by Sandra Byrd
“Oh, hey, Savvy,” he said. “Have you prayed about the worship team yet?”
I stared at him. I’d promised myself, no more little white lies. And I certainly wasn’t going to lie in church, about worship. Especially after I’d just told the Lord that I was going to worship in spirit and in truth.
“Uh, no.” I could see the look of disappointment on his face. I felt disappointed too.
“Okay, then,” he said. “We’d better get the show on the road.” He headed to the stage, where he was joined by the keyboardist, the drummer, and one electric guitarist.
Halfway through worship, I realized that Joe hadn’t said he was going to ask me again.
Chapter 20
Thursday afternoon I walked to Be@titude. It was warm, and I was wearing a new pair of white capris with a sporty tank layered over a tee. I had my big bag but not my notebook, as I was going for ministry purposes that night, not to take notes. The traffic was getting busy, so I looked twice to the right and the left before crossing the street. I really didn’t want to have my obituary read, “Teen Girl Hit by Big Red Bus.” That would be an embarrassing way to die.
I rounded the corner toward the shop and reached over to pluck a long-stemmed rose from a wild bush tumbling over an ancient stone wall. I thought about how old the village was. No one knows for sure, but some people think Anne Boleyn, one of the wives of Henry VIII, was born in Kent. It was possible—not probable, but possible—that she’d been right in this area. Or at least could have seen it from the top of one of the castles.
I loved England.
I pushed the door to the shop open, pleased to see that there were two customers inside, one of them toting out a big, plastic-wrapped hanger bag. Ka-ching! More money for Becky.
“Hey, Savvy, I’m fairly busy,” she said. “Do you want to thumb through some of those catalogs in the back for a few minutes till I can get you set up on the fund-raiser page?”
I nodded. Cool. I hadn’t been able to look at them for myself last week, and I wasn’t really in the mood to start up her expensive computer on my own. I went to the little office next to the try-on rooms and plopped down.
If I wasn’t going to be a world-famous journalist, maybe I’d own a shop like this someday. I could picture it now. It’d be big, really big, and probably somewhere on Sloane Street, where all the fashionistas shopped. It’d have a big Dale Chihuly glass sculpture in the middle to acknowledge my American background. Everything would be sleek and modern. Including me. A lot of important people would shop there, probably Kate Middleton when she became princess. I’d have started my own ministry with the profits, and Princess Kate would find the idea fascinating and would want to put her royal stamp of approval on it. And then . . .
“Savvy!” Becky’s voice popped through my daydream.
I blinked and looked at her. “Oh yeah.”
“Are you okay?” She looked concerned. “I called you twice.”
I nodded. “Just daydreaming.”
She glanced at the stack of catalogs next to me. “Didn’t get to look at any yet?”
I shook my head.
“Well, then, slip them into your bag, and you can look at them at home. I’ve got a lot of inputting for you to do, and then we’ll be ready to send out the final auction announcement!”
She leaned over me to start up the computer, and I could breathe her perfume, something light and modern. Green but not floral. “Here’s the list of people we need to add to the list.” She tapped a yellow notepad. “And here are the other items we need to include on the auction page, which I’ll just load now.” She made a few clicks. “You’re set! I’m going back to the shop to attend the clients and get a few other odds and ends done.”
As she returned to the main room, I glanced up at the corkboard next to her computer station. There were snapshots on it of women, some with their kids. The women’s names were under the pictures. There was a little date scribbled next to each picture—the date they’d first contacted Becky—for help, maybe?
I saw Isobel Alderman, with gap-toothed Emma standing right beside her. She had “21 April” scribbled beside her name. Not too long ago! Emma smiled down on me. I smiled at her picture and began to type.
Thirty minutes later I was finished! I snuck out into the store and stood behind Becky till I caught her eye. “All done,” I said. “Everything is uploaded. You should be hearing from bidders tonight!”
“Nicely done, Savvy,” she whispered. “I’ll be with you in a minute.” Then she turned again to help a shopper.
I moseyed back to the computer and sat down to wait. I looked at the Internet icon. Might as well check my e-mail. I logged on to the server and scrolled through a few.
A lot of Asking for Trouble forwards from Jack. I’d have to pick a question to answer soon. My heart buckled a little as I thought about my answer last week to the artist—the one Penny knew.
A forward about the garden club from my mom.
An e-mail from Natalie. Interesting. I clicked that one open and scanned the CC field. She’d sent it to everyone on the newspaper staff, talking about her plans for the next year. Should she win, that is.
And right before my eyes, a new e-mail arrived from . . . “Your friend Ashley Gorm Strauss”?
I clicked on that one too. It was an e-card. How nice! And it even had a benefit. It was from World Rice Bowl and promised to donate £1 toward world hunger for each person who opened the card. The sender would be notified about how much her friends had raised for her, as well as all the friends her friends forwarded it on to.
I looked out to the shop floor. Becky was still chatting. I looked at the e-mail again. Surely it hadn’t escaped my friend Ashley Gorm Strauss that I hadn’t responded to her last forward about the true love of my life. Might as well open the card.
