The Haunting Story of Two People—and Their Bots—on Therapy’s New Frontier

I.
Quentin in the Desert

Quentin awoke on a thin mattress, beneath a collection of scavenged blankets, in an abandoned RV deep in the Arizona desert. A young pit bull lay curled up beside them in the mid-morning light. Sliding from their bed over to the driver’s seat, Quentin pulled an American Spirit cigarette from a pack on the dashboard beside a small bowl of crystals. Outside the RV’s dusted-over windshield stretched an expanse of reddish clay earth, a bright cloudless sky, and a few scattered and…