Chapter 19 #2
He also looked adorable, sunny smile greeting Rowan, while he wore what was a truly ridiculous sweetheart-style apron in blue and white gingham with embroidered blueberries overlaying the fabric and on the pockets, like he was some 1950s housewife.
Rowan had bought the apron because he thought it was cute!
So sue him! He more so loved seeing Milo wearing it because he had chosen to.
“Before you say anything about your day, please taste this.” Milo filled a small spoonful of something from a simmering pot on the stovetop, waiting for Rowan to come to him, but holding one hand under the offered spoon in case anything dripped.
Rowan had so much to tell Milo, but if the bot was going to look that sweet and excited, he couldn’t exactly say no to him.
He approached, blew cool air on the gooey looking and heavenly smelling pie filling on the spoon, which didn’t look too steamy to taste, and opened his mouth for Milo to feed it to him.
Christmas. Thanksgiving. Fourth of July. It was a burst of every classic American holiday that called for pie like this and practically transported Rowan to his childhood.
Definitely better than the pretzels or French toast.
“This is amazing, Milo,” Rowan spoke after swallowing, careful to have savored that first taste.
Milo’s silver eyes flashed, gears spinning wildly in apparent excitement.
“I’m so glad! But I don’t only want amazing.
I want it to be perfect. The best you’ve ever had.
Your absolute favorite! Eventually. So…” Milo turned to scoop out another spoonful from the pot and held this one out to Rowan as well.
“Tell me what specifically you like or don’t like about it so I can continue to make it even better. ”
Rowan had to chuckle at Milo’s earnestness. He had never had anyone want so badly to do something nice for him. He blew again on this fresh bite, and when he took it into his mouth, he made greater note of the nuances of flavor.
He could admit, good as it was, especially after the day he’d had, it wasn’t perfect, at least not to his tastes.
“It is really good, Milo,” he prefaced. “Almost like a better McDonald’s apple pie.”
“Fast food?” Milo asked with a wrinkle of his nose.
“Nostalgic, like being a kid again. But also… maybe a little too sweet yet? A few bites are Heaven, but it would be too rich for me to finish a full piece of pie.” Rowan worried this might deflate Milo’s enthusiasm, but to the contrary, he lit back up again.
“That’s a good thing to note! I can work with reducing sweetness. What else?”
Rowan savored the lingering flavors in his mouth. “Hmm… it smells so much like cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves, but I want to taste all of those more, you know?”
“I do! I can fix that! Anything else?” On this next prompt, Milo gathered one more spoonful to feed to Rowan, and while it was sweet, even more noticeable on bite three, there was so much to love about it.
“Honestly, Milo, the consistency is perfect. It’s silky, not too overloaded with apples, and the apples themselves are the perfect softness. I wouldn’t change any of that. I don’t think I’d change anything else at all.”
“I’m so glad!” Milo said again. “I can work with all of that. What to keep, what to change. Ethel’s recipes were a very good starting point.
And, um… this is more for me than the recipe, but…
what does it make you feel when you taste it?
So I could perhaps imagine the taste based on what it conjures within you. ”
He wanted to learn. He wanted to experience everything he could—and everything he couldn’t.
It was like teaching someone who couldn’t see what colors looked like by explaining them in terms of feeling.
“Holidays,” Rowan said, since that’s what he had thought of first. “Coziness. Comfort. Home and family. Nice moments with family. The perfect apple pie, the perfect comfort foods, are always like that. They take you away and, for a moment, everything feels a little bit better.”
Being with Milo made Rowan feel that way too.
The bot was just so pure. So special.
“That does sound wonderful,” Milo said. “I’m glad I could do that for you, Rowan. But I am going to make this even better next time. You’ll see.” He turned back to the stovetop and turned it off, moving the filling to a dormant burner to cool.
“What about this batch?” Rowan asked. “I hate for all of that filling to go to waste.”
“It won’t. I have wonderful ideas for reusing it for your breakfast the next few days. How I prepare it will be sure to cut the sweetness, and add in some healthier aspects of course.”
“That sounds great, Milo. I trust you.”
Milo smiled even brighter at the compliment. “So, tell me then, how bad were things at work today? Were there repercussions for the director learning about me?”
Right. Rowan had nearly forgotten about what had plagued him literally the entire day. “Actually, this might turn out to be a good thing. I hope. Let’s sit down.”
