Page 1 of The Lonely Hearts Guide

It was always going to end in disaster. Ever since they hit the market, automatons were the talk of the town. With such a heavy cost attached, there weren’t many of them, so they became something akin to modern-day folklore. Always spoken of as an outlier, while never touching anyone’s life personally. People feared them because they didn’t understand them. Most only saw them as machines, but Alexander thought they were magnificent.

Lifelike in a way nothing that had come before was. So humanlike, it was nearly impossible to pick them out of a crowd. Alexander contemplated purchasing one for years, observing each new series and the improvements they brought.

Series A wasn’t much of a series at all. The automatons didn’t look human in the slightest. Plastic faces with painted-on grins. Metal bones and visible machinery whirring beneath their translucent chests. They even had a hatch in their stomachs where maintenance was performed. Series B wasn’t much of an improvement aside from solid skin hiding away their bells and whistles.

Over time, scientists like Emily Broussard brought their men to life. They laughed and smiled and showed emotion. They had hobbies and favorite television shows. Homes like Ms. Broussard’s Home for Bountiful Beaus produced the closest thing to artificial humanity mankind had ever seen.

A member on the board of directors for Davenport Developments—the company Alexander’s father headed—purchased one a few years earlier, and he often tagged along to work. It was around the time Alexander was just beginning his internship, fresh out of college. Over the span of three years, Alexander and the automaton, Anthony, became good friends. On the days he would visit, Anthony often wandered the halls of Davenport Developments with a curious look on his face. There was always a feeling of urgency seeping out of him, like he knew his time was limited, and he wanted to learn as much about the world as he could while he had the chance.

They shared lunches in the office break room, Anthony asking question after question about his time in college. His childhood. Anthony even inquired about matters of the heart. Admittedly, Alexander didn’t have much of a story to tell when it came to love. Between school and his job at the company, he wouldn’t have much time for romance in the foreseeable future.

Then Anthony disappeared. For months, Alexander would ask about him, and Anthony’s partner, Bradley, downplayed his disappearance by claiming Anthony fell ill and was recovering. After three months, Alexander grew more and more concerned. Eventually, Bradley admitted to returning him to the home from where he was purchased.

Alexander couldn’t comprehend the words as they were spoken. Bradley gave a laundry list of complaints about Anthony. From the way Anthony failed Bradley as a lover, to Anthony’s inability to maintain their home, the man lamented for half an hour. But in Alexander’s mind, Anthony wasn’t a piece of furniture meant to be discarded once it lost its sparkle. He was a man. More of a man than some men Alexander had met. As soon as he wrapped his head around the situation, Alexander decided he needed to purchase Anthony. To give him a loving home where he could simply exist with no expectations, no demands, and no more fear.

When Alexander called Ms. Broussard to inquire about re-homing Anthony, she broke the news that Anthony had been decommissioned. Ripped to shreds, torn down for parts. Alexander remembered the chill that spread down his spine as he heard the news. Anthony was his friend, and he’d been powered down and ripped apart, limb by limb, bolt by bolt.

“Oh, Mr. Davenport,” Emily Broussard soothed, her voice smooth like caramel with a Cajun twist at the end. “Don’t worry your pretty little head. As I tell my beaus; Never fear, Mother’s here. I can craft a beau who can give you a love story for the ages.”

But Alexander didn’t want just any automaton. He wanted his friend. There had never been a romantic or sexual connection between the men; Alexander simply wanted to keep him safe. To protect him from a world that would, and did, tear him apart.

He declined the offer, but Ms. Broussard reminded him the door was always open, sweetly saying, “Even the unlovable can have a love story for the ages with one of my beaus, sweetheart.” A backhanded compliment? Probably, but Alexander simply sighed and shrugged it off.

With rescuing Anthony no longer being an option, Alexander turned his eye on Bradley. For months, he bit his tongue and bided his time, keeping his ears open, listening to gossiping coworkers while pretending he was working. For months, Alexander treated the company like a midnight garden, tiptoeing around, catching whispered rumors like fireflies.

In the end, Bradley Pascal’s undoing was swift and merciless. He was walked out of the office in handcuffs, indicted on charges of embezzlement and money laundering. When Bradley was led past him, Alexander smiled kindly and said, “For Anthony.”

Six months later, Alexander’s father passed, leaving the company to him. There were more office whispers; calling him unfit to lead, taking bets on how long he would last before cracking like an egg. He kept his nose down, working endlessly to fill his father’s shoes. Somewhere along the way, he, and the rest of the company, realized Alexander was a natural. A Davenport, through and through, like his father, and his father before him.

