nected Victorian townhouses just off Picadilly. It was where Art
consulted out of. Also, two-hundred-odd usability specialists, product
designers, experience engineers, cog-psych cranks and other tinkerers with the
mind. They were the hairface hackers of Art's generation, unmanageable creative
darlings -- no surprise that the VP of HR would have cause to spend a little
face-time with someone there. Try telling Fede that, though.

"All right, Fede, what do you want me to do?"

"Just -- Just be careful. Sanitize your storage. I'm pushing a new personal key
to you now, too. Here, I'll read you the fingerprint." The key would be an
unimaginably long string of crypto-gibberish, and just to make sure that it
wasn't intercepted and changed en route, Fede wanted to read him a slightly less
long mathematical fingerprint hashed out of it. Once it arrived, Art was
supposed to generate a fingerprint from Fede's new key and compare it to the one
that Fede wanted him to jot down.

Art closed his eyes and reclined. "All right, I've got a pen," he said, though
he had no such thing.

Fede read him the long, long string of digits and characters and he repeated
them back, pretending to be noting them down. Paranoid bastard.

"OK, I got it. I'll get you a new key later today, all right?"

"Do it quick, man."

"Whatever, Fede. Back off, OK?"

"Sorry, sorry. Oh, and feel better, all right?"

"Bye, Fede."

"What was *that*?" Linda had her neck craned around to watch him.

He slipped into his cover story with a conscious effort. "I'm a user-experience
consultant. My coworkers are all paranoid about a deadline."

She rolled her eyes. "Not another one. God. Look, we go out for dinner, don't
say a word about the kerb design or the waiter or the menu or the presentation,
OK? OK? I'm serious."

Art solemnly crossed his heart. "Who else do you know in the biz?"

"My ex. He wouldn't or couldn't shut up about how much everything sucked. He was
right, but so what? I wanted to enjoy it, suckitude and all."

"OK, I promise. We're going out for dinner, then?"

"The minute I can walk, you're taking me out for as much flesh and entrails as I
can eat."

"It's a deal."

And then they both slept again.

7.

Met cute, huh? Linda was short and curvy, dark eyes and pursed lips and an
hourglass figure that she thought made her look topheavy and big-assed, but I
thought she was fabulous and soft and bouncy. She tasted like pepper, and her
ha