They did, with Milo still in his apron, something Rowan had no intention of correcting until Milo wanted to remove it, and Rowan explained how his day had gone and how Andrew had reacted.
“So Raina also knows now and grilled me with about a million questions when I returned to my workstation, but no one else can find out. The director was very firm about that. He did seem honestly excited though.”
Milo looked shell-shocked, gaze distant with eye gears shifting as he processed all of the information.
When he was finished and met Rowan’s stare, he lit up like Christmas to match the smells in the kitchen.
“This is wonderful, Rowan! He’s not mad, he wants to meet me, he wants to recreate what happened.
It’s everything I was hoping for. I was so…
sad working on Anabelle because she wasn’t like me.
I couldn’t talk to her, not really, and it made me wish she could awaken like I did and experience all the wonderful things I have so far.
Plus, the rigidity of programming can be highly annoying. ”
Rowan laughed.
A few mild whirring noises alerted them to the entrance of Spot, who was likely full from vacuuming and mopping and would need to deposit her contents. Milo had set that up for the tiny bot in a hidden alcove beside the pantry, where Spot was clearly headed.
“I know not all bots are built enough like me for singularity, like Spot there, but for those who could…” The fluid in Milo’s eyes appeared to be increasing, but at least this time it wasn’t from sadness.
Happy tears were a thing too, so very human, and Milo was experiencing them.
“We would be a new species being born, yes?”
“Yes…” Rowan reached across the tabletop to take Milo’s hands.
“And if we get that far, there is going to be so much more to weather with this, Milo. It’s good, I hope, that we have Andrew on our side, but…
” He hated to ruin Milo’s excitement by being pessimistic.
Cautiously optimistic, he could do. “Let’s take this one day at a time, okay?
But I will be with you every step of the way. ”
Milo’s chest swelled, not with any intake of unnecessary breath but as if his non-existent heart had grown three sizes. “Thank you. And soon, I will learn to make you the perfect apple pie in gratitude!”
Rowan laughed again—and then noticed that the music he'd mostly forgotten was playing had made a jarring genre change. “Did that just switch from Aretha Franklin to Weird Al?”
“I am trying to be eclectic in learning my tastes!” Milo declared.
Rowan held back yet another laugh, but there was no denying what he already knew.
Milo was amazing.
Notes:
So, to be perfectly honest, I don’t like apple pie. I know, what kind of American am I? XD I prefer blueberry. So here is my recipe for the perfect blueberry pie:
CRUST
(you can use Pillsbury, no judgment, but if you have the time, homemade does amp it up)
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 Tbsp granulated sugar
1/2 tsp sea salt
1/2 lb COLD unsalted butter, (2 sticks) diced into 1/4″ pieces
7 Tbsp ice water, (7 to 8 Tbsp)
Place flour, sugar, and salt into food processor and pulse a few times to combine.
Add cold diced butter and pulse mixture until coarse crumbs form.
Add 7 Tbsp ice water and pulse until moist clumps or small balls form.
Knead dough just enough for it to hold together.
Divide dough in half and flatten to form 2 disks.
Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate 1 hour before using.
FILLING:
2 cups fresh blueberries, rinsed and well drained, (16 oz)
1 21 oz can blueberry pie filling (combining fresh and canned makes for best taste and consistency)
1 tsp lemon zest
2 Tbsp lemon juice
4 1/2 Tbsp all-purpose flour
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 egg , + 1 Tbsp water, for egg wash
Transfer 1st pie crust to 9" wide, deep pie pan.
Cut 2nd into strips for lattice top OR leave as-is for venting later.
Then, in large mixing bowl, combine blueberries and blueberry pie filling, 1 tsp lemon zest, 2 Tbsp lemon juice, 1/2 cup granulated sugar, 4 1/2 Tbsp flour, 1 tsp cinnamon and toss to combine.
Transfer blueberries into dough-lined pie pan.
Cover with second pie crust as desired. If doing full coverage, be sure to vent with knife cuts, preferably shaped into something fun - like a heart (or dick—come on, we've all done it!).
Pinch edges to seal, then crimp for fluted pattern.
Beat together 1 egg and 1 Tbsp water and brush egg wash over crust and edges.
Bake in center of oven at 375?F for 50-60 minutes, or until crust is golden and blueberry juice is bubbling at the edges.
Personally, I eat this COLD the next day with vanilla (or even better, lemon or cinnamon) ice cream.
Yes, COLD, with something else cold. I'm weird. Enjoy! <3