by Jenna Barton
Several of my admins were telecommuting for the day, and it looked as though a few others—including Alan—had gone to lunch. The pale gray walls of my cube looked the same. A fractal screensaver pulsed on the monitors I used with my laptop. And my phone sat, benign in its plain black protective case, on my keyboard.
I hurried to pack away my belongings before I was noticed. Once I was outside in my car, I keyed a quick note to Steve from my work phone citing a “personal emergency” and letting him know I would be at home but telecommuting for the rest of the day.
Chapter Twenty-One
WALT WAS OCCUPIED with a small group of day hikers when I reached the park. I caught his eye, waving, and crossed the open space to the visitor center. Sam Cross was behind the desk as usual, arms crossed over his stomach and nodding toward his afternoon nap.
“Well if it isn’t the prettiest computer repairwoman in Grayson County.” He came to me, chuckling, and offered his hand. Such an old flirt, Sam. After the accusations and horror of Dani flipping through the first and only pictures I’d ever taken with my phone, it was a relief to be looked at with favorable eyes.
“Hi, Sam,” I said. “How was your weekend?”
“Well now, I’ve got to be honest with you. I’m ready for these kids to get back to school and let an old man get back to cutting the grass once a week and nappin’ in the afternoons when Walt ain’t looking.”
My phone chimed in my pocket. I reached in and turned it to vibrate.
“Tell you what, Sam. I’m going to distract him for a little while, just so you can get your nap this afternoon, okay?”
As he laughed along with me, I felt normal—even comfortable—again in my skin. I’d learned the skill of talking like this from Walt, not a management class developed by forward-thinking human capital experts.
We chatted about the upcoming fall season, which would bring a final surge of weekend visitors and then the park would fall mostly silent through the winter, giving Sam, a seasonal employee, the opportunity to visit his grandchildren in Arizona for the holiday season.
Holidays. I looked out to the lawn and found Walt helping a father adjust an infant’s hiking carrier on his back.
We could take a few days, maybe visit somewhere he’s always wanted to go…
My phone continued to buzz, almost incessantly.
“Sam, I’m getting hit with a lot of work emails and should check them.”
“I’ll see you later, darlin’.” He grinned and shuffled back to his lookout over the glass display cases.
Outside, I checked my work phone. Twenty-three new emails since I’d arrived at the park. I keyed in my password—and rolled my eyes over the much more secure one on the phone that, until I met Walt, was the one I most often used.
For the second time in as many hours, my heart plummeted into my stomach.
I’d sent a mass email to all of ThinkMine, with an attachment.
“Oh my God no, no, no…” I muttered, waiting for the message to load.
It was me. Naked, looking over my shoulder at my bruised backside.
I didn’t consider looking like a hysterical woman and didn’t bother to cover up the horrified sobs shaking my body so much I stumbled as I ran to my car.
“Erin?”
He was behind me. He’d see, too. The picture was for him, but he’d not seen me humiliated by it. How fucking careless could I be?
“Hey, what’s wrong?”
I couldn’t take relief from the easier tone in his voice, compared to what I’d heard in the ThinkMine parking lot. Just minutes before I’d been comfortable, hopeful about us.
“Sweetheart, what is it?”
I shoved my phone at him.
“What the hell…” Brows drawn, he scrolled through the email. “Did this go to everyone?”
“Every name in the company directory,” I told him dully. The phone rang, and he handed it back to me. It flashed an international exchange and a Mumbai number. “Ardhi? Oh thank God.” I stepped away from Walt.
“Your douchebag has been at work, dear.”
“How do you know it’s him?”
“He has a remote link to your laptop from his desk. The proxy has been sitting out there since mid-July but inactive, so we didn’t notice any resources going from the location where he buried it. It was on one of your Alpine machines.”
“Ardhi, what…can you fix it?” Behind me, Walt cleared his throat.
