Jeff’s emails, then sort them by name. Sender: Patricia Underhill. Sent to: Patricia Underhill.
I scroll down the list, and there they are: the emails and emails and emails we’ve exchanged over the last year. I open one at random.
I think I need some more training
, he wrote at 11:52 a.m. six months ago.
Uh-huh
.
No, seriously, I can’t remember if we’re supposed to be compassionate and caring, or caring and compassionate. I need to do module 3 again
.
I could explain it to you on the phone
.
That wouldn’t be any fun
.
I’ll see what I can do. The training centre’s pretty booked this week
.
I have faith
.
You gotta have faitha, faitha, faitha
.
You have terrible taste in music
.
I click it shut. I press the buttons to highlight them all, my finger hesitating over the Delete key.
I can’t do it.
I reach into my desk drawer and remove a USB key. I transfer the emails to it, then erase the originals from the server and then the offline backup, a real delete this time. The USB key has a lanyard attached to it, which I loop around my neck. The metal feels warm and dangerous against my skin.
Now I have one thing left to do. Because erasing the emails from the office’s system doesn’t affect whatever he’s kept in his personal account. Maybe there’s nothing there, but I can’t take the risk. I go to his email service, type in his address, and take a guess at his password. His middle name is Michael but that’s not it. I try his birthday in all combinations, his address, the name of his favourite football team. Seth’s birthday. Claire’s. Nothing works.
Then my eyes track to the “forgot your password?” prompt. I follow the instructions to have a password hint sent to [email protected], and wait the anxious seconds before the email arrives. It pings into place and I open it. I almost laugh out loud. Jeff’s password hint is
fuck off
.
It would be. I type
fuck off
into the password space, and still nothing.
Goddamnit. My only hope now is, if I can’t figure it out, maybe no one else can either.
A faint hope indeed.
Twenty minutes later I’m home again and crawling back into bed, though sleep is an impossibility. The lanyard is still around my neck. I clutch the USB key in my hand like it might contain some part of Jeff that’s still alive. His beating heart. His gentle brain.
Brian turns towards me, awake. “Did you go out?”
“I, uh, remembered I hadn’t sent a report to Mr. Keene that he needs first thing tomorrow morning.”
“Couldn’t you have sent it from here?”
“Something’s wrong with the remote server.”
“Sorry you had to go out.”
“That’s okay.”
“You know you don’t have to work there if you don’t want to.”
“I know.”
He pulls the covers up to his shoulders. “I should get back to sleep, and so should you.”
“Don’t worry about me.”
His hand snakes towards my thigh under the covers. “I won’t ever stop.”
CHAPTER 9
Meet Cute
About a year ago , Johnson Company did a total software overhaul. Our new email program took its cue from Facebook. Everyone in the system now had a user profile that included a picture and a mini-bio that popped up on the side of the page if you clicked on their contact information or emailed them.
My name is Jeff Manning. I like sunsets and kittens and …
It was meant to foster “inter-office collegiality” or some such bullshit. As far as I could tell, it was mainly an opportunity for voyeurism and ridicule, particularly for the people—almost always women, almost always of a certain age—who took the whole thing too seriously. They’d strike “alluring” poses with their faces tilted to the side, their hair salon-perfect, and post bios full of their likes and dislikes. If they were stupid enough to mention their cats — or, God forbid, pose with one of them—they were done for.
I don’t know if it was spite, boredom, or low-level rebellion, but the minute the site went live, there
I scroll down the list, and there they are: the emails and emails and emails we’ve exchanged over the last year. I open one at random.
I think I need some more training
, he wrote at 11:52 a.m. six months ago.
Uh-huh
.
No, seriously, I can’t remember if we’re supposed to be compassionate and caring, or caring and compassionate. I need to do module 3 again
.
I could explain it to you on the phone
.
That wouldn’t be any fun
.
I’ll see what I can do. The training centre’s pretty booked this week
.
I have faith
.
You gotta have faitha, faitha, faitha
.
You have terrible taste in music
.
I click it shut. I press the buttons to highlight them all, my finger hesitating over the Delete key.
I can’t do it.
I reach into my desk drawer and remove a USB key. I transfer the emails to it, then erase the originals from the server and then the offline backup, a real delete this time. The USB key has a lanyard attached to it, which I loop around my neck. The metal feels warm and dangerous against my skin.
Now I have one thing left to do. Because erasing the emails from the office’s system doesn’t affect whatever he’s kept in his personal account. Maybe there’s nothing there, but I can’t take the risk. I go to his email service, type in his address, and take a guess at his password. His middle name is Michael but that’s not it. I try his birthday in all combinations, his address, the name of his favourite football team. Seth’s birthday. Claire’s. Nothing works.
Then my eyes track to the “forgot your password?” prompt. I follow the instructions to have a password hint sent to [email protected], and wait the anxious seconds before the email arrives. It pings into place and I open it. I almost laugh out loud. Jeff’s password hint is
fuck off
.
It would be. I type
fuck off
into the password space, and still nothing.
Goddamnit. My only hope now is, if I can’t figure it out, maybe no one else can either.
A faint hope indeed.
Twenty minutes later I’m home again and crawling back into bed, though sleep is an impossibility. The lanyard is still around my neck. I clutch the USB key in my hand like it might contain some part of Jeff that’s still alive. His beating heart. His gentle brain.
Brian turns towards me, awake. “Did you go out?”
“I, uh, remembered I hadn’t sent a report to Mr. Keene that he needs first thing tomorrow morning.”
“Couldn’t you have sent it from here?”
“Something’s wrong with the remote server.”
“Sorry you had to go out.”
“That’s okay.”
“You know you don’t have to work there if you don’t want to.”
“I know.”
He pulls the covers up to his shoulders. “I should get back to sleep, and so should you.”
“Don’t worry about me.”
His hand snakes towards my thigh under the covers. “I won’t ever stop.”
CHAPTER 9
Meet Cute
About a year ago , Johnson Company did a total software overhaul. Our new email program took its cue from Facebook. Everyone in the system now had a user profile that included a picture and a mini-bio that popped up on the side of the page if you clicked on their contact information or emailed them.
My name is Jeff Manning. I like sunsets and kittens and …
It was meant to foster “inter-office collegiality” or some such bullshit. As far as I could tell, it was mainly an opportunity for voyeurism and ridicule, particularly for the people—almost always women, almost always of a certain age—who took the whole thing too seriously. They’d strike “alluring” poses with their faces tilted to the side, their hair salon-perfect, and post bios full of their likes and dislikes. If they were stupid enough to mention their cats — or, God forbid, pose with one of them—they were done for.
I don’t know if it was spite, boredom, or low-level rebellion, but the minute the site went live, there
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