by JT Kalnay
“Yeah. I hope not too,” Craig said. His teeth clenched down together and slowly ground back and forth as an ice pick of pain began developing behind his right eye.
#
As Craig cleared the last of the dishes from the table, Stacey looked up at him. “Why don’t you ask Rakesh for some ideas on why your machine keeps logging itself on?” Stacey said.
“Good idea,” Craig answered. After putting away the last dish, he walked to his office and sat down at his computer. In a minute he had his email application up and running.
TO: [email protected]
FROM: [email protected]
DATE: April 24, 1994
RE: NW PROBS
Hey Rakesh. Wassup? Stacey sends her best. I’ve got a problem (is that the only time I write you? :-> ) with my workstation at home. I log it off at night but when I wake up the next day it’s logged back on by itself. Any ideas? Craig.
P.S. Do you really think this baseball strike is going to happen?
“That ought to do it,” Craig said as he snapped off the monitor. To be safe, he disconnected the modem cable and unplugged the power strip.
“You almost ready to go?” Stacey asked.
“Almost,” he answered. He walked over to where Stacey was seated and stood behind her. He gently began massaging her neck and shoulders. Her head leaned back against him then she rolled it slowly side to side.
“That feels sooo good,” Stacey said. Craig leaned forward and kissed her on the forehead.
“I love you,” Craig said.
“Even when I’m hungover?” Stacey asked.
“Even then,” Craig answered. “Now I’m ready to go.”
“I hope there’s more where that came from later,” Stacey said.
“Always,” Craig answered.
#
“Good morning Mr. Walsh, Miss Horner,” Rufus the guard said.
“Morning Rufus,” they chimed.
“Think there’ll be a baseball strike?” Rufus asked.
“I don’t know,” Craig answered.
“How somebody who makes four million dollars a year for playing three hours of baseball a night for eight months a year can go on strike is beyond me,” Stacey said. “If women played baseball, there’d never be a strike.” Rufus and Craig looked at each other and shrugged their shoulders.
“See you for lunch?” Stacey asked Craig.
“Absolutely. Good luck with your meeting,” Craig said. He went straight into the building while Stacey stayed behind to give Rufus instructions concerning the visitors she was expecting. As Craig entered his office he noticed the email icon dancing around on his monitor. “You just can’t miss motion on your screen,” Craig said to himself. He was repeating a line he’d heard and not really believed in a GUI Design Class he attended in New York City taught by a wise ass who thought he knew everything. Craig brought up the email application. Though twelve messages were waiting, one immediately caught his eye, and he quickly opened it.
TO: [email protected]
FROM: [email protected]
DATE: APRIL 24, 1994
RE: YOUR PROBS
Hi Craig. Don’t be so worried. You don’t ping me only when you have a network problem. One time you pinged me because Stacey had a network problem. :-) It sounds like one of two things. Either you’re sleepwalking, which I can’t help you with, or you’ve got a virus. There’s some pretty nasty ones floating around out there. A whole new crew of hackers from central Europe are trying to make their name. I’ve attached my latest virus scanner. Oh, btw, I’m in Hong Kong right now. There is some weird sh*t over here. I’m installing the X-dot protocols for the FIRM, but I should be back in about two weeks. You’ve got to get over here and see it before they give it back. Give my love to Stacey. I still think she liked me better. But how could I compete with her TA? Seeing her every day in class, and more importantly, every night in the lab? You dog. Anyway, good luck with the scanner program. Let me know if it turns up anything. Oh yeah, one last thing, I was walking one of the backstreets yesterday, and I saw the head of a steer impaled on a pike stuck into the ground. There was this nasty cloud of flies all around it and a dog licking up the puddle of blood on the ground. Can you believe it? It was the advert for a butcher shop. Like I said, some weird sh*t over here. Later, Rakesh.
Craig quickly scanned his other emails. “Junk mail has arrived on the Internet,” Craig said in disgust.
“Has it?” Stan Maxwell asked from the doorway. Craig nearly jumped out of his seat.
“Holy cow you scared me,” Craig said. He put his fingers to his neck, looked at his watch and started counting. Fifty to one sixty in one second,” Craig said. “You’ve got to stop doing that to me.”
“Sorry. Didn’t mean to scare my top programmer,” Stan said. Craig blushed at the compliment. “I’m thinking of hiring two more programmers to work on the new satellite positioning project,” Stan said.
“Cool. We could use the help,” Craig said.
“Do you think you can grill some candidates for me? Really put them through their paces technically? I need to know if they’re as good at this neural network stuff as you are. I want them to be able to maintain your old code so that you can get on to your next project,” Stan said.
“Sure,” Craig answered.
“Thanks. I’ll let you know when the candidates are coming in. It’ll probably be next week,” Stan said. He hooked his fleshy thumbs under his tightly stretched red braces and gave a little tug. “So I’ll let you get back to work, or whatever, then,” Stan said. Having delivered the parting shot, he waddled out of the office. Craig nodded at the retreating corpulence. Minutes later he had achieved concentration and was absorbed in his code.