Two years after taking the helm, Alexander purchased a copy of Forbes with his smiling face on the cover. King of the Mountain, they called him. He wasn’t sure about that, but he knew better than to turn up his nose at a compliment.

After three years, Alexander worked fourteen-hour days, rarely going anywhere but work engagements, the office, and home. His mother, Twylah, lived on a small, private island near the Gulf of Mexico. She had a small bakery, by the coast. From sunup until sundown, the air on Sugarplum Island smelled divine from the hodgepodge of sweet sugary treats and sea salt wafting through the twelve-home town. Alexander visited as often as he could, but his free time was sparse and sporadic, so he never knew when he would have a moment’s peace. He didn’t mind it, though. The constant hustle and bustle. The never-ending grind. It was busy work, but Alexander thrived, carving a life for himself and propelling his company to even higher heights.

While he had a large trust fund, Alexander used none of it, only living off the money he made for himself. Within a year and a half, he could buy a mansion in Hunnington Park, one of the nicest gated communities in Dallas.

As lovely as the community was, his neighbor was anything but. Martin Moore. God. The man was unbearable. An aloof drunk and alleged exhibitionist who held wild, nearly nightly sex parties at his home, three doors down from Alexander. They met a handful of times at block parties and the country club Alexander paid exorbitant fees for but rarely got to visit.

On one of the few rare occasions Alexander had a bit of time to himself, he decided to play a few holes. Unfortunately, Martin was there as well and talked him into playing together. Over the next two hours, they discussed their careers and lack of personal lives.

While Alexander was driving his tee into the ground, another cart pulled behind theirs, and he looked over his shoulder to find a man cuddled up next to another. The man driving the cart was staring down at the young man like he was the most precious thing in the world. The younger man looked up, and flashes of pink light fluttered in the corner of his eyes.

Alexander had seen the lights before, each time Anthony was happy while he would visit the office. He had other colors, too. Blues for when he was sad. Orange when he was nervous. Mostly, it was endless beams ofpink-pink-pinkwhen Alexander and Anthony spent time together.

Martin noticed the lights, too, because he knelt beside Alexander and gave a sly, conspiratory smile. “Have you ever heard of those i-Series beaus, Davenport? I’ve been thinking of getting one.”

“Yeah?”

Martin nodded. “Yeah. With my busy schedule, I’m never going to find someone any other way. I’d rather have a human, obviously, but this way, I’ll have someone waiting at home for me, even if I only get to see them a few hours a day. The life of an executive is lonely. You know that better than anyone.”

“I guess,” Alexander said, shrugging his shoulders. He put the thought to bed, but as he crawled into his cold, lonely bed that night, his mind crept back to the conversation. Alexander browsed Ms. Broussard’s website for an hour, looking through all the options. When he saw mention of lap sitting and lonely beaus needing to find their forever, Alexander made a choice.

A call was made. Inventory consulted and an order placed. But that wasn’t what it felt like to Alexander. He wasn’t buying a machine, he was buying a person. Someone he could hold with his own two hands when his schedule allowed and he needed to feel a warm body by his at night.

In order to have their automaton perfectly personalized, Alexander and Martin took online classes and a seemingly endless number of tests to check their knowledge. Alexander knew Martin cheated on his, but he didn’t know how. The man knew nothing of automatons or the suggested methods of providing them a good life. Granted, “Suggested” was italicized, and there was an asterisk beside it in the workbook. At the bottom was a footnote that read, “While our goal is providing a loving home for our wonderful househusbands, we at Ms. Broussard’s Home for Bountiful Beaus know the man is the king of his castle, and the level of love andcomfortprovided to their beau is entirely at each owner’s discretion.” Alexander didn’t like the sound of that. He didn’t like it one bit.

Almost one year after placing the order for their beaus, Alexander and Martin stepped into Ms. Broussard’s home for the first time. Alexander knew luxury firsthand, but even he was amazed by the home’s interior.

The grand entryway of the mansion was the picture of opulence and elegance. There was white marble in the foyer with stunning swirls of pinks and purples. A grand stairwell stood at the side of the room, leading up to hallways in two directions. Wherever each side led to was anyone’s guess, as a gorgeous, purple drapery system hid the halls behind them away. Bathed in soft, creamy light, the foyer had an almost dreamlike feel.

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