by Ray Daniel
I ducked down in a gap next to the convenience store, ran up the steps, and tried the door. Locked. I rang the first-floor bell, and got a buzzing in return. The hallway had the utilitarian, painted-over look of housing for young people—kids who have yet to be convinced that a tastefully appointed entryway is the essence of happiness. I headed up the steps. Dorothy lived on the third floor. Someone opened their apartment to see who had buzzed.
“Sorry,” I called down. “Wrong button.”
Dorothy’s apartment door stood at the top of the steps. I knocked. Waited. No answer. Knocked again. Heard a woman: “Just a minute!”
The door opened and a petite girl wearing jeans and an apparently ironic Styx T-shirt stood before me: straight black hair, olive skin, almond eyes, and a silver septum ring whose barbells stuck out of her nostrils like two mercury snots. The sparkling nostrils caught my eye.
“Can I help you?” she asked.
“Are you Dorothy Flores?”
“Yes.”
I took a step in, stuck out my hand. “Hi. I’m Aloysius Tucker.”
Dorothy screamed an ear-shattering scream, reached down next to the door, grabbed a wooden baseball bat and took a swing at me. She had excellent form. The bat smacked into my ribs, shooting pain through my side and dropping me to one knee.
“Stay away from me!” she yelled, and raised the bat over her head in what would definitely be the coup de grâce.
I decided to reason with her. “What the fuck?” I said, raising my hand to block the bat if it came down.
“You stay away from me!” Dorothy repeated.
“Stay away from me, you psycho!” I said, the pain in my ribs destroying any shreds of diplomacy.
Dorothy lowered the bat, kept it ready. “I’m not a psycho.”
I pressed my hand into my side, winced. “My ribs say you are.”
“You killed Peter! Now you’ve come for me!”
A frail voice called out from the back room. “Dorothy? Dorothy, what’s the matter?”
Dorothy said nothing.
“Should I call the police?”
Dorothy looked at me. I said, “I don’t care. Call them. You’re the one with the bat.”
“You’re the killer.”
“Dorothy?” the voice called. “I want to get into my chair.”
I made an it’s your call gesture. “I was going to warn you, but now I’m not so interested.”
Dorothy looked from me to the voice in the back and back. “I’ll help you in a minute, Auntie,” she called. Then to me she said, “You need to leave.”
I got to my feet. “Fine. Don’t blame me when the FBI surprises you and I’m not there to help.”
Dorothy said, “After today, you’re not going to be helping anybody.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Just get out.”
I got out. Reached the street, gingerly touched my ribs. Just a bruise. Still hurt. Went across the street to the CVS next to Mary Ann’s Bar, bought some Advil, and stood in the street.
I had kept my PwnSec doxing to myself in hopes that I could use its secrecy as leverage with Dorothy. That didn’t work out. Dorothy had drunk all the Internet Kool-Aid when it came to me. So the next step was to share what I knew and see where that got me.
I called Mel. Told her what I had.
“Meet me for coffee,” said Mel.
“Sure. Where?”
“The 7 Pond Coffee Bar.”
“Where is that?”
“Um … 7 Pond Street?”
“Smart-ass.”
“Smarter, anyway.”
I closed the call and put in a request for an Uber. It was time to stop messing around with PwnSec and get some help. Dorothy said that something was supposed to happen today. I didn’t like the sound of that.
Forty
A Tesla sporting an Uber windshield ornament glided to the curb with battery-powered silence. I pulled open the passenger door. Checked out the driver. Fat face, fat stomach, fat legs, and fat stubby arms. The guy filled the seat the way pudding fills a bowl.
“Mind if I sit in the front seat?”
“What is your name, sir?”
“Aloysius Tucker.”
“Then come on in.”
I climbed in. The Tesla slid off down Beacon Street, took a right at Dean, and lost itself in a warren of residential housing.
I said, “You don’t see many Teslas doing Uber.”
“Are you the Aloysius Tucker?” the driver asked.
Uh-oh.
“You mean the as in ‘the famous Aloysius Tucker’ or as in ‘the infamous Aloysius Tucker’? Because if it’s the second one then no, I’m not me.”
“You’re the guy they’re talking about on the #TuckerGate hash, right?”
“And you are?”
“Derrick James. On Twitter I’m @BosUberTesla.”
I treaded carefully. “And how are things on Twitter?”
“Did you really slap that guy on the head?”
“Yes.” I opened my Twitter app, searched for @BosUberTesla.
“I don’t think it’s right to slap people.”
“I don’t think it’s right to insult women. Ah, here you are,” I read from the app: “‘Tucker is just a dumb asshole.’”
Derrick’s fat face flushed red.
“I’m a dumb asshole?”
“I didn’t mean it that way.”
“Really? How else does one mean ‘Tucker is just a dumb asshole’?”
“I was defending you.”