#
“Earth to Craig? Earth to Craig?” Stacey said quietly from the doorway. She knew how jumpy Craig could be when someone “snuck up on him.”
“What? Just a sec,” Craig answered. He pointed and clicked then turned in his chair.
“What’s up Stace?” he asked.
“Ready for lunch?” she asked.
“Already?” Craig asked. “How can it be noon already?” Craig asked.
“It’s after one,” Stacey said coolly. Craig examined his watch, which read 1:30.
“Sorry. You know I get in this code and I can’t get out,” Craig said.
“I know,” Stacey answered. “It’s like something else you get into and can’t get out of,” she said mischievously.
“So where do you want to eat?” Craig asked.
“Home,” Stacey answered with a wink. A small smile spread across Craig’s face. He flipped off the lights on the way out of his office.
#
Craig and Stacey lay sprawled naked across their king sized bed. Craig lifted a fork of cold pasta salad to Stacey’s mouth. She took it and smiled. “You are the most amazing woman,” Craig said. He traced his finger along her shoulder to her elbow.
“Don’t ever forget it,” Stacey answered.
“I won’t. Hey! I forgot to tell you. Stan asked me to interview some people next week. He said we might need some more people for the GPS project. He also said they’re going to have experience with neural nets so they can maintain my code,” Craig recounted.
“Uh-oh,” Stacey said.
“Uh-oh what?” Craig asked.
“You have so much to learn grasshopper,” Stacey said.
“What are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about making yourself indispensable,” Stacey said. She slid her hand across Craig’s chest.
“Oh?” Craig managed.
“You don’t want anybody else working at the firm who is able to do what you do, do you?” Stacey asked. Her hand slid lower to his flat stomach.
“No. I g-guess I don’t.”
“You don’t want anyone thinking you can be replaced do you?” she asked.
“Definitely no,” he said. His words were coming in quick gasps. Stacey stroked him gently, teasing him.
“I see what you mean,” Craig said.
April 27, 1994
Nagoya, Japan
Assembled From News Service Reports
A China airlines A300-600R Airbus crashed during an aborted landing today. Two hundred and fifty six passengers and fifteen crew members were killed. There were ten survivors. Witnesses report that the plane had tried to land once and was on a second attempt when the right wing dipped and impacted the ground. The plane broke into pieces and immediately burst into flame. All the survivors were in the tail section, which broke apart from the remainder of the plane and did not catch fire. The black box flight recorder has not been recovered. Airport tower tapes revealed that the last transmission from the cockpit was “going around.”
April 27, 1994
Ancirik, Turkey
Assembled From Wire News Reports
The Turkish Air Force today confirmed pilot error as the reason for the friendly fire shoot down of two U.S. Blackhawk helicopters here on April 24, 1994. Turkish Air Force officials will neither confirm nor deny that court-martial proceedings are being brought against the two pilots who reportedly failed to visually identify their target before loosing a salvo of four air-to-air missiles. The bodies of the deceased airmen have still not been turned over to American officials by the Iraqis. Informed sources in the State Department, speaking on condition of anonymity, report that there is a possibility that the bodies will be paraded in Baghdad as trophies of war.
April 28, 1994
Seattle, Washington
Assembled From Wire News Reports
AirCom officials today denied rumors that software problems aboard a United States Air Force Boeing E-3 AWACS plane contributed to the friendly fire shoot down of the two Blackhawk helicopters over Iraq on the 24th. Twelve U.S. servicemen were killed. None of the bodies have been recovered. An AirCom official, speaking on condition of anonymity said, “We have no idea where this rumor about our software came from, but it is 100% bull…”
Chapter
April 28, 1994
San Francisco, California
Stan Maxwell, the president of APSoft, was stationed at the head of the modern but tasteful boardroom. Craig and Stacey were arranged near him.
“Here’s the CD Stan,” Craig said.
“Ready for the FAA?” Stan asked.
“Ready, willing, and able,” Craig said.
Stacey cleared her throat. “We copied the final beta onto ten QA machines a week ago. The program’s been running 24/7 on all ten machines without one glitch. It’s ready for the FAA,” Stacey said.
“Alright. Rick is back in action in Washington so we’ll send him a couple of copies on CD and let him run with it,” Stan said. “This is a niece piece of work. You two are a hell of a team.” Stan reached into his briefcase and pulled out two passes to a nearby amusement park. “Take tomorrow off, with pay, on the firm, and have a good time.” Stan handed over the two passes then peeled two one hundred dollar bills off a fat wad from his pocket and gave them one each. “And Craig, buy her something nice with that.”
“Yessir,” Craig answered.
Craig and Stacey fairly danced out of the office, their feet barely touching the deep piled carpet. Back at Craig’s office, the QA chief, Anthony Hayes was waiting, twisting a lock of his impossibly unruly red hair in his left hand.
“Craig? What do you make of this? We shut down five of the QA machines and the funniest thing happened. Two of them put up a message that they couldn’t find their gateway to the Internet.”
“So?” Craig answered.
“So? So those are two standalone machines. They’ve never been connected to anything. How come all of a sudden they want to connect to the Internet? Could it be something in your latest beta?”
