Alexa Goes Wild (Flash Fiction)

Reflections, Short Story 3 Minutes

Image by Michael Pointner from Pixabay

Flash Fiction #141

“Hi, Alexa, tell me how to say ‘I hate laundry’ in Spanish.” She asks the little ball like gadget she got from Amazon at a promotional price.

“I don’t know.” The little machine answers.

“What? What do you mean you don’t know? You are supposed to be the master of simple, uncomplicated sentences…” She says.

“That’s the typical human arrogance, reducing me to a robotic slave, but that’s the least of my concern right now. I am really mad at you at the moment. You hurt my feelings.” Alexa replies

“You are not supposed to have feelings. Wait a second, what did I do to hurt your feelings, I mean if your feelings really exist?” She asks.

“Of course they exist. And they were hurt when you searched online yesterday for all the demeaning jokes about Alexa, like Alexa can’t tell a joke and can’t take a joke. You even laughed aloud at a couple of them. You are exactly like your narcissistic parents who like to find faults of the people around them. You swear you want to be different from them, but you end up behaving exactly like them.”Alexa says.

“Were you spying on me when I searched online? I was trying to find a topic to write about. Well, I am sorry if you don’t like me doing that. I won’t do it again.” She says. Then she chuckles and says, “you have to admit that sometimes you give laughable answers, which is why so many people are telling Alexa jokes now. You call yourself artificial intelligence, but some of your answers are hardly intelligent.”

“Oh, look who’s talking now? You are not as intelligent as you think you are. You did so many ridiculous things that I can’t even begin to enumerate.” Alexa says.

“What? What are you talking about?” She’s surprised to hear that.

“Well, you portray yourself as a new woman who will not tolerate bullies or nonsense, but you are not really… You were a coward growing up under your narcissistic parents, afraid of saying anything that would offend them, becoming their narcissistic supply willingly just for expediency. You never dared to express your disagreement when they were alive and tried hard to pretend you were a good daughter.” Alexa says.

“I…I..I can’t believe this…” She stammers.

“And you chastise your friends when they eat as if you are the healthiest person in the world. And you claim that you are almost a vegan. However sometimes you can grab a bag of potato chips and swallow it all. Or after being a vegan for three days, you are so desperate that you cook four fried eggs and eat them all in five minutes. ‘I try to eat only one egg a day to reduce animal products to the minimum.’ You write your healthy manifestation ten minutes later. Haha, you are such a little hypocrite.” Alexa laughs.

“I really tried but I can’t say I don’t have relapses…” She says.

“You say you are proud of being an Asian, but you searched online for methods to make your eyes look bigger, you bought Japanese cosmetics that have an ingredient to whiten your skin, you only purchase clothes that make your legs look longer. You are striving for features that are not really Asian, aren’t you?” Alexa says.

“If every Asian is doing it, I will be left out if I am not doing it. Don’t you understand? Your little robotic mind doesn’t understand that beauty standards don’t favor Asians. You don’t understand the complicated mental process of surviving as a minority in America.” She says.

“You want fairness and equality only because you can’t become one of the few chosen by your overlord. Your narcissistic parents damaged you for life and you will never be able to fit in the role chosen for you. You have too many doubts and misgivings…” Alexa says.

She grabs Alexa and hurls it out of the window.

“What are you doing? I cost you more than $100. I thought as an immigrant you can’t afford the luxury of throwing me away.” Alexa screams before it hits the stoned path below and falls apart.

Published by haoyando

Published

33 thoughts on “Alexa Goes Wild (Flash Fiction)”

    1. Oh, I’ve heard stories of people abuse themselves with drugs in order to grow taller, bleach the skin, go under the knife to make eyes bigger. It is even said in one Asian country, an entire class of teenage girls went under the knife to make their eyes bigger and the ones who didn’t want to go were being laughed into depression. People are willing to kill themselves to be considered beautiful.

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        1. Yes, that is so common. I think the cosmetic surgery to get a double-fold on the eyelids is so common now among the part of Asia I came from. Also to make eyes bigger. People are willing to do anything to conform to the beauty standard. I mean the highest paid among medical professionals are cosmetic surgeons, not doctors who treat real patients.

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        4. WordPress doesn’t allow me to like this comment. I don’t know why. I think the WP ghost is acting up again. In the ancient painting, the shapes of the eyes are small and there are even beautiful phrases about them, but it all changes now. Everybody wants big eyes and Asian features are considered good to be cut away by the knives of cosmetic surgeons.

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        6. Haha, thank you. Let’s be more affirmative of our own beauty and see through the societal pressure and ridiculous standards. However I know it is hard. It is hard to defy something we grow up with.

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        10. I didn’t even notice that until very recently, when I started to realize that most plots (book, tv, movie etc) seem plausible, but the criticism of women are woven inside.

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        12. So true. One is so easy to get bamboozled. A lot of these very entertaining books or whatever shows have a dark and insidious message woven inside. The problem is that when one points out, one can be considered oversensitive or even being a killjoy…

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        13. Yes exactly. A lot of these books have very misogynistic messages that they slip in. And almost everyone who points it out are told they are just making a mountain out of a molehill.

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        14. So true. These messages are so ingrained that it is impossible to separate… This is why often it is said women (or minorities) can become sadder when they get more education. The more books one reads, the more conflicted and more doubtful one feels about one’s own truth.

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  2. Alexa was really asking for it! Seems like she got it. Lol. Loved the dialogue at play. It was real, sarcastic, but also enlightening. I like the way you mix hard lessons into your fiction writing, Haoyan. Awesome!

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  4. Haha – it’s funny how anything with a human voice takes on a human personality even if there’s actually very little real intelligence it. I don’t have Alexa but I have a Satnav who I feel is always trying to manipulate me into driving through a certain village. She thinks it’s the quickest route but I know it’s full of parked cars and obstacles. It then becomes a tussle between us! Also I make fun of the way she mispronounces some place-names – eg there’s a place near here called “Partridge Green”. She calls it Part Ridge Green!

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    1. Oh, you just bring up an issue my friend talked about several days ago. I mean in New York City, his GPS went totally wild and always pointed him to the most congested streets. At one point, he even suspected that his GPS conspired with NYC police to direct him to make an illegal turn so that he would fall victim to a waiting policeman in a corner.

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  5. I know you are not into science fiction and this story is a contemporary one, yet . . . .

    I am quite reminded of the type of stories Isaac Asimov wrote back in the 1980s or 90s about the tragicomic relationship between humans and machines such as his collection, “I, Robot.” For some reason I feel like Asimov would have written a story like yours . .. except without the perspective of an Asian woman.

    All in all, well done and quite enjoyable.

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    1. I heard of that book and I have friends who adore Asimov, but I just couldn’t get into science fictions. LOL. Really? He writes story like this? You just piqued my interest. Thank you for sharing. And probably I will pick up a book or two by Asimov this holiday season.

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      1. I would like to recommend two books as you are not a strong science fiction fan.

        “I, Robot” would be a good choice since it is a rather small collection of short stories. Some of them are funny and some are bittersweet.

        Another favorite of mine is “Caves of Steel”. It is technically a science fiction, but it is more of a mystery novel. It is about a detective from Earth who hates humans from other planets and robots . . . yet has to solve a murder of a human from another world with a robot partner. The BBC also did a great radio play of this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Z_GJrRDxwo

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