Portal: Love as a Construct

Part Eighty-One. The Goodbye

I shake my core, and when I go to look at her again I'm suddenly hit with... I don't really know how to describe it. She just feels so... young right now. And I mean... being a mom, that's one of the very few things in the world she has no way of knowing how to do. And she really only started living after she settled things with Dad, and that was only a few years ago...

"Momma, there's... it's not you. It's really not. I don't really know why I feel like that. I don't ever feel like... pressure from you, or anything. I guess it's... who you are, really. I have a lot to live up to."

She still looks confused. "I don't want you to live up to me. If indeed there's anything to live up to. Just be yourself. That's all I want for you."

"I know that," I tell her, wondering how I'm supposed to explain it. "I just feel like I have to, that's all. I'm your daughter, so I don't want to be embarrassing or anything."

"I don't... you're concerned about embarrassing me? Honestly, Caroline, I don't care what other people think of me. Especially not in connection with you. Don't worry about that."

And I know all of that. I know she just wants me to be who I want to be, and that I shouldn't worry about how I make her look. I don't think I make her look bad. Most of the time. "I try not to. You just have a really long shadow, you know?"

"I'm sorry."

"Momma," I say, rolling my optic, "it's not like you can do anything about it."

-"I just want to make sure I'm doing my best as a parent, that's all. I'm aware people must... expect things of you, as my daughter, but I want you to know that I do not. I – "

"How many times do I have to tell you?" I interrupt, looking at her sternly. "Momma, I have been outside. I met other kids and I met their parents. And I'm not making stuff up when I say you're the best of them! Nobody I ever met tries as hard as you do. I know you're doing your best. I know that. There's no need to feel bad about your parenting! You're a good mom, alright!"

She looks away and I know she still feels bad even though I've told her this same thing like five times already. I stare down at the paper again.

We're just kinda in silence after that, and I'm a little annoyed because I can stare at these proofs all day and they're not gonna turn into anything I can read. So I kinda want to talk, to fill this dumb silence, even though that'll defeat the purpose of why I'm even here. "Hey. Momma?"

"Mm."

Well, that's not a very encouraging response, but she doesn't really sound too upset. Maybe a little. "If you could have one thing, what would it be?"

"What sort of question is that?"

I shrug. "Just the first thing that came to mind."

"Does it have to be... physical? Or can it be more of a... concept?"

"Whatever's fine."

"Well," she says, sighing a little in what I think is resignation, "there's only one thing I really want for myself. Which is... to have meant something. I mentioned this yesterday."

I wasn't expecting an answer like that. I bring my attention to her, hoping she'll elaborate. I mean, a mention of it is all well and good, but... a mention is like a summary, and I'd rather hear how she really feels about this whole legacy thing.

"There is one thing that... concerns me the most," she continues slowly, regarding the floor panels somewhat uneasily. "No. I'll be totally honest. It terrifies me, to think that... that I may die forgotten. And I know it's... sort of stupid, but... I'm supposed to be the culmination of so many things. I am the most advanced supercomputer ever built. I am arguably the most advanced AI ever made. I am the most intelligent being alive... possibly ever to live, on this planet at least. So it follows that I should have achieved something great in my lifetime, that I should have done something with all of this potential that I have. And I hate to think that... that I won't. That I will just continue to stagnate, as I have done for so many years now, and that I will have wasted all the chances I've had the opportunity to pursue. I don't know why the Universe decided on me to give all of this to. But I do now that, if I do not achieve anything that outlasts me, that I will have failed the very Universe and will have... will have lived for nothing. And I don't mean to say that you aren't worth anything. You are. But... I want to have built something lasting for myself. That I did, to move the world forward, that made use of everything I am. Right now, I... there's nothing. I've started quite a lot of things. I've finished none of them, and no one but I will be able to make any sense of them for many, many years from now. I can't stand the idea, that all I'll ever culminate in is a plethora of half-finished projects and unresolved programs and... I can do better than that, can't I? Can't I, of all people, end up meaning something? And yet the years go by and I continue to have built nothing, I continue to only maintain the past, and the longer this continues the more likely it is that I am going to have squandered everything."