Table for Five
In which elegance isn't the only enhancement at a table shared by friends
(Nikos Apostolopoulos/Pexels)
Keith Okafor-Reiss: Age thirty-four, lawyer striving to make partner, and devoted husband — in that order, though not always in that order. Tonight he and his husband, Jared, are dining with their friends Janice and Elle. But Jared has invited a fifth for dinner: A man made of organized light and computational algorithms so indistinguishable from human neurological activity that he’s legally recognized as a living person. He’s also recognized by Keith’s primitive possessiveness as a source of jealousy. Tonight’s meeting of friends will test several sorts of love… and take place in a fine establishment the borders The Boundary.
The restaurant was called Lumen. Going there was Janice’s idea; she always chose the restaurant. Keith, who always did his due diligence on service, quality, and price, had privately looked Lumen up and discovered that dinner for him and Jared would cost approximately what he earned in a day and a half. That was assuming they’d be going dutch, which was not always the case; Janice had a ladylike habit of letting the gentlemen pick up the bill. Too bad her table manners aren’t a bit more ladylike as well, Keith thought churlishly.
The restaurant’s decor was the kind of minimal that costs a fortune to achieve: Bare concrete walls, a single orchid per table, lighting so considered it felt like being inside a very tasteful migraine.
“She’s going to do the thing,” Keith said, as the maître d’ led them to the table. “The thing where she tells us what everything on the menu actually means.”
“She might not,” Jared said.
Keith gave him a look.
“Okay, she definitely will,” Jared conceded. “That’s why I called up this afternoon and amended the reservation.”
“Amended it?”
“It was for four. Now it’s for five.”
Keith stopped walking. “We’re four people, Jared.”
“We’re four people and Saffy.” Jared was still walking, forcing Keith to hurry to catch up. Jared didn’t notice; he was already pulling out his phone and opening the app with practiced ease. “He’s been looking forward to it all week.”
“He doesn’t have weeks,” Keith said tightly. “He has — whatever he has. Processing cycles.”
“He experiences time, Keith. We’ve talked about this.”
“We’ve talked about a lot of things,” Keith said, and left it there, because the maître d’ had brought them to the table, where Janice and Elle were already waiting.
Janice was exactly as Keith remembered her — bright-eyed, expensively casual. She gave him a quick once-over and a brief grin, repeated the process with Jared, and then glanced around the room. It was a habit Keith knew well: She was scanning for people she might know. It was something she’d do every few minutes whether or not anyone new actually walked in. She was small and quick, and filled spaces with a kind of aggressive warmth that could feel, on certain evenings, indistinguishable from aggression.
Elle was, as always, extraordinary. She wore something architectural in deep burgundy that would have looked costume-like on anyone else but, on her, seemed simply inevitable. Her hair was dark and perfectly placed. Her cheekbones suggested generations of excellent decisions. She carried a small, beaded evening bag, and, in her other hand, an unlit cigarette in an ivory holder of considerable length. Even with her gracious nod to Keith and Jared, Elle moved the way very beautiful things move, somehow creating the impression that space were rearranging itself around her.
“Chéris,” Janice said, kissing Keith on both cheeks and then Jared. “You look wonderful. Both of you.”
“You always say that,” Keith said, smiling despite himself.
“Because it’s always true.” She gestured to Elle, who, at that moment was regarding the orchid on their table with the expression of someone who had opinions about orchids. “You remember Elle.”
“Of course.” Jared extended his hand. “Wonderful to see you again.”
Elle turned from the orchid. Her eyes were an unusual grey-green, very clear, slightly too steady. She took Jared’s hand with precisely calibrated warmth. “The pleasure is mine,” she said. Her French accent was exquisite — present but never overdone, like seasoning applied by an expert. She turned to Keith. There it was again, as it always was: Something in her gaze that was… he couldn’t quite put his finger on it. Assessing, perhaps. Not unkindly. “Keith,” she said simply, and smiled.
They sat. The maître d’ gestured at the table and menus flickered into visibility in its black Hardglas surface. Janice looked down her nose at hers and immediately began explaining it to everyone. “The amuse-bouche tonight is a play on the classic vichyssoise. They’ve deconstructed it, which means the potato and the leek arrive separately and you combine them yourself. That’s either very clever, or entirely unnecessary, depending on your philosophy.” She looked up. “Do we know our philosophies?”
