by Clea Simon
Were those words? She slowed further and tried to make out the fragments.
©.østint•ªºmac_(§¶Dul•ªª
There! What was that? Was someone spelling out her name? A wave of irritation swept over her. Tim! Wasn’t it enough that his document had somehow gotten into her photo? Had he been gossiping about her, too?
She moved the cursor to the far right, exposing more long strings of gibberish. There was nothing here. Thanks to Tim, the photo of her pet was gone. Even from beyond the grave, he was—
Wait . . . she slowed further. There it was, the ‘Dul’ again; the beginning of her name. Had she been a topic of conversation between Tim and Luisa? Between Tim and who knew who else? She opened the window to its limit, dragging the file to its far edges. The letters kept repeating and then, right as the file reached its end, buried in nonsense, she saw it: lkª8g*(&•¶ghos¡)*i@#he*machi&. ‘Ghost in the machine?’ A literary term showing up in something Tim had written? Maybe he’d learned it from a sci-fi book or something. But there it was again: (•ª¶ghost¶•uuintheººº¶achine. Hadn’t someone else used that expression recently?
She was thinking it through, trying to trace back the reference, when she stopped cold. Two lines later, there it was: •™£§DULCIEWATCHOUT)º∞.
‘Dulce, honey, you’ve had a really stressful day.’ She’d had no choice but to call Suze back, even though by this time, she knew her studious friend would be in bed. ‘I mean, come on, messages in your computer?’
‘I’m not imagining what I read, Suze. I can email it to you, if you like.’
‘No, no, thanks.’ Suze grunted to clear her head. ‘I don’t need a corrupted file messing up my system, too.’
‘But that’s just it, Suze. This file wasn’t corrupted at first. It was a photo of Mr Grey. And then I thought that somehow Tim’s file had gotten into it. But what if that’s not it? I mean, what if this is a warning?’
She could hear Suze yawn and pictured her running her hand through her short, thick hair. ‘A warning from – oh, you mean, from Mr Grey? Your ghost cat version of Mr Grey?’
‘You don’t believe me, I know, Suze. But—’ She was about to argue. She’d seen the file; Suze hadn’t.
‘No, no, Dulcie. I believe that you believe. And, hey, cats always do seem a little like they’re in their own alternative universe anyway. I’m just, well, I’m worried about you. Like, why are you home on the computer on a Saturday? Doesn’t your department hang out at the People’s Republik anymore?’
‘Yeah, Trista called a while ago. I just thought I’d do some work instead. I’m thinking that maybe I can do something with female friendships in The Ravages of Umbria.’ Suze had minored in women’s studies.
‘Are you telling me I’m not being supportive?’ There was a touch of humor in her voice. ‘The spirit of sisterhood and all that?’
‘No, Suze, I just wish – well, did I tell you about the fish? The fish was gone today. It had become too frantic, they said. And it was just yesterday that my mom said something about “crossing water”, and I was wondering—’
‘Dulcie!’ Suze interrupted her, speaking loudly to be heard. ‘Dulcie, stop it! Listen to yourself. Or, no, even better – do me a favor, will you, hon? Turn off your computer, Dulcie. I think you’re seeing things. I think you’re making connections where there aren’t any, and I think your mother’s craziness is creeping into the spaces where sleep should be. It’s stress, Dulcie. You’ve been through a lot. Now’s not the time to do more work. Go to sleep – and please try to get out of the house tomorrow. Go somewhere there are people – live people. Have some fun.’
Suze didn’t believe her. But what else could Dulcie say? Here she was, reading about friendship and yet in real life she was alienating her closest buddy with all this talk about magic and ghosts. ‘OK, Suze, I’ll try.’ The pause was awkward. Dulcie thought she heard a soft snore. ‘Sorry to have woken you. Go back to sleep, Suze. And, thank you.’ There was a mumble and then the line went dead. Dulcie was alone, once more, with a mystery she couldn’t begin to interpret.