“You were defending me? Let’s see. What else did you have to say in my defense? Oh, here’s one. ‘If that dumb fuck tried to slap me I’d beat the shit out of him.’”
Derrick’s blush started to fog the windows. “I was angry because—”
“You were angry? Why? Did you have some dick try to handcuff you?”
“No, but—”
“Did he call your friend the C-word?”
“No, but—”
“Should I keep reading? Did you have other things to say about me?”
Derrick kept his eyes on the road.
I flipped through Derrick’s comments. Found a good one. “You called me a ‘motherless son of a bitch.’ That doesn’t even make sense. I should give you a one-star rating for slaughtering logic.”
Derrick whispered a comment.
“What? I couldn’t hear you. But, you know, I’m just a dumb asshole. Probably deaf too.”
“I’m sorry,” Derrick said, barely audible above the nearly silent electric motor.
“You’re sorry? You’re sorry for what?”
“I’m sorry I called you those things. But—”
“Everything before the but is bullshit, Derrick.”
“I mean, I said those things but I was defending you. Can’t you see that?”
“You mean when you wrote, ‘You guys should take it easy on Tucker, the poor motherless son of a bitch.’”
“Yeah. I mean, they’re not being fair.”
“I’ll give you that.”
“So I was defending you up and down, and then you slapped that guy and I looked like an idiot.”
“Why are you even defending me at all?”
Derrick negotiated a rotary at Chestnut and drove between stone walls separating the road from a park. The brown grass and leafless trees of the Emerald Necklace in April did nothing to suggest that spring was on its way. The Tesla’s tires made the only noise in the car.
“I don’t understand,” said Derrick.
“What don’t you understand?”
“Why wouldn’t I defend you? People are being stupid.”
“How is this your problem?”
“I don’t know. I just like Twitter.”
> “So I’m just an online character to you?”
Derrick tightened his lips and tapped the giant Tesla touchpad with fat fingers. Soft jazz slipped from the speakers. Apparently, we were done talking. As Derrick popped out onto the Jamaicaway, I realized what a disappointment I’d been. Derrick had been excited to meet his Internet hero, the guy he’d been defending against hoards of misinformed trolls, and that hero had just turned out to be a gigantic douche bag.
“Thank you,” I said.
Derrick flicked his thumb. The music got a little louder.
“Thank you for defending me,” I said. “I’m sorry I was a jerk to you.”
“You should have read the whole thread.”
“I know.”
“Instead of just taking things out of context and looking for the bad stuff.”
“I know,” I said. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
More jazz. I tried a different tactic. “Do you mind if I ask what you do for a living?”
“You mean so that I can afford a Tesla?”
“Yeah.”
“I wrote an app.”
“Which one?”
“Dumpster.”
“The one that finds the nearest public bathroom?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s a pretty cool app.”
“Yeah, I made a ton in royalties to start, then I sold the whole thing to Google.”
“So then why are you doing Uber?”
“I like to drive.”
“That’s cool.”
Traffic clogged at a light.
“So what are they saying?” I asked.
“Who?”
“The Twitter people on #TuckerGate.”
“There are three camps. First, there are the people like me and Epomis who say that you’re innocent.”
“Epomis? That’s sweet.”
“You know her?”
Whoops. “Just online.”
“Yeah, so she’s one of the folks defending you. Then there’s the people who say that you killed Runway. They say you’re the HackMaster.”
“Who’s the HackMaster?”
“Some guys on Reddit did analysis of the pictures of Runway. They had a long, technical reason for why it had to have been done with a samurai sword. So they called the killer the Samurai.”
“Why not the Ninja? They’re assassins too.”
“Right? That’s what I said. There was another group arguing for the Shinobi, because that’s Japanese for ninja, and it was disrespectful not to use the Japanese word. Then someone accused everyone of cultural appropriation, so they dropped the whole samurai thing and—”
“By the power of the collective intelligence settled on the HackMaster.”
“Yeah.”
“Why does the collective intelligence think that I’m the HackMaster? There’s no connection to me.”
“That’s what I said! No one has ever shown that you can use a sword.”
“That’s because I can’t.”
“Right.”
“You said there were three groups.”
“The third group says that you’re not the HackMaster, but that you did kill your wife.”
“Why would I do that?”
“For the money. I guess you got a lot of money from your old company?”
“They say that I killed my wife for a severance package?”
“Yeah, and the FBI helped.”
“Why would the FBI help?”
“It was a lot of money.”
“So now I’m paying off the FBI?”
“You have to admit that you have friends in the FBI.”
I didn’t mention that I was heading to coffee with my friend from the FBI. “This is ridiculous,” I said.
“When you spin it all together, it creates a pretty good case.”
“So you’re on their side?”
“No! No! I never would have picked you up otherwise. Are you kidding me?”
Derrick parked on Pond, across the street from a little coffee bar. Mel sat in the front window at a counter. She waved.
I opened the door to get out. “So what do you think?”
