Bono

The danger, she felt, wasn’t so much that robots were becoming people, but the other way around. Watching commuters on the subway, she was saddened by how everyone in the car lowered their head over a phone. Their eyes glazed over as they switched off and sank into states of semi-hypnosis. The last thing they touched at night was their cool sliver of technology. When they woke in the morning, the first thing they reached for wasn’t the warmth of another human, but their phone. It made her wonder how long it took to forget how to be human—one generation, or two?

She understood why pets had surged in popularity. People needed the comfort of warm fur, the gleam of a trusting eye more than ever. In many cases, it was all they had to stay connected to their animal selves.

Though she relished the company of friends and family, she was equally content sitting alone in a diner listening to others try to make sense of their world.

That was the woman I came to know again. So, while I was alone in New York, I was far from lonely. I had myself for company, and I quite liked it.

I also had Bono. Whether I was bathing my senses in a Wagner opera at Lincoln Center or munching on pizza at Lombardi’s in Nolita, I knew that on the third floor of a not very elegant building near the UN, a small beating heart was waiting for me.

One morning, as I rifled through my underwear in search of one of my new bras, I came across a furry pink cat toy I’d brought from Australia. I placed it on the floor beside the bed and went out for the day.

When I returned that evening, Bono was tossing the thing around the apartment as if it was the best pet toy that had ever been invented. And to my elation, he’d started doing number two.

Chapter Twenty-two

TELLING TALES

To be granted permission to stroke a cat is a high compliment.

I’d heard nothing from the Huffington Post and was beginning to wonder whether they had even received my first blog. Concerned by the lack of response, I called Vida. She responded with her trademark breeziness saying she’d spoken to an editor there and it was going to take a few days for the blog to be posted. Next to Michaela, Vida was the biggest non-worrier I’d ever met.

Meantime, Vida added, the publishing house would like me to bring Bono along to the book launch they were hosting in ten days. It would be in a pet shop so Bono wouldn’t be lonely.

I tried to explain that Bono hosting a book launch would be like Howard Hughes starring in his own song and dance spectacular. It would traumatize him, and undo the progress we’d made. If he was put on show in front of strangers, he’d curl up in a ball and have even less chance of finding a home.

In the end we agreed to make a decision closer to the time.

Even if for some reason Huffington Post decided not to use my stuff, I went ahead with a second blog post.

“I’m only trying to help you,” I said to my roommate, who remained gregarious as an Easter Island monument.

No one said it was going to be easy . . . I typed, like a schoolgirl telling tales. Bono refused to budge from under the bed.

As I hammered away, a set of whiskers appeared from the shadows. A nose and a set of traffic light eyes nudged forward. Watching me from the safety of his cave entrance, the cat seemed curious. I called his name, but he didn’t respond.

“You are a high-maintenance, unrewarding animal,” I said, turning my attention back to the keyboard. “And you can stay there as long as you like.”

With half a blog under my belt, I flopped on the couch and flicked through the TV channels. In a strange variation of Stockholm syndrome, America’s bitter struggle for freedom from Britain seemed to have left the nation obsessed with Downton Abbey and Call the Midwife. Though I was intrigued by their version of Antiques Roadshow, it soon anaesthetized me into a stupor. I was about to switch the thing off, when a tiny figure trotted across the room toward me.

I froze, and pretended to be fascinated by the commercials. Bono moved closer and nudged the edge of my shoe with his forehead. Resisting the urge to cry out and embrace him, I ignored him and kept staring at the TV. Bono emitted a bell-like mew. I pretended not to hear.

When he leapt on the sofa and sat beside me, my heart melted like the ice cream in our fridge that didn’t work. I leaned toward him. He hesitated, as if he might change his mind and scurry for cover. But he stood still and he let me slide my hand over his bony spine.