Hi Annika,

I’m a junior at UCLA (comp sci major) and my roommate Sean said he really liked helping you train OLLI two weeks ago. Can I volunteer to do that too?

Colin McGuire

“Perfect,” June said when she was done reading. “I like that his roommate’s already done this, so he has an idea of how it works. And comp sci majors are normally interested in the tech, so they don’t ask stupid questions like ‘Who am I talking to, exactly? Why do you get to define sentience?’”

Annika laughed. “You really didn’t like that philosophy major, did you?”

June grunted her displeasure as she went back to her desk. “OLLI’s a neural network. ‘Who defines sentience?’ Who gives a shit? Just help me train the damn thing.”

Annika grinned.

OLLI—the Original Love Language Interface—was completely innovative tech. Once it was ready, it would function as a relationship therapist people could have in the comfort of their own phones, a Google Translate for couples. You’d pull up the Make Up app, leave it on the table while you had a serious conversation with your partner, and OLLI would listen in and facilitate a healthier, calmer dialogue. If things started going badly, OLLI would flash a suggestion to fix your mistake—for example, by rephrasing something in a more compassionate, partner-focused manner. OLLI would also be able to detect anger or highly negative emotionality in your voice and push calming messages to help correct the issue.

Annika had read a book by a marriage counselor who claimed poor communication was responsible for ninety percent of divorces. Make Up could fix that. That’s where the beta testers came in.

Annika and June would sit with volunteer beta testers for hours while they answered questions and role-played a communication a user might have in a relationship, to train OLLI on their voice and patterns of speech. Eventually, OLLI would get so smart and self-sufficient that it could be used by anyone anywhere.

It was, if Annika did say so herself, a completely genius idea. It was just taking slightly longer than either of them had anticipated or hoped to finish the OLLI prototype, which meant the grants they’d won were drying up and there was no new source of income. A fact that Mr. McManor from the Bank of California had clearly noticed.

But Annika was still optimistic. Little electric sparkles of excitement danced along her skin as she responded to Colin and asked him to come in. This was how she’d felt when she first came up with the idea for Make Up and OLLI, the kind of feeling she got every time she thought about helping someone fall back in love with their loved one. The kind of feeling she lived for. You know, not the dark, sinking desperation that came from being cash-poor.