“I think she’s cute.”
“No, I mean about #TuckerGate.”
“I think you’re innocent, but—”
“But?”
“I also think you’re screwed.”
Forty-One
The choice of a favorite coffee shop may not be one of life’s most significant decisions. Still, it should not be taken lightly. Whether you go for the Old World ambiance of a Caffe Vittoria, the subterranean coolness of Wired Puppy, or the Boylston Street bustle of the Thinking Cup, you’re choosing a place that becomes both your refuge and your office, your kitchen and your den. It’s a place to meet friends, read a book, cruise the Internet, and, sometimes, drink some coffee.
I admired Mel’s choice of 7 Pond Coffee Bar as her coffee shop. Like Caffe Vittoria, it sported big glass windows that made you part of the street scene while letting you watch it from climate-conditioned comfort. While Caffe Vittoria looked out onto the tight, bustling confines of Hanover Street, Mel’s seat in 7 Pond let her look out upon the quiet residential foot traffic associated with two stately triple-deckers, plus a glimpse of the action on Centre Street. Nicely done!
I got myself a double espresso and made myself comfortable on the stool Mel had saved for me.
“So, Mr. Doxer,” said Mel, “you have news?”
“News and a bruise.”
“A bruise?”
I pulled up my shirt. “Baseball bat.”
“Who did that?”
“Dorothy Flores, but you know her as NotAGirl.”
“NotAGirl is a girl?”
“Pretty clever.”
“When did she hit you with a baseball bat?”
“Right after I introduced myself at her front door.”
Mel gave me a twisted frown and drank some cappuccino, the heart shape in the foam getting distorted by her lips. “You introduced yourself at her front door?”
“Yup.”
“Why didn’t you call me first?”
“The idea was that I’d threaten to contact you if she didn’t talk to me.”
“You could have done that after talking to me.”
“Not with a straight face.”
“So she beat you with a bat, and now you’re talking to me.”
“I think I would have gotten beaten even if I had talked to you first. She was terrified. I think they really believe what they’re writing.”
“Who?”
“The PwnSec trio. There’s Dorothy, then Russell Nguyen who goes by the name Eliza, and Earl Clary, who is Tron.”
“Good work.”
“I’m not sure how this helps us find the senator’s video.”
We drank our coffee and looked out upon the quiet pedestrian traffic. Mel started to say something, stopped, started again, stopped.
“Sox won,” I said, trying to break the ice. “We’re nine and three.”
“Is that good?”
“Pennant fever grips Hub.”
“Huh.” Mel was miles away.
“You might as well tell me.”
“I’m not supposed to.”
“I’ll find out anyway. I’m Master Doxer, remember.”
“Mr. Doxer, not Master Doxer.”
“I can’t be both?”
“We’ve found something on Peter’s computer.”
“The senator’s video?”
“No. A selfie of a topless Asian girl with a shoe on her head.”
“Why is that important? Peter was twenty-two years old. That computer must have been choked with porn.”
“Less than you’d think. This was the only picture.”
“What was special about it? Other than it was evidence of a life hack.”
“Yeah, I got that. Peter must have been tormenting the girl and forced her to take the shoe-on-her-head picture to get him to back off.”
“A classic hacker move. Was there anything special about it?”
“Two things. First, it was not in our database of porn. That means it was a one-off, a picture someone took themselves.”
“That makes sense. Selfies wouldn’t be in the database.”
“And it contained the malware.”
“The zombie malware?”
“Right.”
My espresso was empty. I got up from our nook and bought another. Looked back at Mel, who was sitting on her stool and scrolling through her phone, looking concerned. She was objectively a pretty girl who knew how to wear a pair of jeans. I pushed down thoughts of dating a twentysomething, then realized that E was probably a twentysomething. It didn’t matter, anyway. Mel and I were working together. No sense complicating that.
I climbed back onto the stool next to Mel. My phone rang. It was E.
“Have you seen Anonops?” she asked.
“No.”
“They’re planning something at your house.”
Mel interrupted. “Have you seen this?” she asked, pointing at her phone.
“Who’s there?” asked E.
“Just a friend.”
Mel gave me a look that said just a friend? Where did that come from? She’s not just a friend?
I said into the phone, “Thanks for the heads-up. I see it now.”
“Be careful,” said E.
“I will.” Ended the call.
Mel said, “Is she also just a friend?”
“We only met yesterday.”
“And?”
A gentleman never tells.
“She says something’s up with Anonymous.”
“Something is up with Anonymous. They’re staging a big protest in Boston today.”
“Let me guess. Going to the Federal Reserve to protest their student loans?”
“Those student loans are no joke.”
“Okay, fine.”
“I’m up to my butt in student loans.”
I resisted the urge to look at Mel’s butt. Resisted the urge to make a smart comment about student loans. Apparently one gets wily in his thirties, and becomes the master of tact.