Interface Updates

The latest News regrading the publication of R.K. Hillhouse’s newest book

The plan is to release the book on eBook, paperback and hardcover with this cover (we have affectionately titled this one the Green cover). We have two others ready and waiting. The White and the Red.

The White cover (Hardcover Only) will be available as an option after we give away a few signed copies.

Both the Green and the White covers were designed and executed by Iram Shahzadi

Cover designer: Iram Shahzadi
Aaniyah.ahmed@99Designs.com

The Red cover (designed and executed by my high school chum, Trevor, of Irvin Productions) is destined to become the eBook cover after a while. My dream is to release it as a vintage mass market paperback.

Be sure to sign up for our mailing list to be kept updated on release dates, new merchandise and contests.

Be sure to like, upvote and otherwise repost our news. Support our designers and the entire staff at our co-publisher Paper Raven Books. It really takes a team. None of us can do it alone.

New Novel Coming in January ’23

Stay tuned for more details, but Interface, a sci-fi fantasy by R.K. Hillhouse, will launch on Amazon in the end of January. Check back for news and excerpts.

Chicken Cordon Yule

Picture Credit G.McAlister

We made traditional cordon bleu with a mustard béarnaise sauce. Lately we tie the breasts because of our lazy knife skills. And it was amazing as usual – Stuffing with ham and double coating the tied breasts and browning all sides in an inch of sunflower oil.

After dinner we joked abut make one big similarly breaded chicken breast roll up with ham and cheese in the center. Somehow this oddity made it onto a weekly menu and the other night we made it.

But hark! Making bread crumbs is not a big deal.

It was obvious right away that this weird dish had the potential to be amazing. As odd as the idea of arranging 5 butterflied breasts and rolling the, into a 24 inch long deep fried log was, we began to realize that it was guaranteed to be delicious. So we really applied ourselves to bring it to fruition. We welcome you to comment on your own attempts to recreate the Chicken Cordon Yule. And maybe we can publish some pictures if you are not too shy.

A note about the name. We have kids and grandkids living with us. All of us are fortunate that this is possible. It causes us renewed wonder at the richness of mundane things because we are there with our 7 and 4 year old discovering life, specifically in this case, the holidays. When we began assembling the parts conversation reflected our excitement at documenting the process. Just a little earlier that day my daughter was explaining yule logs and we were texting about making one. We tried several names while cooking; decided on none of them. When she sent me the pictures (there were 84!) the folder they were in was named Chicken Cordon Yule.

Kitchen Manager keeps watch.

I think you can see why from the pictures.

Feeds 7 for more than one meal

 Ingredients

5 organically grown (probably Cornish cross monster chickens by the size of these breasts. We got ours at Costco – they sell them in large enough packs to increase the size of this experiment.)

 4 cups of breadcrumbs (Did I ever tell you that I live in rural America? Walmart is the only real – and I use the term loosely – grocery store within 50 miles. They sell an amazing array of organically grown goodies. But realizing that we did not have enough and searching the aisles, there was no organic premade breadcrumbs. Most urban folk – we lived in Nashville, TN and Portland, OR proper. I know what availability should be. Believe me, it ain’t that here. But hark! Making bread crumbs is not a big deal. Even if you don’t collect bread ends like we do, you can get a loaf of suitable organically grown bread from Walmart and lightly toast them in a 300 degree oven for a few minutes and toss them into a food processor or a blender.

 A couple eggs, whipped (You can use whites. This is just a medium to stick the coating to the roll before you fry it. Once browned, the coating will form a shell that keeps the moisture in. Add a tablespoon of water to the eggs.

 A cup of organic white unbleached flour. (Walmart did have this – running out of ingredients should be embraced. No matter how much energy you put towards pre assembling you ingredients you will always forget something. No sense in letting it ruin the fun.)

 Approximately two ounces of Gruyere cheese, sliced into 1” wide 1/8” thick strips.

An equal amount of ham sliced the same.

Two or three cups of sunflower oil[1] (It is not organic but it is not yet available as a GMO. We avoid other oils, like peanut or soy, which may add a specific, what some might consider a better taste to the frying for allergies. I believe canola is toxic. But that is a rant for another day.)

A ball of cotton kitchen twine

Sauce

Two cups milk at room temperature

Two tablespoons flour

Two tablespoons butter

One tablespoon Dijon Mustard

Assembly and cooking

Dry and butterfly 5 chicken breasts removing the tenderloins for another meal.