I clicked on the card icon, and as I did, I noticed by the bar on the bottom of the screen that it was downloading.
Wait a minute. I’d only meant to open the card. Not to download it onto Becky’s computer.
I pounded the Escape button hard. Nothing. I hit Control-Alt-Delete. Nothing.
Becky was now ringing up the sale. It wasn’t like I could shout for her.
All of a sudden the computer flashed twice, on and off, on and off. Then I noticed that my address book from my still-open e-mail account appeared on the screen, and the names and e-mail addresses began to scroll through. I tried to close out of the e-mail program, but it wouldn’t shut down.
Desperate, I turned off the computer. My face was flaming hot. I could barely breathe. I was about to have my very first asthma attack; I was sure of it. Or heart attack, maybe.
The customer left the store, and Becky came back. She took one look at my face and said quietly, “Savvy, what’s wrong?”
Chapter 21
“Becky, I’m afraid I made a very big mistake.”
Becky cocked her head but said nothing, nodding for me to continue but looking at the black computer.
“I sent everything out like you asked me to. And I got the site uploaded. But . . . well, when I was waiting here for you, I started reading my e-mail. Then I clicked on an e-card, and all of a sudden something started downloading.” I told her the rest of the scenario, and as I did, her face went milky.
“Malware,” she said.
Worst. Day. Ever.
Chapter 22
I offered to stay and help, but Becky said no, she’d better close the shop and figure out what happened. For all she knew, the malware had been sent to all the people on the donor list, and as soon as they opened the message from her, right after the e-mail announcing the auction, they would infect their own computers.
I gathered up my bag and the rest of my things. She said she’d contact me later but she’d really better get to figuring this out. My eyes felt like fireballs, and I barely made it out of the shop without crying. I lost it as soon as I heard her lock the door behind me . . . an hour early.
Lord, I prayed, holdin
g loud, clamoring sobs inside through sheer willpower, please, please, please don’t let that e-mail have gone out to the donors. Please let this be a simple fix for Becky’s computer. I’m so sorry that I made this mistake, Jesus. Just don’t let a lot of those other people be harmed. Please, please, please.
I stopped pleading as I felt my phone vibrate, indicating an incoming text. It was from Penny.
Savvy. Don’t open any e-mails from Ashley. Will explain more later.
Too late.
I walked a bit slower, hoping the cool air would calm down the red I knew must be splotching across my face. I pulled myself together, turned down Cinnamon Street, and headed to Kew Cottage. I could handle this. I could be calm.
I opened the door, and Growl came running toward me, but somehow he must have sensed something was wrong. He skidded to a stop, surfing on the small rug in the hallway.
Louanne came after him. “Sav . . .”
Before she could even finish my name, I raced upstairs into my room, slammed the door behind me, and let the sobs loose.
A minute later my mother knocked on the door. I didn’t answer, but I didn’t tell her to go away, either. She turned the knob and came in. For a few minutes she just sat and rubbed my back. In spite of myself, I was soothed. She said nothing, but I finally did.
“I ruined Becky’s computer,” I said. “With malware, whatever that is.” Then I sat straight up in bed, remembering Becky’s computer scrolling through my e-mail address book before I shut it down. “Mom! Did you get a message from me?”
“Well, I don’t know, honey,” she said in her quiet, calm tone, which indicated she seriously did not get the panic required by this situation.
“Mom, this is important.” I bolted out of bed and ran downstairs. Dad was hunched over the computer, as he often was at night. “Dad, please log on to your e-mail right now and see if you got something from me.”
He looked up at me and opened his mouth as if to say he was busy, but noticing my streaky face and watery eyes, he closed out of his program and logged on to his e-mail. “Nothing. Did you send it today?”
I took my first little breath of relief. “Can you log on to Mom’s?”
He did. “Nothing.”
He let me check my own e-mail. I quickly clicked on my sent mail. Nothing had been sent that day. I deleted the message from Ashley, then permanently deleted it, and then I slumped on the couch and texted Penny.
Did you get an e-mail from me?
No. Did you open Ashley’s card?
Yes.
A minute went by.
I’m so sorry, Savvy. Is your computer ruined? Two of Ashley’s friends’ computers are totally gone. Smoke. And they forwarded it to other people before it was too late.
I opened it at Be@titude.
I’m so, so sorry, Sav.
I didn’t text back. Instead I quietly asked my dad, “What is malware?”
“Malware means ‘malicious software,’” he said. “Programs designed to cause a lot of damage. Why?”
I started crying again, and he came and sat next to me on the couch. I had to fight two desires at once. One, to let him hug me like he had when I was a little girl, and the other, to push him away and try to deal with this on my own. I bridged the difference and just drew a little closer and explained what had happened at Be@titude.
“Probably a computer virus, which is kind of like a Trojan horse. It looks like you didn’t send it on after all because Mom and I didn’t get an e-mail, and neither did Penny. Chances are good that if it would have gone to anyone on your list, it would have gone to everyone on your list.”