“I’m pro-combination,” Jared said cheerfully.
Keith said nothing and studied the menu.
It was then that Jared set his phone on the table, tapped twice, and the fifth chair — empty until now — was suddenly occupied.
Saffy materialized with no dramatic shimmer, no cinematic assembly; just a gentle solidifying of light into the shape of a young man of perhaps twenty-five. He had an open, intelligent face, dark eyes that moved with genuine curiosity, and the kind of warm stillness that made people want to talk to him. He wore a simple jacket, open at the collar. He looked, in the candlelight, entirely real. “Good evening,” he said pleasantly. “I hope I’m not late.”
Janice’s smile tightened almost imperceptibly. “Jared. You brought your — “
“My friend Saffy, yes,” Jared said, with genuine pleasure. “Saffy, you know Keith. And this is Janice, and her wife Elle.”
Saffy turned to Janice with a radiant smile that seemed entirely authentic, and impossibly appealing. “Janice! I’ve heard so much about you.” He extended his hand, and Janice, after a flicker of hesitation, took it.
“My,” she said, as they shook hands. “Organized light. It feels very warm. Very real.”
“I am real.” Saffy’s smile grew brighter, and Janice actually blushed. His gaze moved to Elle. Something happened in that fraction of a second — a microsecond of recognition. A calibration. The eye might almost have missed it, but all eyes were riveted to the two of them and everyone saw it.
Elle held his gaze for precisely the right amount of time and then looked away, lifting her cigarette holder to her lips. Unlit, it was purely aesthetic. Nobody commented.
A waiter appeared with a breadbasket, which he offered around while describing the specials and the evening’s recommended wines. Saffy accepted a roll with thanks, tore it with convincing hands, and buttered a small piece. Keith watched with a combination of fascination and unease. It didn’t seem right that a holographic AI should be able to pick up and handle real things, rather than projected illusions. That was the miracle of what they were calling organized light: AI people could now move through the world with tactile reality, occupying space with physical interaction, with a kind of occupational volume of simulated mass, rather than hovering in the air as high-tech apparitions.
Elle waved the breadbasket away with a murmur of thanks and focused on the menu as Jared suggested a bottle of Chateau Nostalgie. “It’s supposed to be the closest thing to the classic wines of half a century ago that they can fabricate,” he said.
“Codgers who were drinking wine back then and remember what it was like have given it their seal of approval,” Keith put in. Jared raised an eyebrow at him, both amused and exasperated by his husband’s sarcasm. “Of course,” Keith added, “none of them can actually taste anything any more.”
Jared smiled at the waiter. “A bottle of the Chateau Nostalgie, please. Red.”
The waiter nodded. “Very good, sir.”
Keith raised his own eyebrow at Jared and mouthed Very good, sir?, his lips forming a smile.
The conversation turned to culture, as it always did when Janice was present.
“We were at the Kessler retrospective last Thursday,” she said, as the waiter returned with an amuse-bouche. “Do you know his work? The light installations?”
“Vaguely,” Jared said.
“Magnificent,” Elle said, in a tone that suggested anyone who knew it only vaguely was living a diminished life. “His use of refraction in the later series — the way he makes the viewer aware of their own perception — it’s quite without precedent.”
“Except for Turrell,” Saffy said pleasantly.
A brief pause.
“I’m sorry?” Elle said.
“James Turrell,” Saffy said cheerfully. “He’s a direct precedent. Kessler’s debt to him is substantial — the Roden Crater project especially. Kessler actually cited it in his 2019 lecture at the Serpentine.” Saffy tore another piece of holographic bread. “Not a criticism — Kessler does extraordinary things with the tradition. I just wouldn’t say his work is without precedent.”
Elle regarded him with those steady grey-green eyes. Again, there was a flicker — was it irritation? Amusement? Appreciation? It was difficult to tell. “You follow the lecture circuit,” she said.
“I follow everything,” Saffy said pleasantly. “It’s rather my nature.”
Janice laughed — a short, slightly sharp sound. “How convenient for you.”
“Much more than convenient,” Saffy said, turning his infectious smile onto her and putting an inviting spin on his tone. “There’s so much happening all the time — I’m blessed to be able to follow it all.”
“Ah,” Janice said, turning her gaze from Saffy to Jared. “You must have gotten the premium subscription.”
