Ashley I met at work. She was the password girl, the account girl, she kept track of all the user accounts for the software I developed. Ashley was from Middletown, and she came up to Dayton for I don’t know what reason. She’s extremely skinny, kind of a freak; she’s got wispy hair like she’s fifty, even though she’s only twenty-two. If you need passwords for anything you go to Ashley.
“I need a ghost account for news.”
“Hold on.” (She’s on the phone.) She’s typing. I didn’t see the headset. “Makowski. You’re so nasty.” That’s what she’s saying into the headset. Makowski is our boss. One of them. “Hold on.” This time she’s telling Makowski to hold on. “What do you want.” She turns around in her chair, spins the chair around, and spreads her legs. She’s wearing jeans. She runs her hands up the inside of her thighs, toward her crotch.
“I need a ghost account for news.”
Her eyes never leave mine. “I’ll chat it to you. Is that all you need?”
“For now.” I turn and start to go.
Ashley turns back to her screen then says: “Wait.”
“What?”
“Why do you need a ghost account?”
Other people in the aisle of cubicles are hearing this.
I just need it. “For testing,” I say. I mean this is her job. She could get fired for giving me the wrong password. But she’ll give me any account I want. You’re supposed to keep things separated—partitioned—for people’s safety. Social security numbers and everything. But in actuality everybody has everything, inside the company. We’re always in the news for leaks.
In my chat I find a picture of a girl squatting over a boy. They’re on a mattress with no sheets. Paint on the walls is crumbling. This is from Ashley. She always sends me porn at work. Technically, the pipe that chat runs on is unencrypted, so anyone in the office who had two brain cells to rub together could run a program and sniff out what everyone else was saying on chat. But no one in this office takes that initiative. They’re all busy surfing YouTube.
I delete the picture. I type: ghaccount?
Ashley types back: a second! Then she types: xoxoxxx
Grisly. Ashley is technically married, but they’re separated. She got the house. That’s where we fuck, typically, though sometimes in my apartment. I fucked her one time in her desk chair on a Sunday morning, which was a really terrible idea but there’s no cameras in this area. I think she has a thing for Makowski. It’s something about the way she presents to him in meetings. Like a slave thing; like she’s getting off on subserviently presenting him with bullet items and completed task reports. I can see when she does it. Makowski doesn’t notice but to me it’s obvious. Something about the way she puts her elbows on the conference table and then where her chest rides after that, its altitude. Makowski is a fucking idiot for not noticing. He’s an MBA.
Makowski I found at the pop machine one day. This is in the hallway outside the office. He’s standing there in his pleated khakis. When he bends down you can see how tight those pants are. I hated tapered khakis, I just do. It says something about you if you’d buy them. This fucker is going for a nickel in the coin-return. It’s not clear if he’s putting it in or taking it out. He struggles with a dollar. It’s folded. It won’t go in the bill acceptor. He sees me standing there and he says: “I’m an MBA, you’d think I could figure this out.”
MBAs. I wasn’t going to critique him. I wasn’t going to say a thing. I was going to stand there quietly and wait my turn. I might have even said something pleasant to him, even though he’s my boss. Something like: “Hey.” And maybe a smile.
But no.
This fucking guy.
Even a pop machine is about him being an MBA.
Does he remember using pop machines before becoming an MBA? Does he remember that non-MBAs can fuck, drive cars, pick their noses, make telephone calls, drink water—even play golf! Motherfuckers and their “golf shirts”. Give me a fucking break.
If Ashley ever fucked Makowski I would lose all respect for her. But she wouldn’t. He’s too fat.
I type: ..? That’s an ellipsis and a question mark. Two is the new three. As in: where is my fucking ghost account?
Ash responds with another link: this time to some Sesame Street gag I’ve seen before. Sesame Street crunk. (“What’s the number for today?”—“I’o’n’know nigga!”)
I call her. I don’t say anything. I just breathe.
I can hear her lips. Gum.
“What are you doin after work today?”
She says: “Making cards.” She makes greeting cards out of construction paper, popsicle sticks, stuff like that.
“That’s not what I mean,” I say. “What’s your pussy doing after work?”
“Oh that,” she says. Long pause. “I can’t talk about that right now. Uh-huh. One second.” ppl at my desk! she types.
ghaccoutn I type. I type fast and the letters get transposed.
.................forthcumming she types.
Then it says Ashley has left the conversation.
I’m imagining her bent over on the carpet in her upstairs bedroom, the extra room, the craft room. She’s got a popsicle stick in one hand and an Elmer’s glue in the other hand. Maybe she’s licking the glue, I don’t know, but I’m fucking her.
Ashley wears the weirdest panties. Her bras, on those tiny breasts..I always feel like I’m with a little boy. Some cross-dressing kid who stole his older sister’s undies. Yeah. She would definitely have a popsicle stick in her hand.
Her husband lives in some apartment north of Cincinnati. It’s kind of fucked up since he paid the down-payment on this house and Ashley never would have been able to get it without him. She can just barely make the payments. I know cause I’ve helped her. Now that’s an expensive hobby.
Ashley is the only person in this entire office who makes any sense. Well maybe Gao. No—scratch that; Gao doesn’t make any sense. Ashley is the only person here who makes any sense. I hope she finds another job, she’s too good for this place. A bunch of monkeys. I’m not sure if I really like Ashley or if I like Ashley because of the contrast between her and everyone else.
She types back across my screen: GKHDDWN
That’s my ghost account.
I type back: txh