Ready to Roll!

Arrange so they overlap. NOTE: it is helpful to have your kitchen twine cut to adequate length and laid out as in the picture.

Arrange ham and cheese so that when it is rolled up the chicken will cover it.

Roll the chicken and ham into a log, being sure to tie each string tightly. You may need more strings. We did. Count the total number of toes BEFORE breading. Trust me, you will want to know.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After the roll is tied, pour the egg and water mixture over and use your hands to coat the entire roll.

 

 

 

 

 

Cover the egged roll in flour. And re-coat the floured roll in egg. Cover the roll with breadcrumbs.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Heat the oil in a large fry pan – NOTE: we realized that a roasting pan would have been a better choice. Our roll did not fit in the pan and we lost a bit of the breading from one end.

Transfer to a rack.

Bake in the pre-heated oven until the inside temps to 140 degrees – 45 min. Make the sauce. Remove and let rest on a cutting board. Chicken should be moist but done all the way through.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The sauce is a standard béarnaise sauce with Dijon mustard added.

Melt the butter in a heavy bottom saucepan on low. Wisk in the four and stir until cooked through 3 min. stirring constantly. Add the milk a little at a time still stirring. After all the milk is added stir on low until the sauce begins to thicken. Add the mustard and stir to combine. Transfer to a gravy boat and leave on the warming shelf until served.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

NOTE: In order to be sure the log stayed intact, we used two skewer sticks inserted at the top and bottom to add some rigidity. After the log has rested for a few minutes, cut at the center and remove the skewers (we had to use a pliers.) Using kitchen shears carefully snip and remove each of the ties. (We used suture scissors.) This is where knowing how many ties you used is a big help.

 

 

 

Slice into rondels and serve over orzo or pastina with a generous helping of sauce.

 

 

 

 

Sorry the color of the sauce is unappetizing. We made ours with sorghum flour so Karen, who has a wheat allergy, could enjoy this. It colors sauces poorly.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[1] A note about GMOs – the jury may be out about whether genetically modified organisms are good or bad. I choose to avoid them for my own reasons. But using any food that has been bathed in poisons like glyphosate, wheat and corn especially is dangerous. It is your business what you eat. But I anti-promote poisons like glyphosate whenever possible. I am affected by them in the foods I eat. Leave your name in the comments to discuss what I have learned to do to avoid the pain and debilitation they caused me.

He never even got to lick the bowl.

Emerson by Harper

#hepotd

This image was taken by Harper, my granddaughter, six years old, of her brother Emerson, 3 years old.
SLR Nikon D3200

 

What Service Does Your Dog Provide?

By Karen Walasek

Finn has “officially” been my medical assist service dog since May in 2011. In broad terms what that means is he helped me with my physical health concerns in ways that no human can. His relatives have been known to smell diabetes and cancer. They can be trained to respond in ways that save the lives of people in their care. They provide the blind with mobility. But for me, the most amazing feat was Finn’s undying focus (on me and others in need) and his drive to respond as he saw fit. As my relationship with Finn grew he took on responsibilities beyond the narrowly defined physical aspects of my personal well-being. Long before his death he became a ritual maker, time keeper, and guardian of balance extraordinaire, tuning into the needs of those within his chosen sphere of influence in ways that eventually taught me to mostly just sit back and watch. I say mostly, because Finn had a way of pushing the limits that caused me to question my own unexamined mistaken loyalties to the propriety of sacrilegiously protected social constructs. All that barking at the Bread and Puppet theater threw me for a loop, I never saw him do anything like it, but Finn knew disruption when he saw it and the need to seek balance.

Finn didn’t care if you were a professor lecturing a class after running a marathon who needed a lick on the leg because your muscles were threatening to cramp, or a student teacher who needed to be reminded to take your meds. He didn’t care if I knew why he had decided to jump up from beneath my seat, bark and paw at a student until the student responded. His sense of purpose was unshakeable. Afterwards he would sit with what I came to know as his official stance, head tilted up slightly, sitting proudly with a look on his face that could only be seen as satisfaction with a job well done. To be sure, I would be embarrassed often, trying to honor the special privileges a service dog owner is supposed to respect, but when human after human would confide in me what service Finn provided for them I learned to accept that Finn chose his service in ways that were beyond my ability to comprehend and I learned to let him take the lead.