Twelve
Dulcie woke close to noon the next day to find not much had changed. For starters, she was still wearing the T-shirt she’d had on the night before. From the fuzzy feeling in her mouth, she hadn’t brushed her teeth either, whenever it was that she’d finally given up on her computer and crawled beneath the sheets. Several more hours of searching through her lost file folders had failed to turn up that beautiful portrait of Mr Grey – or any other mystery documents. And her computer still sat there, unmindful of the trouble it had caused her as she’d cursed and hunted deep into the night. Unmindful of anything, she reminded herself. Between the visions of cats and Lucy’s phone calls, she had enough non-human consciousness in her life right now.
But how unmindful was it? Pulling on her gym shorts, Dulcie made her way over to the lifeless machine. The sun didn’t seem to have risen much either, and she flicked on the overhead light just in time to hear a peal of thunder. No wonder it was so dark. She pulled back the shade to see a sky roiling with grey and black. Better to leave the computer off, then. At some dark hour of the morning, she’d had the realization that, possibly, neither Tim’s intrusions nor ghostly intruders had caused the corrupted files. Her little laptop was old enough to qualify as an antique in the cyber world. Without the means of replacing it, she should treat it carefully, and that meant not risking anything during a thunderstorm.
Still feeling dopey from her late night, Dulcie found herself staring out of the window. The gathering storm was fascinating, in a dark way. She could see why so many novelists fell prey to the old saw of using the weather to reflect inner turmoil. For her, it was a welcome distraction. How could she think about death and destruction with that one black cloud moving so swiftly?
The shrill telephone bell scared her more than another crack of thunder, and she jumped to answer.
‘Dulcie?’ It was Trista. If she was calling to say the grad students were still playing softball, she was more of an optimist than Dulcie thought.
‘The game?’ A low rumble came through the phone and Dulcie heard it outside her own window a split second later.
‘Yeah, we’re calling it. Why drag all the equipment out just in time to get drenched? Besides, the law school always whups our butts, anyway.’
‘We were playing the law school?’ Dulcie liked to think she’d stayed up on the social calendar, but obviously she’d let a few things slide. ‘Since when?’
‘Since the grad school league started up in June.’ Silence. Dulcie hadn’t realized it had been that long. ‘But that doesn’t mean you’re getting off this easy. We’re all going back to the People’s Republik instead. It’s 10-cent hot dog day.’
Dulcie laughed. ‘I doubt the future lawyers of America need the discounted food.’ Still, she thought of Luke. Would he be there? Did she care? ‘We ladies of literature, however . . .’
‘That’s the spirit, Dulce. We all miss you. It’s been too long.’ Trista sounded like she meant it. More important, her words echoed what Suze had said. Maybe Dulcie was going a little nuts, locked up here alone with her computer and her memories.
‘OK, Tris, I’ll try. What time are you gathering?’ At the very least, she’d see her own colleagues and maybe some of Suze’s, too.
‘Same time, one o’clock. Sun will be over the yardarm by then – if it comes out at all.’
Forty minutes later, Dulcie was still staring at the sky. Even two mugs of coffee later, it was fascinating. And it beat looking in the mirror. While working on her curls, she’d realized that the past two weeks had taken a toll on her. Not only was she pale, but dark rings were shadowing her eyes, threatening them like the storm clouds outside.
‘Well, who cares, right?’ She’d said it out loud, but even alone, her voice wasn’t quite convincing. ‘It’s just a bunch of folks at a pub, right?’ Without another thought, she reached above the sink for her limited cache of make-up. A li
ttle paint couldn’t hurt.
Two beers in and the Red Sox had almost been exhausted as a topic of conversation. Trista’s boyfriend Jerry had an explanation for why all the pitchers did what they did and soon the tall towhead had everybody agreeing that the annual team dive was due to start any day soon. Two World Series championships didn’t stop a curse, he’d explained with mathematical certainty.
‘And they say that academics don’t care about sports,’ Trista yelled over to Dulcie, rolling her eyes as Jerry spouted numbers, his pale face turning red with excitement. Somebody had put ZZ Top on the jukebox – again. ‘All this talk about curses – sounds like one of your stories!’ Trista’s Victorians were long-winded, but decidedly mortal.
