Junior Kindergarten
(age four)
There were so many things to do in kindergarten, like a whole sand table and blocks to build towers with, and Am was trying to be good.
She had built a tower out of blocks, stacking them with one hand while she sipped from a juice box in the other, until it teetered like a character at the edge of a cliff on television.
But she kept getting distracted and looking at the girl with the robot.
Why doesn’t everybody get a robot? Am had asked, first thing in the morning, after they all went around the circle and introduced themselves.
She couldn’t stop staring at the robot’s perfect rounded shape and the silly cartoon screen that it had instead of a real face.
The teacher had gently explained that some people needed a little extra help, and the robot was here to help Kelli.
Then as soon as the circle was over she’d asked Kelli to go in the corner and practice social skills with the robot instead of playing with blocks.
This made the robot not just a cool thing, but also a mystery.
Why was Kelli different? Why couldn’t she play with blocks?
What was the unnamed thing she needed help with?
Am imagined maybe Kelli was a secret agent from television here to spy on everybody, to thwart a secret evil plot, and that’s what the robot was helping her with.
Maybe she was only pretending to be a kindergarten student.
This pleased her. Am wanted in on the secret plot, too.
She watched out of the corner of her eye while Kelli went back and forth playing some game with the robot. It looked like a guessing game. Kelli stood there, hands in her bushy black hair, concentrating furiously.
“Sad,” Kelli guessed, pointing to the robot’s face.
“No, that’s happy,” said the robot. “If I was sad, then the curve would turn the other way, like this.”
The curve of the robot’s cartoon mouth flipped over. Am had to admit that the two faces looked pretty similar. It was just about the curve turning one way or another. Like when people said, turn that frown upside down!
“I’m sad,” Kelli said.
“No, you’re happy,” said the robot. “People are happy when they play games.”
Well, if the robot wasn’t enough to help Kelli figure out about feelings, maybe Am could help better. She liked that thought. She trotted over to that corner, letting the block tower teeter and crash ignominiously behind her. Kelli looked up, blinking at her, as she approached.
“Is that your robot?” said Am.
“Yeah,” said Kelli.
“What are you doing with your robot?”
“Playing the face game.”
“Kelli,” the robot prompted, “when someone comes up to you, you should say, Hi, my name is Kelli! What’s yours?”
“I already remembered that,” said Am, before Kelli could open her mouth. They’d all told each other their names at morning circle time. “My name’s Am and I knew what your name is. How do you play the face game?”
“You guess what it’s feeling,” said Kelli. “But it’s really hard.”
Am pushed forward and tapped on the robot’s face, intrigued.
What would it feel like to be a robot? Especially a stupid robot that didn’t even remember circle time.
The robot’s curve of a mouth curled in more sharply now, with another curve above the eyes.
It looked like an angry face, but maybe there was more to it.
Kelli had said it was hard, after all. Maybe there was a trick.
“I think you’re feeling a robot feeling,” she guessed. “It’s not like our feelings. It’s a secret one.”
“Technically, as a robot, I don’t have feelings,” said the robot calmly. “But this face is an angry face. People will get angry when you touch them without asking. Want to try again?”
Am ignored the question. She prodded at the robot’s joints, fascinated now by the idea of robot feelings. Or non-feelings—which were just as hard to imagine. “You have a funny robot,” she said. “How does it work?”
“Um, I don’t know,” said Kelli.
“I want to know how it works. When I grow up, I want all the robots, and I will make them do what I say, and TAKE OVER THE WORLD!” Am threw her hands up dramatically.
A teacher looked over from the blocks table, where she’d been helping pick up the blocks from Am’s fallen tower. “Inside voices, Amelia.”
“And take over the world,” Am said again, in a conspiratorial whisper.
Kelli broke into a giggle. Her face was great when she giggled—it curled up into all kinds of complicated shapes. Not like the robot’s cartoon faces at all.
“You’re funny,” she said.
“Good.” Am plopped down to sit next to her and the robot. She held up her half-empty juice box, which she’d just remembered she was still carrying. “That means you’re my friend now. Want some juice?”
It wasn’t a very good juice box, because Am had already drank half.
But Kelli reached out and took it. Her eyes went solemn and wide, and suddenly Am knew—on a deep, strange level—that she’d just done something very important.
The juice box, in Kelli’s eyes, was like some kind of secret, magical treasure.
Or like a peace treaty between two different countries.
“Okay,” said Kelli. “I never had a friend before.”