Consistently adhering to the most sought after design choice, rectangular appendages protruded from the main sides of the towers, simple balconies for the inhabitants who resided behind the thick anti-UV glasses. The dark grey colour gave off a professional and stylish ambience, particularly attracting potential buyers or renters from the affluent middle class.
Those people with new money found pressure from their peers to live in a matching environment. Jakarta as a megapolitan had its fair share of slum areas where houses generally joined at the hip with each other, one major factor of fire hazard in densely populated urban districts.
Stephanie sent a final glance at her screen before stepping to the other side of an auto glassdoor. No receptionists or security guards in the lobby. No more nonessential people since the Immune had been focused and reallocated to work somewhere else that still required human hands and minds. Probably the Immune people from these front office jobs were now working at the logistics points like the two workers or care of the elderly.
Air conditioning did not work on the ground floor. Again, nonessential items. Who found time to fix them? Maybe the technician had been one of the innumerable names on the online registry of the dead when the public cemetery could not handle them anymore, a fact that always struck Stephanie however many she tried to forgive on Memorial Days she attended; this society was built on optimism and upwards forecasting. Nature showed its ruthless hand and the maths toppled in the blink of an eye.
Stephanie pressed the Up button on the elevator, waited for a few minutes, and then boarded the carriage that would carry her to the eleventh floor.
Only the subtle whirring hum of elevator belts was heard during her ride up. The cross symbols made of a pair of black tape stripes were still glued to the elevator floor, marking the standing position each of the passengers had to stand on due to the physical distancing. Oh, how it felt like aeons ago. She was the only one, almost felt like the last survivor of this planet, despite the truth ultimately disagreeing with that.
It dinged when the digital light showed 11 and she got off. The first sight assaulting her eyes was the open doors of the vacant units. Daylight didn't find its strength to bathe the nooks and crannies of the abandoned space, the owners might have been listed on the internet some time ago. Too hard for the next of kin to follow up on petty matters like who continued the upkeep of a property when their wellbeing themselves were also at stake.
And at the corners that love of a family could not dust anymore, darkness crept in. It felt like staring down the depth of a dry well that used to overflow with freshwater, now its jagged inner wall parched with the memory of the spring.
Stephanie could imagine the delicious smell of baked goods wafting in the air, could hear the cheerful laughter of toddlers and parents, or the sweet snores when the calm nights descended upon them despite Jakarta continuing to buzz from one dawn to the next. But now, even the sunlight dragged its feet to shine its melancholy. The dust bunnies under the beds or sofas must feel content just with the company of balls of paper and kisses from the wind.
Stephanie knocked on the door, its teak wood could use some polish.
"Good afternoon, I'm Stephanie Marsayudi from Prattle. I have an appointment with Ms Lila Wardani," she mentioned her client's full name as recorded in the app for the Companions to view.
It didn't escape Stephanie that the eyes that stared at her had a moment of wariness before softening. Quite common in people with social anxiety, like a person's first contact with new foods. Cautionary first, surprise later. She got quite fluent in detecting microexpressions.
The tensed shoulders of her client fled swiftly, replaced by a soft voice that matched the now surprised gaze, "You came. You really came."
Both ladies walked inside the unit, the wall painted in ochre. Few minimalist paintings in pastel colours hung on the wall. A typical wedding photo, of the groom and bride wearing their happy smiles, centred on Stephanie's gaze. Her eyes furtively glanced at the interior, finding no sight of preteen or younger person's articles. So, no children, perhaps. Probably sensitive to the topic as well, she mentally noted to avoid the triggers when spending time for their first session.
The golden blackout curtain danced to the rhythm of the wind, like a faraway girl humming a sombre tune.
Stephanie met some clients of a similar socioeconomic background as Lila's, and many of them could be grouped into one user persona—a common profile.
If Lila's family was lacking one of the family members, then Stephanie would take great care to avoid sorrowful topics from the conversation. That could wait until the second or third session.
A Companion did not differ greatly from a dating partner. The initial awkwardness, the start of emotional opening, the common ground, the comfort zone, and finally the intimacy.
She beamed when Lila came back carrying a tray, two teacups perched on top of it. The ceramics clunk when the lady of the house set them on the table. She winced.
Stephanie hid her frown by lowering her gaze. Why would Lila wince when the cups made noise? The quiet aura made more sense now. Living alone for most of her two years, supposing her husband or child was no longer, a person could develop sensitivity towards auditory stimuli.
The guest and the hostess both settled now. Stephanie became the one who initiated the welcoming aura, but no words came out of Lila's mouth. Nor a smile on her face.
Silence filled in the space. The client darted her eyes everywhere but the Companion's face. Stephanie kept her gaze soft and welcoming. Not directly at the client's eyes, to not signal hostility, she recalled her own manual. She waited, as timed silence was the best tool to open the locked space for someone else to become comfortable. No interruption, no pushy attitude.
Lila opened her mouth slowly and Stephanie waited for the voice to catch up. No eager gesture, she reminded herself, otherwise, Lila would clam up again.
"How do—," Lila timidly said, rubbing her palms against each other, "—we speak? What should I say?"
Typical first-timer.