When I was a graduate student at Portland State College classes which were held in circles with all the chairs pushed back leaving the center open, became an invitation for Finn to begin and end our gathering with a ritual roll on his back. It became such a known ceremony that students would ask him if there was a problem if he refrained.  Class just couldn’t begin unless Finn did his roll, and it wasn’t over until he said so. Before long people began thanking me for bringing Finn and the best part of sharing my life with him became listening to these stories. I would be pointed at on the escalator of a mall by a teenager yelling proudly, “I know that dog!” Finn as service dog to the world was a teachable moment for children to learn about service dogs and to learn they should always ask first before you reach to touch a dog. They also learned that animals should have their sovereignty respected when I would ask Finn if he wanted to say “hello”, and sometimes he would turn his head away in an obvious “no”. He was the ambassador for veterans with PTSD who would randomly walk up to us in a book store to ask about getting their own service dog. Struggling high school students needing individualized learning plans, elderly couples who recently lost their dog, travelers nervous about flying, unruly teenagers who needed to be told rough housing is for outdoors only, I have lost count of those he touched.

All the while Finn never lost track of me. He filled the cracks and crevices of my life with love and devotion, tucked under my desk, the dinner table, a restaurant booth, at my feet during a cross country flight, I was never alone. He was always there, watching out for me. What this did for me was allowed me to become healthy. Finn willed me to get better. I went from being someone who could barely get in and out of a car to someone who does farm chores. I went from someone who felt defeated by my health to someone who knew no fear to find the next step whenever I reached a plateau. Wherever I went, whatever I needed to do, I could regain my sense of courage and feel safe.

These things will always be with me, even as I am constantly met with the places where Finn is no longer there. No need to ask if my buddy-buddy needs to go out, no need to make sure the water bowl in the bathroom is filled in case he wants to get a drink in the middle of the night. It’s the mundane empty places that hit me unaware and I uncontrollably grieve his loss. I expect that. Finn taught me that, who cares what rules might claim different. Needs must be met; all rules be damned. How could I not? On his last day I only left him once to go to the barn to milk the cow. He had been on the back porch so that he could take in the fresh air of his farm. Though he could barely stand, when I returned he had managed to make it to the edge of the gate closest to the barn so he could keep an eye out for my return. In his last hours he wanted me close, never to lose physical contact so that I sat in my chair with my foot pressed against his side never to allow for a break in touch. I read to him, Welcoming Spirit Home: Ancient African Teachings to Celebrate Children and Community by Sobonfu Somé. Somé told tales of the specialness of each child being born in this world, each with a special gift to share, it made the most sense to read. When it was time to put the book down, and I placed my hand on his head, Finn was ready to let go. Like it or not here I was once again, following his lead. What service does your dog provide?  Hell, I don’t have a clue; I don’t think I will be ever to fully answer that question. Ask Finn, I am sure he knows better than me. Don’t worry; I talk to him all the time. He doesn’t mind. And when you are done listening to what he has to tell you with his presence, he will get that look on his face, head tilted just so, all-knowing, with the satisfaction of a job well done. Finn will always be service dog to the world and beyond.

Finn 1/7/04 – 9/25/18

Rose

It must have been horrible,
what you did to me
The curtain remains,
a guard with my twisted face,
screaming in your voice,
snarling at my approach
I rage to not look
in the mirror

Oh I could be you,
after all, you live inside me
But then I would have your face
Though I yearn to remember
Not enough to relive it

 

 

 

 

NOTE: that is probably my brother in the first picture. I intend nothing by it, just thought it was a good picture for the post. The center one is me. 

Puma Capricornensis

A discarded excerpt from my Novella: In the Neighborhood Named for the Stars

As the winter released its full-nelson on the land and the ground water began to seep up through the soggy lawns, I sat alone on the wrought iron furniture on my mother’s front porch, in the early evening just as the glass-sliver stars began appearing in the broad blue wash of sky over the houses across the street. I saw a large, low shadow move between the houses, and being that age, you know, the age before fear? I did not resist my curiosity and went to seek out its source. I saw his long thick tawny colored tail in the patterned lawn light of the Older’s backyard and froze. Before vaporizing into the forest, he turned his impossibly huge head to me and slowly closed his amber searchlight eyes.

