in a somewhat odd almost reclined position and then getting cleaned and blow-dried by that toilet, I used the hands-free sink, which also blow-dried my hands after washing them.
A screen sat on the bathroom wall that looked like the one he’d used to order food beside the bed. It flashed with a red icon and a string of symbols scrolled across the bottom. As I had no idea what they said, I backed up and accidentally touched wall. I heard an R2D2-like sound and spun around, finding another screen with all sorts of icons. One was of painted fingernails. An icon of a jar. There was another of a glowing head and another with some hands. I was curious so I touched the hands one and there was a click in the wall and robot arms came out from two different tiles quickly and landed on my shoulders. I startled. The hands, which looked far too much like human hands to not be creepy, manipulated me so I turned around and began lightly squeezing my shoulders. My eyes went wide as it squeezed my shoulders gently. I felt a little panicky, so I grabbed the wrist area of the hands and that made them lift off me. I turned, backed away, then skedaddled, bumping into the opposite wall and heard another loud noise. I’d evidently touched that other screen by accident with my butt, and glass was protruding from the walls, framing in an area. A tile slid sideways on the floor and revealed what looked like a drain. A vast silver umbrella frame came down from the ceiling and went wide. Oh. A shower. No water turned on so at least I didn’t flood Zane’s bathroom.
I got out of there before I could muck up anything else.
I moved back toward the room I’d been in, not wanting to do any snooping. Well, I guess I’d snooped the playhouse, but that was in an effort to find the bathroom and it bought me a wave of guilt and sorrow. After getting free of the massaging hands, I wasn’t about to do any more wandering.
I finished the rest of the glass of deep purple throat-warming juice and then looked into the bed cubby at the plant Ollie had left for me.
I stepped in and touched one of the closed-tight blooms with my index finger. It straightened, taller, and then the blooms stretched wide open, revealing orange inner petals and a glimmer of light for just one instant before an ice-cube sized black square slid out. I caught it with a gasp.
Another bloom immediately unfurled and did the exact same thing. This square one was emerald green and oblong. I was fairly sure it was an actual emerald. I was in awe. Was this a real plant or a fun electronic toy?
After I touched a third, a teardrop-shaped red stone landed on the floor. I bent to pick it up and looked up again to see several more blooms opening slowly in varied colors, orange, yellow, blue. Stones of various sizes, some as small as pennies, others three inches or so in diameter, fell out of them as they bloomed. My hands were filled with what looked like precious gems. Another one fell to the floor. A larger black stone, the size and shape of a peach pit.
My mind strayed to the outdoors and all the flowerbeds lined with colorful rocks. Did these come from the flowers when they bloomed?
How wonderful!
Bells sounded. It sounded a lot like a doorbell, only instead of a high and then low tone such as a ‘ding-dong’, it was a triple tone of ‘ding-dong-ding’. I didn’t quite know what to do. It sounded again. I looked out the window, but I was facing the back yard. I didn’t know where the front entrance to the house was since I’d come in via the roof. I didn’t know if there even was another entrance but decided there must be as little Ollie and older Ollie had gone down a level on their way to the house next door.