Cold Calls by Charles Benoit Page A

that, she put three bullet points.
    Fatima glanced up at the ceiling. “Maybe nine?”
    Shelly put
F 9
after the first bullet and
S 9:30
after the second.
    â€œLooks like she started with me,” Eric said. “I got my first call two weeks ago. Wednesday night, around ten. It sounded like a prank, so I hung up. Then he—sorry,
she
—called again a few minutes later. That’s when she said, ‘I know your secret.’ But that time she hung up on me.”
    â€œSmart,” Shelly said, adding Eric’s details to the list. “Hanging up like that, she got in your head.”
    â€œI don’t think so.”
    â€œReally? I bet you couldn’t wait till that last call came. And don’t worry, she got in all of our heads.”
    â€œI can’t believe you hung up,” Fatima said. “Weren’t you even
curious?
”
    He shrugged. “Not really. I mean, calling with that I-know-your-secret stuff? That’s something you do when you’re in fourth grade. You could say that to
anybody
and they’d freak.”
    â€œThat’s pretty much what I did,” Fatima said. “I ended up just about begging her to tell me what she knew. And then, well, she did.”
    â€œI didn’t have to beg,” Eric said. “She called back, then sent me an email from a bogus EarthLink account.”
    â€œAnd something in the email proved she knew your secret?”
    Eric nodded.
    â€œAll right, let’s go there next.” Below the bullet points, Shelly wrote
WHAT
.
    â€œWe’re going to tell what our secret is? I don’t think so,” Eric said.
    â€œSorry, that’s not what I meant,” Shelly said. She crossed out
WHAT
and wrote
EVIDENCE
. “She’s got something on each of us—”
    â€œNo kidding.”
    â€œâ€”but it’s gotta be something that’s really obvious.”
    â€œIf it was obvious, then it wouldn’t be a secret.”
    Shelly ignored him. “Whatever it is she’s got on each of us, it’s gotta be self-evident.”
    Eric looked at her. “
Self-evident?
Can you just say what you mean?”
    â€œNo, hold on, I got it,” Fatima said. “You’re saying that whatever evidence she has, it has to be something that she doesn’t have to explain to people. Right?”
    Shelly closed her eyes and smiled. “Exactly.”
    Eric knocked on the table. “Why?”
    â€œBecause she’s not gonna want to be there to have to explain it to them,” Fatima said. “She just wants people to look at it or read it or whatever and know right away what the big secret is.”
    Eric took a second, then nodded. “Okay. Go on.”
    â€œFor me—and this is all I’m going to tell you—she’s got information.” Shelly wrote the word on the paper.
    â€œVague much? Everything is information,” Fatima said.
    Shelly played with the marker as she thought it through, pulling the cap off and snapping it back in place. “She knows something about me,” she finally said. “Is that good enough?”
    Eric waved his hand, moving her along.
    â€œA book,” Fatima said. “She has a book of mine.”
    â€œLike a journal?”
    â€œSorta. But not really. Can you just put down ‘book’ for now?”
    Shelly added it to the list, glancing at Eric as she wrote. “Your turn.”
    â€œI don’t see the point of this,” he said. “How can knowing what she has help us figure out who it is?”
    â€œIt might not,” Shelly said. “But we don’t have much to go on, do we? It’s a piece of the puzzle, that’s all. Maybe an important piece, maybe not. Later it might make all the difference. Or none. Look, you don’t have to be specific. I wasn’t. Is it bigger than an X-box?”
    He sighed and rubbed the hint of stubble on his chin. “It’s a