Twenty-Six

Jael was in full-on bodyguard mode as she walked me up to my apartment. It had been a quiet Uber home. Normally Jael plays the politely attentive listener to my blathering, but after being thrown out of Maria’s life, I lacked the will to blather.

Parting with Jael is usually a mildly awkward affair. A handshake is ridiculous, a peck on the cheek is too mushy, a salute works sometimes along with “see ya.” Today Jael broke with all of these approaches and pulled me close for a stiff hug.

“It will be better tomorrow,” she said into my ear. “Stay in tonight.”

“I will,” I said, hugging her back. Then she left, moving down my spiral hallway staircase with her typical silence, and I was left sitting in my apartment with Click and Clack. The boys didn’t seem in a talkative mood, so I left them alone, poured some of Clyde May’s Alabama whiskey, and let its apples settle in my nose before taking a swig.

My phone chirped. I had a text message from Twitter: 328938 is your Twitter login code.

I’d set up my Twitter account so that it would text me one of these codes every time I logged in from a new computer or phone. But I hadn’t logged in from a new computer or phone. That meant only one thing: somebody had guessed my Twitter password.

I shouldn’t have been surprised. My password—BiteMe!—was pretty weak. It was short, numberless, and built of real words.
Password-guessing processors that can make millions of guesses a second shouldn’t have had too much trouble with it, and apparently didn’t.

I sat for a moment, letting the Alabama whiskey wash away the instinctive gut punch of having been hacked. The irrational feeling of violation had me looking over my shoulder, listening intently to the apartment. Clack clomped across the sand, his scuttling filling my apartment with sound.

“Could you keep it down?” I asked him. He ignored me.

I opened my Twitter page, intending only to go to my settings and change the password. Online insults can only hurt you if you go looking for them, if your need to be noticed and your need to know that others are thinking about you overrides the good sense to avoid listening to an anonymous bully pillorying you as he stands in line at the unemployment office. I changed my password and then … peeked at the carnage on #TuckerGate.

@Eliza: It’s like Charles Stuart all over again. #TuckerGate

Good God!

I decided to limit the damage to my psyche by avoiding #TuckerGate, and instead only viewing tweets that mentioned me, and only from people I followed. It still wasn’t good.

@Coffee4Hugh: You’d think Mr. MIT, @TuckerInBoston would be better at hiding a body. #TuckerGate #GoUMass

That was just Hugh Graxton being a jerk, but others weren’t so charitable.

Many people whom I’d followed because I thought they were smart and funny turned out to be stupid and inane when it came to talking about me. I unfollowed them all, except for Hugh.

It wasn’t all bad. I had some defenders:

@Epomis: Sorry @CapnMerica, you want to be a hero, go do something heroic. What got you bitch-slapped? #TuckerGate

Idiot that he was, @CapnMerica told @Epomis what he had called Jael.

@Epomis: Serves you right. I wish @TuckerInBoston had kicked you too. #TuckerGate.

I sent Epomis a direct message.

@TuckerInBoston <private>: Thanks for the support!

Epomis replied immediately.

@Epomis <private>: It’s not fair what they are doing.

Then:

@Epomis <private>: Want to get a drink?

@TuckerInBoston <private>: You’re in Boston?

@Epomis <private>: I’ll be at the Beehive at 10. Meet me there.

@TuckerInBoston <private>: What do you look like?

@Epomis <private>: I’m a girl.

@TuckerInBoston <private>: There are girls on the Internet?

@Epomis <private>: See you there?

I thought of my promise to Jael. The safest thing to do was just to stay here, chat on Twitter, find out a little more about Epomis from a distance.

I sipped my whiskey. I’d brought this whole thing on myself. Maria had told me to leave it alone, Huey had told me to leave it alone, Bobby had told me to leave it alone. So what did I do?

Peter’s head stared back at me in my mind’s eye.

Sitting here drinking alone wasn’t the answer.

@TuckerInBoston <private>: How will I find you?

@Epomis <private>: I’ll find you.

I grabbed my coat, headed for the door, ready to put the past in the past.