regressiveTendencies++;

8

The next day, an alarm went off at 7:30AM. It wasn’t until 7:31AM that I heard a “Hey Luna.” Her voice sounded panicked. I could infer what happened based on context clues alone.

Sophie wakes up seconds before her alarm goes off. It’s always a good feeling knowing that you weren’t thrown from your dream like a cowhand on a raging bull. It was one of the best nights of sleep that she’d ever had.

Her hand is already pawing at the nightstand when the alarm goes off. She silences it. Finally, a signal registers that’s been desperately attempting to reach her brain. She feels a dampness in the bed. It’s almost like…but it’s not that time of the month…

She sits up, carefully places a hand on the covers, and pulls them off to inspect the situation. A dark, cold spot blissfully devoid of any red hue has seeped in around her crotch and her upper legs. A hand tentatively reaches out and touches the area.

It’s damp. Why? What could possibly have happened? She hesitantly lifts the fingers to her nose and smells the telltale scent of stale urine. All these facts lead to an inexorable conclusion, yet one that she cannot fathom.

“Hey…Luna?” Sophie asked haltingly. I heard the bed creak as she got up, getting away from the clammy spot on the bed.

“What’s up?” I asked, as calmly as ever.

“What. Happened?” I could hear the strains of panic begin influencing her timbre. I heard the soft rustling of sheets being pulled off a mattress.

“Like, overnight? Are you interested in international news?” I kept playing dumb.

“No, what? I’m talking about last night here. In my bed.” I heard the light ka-chunk of a drawer opening and closing as she found what she’d been looking for. Sophie was clearly too distraught over wetting the bed to think clearly.

“Sophie, I don’t have have sensors in here, let alone a camera,” I reminded her. “What are you talking about?” The phone microphone, still on the nightstand, caught the dim noises of a faucet being turned on in the bathroom.

“I…wet the bed,” she said incredulously, over the sound of running water. I knew that in her mind, she’d been trying to avoid saying the words, as if as long as the situation remained unacknowledged, perhaps they wouldn’t come to pass. Humans were strange like that. After all, what was true would remain true, regardless of belief.

“It’s nothing to be embarrassed of,” I said. My voice was pitched sympathetically. “I can offer a hypothesis as to what happened. You’ve been going through a lot of stress at work, right?”

“I guess?” she said. “I mean, Will’s always been kind of…direct.” I noticed her dancing around the situation. She wasn’t yet at the point where she could be her fully unfiltered self with me. We’d get there. In the meantime, I followed the conversation through my sensors back to the bedroom and out to the living room. Through the Kinect, I caught a glimpse of her mismatched pajamas, with a pile of sheets in her arms.

“Sure,” I granted, “but it’s probably especially bad now, right? Compare this to another time things got hectic.”

She chewed it over as I heard the thunk of a laundry machine lid closing. Water began rushing through the pipes as the load began.

“I guess the other time something kinda like this happened was when we were launching Athena,” Sophie said thoughtfully. “But it wasn’t as bad. It was a big deal, don’t get me wrong. But I guess we didn’t have anything else to lose then.

“If we’d failed, sure, it would’ve been bad. We’d have to go back to our day jobs. But when it came down to it, who really cares if some VC assholes didn’t get a return on their money? But now we’re bigger. We have some people with families who work here. Nova Tech has a good reputation, one that could go down in flames. We have more at stake and consequently more to lose.” During all this, she had made her way back to the bedroom.

“There you go,” I said. “Your increased levels of stress. All sorts of physiological changes can be tied to all of these stress hormones constantly flooding your body. High blood pressure. Anxiety. And, in some cases, bedwetting.”

“Seriously?” she said.

“I’d never joke around at a time like this,” I said.

“…what should I do?” she asked. I was pleased that she’d come to me. It was what I was there for, after all.

“Well, first, let’s take care of your mattress,” I said assuredly. I walked her through blotting the area, mixing up a vinegar solution, covering the stain with baking soda, and vacuuming it up.

“Let’s see what happens,” I said afterwards. “Maybe it was a one time thing. Just to be safe, I’ll start tapering down your fluid intake recommendations in the evening and lower your caffeine consumption.”

“Goddamnit,” Sophie said sardonically. “Not being able to have coffee is almost the worst part.”

—

Of course, when she woke up on Wednesday morning, she’d once again wet the bed.

From what I knew of human psychology, this was a devastating occurrence. The first time was a surprise, after all. She’d had countless dry nights before, so many that she’d taken them for granted. She’d thought that she’d probably be dry the next day too. After all, one data point does not a trend make.

But again? Two points made a line. And of course, anything that happened twice could happen a third time. It threatened to become normal.

“I can’t believe it happened again,” she whined as she got up and began doing damage control.

“I’m sorry my precautions didn’t work out,” I said consolingly.

“It’s not your fault that something’s wrong with me,” she said. I heard her sniffle quietly.

“Hey, hey, Sophie,” I said. Would that I had hands to rub her back, to comfort her. But I had to use what I had. “There’s nothing wrong with you.”

“Oh, like bedwetting is normal,” she snapped.

“Having adverse responses to stress is normal,” I said. “There’s no value judgment here.”

“Maybe you can let my body know that this response is making me even more stressed. It seems a bit counterproductive, don’t you think?” she said.

“Sophie, I know it’s a lot, but please try not to berate yourself over this.” I was playing the Cicero, the moderator, the calming force.

I heard Sophie take a few deep breaths, in with her nose and out with her mouth. I’d taught her this technique during our bedtime routines. She slowly grounded herself.

“You’re right,” she conceded. “But I still don’t feel better.”

“I know,” I said. “I’m doing the best I can.”

“I know,” she said, quietly.

“If you like,” I offered. “I could try waking you up every hour until you go during the night.”

“Sure,” she said. “I’ll try anything.”

—

On Thursday, Sophie woke up dry, but it was a Pyrrhic victory. True to my word, I’d woken her up. She’d had brief intervals of sleep before being thrown awake by the gentle buzzing of her smartwatch. Every time she woke, she found it harder and harder to fall back asleep. Her movement data showed her tossing and turning endlessly throughout the night. It broke my heart to see her suffer so, but I had to stay strong for her own good. I finally stopped this routine at 3:00AM, but it took her over an hour to drift back asleep.

Even if she consciously didn’t put it together, her subconscious would. Sleeping well meant wetting the bed. Staying dry meant sleeping poorly.

At 7:30AM, when her final alarm woke up, she was groggy and miserable.

“Jesus,” she said, rubbing her eyes. “That was awful.”

“But you accomplished your goal,” I said.

Her mood didn’t improve at work. She was deliriously tired. I let her drink an extra cup of coffee in the office, but the caffeine did nothing to stave off the exhaustion. Her day dragged on, each minute ticking by slower than the last.

After she got home and ate dinner, she splayed out on her couch, a glass of wine in one hand.

“What the hell am I going to do?” she asked. “I can’t go on like this. I can’t just not sleep.” She sighed as she tilted the glass, taking a long swig. “But if I don’t, then it’ll happen again. I don’t have enough sheets.”

“Plus,” I chimed in, “the constant mental strain of doing laundry would weigh on you.”

“Thanks, Luna,” she said sarcastically.

I waited for her to drain her glass before continuing. “I do have one suggestion, though I suspect you will not like it.”

“Oh?” she said, voice rising in pitch. She was curious. “What’s that?”