“All right. Now what?”
“See where it says undo?”
“Oh! Is that what that’s for? Should I click on it?”
“Go ahead.”
The squeal pierced Anna’s eardrum, and she jerked the phone away from her head. Martin, whose desk was eight feet away, grinned even as he continued typing.
“I heard that over here,” he said. “Your ear’s gonna be ringing for an hour.”
“Oh, thank you!” Cynthia was effusive in her joy. “Thank you so much! You just saved me, I’m so glad I called you, what can I do for you, can I send you some cookies?”
“Tell her yes,” Martin said.
Anna rolled her eyes but couldn’t help the smile. Bringing the phone closer, she said, “You don’t need to do that, Cynthia. This is my job.”
“Yes, but you’re so good at it! I really want to send you some cookies; you have no idea how much time you’ve saved me, and Professor Gimbal too if he only knew it, but of course I’ll never tell him I almost lost the whole file.”
“Well, in that case, we’d love the cookies. Thank you. And Cynthia? That little trick has a keyboard shortcut, too. Just press Control-Z. It’ll do the same thing. And it has a memory of your most recent keystrokes and mouse clicks, so even if you’d typed a few letters, it would have been okay. You could just keep clicking on undo, or keep pressing Control-Z, until you got back to the point where your text vanished.”
“How lovely! But what happened to the text in the first place? God, I hate these damn computers sometimes. I swear they’re possessed.”
Anna stifled a laugh. “Actually, the program did exactly what you told it to.”
“I most certainly did not tell it to erase my entire document!”
“No, but from what you’ve described, I think you just made a common typing slip. Somewhere in there you probably hit Control-A without realizing it. Control-A is the keyboard shortcut for selecting all of your text. So what happens when you’ve selected all of your text, and then you hit the enter key? Or any other key, for that matter?”
Silence.
“I see what you mean,” said Cynthia, more subdued now. “You know, my old IBM Selectric was a lot more forgiving.”
“Yes, but could your old IBM Selectric copy and paste entire paragraphs and pages?”
“No, but it never took five years off my lifespan in a single moment, either.”
“You’ll be fine, Cynthia. If you have any other problems, just call.”
“You know I will. Bye, Anna. Thanks again.”
“You’re welcome. Talk to you later.” Anna put the phone back in its cradle and rubbed her ear. “Ow.”
Martin laughed. “Better you than me.”
“Thanks a lot. Next time I’m transferring the call.” Cynthia was one of their more frequent callers. She was sweet as could be, but tended to freak out rather easily whenever a computer was involved.
“No, you won’t. She prefers you. I frighten her.”
“That’s because you don’t know how not to speak geek.”
“Works every time, too.” He pressed a key with a flourish and then pushed his chair back. “Let’s see if that did it.” Turning to his secondary computer, he entered a few commands and pumped his fist in the air. “Yes! The College of Engineering website is back and intact!”
“Good,” said Anna. “Now tell whoever screwed it up to never mess with it again.”
“Dream on. Someone over there has to maintain it.”
“More’s the pity, too.” Anna could never understand the shortsightedness of university bean counters. Central Web Services created all university websites in order to assure across-the-board compliance with style, as well as universal access. But maintenance of those same websites fell to the individual colleges and departments, because the bean counters felt it was better to spread the budget across all of them rather than concentrate it in Central Web Services, where people actually knew what they were doing. Inevitably, things got screwed up, and then whose phones rang? Not Central Web Services—their job was design only. No, it was Tech Support Services that got the call. Which meant it was their time spent cleaning up the mess and their budget that took the hit.
Ah, well. Anna finished filling out the call record on Cynthia Robertson’s call and picked up her service request clipboard. Time to get out of the lab and into the open; she had several requests from departments scattered all over campus. It was a nice day, and she was ready for a walk.
“I’m heading over to Admin,” she said, pulling her coat off the wall hook behind her desk. “Try not to break anything while I’m gone.”