Because still, every year you arrive, summoned by Eostre, to spill the blood of winter and leave in his place the virgin lamb of spring.

I knew well enough not to follow him, turned around and returned to my house. But I wanted to reach out and touch his fur, to speak to his unimaginable wildness. Unable to articulate ideas of this scale, I simply let my mind move on to the present concerns of my young life, dinner and television, content to process it when and if I could, later.

I know now that Puma concolor, is called by 40 different English names. By that count, it is the animal with the most names found anywhere in the world. People in the Midwest call him a cougar or a mountain lion, but he is more kin to a common housecat than any sort of lion. I have witnessed his scream sounding more like a woman being dismembered than the roar of any big African cat.  Imagine him, glowing golden eyes hunting the tar black night. Loose furred pelt, undulating over taught muscle-wrapped bone. Sinew and cartilage stretch connective tissue. Silent, predatory and cautious.

More than a century ago he roamed in our nocturnal woods solitary and reclusive. His range is still vast, known to cover up to fifteen hundred miles. One spotted in Connecticut was thought to be a released exotic pet. A day later, the unfortunate animal was killed by a car. DNA tests proved he came from the Black Hills.

*

I saw him that night, but I never thought to speak of it. Even then I could understand he traveled the underground arteries in secret, flowing between broad rural tracts and narrow wildlife reserves, avoiding the human encroachment that blots up every natural space as a sponge absorbs a pesky spill.  An animal like that collapses the distance between present and past.  Stalking, ambushing, gorging, advancing.

If the man I am now could be in the blackness then, I would speak to that ghost of the Eastern lion, “You know our woods do not go on forever.” You can remember where forever began and can see the end, just over the next daybreak. Your habitat is like a mirage evaporating in the sun of human progress. Yet still you come, traversing interstates in secret, pressed against clapboard siding, crouched beneath closed windows, passing unknowing hearth gathered inhabitants believing their superiority. They’re whistling past the tombstone of a crumbling civilization sinking on a thinning layer of fossil fuel.

Marten and fox will beware your unstoppable procession, set into orbit at a time before time when earth spun on a different axis; they know, in this vernal hour, their season is ended. Puma Capricornensis, proud messenger, driven into secrecy and unaffected by time. I welcome you on your sacred mission. Because still, every year you arrive, summoned by Eostre, to spill the blood of winter and leave in his place the virgin lamb of spring.

Chapter 8 The Dark Tower

“The only queer people are those who don’t love anybody.”
― Rita Mae Brown

Stephen King wrote about a Dark Tower in New York in book four, Wizard and Glass. Number two Dag Hammarskjold Plaza was built over the Rose to protect it. But there is a real tower in Manhattan called Titanponte and it is downtown at 33 Thomas Avenue, which is about a mile from my loft.

We were walking over to Think Coffee on Mercer to use their WIFI and Michael brought up the book. The story had invaded his dreams; he woke from a nightmare hollering about Henry Raymond Glass.

“I don’t think he’s in the story, Mickey.” New York City was grey and dirty as usual. Stank from the subway threatened to knock me down.

He said, “Yeah, I know. He isn’t a normal character. But I recognized the name, I just can’t remember where.”

I told him the real Dark Tower was an NSA building run by AT&T. Acronyms. When I was a kid there was a homeless guy in our neighborhood, Badger, who used to make up acronyms for us kids to use in our spy games. I hadn’t thought about him in years. I always pictured myself as James Bond, as a girl.

Badger told me that was good, that I’d be in cognito since most people are looking for a tall man with a British accent. I had to look it up; I was such a poser. Soon after that he began buying me milkshakes at McDonalds. He always sat next to me in the booth. I never thought about it at the time, but he had plenty of money to buy me drinks and snacks. It seems strange that he made out like he was homeless. Thinking back on it, I doubt he was.

I bit Badger’s earlobe off when he put his hand down the front of my jeans. Then I braced my back against the wall and shoved his skinny ass onto the floor with both of my Chuck Taylors. He was a dipshit perv, but he created cool names, I still remember the one he made for my secret spy organization: S.H.O.C.K. Secret holographic organ collection kids. Yeah, looking back on it, the guy was a little wacked; He must have had a thing for pre-pubescent pussy. I told him that if he touched me again I would find where he slept and cut his balls off. I carried a folding knife, which wasn’t very long, but it was sharp, and I used it to make my point, pun intended, by flashing it across my palm and showing him the blood running down my arm.

