14 February 2027
Sunday. Valentine’s Day. Romance is in the air, along with the smoke.
A couple arrived at the desk holding hands and asked for my laboratory for two. Just the two of them, alone, in the dark, with a body under a sheet. I was touched. I was also obliged to refuse. My experiment needs three assistants at the very least, in both laboratories, on every day of the week. Two people cannot read the journals, hunt the organs and mind the machinery at once. I have tried it with one, myself, and look where it got me.
They went away and came back twenty minutes later with her brother, who had been eating lunch nearby and did not entirely understand what was happening. He was the best assistant of the three. He asked no questions and carried everything.
A hens’ party came in later, in veils, and a birthday after that. My laboratory is very popular for celebrations. Nobody has yet held a wedding in it. I live in hope.
In the margin: The brother wrote his name on the back of my hand in biro. I have decided we are friends. Also, the doctor did not try it with one. He tried it with me, and I was asleep, which I maintain does not count.
— V. Frankenstein
