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She nodded emphatically.
When they were in eighth grade, Jason Tiller had jumped off the gym roof and broken his leg. Mrs. Terlecki believed Jessica had goaded him into it and had had it out for her ever since. In fact, poor skinny Jason had been suffering from unrequited love and was trying anything and everything to catch her attention. Nobody remembered that though, did they?
“Can I ask you a question, ma’am?” she said now, hoping she wasn’t making a mistake.
“Hm. Go on.”
“Have there been any complaints about my work for the school?”
“The school photos, you mean?”
“Yes. Or the team pictures or the grad photos. I’ve had some cancellations lately and,” she forced herself to laugh, “I guess I’m getting a little paranoid.”
“I haven’t heard anything. How many cancellations have you had?”
“Oh, one or two,” she said, waving her hand dismissively. “But as far as you know, the school is happy with my work? No complaints from anyone?”
“What kind of complaints would we be getting?”
Carrie gritted her teeth. “I have no idea. That’s why I’m asking.”
Mrs. Terlecki tapped a pencil against her lips, thinking. “I’ll ask around. Have you checked with your grandfather?”
“Why?”
The woman gave a little shrug. “That’s usually where people go, if it concerns a Jackson. Shows respect.”
“Since I’m a grown woman,” said Carrie tightly, “I’d appreciate it if any complaints came directly to me. Will you let me know if you hear anything?”
“I’ll try.” She had a memory like an elephant. If only it was as accurate as it was long. “There’ll be nothing to hear, I’m sure.”
“Oh, I almost forgot,” Carrie added, hoping it didn’t sound as fake as it felt. “I’ve been getting warning messages about my website being targeted by hackers. Apparently whoever’s been doing it is local. I hope the computer science department has a handle on their students.”
“Why would anyone hack your website?” Mrs. Terlecki’s skinny eyebrows jumped on her lined forehead.
“I have no idea, Mrs. Terlecki,” said Carrie, suddenly so tired of how hard it was to maintain the image people wanted to have of her. “Sometimes people just do stupid things.”
“That they do, my dear.” Mrs. Terlecki gave her a reptilian smile. “You have a nice day now.”
*
“So?” said Carrie. “How’s it going?”
“Good. Fine.” He pushed back the dark hair that fell in messy waves over his temples, only to have it slip back again. She found herself wanting to see if she could smooth it out of his way.
She’d always been a sucker for hair.
She stood behind the guest chair in her office, watching Ethan as he worked. Ethan’s long fingers flew over the keyboard, typing, clicking, cutting, pasting, sending rows and rows of code into the black-and-white space that was her website.
Or, he could be launching missiles from her desktop, for all she knew.
“You get done what you needed to do?” he asked, without looking up.
“Sort of. Trying to track down a missing check, that’s all. It’s in the mail, as they say.”
She tried to laugh, but it fell flat, even to her ears. She’d bought some new equipment recently that she couldn’t afford to pay for, without this money.
“Damn,” he muttered, tapping his fist lightly against his chin. It looked like he hadn’t shaved that morning but instead of looking dishevelled, it gave him a stylish, GQ sort of look.
Quit it, Carrie!
“What’s wrong?” she asked. “Don’t tell me you’ve found more of my old pictures online.”
“No, no,” he said, “but you’ve got bigger problems.”
She seriously doubted that.
“Like what?”
He started talking about things like firewalls and routers and templates and violations and when he got to malware and optimization and e-commerce functionality, she stopped him.
“Just tell me, can you get my main website working again? Safely?”