“Yes, I recalled the email as soon as I caught it. It’s bloody lucky I’m here this evening, dear. You never send corporate-wide email and it caught my eye.”
“Oh, Ardhi, thank you so much.” Tears rolled over my cheeks and I raised a shaking hand to wipe at them.
“Anyone who opened the original email will have seen it. Steve is wiping the image from all of the locations that opened it, but sadly, we can’t unsee it from anyone who opened the email and looked.” He sniffed. “I’m a good security engineer, Erin, but not that good. Yet.”
“Are you sure it was Alan?”
Walt’s hand covered my elbow. “Alan? That guy?”
“Quite sure. Who’s that with you?”
“Er…my…um no one from work.”
“Damn it, that’s it. I’m going over there.” Walt turned on his heel and started for his park SUV.
“No, Walt.” I jogged after him. “Walt, you can’t do that.”
“The hell I can’t.”
“Walt, you have to let us—let me handle this.”
He stopped by the Blazer’s door, and his hand grasped the wide view mirror housing so hard his knuckles immediately went white.
“Erin, I don’t give a fuck about how y’all plan on handling this inside your company. I do, however, have a very big say in how that son of a bitch treats you.”
“Walt, no!” A couple walking toward the Hemlock Loop trailhead paused and looked at us. I tugged at his hand. “Please don’t. Let me take care of this myself before it gets so big I lose my job, not just my credibility.”
“I can take care of it and make sure it’s in a way this guy gets the message to leave you alone. Until his warning—or whatever you all call it—is over and he’s gone. But I will not stand for you being pushed around anymore.”
“Walt, you can’t do that. Those are my coworkers, my team. Do you understand? Alan isn’t your problem, he’s mine to manage. I have to fix this.”
“I just told you, if he’s hurting you, he’s my problem. That’s how this thing we’re doing—what you asked to do—works. It’s how I work, Erin. I don’t stop looking out for you once you go off into the vanilla world. You’re still mine to watch out for.”
“You can’t. This isn’t The Enclave, Walt. This is my work. My career, which he’s incinerated. He’s ended me at ThinkMine and you’re worried about…playtime?”
“It’s not playtime for me.” He put his hands on his hips. “Erin, haven’t you paid attention for the past three months?”
I looked away, silenced, and before I could take my centering breath, as he’d taught me, and look back, Walt turned from me and walked across the grass. Away from me.
“Fuck this.”
“Walt!”
Shaking his head, he stepped into the visitor center and pulled the door closed hard enough to make the windows bounce.
“Erin?”
Ardhi. I’d never disconnected the call.
“I’m sorry, Ardhi.”
“No. Not at all. I have to tell you, though, I agree with your friend.”
“That’s not going to help.” I sat inside my car and started it. “As much as it seems like a good idea, it still won’t take—” I paused looking over the grass wrapping around the visitor center and Walt’s forest beyond. I needed to say it. “It won’t take back every comment I’ve heard about being a girl coder. About IT ass and how I’m getting it. I manage nine other men besides Alan, Ardhi, and they will never forget they’ve seen me naked.”
“No,” he said finally. “No,
dear. I don’t suppose they will.”
Back at the house on Sycamore Street, it was Monday afternoon. The neighborhood dog barked. Mr. Jensen waved amiably from his weedeating. Two white butterflies flitted across the grass, a never-ceasing dance, just between them.
Not the artificial calm of the Mine. Comfortable and familiar, all the same.
I swallowed hard and crossed the front porch.
Dani’s bags were by the front door. She had curled up on one of the sofas with a home magazine I’d never taken from the mailing sleeve during the past few busy, Walt-filled months after it arrived. Beside her was a glass of the iced tea he’d made Friday night.
And she’d used a coaster.
I let my bags slide from my arm and stay where they landed.
“Hi.”
“How’s Walt?” She patted a cushion beside her.
I shook my head. Too much. I sank beside her.
“Erin, if this—” she started. “If I’ve ruined things for you at your job…I’m so sorry.”