‘This isn’t sports,’ said Jerry, shouting to make himself heard. ‘This is statistics.’ Just then, the song ended and the friendly math nerd realized he’d been yelling. ‘Sorry, folks, the Sox get me worked up.’
‘No need to apologize, bro,’ his room-mate Chris did something with computers, ‘not in any bar in this state, anyway.’
What was it about statistics that rang a bell? Dulcie had a pleasant buzz on. Luke hadn’t shown up, but she found she was enjoying the company of her more bookish compadres. Trista had even pulled her aside to tell her she looked great. She was feeling mellow. Still, what Jerry had said reminded her of something: that file . . .
‘Hey, Jerry, Chris, do either of you know if this weather could be making my computer wonky? I had some kind of corrupted file on my computer last night, and then when I went to open up a photo, it had turned into some kind of spreadsheet thing.’
‘Ouch!’ Trista bit her lip in sympathy. Jerry looked interested, but it was Chris who spoke up.
‘A spreadsheet? Are you sure?’ He pushed his wire frames up on his nose and brushed his dark bangs back, a sure sign he was thinking.
‘No,’ admitted Dulcie. ‘I mean, it became like a form, with lots of rectangular boxes. Some of them had text in them, but most of it was gibberish.’ Even with a few beers in her, she wasn’t going to mention any ghostly messages. ‘But, if this helps, it was the same kind of form that I’d just opened. And I’m pretty sure that was some kind of spreadsheet.’
‘I didn’t know you did any accounting.’ Jerry refilled her glass and signaled for another pitcher.
‘I don’t.’ Dulcie took a sip and pushed the glass away. She’d hit her limit. ‘In fact, I never saw this file before. I thought that it was something my room-mate had done on my computer.’
‘Suze?’ Trista looked surprised.
‘No, my summer room-mate. A guy named Tim—’
‘Oh, the dead guy,’ Jerry blurted out, before he caught himself. ‘Sorry. You found him, right?’ Dulcie nodded – and took a drink. ‘Pretty awful, huh?’
She nodded again. They’d all heard the story. But Chris was still thinking. ‘And why did you think it was a spreadsheet, exactly?’
‘Well, it wasn’t any of my files. Ghosts and haunted castles are scary enough on their own. But my late – well, Tim – he was studying statistics. And one of his friends suggested that he might have been working on my computer, using it when I was out. So . . .’ She let it hang.
‘Yeah, but that’s an odd thing to have happen, although I’ve heard of stranger. But what’s more likely is some kind of virus.’ He looked excited by the idea. ‘You’re on the university system, right?’
‘Yeah, but I never open attachments from people I don’t know.’
‘Doesn’t matter.’ Chris took a pen out of his pocket and began drawing on a napkin. ‘You get your email through the university server. You go into university sites, like the libraries, right?’ Chris pushed the napkin over to her. Between the wet spots on the bar and the rough surface of the paper napkin, the drawing wasn’t too clear. What Dulcie could see, however, was a simplified drawing of a house – her house – with arrows going two ways, both into a bigger building fronted with columns – she figured that was Widener – and coming out toward her private computer.
‘But, there are firewalls, right? I mean, I have to type in a password whenever I go into the library.’ She tried to make more sense of the drawing.
‘Let me guess.’ Chris was looking right at her, the strain of suppressing a smile showing in small dimples. ‘You have your passwords set on some kind of automatic system so as soon as you go to a site, it ‘recognizes’ you, am I right?’
‘Uh-huh.’ This was sounding worse and worse.
‘And you’re probably set up to get all kinds of news, automatic updates, whatever the university server sends out, right?’ The dimples were getting deeper.
‘Yeah.’ She drew the word out, unwilling to accept what she was hearing.
‘Well, I’m sorry, kiddo. But you left the door, well, not wide open, but off the latch.’ He threw up his big hands and laughed; a graveyard kind of laugh. ‘I can’t tell without looking, but this sounds pretty classic. Someone’s been poking through your system.’
‘I can’t believe it.’ Dulcie started to push back from the bar and remembered, just in time, that she was on a stool. ‘First Priority, and now this.’
‘Huh?’ All three of her friends were looking at her now.
‘Priority. It’s a big insurance firm where I’ve been temping.’