"It's okay, take it easy, really. You can talk about anything, Lila."
"But I don't have any issues," she jolted. Her eyes focused on Stephanie's, her brows furrowed. A standard response when hiding something, but Stephanie played calmly. A safe space, she repeated her mantra.
"Well, this is not an investigative opportunity. As a speaking Companion, a comfortable talking session is what I'm here for. You can talk about your daily life while I'm listening attentively. You can do a lot of things while I'm sitting here, or you can ask me to do some activities. Heck, you can even ask me to help you in the kitchen. I helped some elderly clients this way, and that's totally appropriate."
Lila hesitated, "But here in your details you say the examples are playing board games, making tea, or watching series together. I'm not interested in any of those."
The Companion chuckled and waved her hand. "It's just a rough guide to indicate the decorum. In actuality, I can do a lot of things my clients ask me to within the corridor of propriety, obviously. You'll be surprised by how relieving it is to just have a human's presence around. Given the pandemic. So, yeah, each of the Companions was expected to write something on their profile page and I put those up. How about we start by you telling me how you found out about our service and we could go from there?"
A safe, gentle, start.
"Youtube ad," Lila found no difficulty in replying to that question. "I was watching a video when your ad popped up in the middle. Annoying, I know, but what caught my attention was your selling point. Yeah, I thought it was probably due to the video topic itself. I've been indulging myself in aesthetics, you know, with the 'my daily minimalistic morning routine' and such."
"Everything looks calming and peaceful, for videos that had been made before time. Very hard to stay positive during this awfully long stay at home. So knowing that everyone else is in the same situation and some Youtubers can still make banks based on this . . . I don't know. The first impression was you running another fad of nonsensical therapy. But, it's affordable and I'll have people coming to talk to me. So, why not try?"
Seeing Stephanie only nodding, Lila abruptly added, "Not that I meant bad for your business."
"No, I know you didn't," Stephanie dimpled, flashing a series of white teeth for casual sincerity. "I love talking to people. Probably focusing on positivity is the best option given that there are too many negative comments lying around on the internet."
She knew. She knew the negativity that still spread around would say things like those Immune at shallow enterprises—meaning one of them was Prattle—utilised their potential by doing menial tasks with the lowest impact to make easy money from the Protected. Insecurity gnawing at her? Most likely.
Seeing other Immune still working at the port, some others at food supply, but she was here just busy arranging her merry band trying to help to uplift someone's moods didn't help her confidence. She was still surprised the negative trolls didn't put her company up in the Top 10 wasteful businesses this month.
Maybe the workers she met when boarded on that bus were just being polite, as in no need to kick the hornet's nest of other professions when they were just fellow travellers. But behind closed doors, or being huddled with their mates, they poured out their hatred towards Stephanie and her likes.
She quickly slammed her mental spiral and got herself together. Another day at work, another client deserving her respect and concentration. "So, yeah, here I am. Hopeful to be a Companion worthy of your time and money," she smiled genuinely.
"Why are you so positive? Because you're Immune? I only met other Protected, well, maybe just on-screen. My husband is also an Immune. He works at a telecommunication centre downtown, he's not that happy, though. Always annoyed at me," she huffed, giving off a sombre mood.
"Oh?" Stephanie angled her head to see the wedding photograph better.
A flash change of expression subtly marred the smile of her client, and an unshakable feeling gradually planted its claws inside Stephanie, like a fibrous root trying to make passages deep in the soil.
A photograph, however large it may be, shows the traits that the person wanted us to see, not what they did not want us to see. Someone did a curation for what outfit to be worn, what expression to display, and which posture to act. The best memory preservation. Censorship of some degree.
What Harari said in his book crossed Stephanie's mind again. Two parts of a human self, namely the experiencing and the narrating self. The experiencing self went through minute-by-minute of life. The narrating self only remembered the peak and the end of the experience. How biased oneself could be, how convenient it was, shaved off the flares of pain from memories.
And pictures people took in their lifetime justified the narrating self only.
Stephanie didn't know whether the man in the picture was a good or a bad man. His podgy body stood beside Lila's curvy one. Her tiara-adorned head leaned on a broad shoulder of his, a brawny arm covered by a black suit rested atop Lila's pale shoulder. The Companion took a polite look at the picture and then glanced at the lady before her. Lila's posture and torso didn't change much over the years, only the facial features did. Oh, and her hair was dyed auburn, a shade lighter than the deep brown in the picture.
She dismissed Lila's comment of her husband being an annoyance as a minor inconvenience, the sort of bicker an old-married couple had. She couldn't deduce it from a single photograph. Alas, there was no heart entirely black or white, as the absolute evil was no man.
She asked in quiet curiosity about how long their marriage had been and threw an assumption that her husband was Immune and now he was out there doing good for humanity, not only for this country.
"Damar and I have been married for eighteen years. As a member of the Council, he's one of the heroes who still maintain the functioning society for the rest of us, I know. A lot of people say that on the internet." That agreed with Stephanie's assumption about their marriage had been for a long time, judging from the youthful faces the couple presented in the photo.
A Council member? Stephanie felt a brick fall in her stomach. She was doing service to a government member's wife?