“It’s not your fault.”
“It was on the floor by the bathroom. I should have ignored it, but it kept ringing and when I picked it up it saw it was him. I…I was curious. I’ve never seen you like—” she waved her hands between us “—this. In love, I guess. And then the pictures.”
“Yes, the pictures.” I arched an eyebrow at her. Though she was contrite—and should have been—I couldn’t let one more opportunity to remind her she’d invaded my privacy pass.
“I mean…Rin? Really?” A small smile threatened at her lips. “You’re into kinky sex?”
My cheeks heated and I looked away. “C’mon, Dani. This is private.”
“But you’re my sister,” she said, her voice going soft.
“That still; doesn’t mean you need every detail of my life.”
“No, you’re right. It doesn’t. But you don’t need to shut me out completely, either.” Taking my hand in hers, she moved closer to me and rested her head against mine, like she’d done when we were children, sleeping together on our ancient pull-out sofa. “I hated it when you left, but I’m glad you did, Rin. I think you belong here. I hope I didn’t mess that up.”
As I got older, I was careful to keep my feelings to myself. Dani and Kathy had so many, all the time. There was so much chaos around them. It had been years, maybe twenty-five or more, since I’d let her see me so hurt. But for the second time in just under a day, I turned and cried, without any hesitancy, on my sister’s shoulder.
We spent the afternoon sitting, mostly silent, on my sofa, watching the trees spill light and dark across the golden oak floors. Two, maybe three hours of sitting. I didn’t bother to change from my work clothes, and never booted my laptop. Eventually the chimes from my phone stopped. Ardhi had erased the replies as well. Someone else took care of it, after all.
I loved this place. The house, the town that held it. Mr. Jensen and Nonni Isolde and the night shift at Crusts. Callahan’s quaint Main Street, coming back to life again, and ThinkMine being part of its revival. It was the first place I’d been at home. Even before I knew Walt and Claire and Lucy and Tate, before I’d gone through the stone pillars with the copper lanterns at Tate’s house, a fundamental part of me felt right here. Almost at home. And then I found them…
A knock at my door shook me from my shadow and light staring.
“Sit,” Dani said, standing. “I’ll get it.”
Steve was there. My mentor, the data center manager. A new wave of humiliation washed over me. Steve Gomez knew what I looked like naked.
Dani showed him in.
“Before I say anything,” he said, crossing to me, “This is a personal visit.”
Oh my God. I was going to be fired tomorrow morning.
“Erin, relax and take a deep breath. I’m not here to fire you.”
I stared at him for a few seconds, willing my adrenaline to creep down to a manageable level. Not firing meant I had my job, but now also had to look people in the eye every day who had looked at me naked. With fading, purple-welted handprints on a good part of me.
“By the way, I’m Danielle Proctor, Erin’s sister.” Dani offered her hand, and they shook.
“Judy from reception was right. The resemblance is amazing.”
“Well…” I began.
“We never see it,” Dani added. After a polite laugh we all looked at each other. “Please, won’t you sit down?”
He sat and motioned to her to join us.
“It’s fine, Dani. He said this is personal, not official.” I turned to Steve. “How do I handle this?”
“I’m surprised at you, Erin. There isn’t anything to handle. You will come back to work tomorrow or Wednesday if you need and you’ll keep planning your virtualization roll-out.”
“But…the pictures and Alan and—” I winced. “Alan. He’s still there.”
“No, I walked him out personally just past three p.m. All of your updates on his action plan and Ardhi’s logs were all we needed to close his file.”
“But—”
“There’s no need to go global over this, Erin. He crossed the line for the last time. You didn’t have to give it any more of your attention. This was a business decision. Which I am speaking to you about off the record. Personally.”
“But I should have taken care of it. How does it look if another man fixes it for me?”
“Rin, it sounds like a couple of guys who respect you took care of business. Let them,” Dani said.
