He'll Clean Up Nicely, I'm Sure

20250921

Prompt from DailyPrompt.com

When Lucy declared she was giving up on dating, her friends were entirely sympathetic. They all understood where she was coming from; it often felt pointless, hopeless even, especially online dating. Many of them had made similar declarations in the past, and some still held to it.
Lucy’s renewed interest in robotics didn’t strike them as odd either… at first.
But when her increasingly low contact turned into a fortnight of social isolation the group chat decided to coax Lucy out. So Gus, ever the organiser, arranged a get-together at his place to play Ultimate Pub Quiz 2010 and even promised to bake brownies (Lucy having once declared that his gooey chocolate walnutty treats could rouse her from her deathbed).
Having Lucy turn down her favourite party game and dessert was what set alarms off. Especially her excuse: “im teaching bob laundry.”
Had she truly rebounded so quickly? Without even mentioning her new guy to her friends?
Tactful questions about “Bob” (carefully not making any digs about how quickly she’d dropped her resolution) were met with Lucy enthusiastically talking about… some project? And sharing photos of what looked like her rewiring her apartment? It took much group puzzling to even figure out that the documents she’d shared were data logs, and nobody had any idea what the data was from (or meant).
Jane and Kelsey were sent on a scouting mission. Under the pretext of delivering left over brownies from the game night.
Wow. This place was a mess. Countless wires duct-taped to the walls and ceiling, stinky mound of takeaway packaging (presumably somewhere under there was the bin), air fresheners stuck haphazardly to random surfaces like warding charms against miasma.
While Lucy had never been super tidy, and they’d braced for things having slipped (and were ready to offer help cleaning), this was a whole other level of high-tech squalor.
“What happened here??” Kelsey blurted, covering her nose with a sleeve. “Is this that Bob guy’s doing?”
“Bob guy?” Lucy repeated blankly.
Her friends stared at her, then each other.
Jane ventured “Um, is Bob a girl?”
“No?” Lucy waved to one of the heaps of electronics. “He’s my robot.”
“Ro…?”
On inspection the pile had limbs and a… well, it’d be a face if there was skin on it. Lifeless eyes stared back at them.
“Say hello, Bob!” Lucy prompted. As if nothing was odd here.
The metal jaws flapped open. Panels around them shifted, trying to shape absent synthetic flesh into a smile. A voice like the distillation of an old radio announcer intoned “Hello, Bob!”
Lucy laughed. A light tinkling display of approval and pride. “Isn’t he great?”
“Uhh…” Jane scrabbled for words and managed “So this is what you’ve been doing?”
“Yeah! I realised why try and find the perfect guy when I’ve got a degree I can put to good use.”
“You’re building a boyfriend?” Kelsey said weakly. One arm still pressed over her nose, the other clutching the box of brownies to her chest. A reminder of the perfectly normal reason for their visit.
“I know, I can’t believe I didn’t think of it sooner! It’s going so much better than my previous relationships.”
“Is… that so?” Jane exchanged another helpless glance with Kelsey.
The pair had been chosen because (in addition to both knowing Lucy for years) Kelsey was happily in a relationship while Jane was happily single. So the group had figured that, whatever Lucy was going through, one of them would be able to offer comfort and advice.
Neither of them knew whether… this… would be categorised as a ‘relationship’ issue or a ‘singles’ issue. Even if that was resolved… where did you start??
Jane decided to try the spiel she’d prepared. “Um. Lucy, I know you’ve had a lot of disappointing relationships, and there’s nothing wrong with wanting time on your own-”
“But I’m not alone!” Lucy waved at the silently watching robot. “I’ve got Bob! And it’s great.”
“Er, Luce…” Kelsey would’ve taken a bracing deep breath, but frankly she was already feeling faint. “You… Something needs to be able to, to think to be a… partner.”
“Oh, what’s thinking, anyway?” Lucy scoffed, brushing this off. “He always has time for me, he’s super supportive, and I’m sure I can figure out how to get him to do housework. We’ve made lots of progress already.”
That did sound disturbingly similar to how she’d described several boyfriends.
“L-let’s eat brownies!” Jane suggested, plastering a smile on. “Here, um, would you like me to bag up this trash for you?”
“Oh, no! I’m figuring out how to get Bob to do that.”
“Uh, ok, but we’re here and it’s kinda blocking that end of the table and there’ll always be more trash for him to practice with, so…”
“No, no, I’m sure he’s almost ready.” Lucy turned to the robot. “Bob, honey, could you take out the trash?”
“Of course, my sweet!” Loud whirring erupted from every joint as Bob slowly rose from its seat and advanced.
Jane and Kelsey backed away as Bob lumbered into the kitchen… well, almost; an arm clipped the doorframe and the robot spun around, walking into the opposite wall.
Lucy heaved a rueful sigh. And brightly assured her friends “He’s getting there!”
“…Sure.”
Kelsey set the box of brownies down, but didn’t move to take a seat. “Have you, um, asked around for advice on your… project?”
“No, I’ve been talking things through with Bob.”
“You have, huh?” Kelsey shot the robot a sideways glance. “What does he say?”
Lucy prompted “So, Bob, what do you think went wrong there?”
“I’m sure it was just a minor miscalculation.” The hollow peppy voice proclaimed. “Let’s try again!”
“See? He’s so encouraging! And has such a can-do attitude. I love it.”
“Mm-hm.” Kelsey tugged on Jane’s elbow. “Well, we’ll let you get on with it. Good luck.”
“Thanks!” Lucy waved and turned back to Bob, her friends immediately forgotten.
This… called for a full intervention. Stat.

Prompt was “Despite their friends’ advice, a character vehemently believes they can ‘fix’ their love interest…”