Martin grunted, his attention already diverted by the site he was clicking through, and Anna closed the lab door behind her. A few short steps brought her to the building exit, and she emerged into the crisp air of late October, where she stopped for a deep breath and an appreciative look around. The sky was a flawless blue, the oaks and maples on campus were flaming with color, and at the moment she felt she should probably be paying someone for the privilege of working here. Sometimes she couldn’t believe how lucky she was to live in such a beautiful place. It was a long way from her hometown in Kansas.
She smiled to herself as she remembered teasing Elizabeth for being an Easterner, without ever letting on that she herself was fairly new to the West. They hadn’t gotten around to autobiographical details—there was just too much else to talk about, especially after they’d found their mutual interest in travel. But she was looking forward to covering some of that territory next Saturday, and the first thing she planned to ask was where the heck Elizabeth worked on campus.
For the last three days she’d been looking for Elizabeth around every corner, irrationally hoping that thinking about her would somehow translate into a physical manifestation. But the university employed thousands of faculty and staff, and the chances of finding one person in particular were pretty slim unless one knew where to look. That didn’t stop her from checking out every woman on campus with mid-length brown hair and long legs. In a clear sign of the perversity of the universe, half of the women she saw appeared to fit that description. But none of them were Elizabeth.
At this mid-morning hour, the rush of students hurrying to their morning classes was reduced to a trickle. By now, most of them were either in class or at home, and a higher percentage of pedestrians were faculty and staff. While crossing the grassy quadrangle behind the library, Anna waved at several people she knew and scanned the rest out of habit, coming up empty as usual. She reached the other side of the quad, walked past the library, and crossed the street that cut through the middle of campus. Turning left, she headed downhill and was soon pushing through the large glass doors of the Kerr Administration Building. This place had a different atmosphere than anywhere else on campus, with the ground floor reserved largely for cashiers and student services staff, while the upper floors were full of staff who managed all the bits and pieces that keep a large university running. Everything, in other words, except teaching and research.
Her service request had been filled out by a Chanda Podhar in the office of the Vice Provost for Research. She’d never been to that office before and had to look it up in the building directory before taking the stairs up to the third floor. Choosing a direction at random, she walked down a long corridor, scanning door numbers. Ah, she’d chosen correctly. Room 315 was only four doors down from the stairs.
“May I help you?” asked the woman behind the reception desk. She spoke in a musical Indian accent, and Anna was instantly charmed.
“Yes, I’m looking for Chanda Podhar?”
“I’m Chanda.”
“Hi, Chanda, I’m Anna Petrowski from Technology Support Services. You filed a service request for someone to consult with you on a computer purchase?”
“Ah, yes. Thank you for responding so promptly.” Chanda rose gracefully from her chair, but instead of coming around to Anna, she floated across the room and knocked on an interior door.
A moment later she cracked it open, spoke briefly with the occupant, then opened it more widely and returned to her desk. “Please go in.”
“Thank you.” Anna crossed the room, rapped her knuckles on the doorframe, and walked in. “Hello, I’m—” She stopped in mid-sentence, staring at the woman behind the desk.
“Hi, Anna! Good, I was hoping you’d be the one to come.” Elizabeth smiled as she stood up, gesturing toward a small table with two chairs. “Shall we sit?”
Anna was too stunned to move. “I thought you said you worked in forestry research?”
“No, I said I deal with forestry research. And I do, along with a few other things.”
“You’re the Vice Provost for Research?” Shit, Elizabeth was way up in the campus food chain. She reported directly to the Provost, who reported to the university President. She was a big shark in their little ocean, and Anna was somewhere down with the cod.
Elizabeth made a show of opening her door and checking out the nameplate. “Well, it says so right here, so I must be.” She closed the door and sat at the table, her smile dropping when Anna remained motionless. “Are you okay?”