“In this case, Erin, it’s more appropriate for me to handle it. And Arch Norman out at Main.”
ThinkMine’s CEO. I groaned and folded over my knees.
Dani cleared her throat. “It sets a tone, Erin. Dante does it in the kitchen. No disrespect. If it happens, he addresses it. Otherwise, Il pesce pulla dalla testa.”
Steve snorted, shaking his head. “Indeed.”
“Fish stinks from the head.” Dani winked at me. “He’s taking responsibility for it.”
“And wants to address it company-wide. At all houses. He’s putting together a board to address harassment at the Mine. And he’d like to talk to you about it, Erin. Once you’re back at work.”
I sat back against the sofa pillows. He was gone. No more arguments and no more dumped code and no more barely-concealed comments to his two lunch partners. No more being called a fucking cunt any time I asked him to do his job.
Steve leaned toward me a little. “Erin, was there more than just the botched patches and star-fucking other managers? You look very, very shaken.”
“I…” I took a long deep breath. “I am. He…it was difficult. I’m glad he’s gone.”
“Was there more? Something you didn’t mention in your notes on his plan?”
I nodded and despite the horror of it, batted my eyelashes at tears. I’d cried more in the past month than the past five years.
“There were a lot of comments. It felt pretty hostile.”
“Christ, Erin, you shouldn’t have kept that to yourself.”
“I didn’t know what to say. It’s not always been easy, being a woman there.”
He looked at me with such sympathy and patted my arm. “I know. Try being a geek with a stereotypically twink husband and no gay snark skills to speak of. I miss the days when you could go to your desk as an admin and not speak to a soul and know no one wanted to talk to you either unless it was about a game you were running or a con you’d gone to.”
“I’m sorry, Steve. That was incredibly self-centered of me.”
“Poo. Stop.” He rolled his eyes. “ThinkMine can try to position us as evolved and associate-centered until the ends of forever and it won’t change it, inherently. Corporate places are big, messy engines that need a lot of us to make them work. Women, especially the ones who are doing male-identified roles, have a hard time in tech. We all know this. You read Information Today, just like I do.”
I nodded, letting out a rush of air I didn’t know I was holding. “Do you
think the fallout would be more manageable if I went back to Los Altos?”
“I don’t know. Offices don’t have walls now.” He shrugged. “After this, you’re not just a girl admin and catching shade for that. People won’t forget this, but Arch’s actions and this workgroup could make a difference. And it’s your private life, just like what I do in mine is my life. It won’t affect your job and won’t affect your leadership once you’ve processed this and quit apologizing for being who you are. So you like kinky sex and—from what I saw outside the center this morning—you have a very hot boyfriend who does too. As long as you have one hand free to code when I need you, you are free to play like a grown-up in private when you work in my center. You can’t say sorry for who you are forever.”
My chin trembled again. Pedicures and contacts and stupid flowered dresses and all of this crying.
“I don’t know if he’s going to be my boyfriend much longer.” I sniffed. “I think I hurt him by trying to keep him—or really, us—to myself.”
Steve’s eyebrows rose and he smiled. “That man? In that uniform? Dear God, I would keep that to myself too if he were mine.”
Dani snorted. “Right?”
“But if you’re hiding him out of shame for what you do, that’s not good.”
“No. Not that, really. Mostly it was from—” I glanced at Dani sheepishly “—my mom and sister and he found out and that pushed a few buttons.”
“We are all minefields.” He shook his head. “You can’t survive your twenties without leaving a minefield behind you.”
“Yeah.” I said, quiet. “Thank you for coming over here. I know it’s not…typical for you.”
“I like you, Erin. I always have. There aren’t many people on this planet who could tolerate what you have to get here and still excelled professionally, no matter their gender. What are you going to do about Woodsy the Dom?”
“I don’t know. He was so angry about Alan.” I grinned a little. “I thought he was going to pull him apart. Over me.”