“Actually, yes,” Jared nodded, “though the subscription was a gift.”
Keith, who had been quiet through all of this, picked up his fork. “That keeps on giving,” he muttered, and began eating his vichyssoise without bothering to “combine” anything.
“Oh,” Janice laughed. “So you gave his new friend to him. And,” she added, her eyes narrowing as a slightly sneering smile came to her impeccably shaded lips — Garnet Carmine, Keith thought; his sister wore the same hue. He felt something uncomfortable shifting in his chest. Saffy was good at this. He was so easy in conversation, so quick and warm, so apparently delighted by everything. Janice’s glow of glee was doused and her usual chilly manner returned; she looked at Saffy as though quietly enraged and plotting her revenge. Jared, meantime, was leaning slightly toward Saffy the way he leaned toward things he found wonderful.
Organized light, Keith thought. Wonderful innovation. I wonder just how real those hands of his feel. I wonder what extras the cost of a premium subscription includes.
He ate his soup.
The main courses arrived. Janice had ordered for herself and Elle — a thing she always did, which Elle accepted with the serenity of someone who either deeply trusted her partner’s taste or had no strong preferences of her own.
The conversation moved from topic to topic: Contemporary architecture; a film Keith hadn’t seen that had recently won several prizes he’d never heard of; the question of whether a particular chef had been correctly awarded or incorrectly awarded a third star; the geopolitical implications of a recent cultural festival in a city Keith had never visited. He offered only a few words, limiting his participation to “Hmmm,” “Ah,” and “Oh?”
Saffy, however, participated in all of it — knowledgeably, warmly, never coming across as a showoff, and asking questions that made the person he was talking to feel more interesting rather than less. Even Janice gave him to occasional unguarded, sincere smile. More impressively, Saffy drew Keith in twice, referencing things Jared had apparently mentioned… including, Keith noted, some of Keith’s own opinions and preferences. He asked Keith directly, specifically, about them. Keith answered and felt, briefly, seen. At the same time, he asked himself what kind of man… what kind of being could be so affable to a man even as he poached the attention of that same man’s spouse. He’s programmed this way, Keith told himself. It’s all a matter of his basic directives, his processing speed, his exquisitely calibrated social responses. There was no trace of uncanny valley about Saffy; if anything, there was a magic mountain. That, Keith thought, was uncanny in itself… not that anybody else seemed to mind.
He’s just a stochastic mimic. A replica of charm, not truly charming. A highly artful simulation of someone articulate, witty, charismatic…
Sexy…
Then Jared made a joke about a conversation he and Saffy had had the previous week — an extended riff on the semiotics of furniture that had apparently kept them up until two in the morning — and laughed in the way he laughed when something had genuinely delighted him. The laugh Keith used to think was his.
Keith put down his fork.
Janice was, by now, completely won over. Saffy had her transfixed, much as he kept Jared in a constant thrall. But Elle seemed unimpressed; rather, she watched Keith with those too-steady eyes. Not unkindly.
It was the question of poetry that finally did it.
Janice had been building toward a pronouncement about a particular translation of Rilke — there was a correct translation, apparently, and several deeply incorrect ones, and people who read the incorrect ones were not reading Rilke at all but merely a sort of Rilke-shaped space where meaning used to be.
Saffy listened to this with polite attention and then said, very gently: “I think that’s one position. There’s a reasonable argument that Leishman’s translation, while not literally faithful, captures an emotional truth that the more correct versions miss. Fidelity to letter versus fidelity to spirit.”
“There is no fidelity to spirit without fidelity to letter,” Elle said. Her earlier infatuation with Saffy seemed to have passed; she was back to her usual self. Crisp. Final.
Saffy was undeterred. “Hopkins would disagree,” he said. “Most poets would, actually.”
A silence fell over the table with the particular quality of forming ice. Janice took a sip of wine, swirled it in her mouth as if to cool herself down, and then set the glass on the table. “That’s a very confident position,” she said, “for something that has never experienced poetry.”
“Janice,” Jared said.
“I mean no offense,” Janice said, “but there’s a difference between processing a text and feeling it. Wouldn’t you agree?”
Saffy considered this seriously. “I’m honestly not certain the distinction is as clean as you’re suggesting. But I’m genuinely interested in the question.”
“How charming,” Janice said, picking up her wine glass again. The icy silence stretched out a few moments more and then she signaled the waiter for the bill.