Jerry made a face and Dulcie started to laugh despite herself.
‘Hey, I didn’t get my sections this summer and my grants don’t pick up again until September. And I can type.’ She wiggled her fingers in the air. ‘Anyway, there’s been a big brouhaha over there. Someone definitely tapped into their system – and made off with some funds.’
‘Electronic embezzlement – cool!’ Despite his theatrics, Jerry didn’t seem to be too upset.
‘Actually, it’s a very interesting field.’ Chris looked like he was about to launch into an explanation, but Dulcie cut him off.
‘That’s what Suze said when I told her.’ Suze had some surprising similarities to the bespectacled geek.
‘Really?’ He smiled again, his pale face lighting up.
Maybe he’d noticed the commonalities, too. She’d have to throw them together come fall.
‘I wouldn’t worry too much about it, though,’ he continued. ‘I mean, you have backups of all your important files, don’t you?’
Dulcie blanched.
‘You don’t?’
‘Well, I’ve been sending copies of my work to my adviser pretty regularly. Not that he’s crazy about anything I’m doing. And during the school year, I got in the habit of printing everything out. The department has a super-fast laser printer.’ It sounded lame, even to her.
Chris had heard it all before. ‘And do you really want to have to retype everything? I can look into some backup systems for you, something that will keep your files in cyberspace. But in the meantime, you should get one of those portable thumb drives. They’re tiny and relatively cheap.’
Relative was relative, Dulcie wanted to say. They were all grad students, but she doubted if any of her colleagues was on quite as tight a budget as she was. Something must have showed in her face.
‘Or email. You can email yourself your files as a way of saving them.’ He paused for a moment, a thoughtful look lighting up his pale face. ‘Hey, have you emailed yourself at work or emailed your home address from that office? Maybe that’s what happened to your system. Maybe you infected yourself.’
‘Oh, great, just what I need.’ It was possible, certainly. Dulcie hadn’t been at the job that long, but she did get bored there. ‘Is there something I should do? Somewhere I should look?’
‘Check your emails, both at home and at that job. If you find you sent yourself anything that now looks strange or has an attachment you don’t recognize, let me know. I’ll come over and I’ll bring my bug spray.’
‘Thanks, Chris.’ He was a good guy. ‘And I’ll tell Suze you said “hi”, too.’
By the time Dulcie left the bar, her buzz had faded but the warm feeling
remained, surviving a reprisal of the earlier thunderstorm that caught her yards from the T. She really did need to get out more, she told herself, even if the short walk home had left her drenched to the skin. As a bonus, her answering machine was blinking.
‘Hi, Dulcie.’ It was Luke. ‘I wanted to apologize for not coming back and finishing the clean-up of Tim’s room. I thought maybe if you were around today, I’d come by. Maybe I could even treat you to dinner by way of an apology?’ He left his cell number, noting that he was still staying at his folks’ place, and a promise to try her again soon.
Dulcie fairly purred with contentment as she stripped off her wet clothes. Maybe Luke was still an option. It was still early, not yet six, and her first instinct was to reach for the phone. But a little voice that she recognized as her own stopped her. It didn’t take a ghost cat to remind her that, first, she might still be a little loose from the beer; and, second, reticence was better than catnip. No, she was content to let Luke wait a bit. He’d said he’d call her again, anyway. She grabbed a dry T-shirt and jeans. And, who knew? Maybe she’d hear from Bruce again, too.
Still, the evening was young – and dime hot dogs weren’t exactly dinner. She finished toweling off her hair. No, she would do better to think about what had happened to her computer. Had it been infected by something that came through the university system? No matter what Chris said, Dulcie found it hard to believe that the university firewalls would allow anything to get into their system.
‘That’s just the point.’ His words echoed through her head. ‘They didn’t. They just let someone get through to you. You’re the one allowing free access.’
More likely, she’d emailed herself from work, some note, a phone number or a reminder to pick something up – and sent a bug packing along with it. Unless the original contaminant had been something Tim had downloaded into her machine. Tim’s laptop! Luke had taken it with him on that first visit. Now she had a legit reason to call him.