“I didn’t have time to pass on the forward,” I said. Mom came down the stairs then, but to her credit, she said nothing about how she’d already told me that forwards were bad news. I stood up. “I’m going to bed now, I think,” I said.
“At six o’clock?” Mom asked.
“I’m not hungry.” All I could think about was that maybe Becky’s address book had still been open after I entered the new e-mail addresses, and maybe the malware or Trojan horse or whatever it was had gone galloping into their computers too.
Once upstairs, I sat on my floor. I pulled out my laptop, but I didn’t have the energy to do any work. Instead, I logged on to a Web site that would help me figure out what a Trojan horse was.
I calmly logged off.
Yes, that’s exactly what those forwards were. They promised something good to fake you out and let them in the computer “door.” But once you opened them up and allowed them inside, they let loose all sorts of evil that not only didn’t do good but destroyed all the good inside.
And then I realized, with a still, small nudge to my heart, that relying on lucky forwards and horoscopes and e-promises was exactly the same thing. A Trojan horse to my faith. I’d started relying on everything and everyone else—except God—to do the good I wanted.
I decided to read the real, actual Bible that night, not the one online. I opened up the one I brought to church, and the flyer I’d slipped in a few weeks back fell out. I read it carefully. I looked up the Bible verse.
Then I made a decision.
It was time to pray. I wasn’t going to stop till I really knew I’d heard from God before telling anyone else.
Chapter 23
Sunday at church I worshiped in an amazing way. I learned more about the Lord and was able to honor Him with words both sung out loud and said in my heart. In Sunday school I had a great time with Supriya. Tommy came up to me and told me that I looked great. I think I glowed from the inside out.
My turning point was just around the corner. I felt it. I hoped I would hear it in prayer. But I still kept hearing, Wait, wait, wait.
I was waiting to hear . . .
Go!
Chapter 24
Monday night I started working on my column. I thought I should begin by looking up the verses I’d used for the last two columns. I wanted to jot them down in the notebook I used to keep track of the questions I’d answered so I didn’t do too many with the same theme. I flipped to the last article where I’d used “God helps those who help themselves.” I thumbed through my concordance.
Nothing. Nothing?
So I went to the one before that, where I’d used “God works in mysterious ways.”
Thankfully, I found it: Isaiah 45:15. So one out of two wasn’t bad, right? But it struck me then that while God does work in ways we don’t always understand, He never works in ways that aren’t true to Himself. That’s what depending on luck or chance would be—putting my trust in good fortune and not in a good God.
I quickly looked up the other phrase online and instead was directed to a site full of quotes that people think are in the Bible but actually aren’t. Deep sigh.
“Lord, I’m sorry.”
“I am the vine; you are the branches. Those who remain in me, and I in them, will produce much fruit. For apart from me you can do nothing.”
I knew that now.
I flipped through my Bible and finally settled on Ecclesiastes 4:9-10 as a response to this week’s question. And for an uber-cool coincidence, one of the lines from that passage was also nearly the name of a Taylor Swift song: “Two Is Better Than One.”
Dear Asking for Trouble,
Last year I had a problem. I felt like I was, you know, heavier than the other girls. Not fat. Maybe fat. Depends on who you ask. Anyway, I mostly took care of the problem by making myself ill after eating. I dropped over a stone, and people noticed and complimented me. It felt good. Lately, well, I’m feeling a bit chubbers again. And sometimes there’s that temptation to make myself ill like I did before. Part of me says it’s all right to do it once in a while. The other part says, well, no, it’s not. I can’t tell anyone else about this problem, as you can well understand. What’s your advice?
Sincerely,
Walking a Slim Line
Dear Slim,
First, I want to compliment you for recognizing that you have a prob
lem. If it weren’t a problem, you wouldn’t be writing in, right? But you are much stronger than most other people because you can see what you’re doing wrong. I have to admit that I have made an error. Two weeks ago, in this column, I advised an art student to go it alone. Sketchy advice. I now realize that going it alone is not a good way to operate, and I’m sorry I suggested it. We all need to help others. And we need those wiser than ourselves to show us the way. Please find the courage to visit the school counselor or talk with your mother, an aunt, or a minister. You can overcome this problem for good in a way that won’t make you ill . . . or worse.
Healthfully Yours,
Asking for Trouble
Chapter 25
Monday I’d sat with the newspaper staff at lunch, but by Tuesday I was back sitting with Penny and the rest of the Aristocats. I nibbled on the meager offerings in my little plastic bag of chopped cucumbers with vinegar sprinkled over them and got my PowerBar out for after.
“My parents had to buy a new computer,” Chloe said to the girl sitting next to her. “And it cost nearly a thousand pounds. They weren’t too happy.”
I didn’t notice who gasped out loud because I was peeling back my PowerBar wrapper, but the rest of us all did the same in our heads. The table went dead quiet.
Ashley gave Chloe a look that could have jellied Natalie and, without turning her gaze at all, finally said, “Well, these things happen.” She brushed a few crumbs off the table, then turned to the left to begin a conversation with Alison, indicating that her “apology” had been offered and we shouldn’t expect any more.