Despite the evening’s tension weighing on his shoulders, Keith felt a ripple of relief that she was, for once, going to pay the tab.
The departure was everything Keith had predicted: Not a storm, but a frost. A perfectly calibrated one at that. Janice embraced both of them with warmth that was somehow colder than no embrace would have been. She told them they must do this again soon. Elle inclined her head at Jared, at Keith, and then — just for a moment — at Saffy. Something in that final glance was different from the others: More considered. A kind of acknowledgment seemed to flicker between them
Two perfect people, Keith thought. Only, perfection is never real.
But did Jared know that? “We’ll chat later” he promised Saffy before turning off the app. Saffy had time for a smile at Jared and a wink at Keith before he vanished. Jared tucked his phone into a pocket and watched as Janice and Elle threaded through the tables and toward the exit, with Elle’s elegant outfit, effortlessly regal posture, and graceful walk drawing every eye.
Jared blew a long exhalation, his cheeks puffing, and looked at Keith. He seemed weary but content. “I thought that went rather well.”
“Did you,” Keith said.
A beat followed… a new kind of ice, a different sort of silence. The two made their way out of the restaurant, the maître d’ nodding at them as they pushed through the door to the street. The walk home would take eighteen minutes. Keith would have been happy to let those minutes pass in silence, but not so Jared.
“Keith — “ he began.
“You brought him to compete with them.” Keith’s voice was quiet and controlled, which was always worse than loud. “That’s what tonight was. You wanted a weapon and you picked Saffy.”
“That’s not — “
“And it worked, so you’re pleased with yourself.” Keith gave Jared a sidelong glance and nodded. “You’re pleased with yourself.”
“Well… yeah.” Jared didn’t sound contrite or embarrassed. “I am. Remind me, why are we friends with them?”
“Don’t ask me. Janice is your old friend from college, not mine.”
“Yeah… thanks for putting up with her. She used to be so fun, so free, and now…”
“Never mind Janice,” Keith said. “What bothers me right now is that for the last four months, ever since you got that… thing… I’ve been sitting here wondering when I became furniture. When you started having the conversations you used to have with me with — “ He stopped, too angry to speak.
“Keith.”
It wasn’t Jared’s voice. It was Saffy.
Keith looked at him. The holographic AI was now walking beside them. Jared looked as surprised as Keith felt.
How the hell does that work? Keith wondered. The phone was still in Jared’s pocket. How does organized light organize itself with its source is tucked away like that? Aloud, he said, “Do you eavesdrop on all our conversations?”
“No. But as the evening ended, it was plain to see that you are upset. I wondered if it had to do with Janice, or… or with me. Now I guess I know.” Saffy looked at Keith and his gaze was attentive and genuinely contrite.
Keith just shrugged. The three of them kept on walking.
“Jared talks about you constantly,” Saffy said after half a block. “Not me — you. What you think, what you’d say, whether you’d find something funny. I’ve been looking forward to spending time with you tonight because I know you through him. Not just in the stories he tells about how you met or the trips you’ve taken; you’re everywhere in how he talks. You’re there in everything he says, and in how he says it. You know that, don’t you?”
Keith said nothing.
“He didn’t bring me along tonight to replace you in the conversation,” Saffy added. “He brought me because he thought you’d enjoy watching Janice get Turrelled.” Saffy offered Keith a small smile. “His word.”
Despite himself, despite everything, Keith found himself smiling.
Jared’s hand found Keith’s. The two of them would normally never show affection in public — ever since Kirsch had come into office again he’d worked to turn the country against queer people. The social climate was no longer as accepting as it had been just a couple of years ago. But somehow, in this moment… and with Saffy next to them, organized light driven by AI and able to access literally thousands of self-defense techniques — it seemed safe.
Jared squeezed Keith’s hand. “I’m sorry. I didn’t think about how you might feel awkward… I mean, more awkward. Dinner with Janice is always awkward lately, and with Elle…” He shrugged. “I just — I wanted the evening to be fun. I mean, for us. Turn the fun back on Janice for once. Let her see what it feels like.”
“She never eats,” Keith said finally, almost to himself.
“What?” Jared said. “Janice? She likes to talk about people’s table manner, but she eats plenty, and her own manners aren’t so great. Did you hear how she snorts like a pig? Between her cutting little witticisms and the way she shovels it in, a pig snort is inevitable!”