“Maybe they’ve got a virus?” Craig said.
“We scanned them. Couldn’t find anything.”
“Did you reboot them?”
“Yeah.”
“Well I don’t know what’s wrong with them,” Craig said. “Maybe one of your technicians is connecting at night to play that network version of DOOM. Who knows? My software doesn’t have any networking stuff in it. Just the ground links. Reformat the hard drives. That ought to fix them.”
“Whatever.” Anthony Hayes left with a disgusted look on his face.
“There’s no network software in the Auto Pilot software is there?” Stacey asked.
“Only the ground links for weather and traffic control. But that stuff doesn’t hit the Internet,” Craig said. “Maybe one of the ground link modules has a bug in the network connection built in for the fancy new remote test tools the service company bought? Who knows? So what time do you want to go the park tomorrow?”
“I’ve got a better idea than the park,” Stacey said.
“What?” Craig asked.
Stacey turned her head slightly to the side, thinned her eyes and looked and looked right through him.
“Oh,” Craig said. “Good idea.” He moved into her arms and pressed against her.
#
“Good night Mr. Walsh,” the guard said.
“Good night,” Craig said. He took two steps then stopped just inside the door, turned and went back to the guard desk. “You got your grandchildren home this weekend?” Craig asked.
“Yessir,” Rufus the guard answered.
Craig pulled the two passes to the amusement park from his back pocket and inspected them carefully. “Do you think they could find some use for these?” Craig asked.
“Yessir, I imagine they could,” Rufus answered.
“Alright then. They’re yours,” Craig said.
“Thank you sir. Good night sir,” Rufus replied. There was the slightest hint of a smile on his wizened old face.
“Good night,” Craig said.
“Good night again sir.” The guard pocketed the passes and buzzed Craig out of the building.
Chapter
May 10, 1994
San Francisco, California
The president and his two employees were back in their usual seats in the boardroom. Brilliant sunlight, the kind only a person who has lived through three straight weeks of spring fog can appreciate, streamed through the skylights.
“The report from Washington is good,” Stan said. “The beta has been up and running for ten days. The FAA is ready to release it to the airline test centers.”
“All Right!” Craig said. He put up his hand to high five Stacey.
“Cool!” Stacey added, slapping a demure high five.
“Craig. You’re going to go to Seattle and get them up to speed. Stacey, you’re headed to London. Three or four days on-site to help them scope out the changes and get their testing people in the loop and then you’re home.”
“Yessir,” Craig said, suddenly stunned. Someone else was going to roll out his software? Even if it was Stacey, it was still his software.
“When do we leave?” Stacey asked, the eagerness to return to London showing in her voice.
“You go tomorrow,” Stan answered. "Craig goes day after tomorrow." He slid tickets and itineraries at the two workers. “Francine’s got it all arranged. Oh yeah. I almost forgot,” Stan said. He got up and left the conference room. He came back with matching, rolling suitcases. “In appreciation of your willingness to travel on such short notice for the firm. We thank you.” He handed the handles of the suitcases to Craig and Stacey.
Craig and Stacey looked at the luggage and at each other. “Thanks,” they said in stunned unison.
Craig’s hand drifted onto Stacey’s knee under the table.
“Good luck,” Stan said. He left the room again.
After a moment absorbing the sudden travel plans, Craig stood up and walked away from the table.
“I’m going to miss you,” Craig said.
“I’ll miss you too,” Stacey said. She looked d
eeply into his blue eyes and saw clearly how much he was going to miss her.
“Maybe you can catch a show while you’re in London? You always talk about how good the theatre is there,” Craig offered. She could tell he was only trying to forget for a moment that he’d be without her.
“Maybe you can go to a Mariner’s game?” she offered back.
The board room fell quiet for a minute.
“Nice luggage isn’t it?” Craig asked.
“Matching. His and hers. I guess Stan assumes we’re a couple?” Stacey said.
“You think?”
“Absolutely.”
“We are so busted.”
“I think he likes it,” Stacey said. “You know. Young love in the office and all.”
“Good thing he likes it because we are a couple. You and me. Together. I’ll miss you.” Craig came back to the table and kissed her gently, not like a sailor shipping to sea, but like a man about to be separated from his wife and who doesn’t know if he’ll ever be back.
“Want to go home for lunch?” Stacey asked.
“I thought you’d never ask.”
Chapter
May 17, 1994
London, England
"So that about wraps it up," Stacey said.
"I agree," the British Airways representative said.
"And so do I," Rakesh added.
Handshakes all around and the meeting wrapped up. Stacey and Rakesh found themselves on the street outside the towering office building where warm spring sunshine glistened off the morning's puddles.
"You can't imagine how surprised I was to see you," Stacey said.
"It was a last minute thing," Rakesh answered. "The Firm wanted me to liaise between British Airways and some of our people so they figured this was the best chance."
"Still. You completely took me unawares."
"Not upset are you?" Rakesh added.
"No. It's just odd. After all this time."
"I know."
Stacey and Rakesh started walking down the block towards the tube.