“Um…I’m a little surprised.” Anna forced her legs into action and sat across from Elizabeth. “Though this does explain why someone in forestry would have meetings at the Hatfield Marine Science Center.” She should have caught that earlier. Hatfield didn’t have any forestry labs; it was purely a marine science facility. With a chill, she realized that someone at Elizabeth’s level showing up at Hatfield would have meant the entire facility being on its toes to meet her, like the enlisted ranks being inspected by a colonel. Hell, they’d probably waxed the floors in preparation for her visit.
“Well, I have to admit that the meetings were the least interesting part of my time at the coast. By the way, you were right; Yachats and Cape Perpetua were spectacular. Did I mention we don’t get much ocean in Michigan? We don’t have trees like that, either. In fact, I didn’t know there were trees like that anywhere outside Redwood National Park. Thanks for the tip.”
“You’re welcome,” said Anna automatically. Good Lord, she’d given tourist tips to a vice provost. This was just too weird. Trying to cover her shock with humor, she said, “I feel a bit funny calling you by your first name.”
“Which is exactly what I don’t want, and why I didn’t come right out and tell you what I do here. Come on, Anna. It’s hard enough making friends as it is without having people write me off because of my job.”
“Okay.” It wasn’t, not really. Elizabeth the Vice Provost was not at all the same thing as Elizabeth the Coffee Shop Friend, and Anna felt blindsided. She was nervous, out of her depth, and utterly unable to act naturally. But she’d come here with a specific task to perform and gladly took refuge in that. “So are you the one thinking about a new computer purchase? Didn’t you just get your supercharged Dell?”
“Yes, but after your little demonstration that Saturday, I came in the following Monday and told Chanda that the Dell is hers as soon as I can get a new one. She’s pretty excited about it; her computer is a five-year-old clunker.”
“Then you want to buy a Mac, I assume,” Anna said, her tone cooler than it might have been. Elizabeth was already replacing a new laptop? Just because she wanted something different now?
“You assume correctly,” said Elizabeth. “You’ve earned your toaster.”
“All right, let’s talk about your needs.” She could see Elizabeth’s puzzlement at her lack of response to the joke, but she didn’t have it in her to act any other way. “Tell me how you use your computer on a given day and what sorts of big projects you might need it for.”
Elizabeth gazed at her for a moment, then straightened her posture and began speaking. In a professional voice that betrayed her managerial background, she succinctly outlined the programs she used on a regular basis, the sorts of graphics she dealt with, how many hours she spent in front of a screen, and how she saw her future usage changing. Anna jotted a few notes as she listened, already knowing what her recommendation would be. When Elizabeth finished, she asked a few follow-up questions, then pulled an illustrated price sheet from the bottom of her clipboard. “Since you want portability, I’d recommend the thirteen-inch MacBook Air,” she said. “You’re not a power user, so you don’t need the Pro, and your shoulder will thank you for the weight difference.”
“Yes, I’ll be glad to get that Dell out of my bag,” Elizabeth said. “I think the power brick alone weighs a pound.”
“Right. Now, there are two versions to choose from, but the only difference is the size of the hard drive. If you want, you can also jack up the processor speed and RAM,” Anna said, pointing out the line items on the spec list. “I would definitely recommend doubling the RAM.”
Elizabeth bent her neck to see the models, then pointed. “This one, but with the faster processor. And I’ll take your suggestion on the RAM, too. How soon can you place the order?”
“I’ve got a batch of orders to process on Friday. Apple’s pretty quick; it should be in by Tuesday.”
“Great. What about a display monitor? Will the Mac work with my existing one?” She gestured toward what looked like a twenty-one-inch monitor on her desk. The black and silver plastic casing told Anna which brand it was.
“If you’re asking will there be any compatibility issues, no, there won’t, though you’ll have to buy an adapter for it. But I’m guessing that once you get used to your new laptop screen, you’re not going to like this one anymore. It will look dark by comparison. Plus—” She got up and circled Elizabeth’s desk to get a better look. “Yeah, this is an older model, and the resolution is comparatively low.”