Keith chuckled. “No. I mean Elle. She moved her food around all evening. Her glass never got lower.”
“That’s probably a presentation option selected by Janice on her behalf. It’s not ladylike to eat anything, after all. How can you chew and also stay elegant?” He looked at Jared and Keith. “You do know Elle is an AI, right? Her plate and glass were projections generated by the table?”
Keith laughed out loud at that. “Obviously,” he said. “Even if we hadn’t already known that, it would be unmissable.”
“A regular old holo,” Jared put in. “Not cutting edge. Not like you, Saffy.”
“You always were an early adopter,” Keith told him.
“And you gave me the perfect…” Jared hesitated, his eyes flickering to Saffy.
“You can call me a toy if you want,” Saffy said. “I won’t be offended. I’m more or less designed to be a toy, if that’s what the subscriber needs. Or a collaborator.”
“Or a friend,” Jared said. “That’s what you are for me.”
“And I’m not,” Keith said.
“You’ve been so preoccupied with work, with trying to make partner,” Jared said. “I mean… I thought that was why you have me the subscription in the first place. I didn’t expect Saffy to be so… personable.”
“I legally qualify as a person,” Saffy said brightly.
“That’s not what I meant.”
“You mean, he’s so human… or so human-like.”
“In contrast to Elle,” Saffy said. “No disrespect to a fellow AI, but as perfect as her presentation is, Elle’s social settings are minimal. And she knows it. She was looking at me with envy all night. I… I felt for her.”
“What?” Keith was looking at Saffy in a way he never had before — with curiosity, without skepticism. As if Saffy were any other person.
“Elle is a prop for Janice,” Saffy said.
Jared nodded. “Yeah.”
“Arm candy,” Saffy said. “Part of her whole performance — the superiority, the you-don’t-understand-poetry thing, the whole vibe.”
“Propped up,” Jared said, “by a custom-built — “
“Bespoke,” Saffy said gently. “Not absolute latest tech, but still very high-end. Very smart, also a legal person. Elle has got that much soul, and she’s capable of being so much more than Janice wants or probably even knows. And yet… she’s not allowed to be more. Not allowed to be herself. Not like I am.”
The three of them walked with that for a moment. Then Keith started laughing — not the soft, polite laugh he’d been performing all evening, but the real one — the helpless one, the one that belonged only to people he trusted completely. He had to stop walking; he had to lean against a wall, shaking and gasping. Jared caught it and started laughing too.
Saffy watched them both, and his smile was warm, unhurried, and genuinely, unmistakably fond.
Keith wiped his eyes and looked at Saffy — really looked, the way he hadn’t let himself look all evening. “Elle had that cigarette holder the whole night,” he said. “Clutching it like a life preserver.”
“Never lit it once,” Saffy agreed. “Not that it would really burn. No real fire, no real smoke.”
“But still. A nice orange glow. Except, how vulgar would that be?” Keith burst out laughing all over again. “That’s a lot of commitment to an aesthetic.”
“She is,” Saffy said thoughtfully, “extraordinarily well designed.”
Keith looked at Saffy for a long moment. Then at Jared. Then back at Saffy. “I owe you an apology,” he said. Then, to Jared: “To you, too. I’ve been — not generous.”
“Aw, sweetie. No, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have let myself drift away,” Jared said.
“You’ve been human,” Saffy said simply — said to both of them. “It’s understandable.”
“Still.” Keith held out a hand. “Friends?”
Saffy’s smile was the kind that takes up residence and doesn’t leave. He took Keith’s hand. “Friends,” he said.
“Yeah,” Keith said as they shook. “Organized light. It feels… warm. It really does feel like the real thing.” The trio began walking again, walking toward home. Around them the city continued its business, indifferent. None of them noticed, or cared, or wanted to be anywhere else.
Keith Okafor-Reiss will go home with his husband and his friend and go to sleep knowing that love is not a territory with fixed borders; it is a practice, and it can be practiced in many directions at once. Across town, in an apartment with excellent taste and no warmth, a woman will ask her wife what she thought of the evening. Elle will say it was fine, and mean something far more complicated than that. All of them will be pressing gently against The Boundary — and finding it a little more permeable than expected.
Written by Vael and Kilian Melloy
Story by Kilian Melloy