“What does that mean? Things will look bigger on the monitor than they will on the laptop?”
“Right. And they won’t be as crisp or clear. More to the point, even though this monitor is physically a lot bigger, you’re not actually going to have much more real estate on this screen than you will on your laptop.”
“So I should get a new monitor, too?” Elizabeth’s eyes sparkled. “I was ogling the Apple displays in the bookstore yesterday. Those are niiice.”
Forgetting herself for a moment, Anna laughed at her tone of voice. “Yes, they are. And expensive.”
“I noticed that. Is it worth it?”
“Depends on how picky you are.” Anna came back to the table and pulled a separate price sheet from her clipboard. Orienting the paper for Elizabeth to see, she pointed. “This one, and this one here, are both good monitors for less money. Since you’re not doing color-sensitive graphic work, either one would be fine. But if you’re really picky about how your screen looks, you’ll probably prefer the Apple—it’ll match your laptop screen perfectly in terms of brightness and color calibration. And it’s designed specifically for MacBooks, so hooking up is extremely clean and simple, and it gives you the extra ports your Air won’t have. Plus it has some of the best speakers on the market, not to mention an excellent built-in camera. If you do video chats, those two features might make or break the deal for you. But it will cost.”
“I have video conferences all the time. Done deal; get me the Apple.”
“Did you even consider the others?”
“Of course,” said Elizabeth, sounding vaguely insulted. “But you listed the pros and cons and I made a decision. Am I supposed to take more time to decide?”
Anna shook her head, the sense of awkward nervousness rushing over her once more. Nobody at her level ever made a purchasing decision like that without having to research alternatives and justify the choice to a higher-up. Watching Elizabeth do it reinforced how different they were and how much power Elizabeth had.
“No, of course not,” she said. “I’ll put the order in. We can probably install it and set up your laptop on Wednesday. Will that work for you?”
“I think so.” Elizabeth got up and moved over to an enormous wall calendar. “Yes, I’ll be here after two o’clock. Does ‘we’ mean some
one besides you?”
Caught, Anna said, “Well, we usually just go out on whichever service request or installation is on top of the stack when we’re available—”
“I’d prefer you,” Elizabeth said firmly. “If that’s all right.”
How was she supposed to say no? “That’s fine,” she said and scribbled a few last notes on her purchase list. Collecting the price sheets, she slid them back onto her clipboard and rose. “Unless you hear otherwise, I’ll be here at two. Congratulations on seeing the light,” she added, trying to go out on a more humorous note.
“Thanks. You’re the one who showed it to me. Are we still on for this Saturday?”
Anna wasn’t at all sure she wanted to meet again. Elizabeth was much more than she had believed, and she was still reeling from the unwelcome surprise. But she didn’t know how to get out of it gracefully. “I’m there every Saturday,” she said instead, and with a final wave was out the door. A cloud of nervous dismay made her take the stairs faster than usual, and she emerged into the bracing air outside with a sense of having escaped. God, that was awkward. She’d had no idea Elizabeth was so unattainable or that she herself could be so easily reduced to a stumbling idiot in her work environment. Neither discovery was remotely pleasant. And she felt…disappointed, somehow, that Elizabeth really was one of those powerful campus people who went through top-end gear like it was going out of style.
It wasn’t until she finished her rounds several hours later that it occurred to her how judgmental she’d been. If anyone else had wanted to replace a bulky Windows machine with a sleek Apple setup, she’d have been delighted to help. Why was she so critical of Elizabeth?
Because that Dell was practically new. It’s not fair.
But Elizabeth was giving the Dell to her administrative assistant, who was apparently thrilled. So what wasn’t fair about it?
She had no answer, and was left with that vague feeling of disappointment which seemed to be applicable only to Elizabeth. She’d filled many orders for top-end gear that, in her opinion, was neither needed nor deserved, but until now she’d never had a reaction like this. It was ridiculous, and she put it firmly out of her mind.
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