I only saw him once again, coming toward me on the sidewalk. He crossed the street before reaching me. I guess I scared him with all that bullshit. Back then I was a lot of talk. But I didn’t question my power, and neither did anyone else. I was fierce.

I have never told anyone about that.

Michael interrupted my thoughts. “Do you think they have something to do with each other? Like the real Dark Tower, Titanponte, is a reflection of the tower in Mid-World? That maybe, Roland is somewhere in our world, fighting the evil that threatens to eat us alive?”

“You’re a nitwit, do you know that? Ok, I’ll play along, who’s Henry Raymond Glass then.” There are a few reasons I keep Mickey around. In addition to his sensitivity and uncut sexual prowess, his brain works in a special way. I like to think of him as half in half out. He’s half in this world with the rest of the pathetic humans and half out of it, into some other, more peaceful, mindful world; that inner world where imagination rules. Michael has a dreamer’s spirit, he can see doors where most see walls. He knew who Mr. Glass was, he just didn’t realize it yet.

Michael was like a pit-bull with a shank bone when a problem found its way into his brain. I knew he was on to something. Interrupting him with a reality check just made him dig for it; and he did. While I transferred the ACH files and covered our tracks, I got a call from Mari.

“Theodora, I must see you.”

“What’s the matter? My line is encrypted, we can talk.”

“Where are you, we need to meet.”

I gave her the address of the Starbucks down the street. We didn’t need to be causing a scene at Think. I liked that place, I want to come back. On the way down the block, Michael said, “I don’t know how they are related, but they are. Henry Glass and King’s book are connected. One leads to the other. My dream left no mistake about that.”

“Oh?”

“I remembered why I woke up.”

We walked a few steps. I almost fell for it and asked him why, but at that point Michael was just playing with me. He smiled and waited before continuing. “A man I never saw before shoved a hard cover book into my hands and pushed me backward into an elevator shaft, I fell and screamed. The book was The Dark Tower, and the dude’s name was Glass. That’s too much coincidence even for me.”

“What did he look like?”

“Black shaggy hair, wide lapelled suit. And glasses, gold wire rims.”

We ordered coffee and sat in the comfy chairs., Mari came in a few minutes later with a gust of frigid wind – a storm was blowing in. We hugged and I gave her my coffee.

“What the fuck, girl?”

“The escort service has been giving me fits since you beat the shit out of my client the other night. He was some sort of big wig. Now he claims that I set him up to rob him. The service fired me. I got thrown out of my apartment, Theo. I have nowhere to go. And someone is following me.”

This is why I avoid relationships with people. When I get close, someone always gets hurt. I said, “You can stay at my place. I have plenty of room.”

“I’ll pay you back. I’ll wait tables if I have to.”

“Bullshit. This ain’t about money, sister. Don’t sweat it. Hey, this is Michael. Michael, Mari. I think I mentioned her.” They shook hands. But Mari was distracted. She kept looking at the door.

Michael said, “Do you need to eat? You look frozen, maybe a warm cup of soup?”

Mickey has a good heart, though all the time he was talking to her he was glancing at her breasts. I know, I was thinking the same thing; Mari is beautiful. But he was right, the coffee helped the color return to her face, but her lips still looked a little blue. We got a cab back to my place. Mari could soak in my oversized tub and Mickey and I could talk a little more about his strange nightmare.

I needed to check on this asshole client. I thought after I broke his nose and tased his ass he would be smart enough to back off. It’s always the dumb, pencil dicks that cause the most hassle. Small penis, big bank account. I would have to do something about that.

While Mari soaked, I got a notification from the server we had hacked to insert the ACH files. My bot worked, though I never doubted it would. When they verified the size of the file to make sure it hadn’t been altered, which of course it had, there was an automatic routine that I planted to lie to them and cover our addition. Once checked, my program would delete itself. At midnight all sorts of money would move all over the world, and not only the paltry sums that I showed Mickey. My project was about to initiate. I am sure Mr. Carver wouldn’t see this one coming. Fuck him.

fin

Chapter 7 Financial Alchemy

“And you’re working for no one but me”
–George Harrison, Taxman

“Let me tell you something about money, Mickey. It ain’t real. It doesn’t even exist. If you know this, you can have as much of it as you want.”

We were making breakfast. I have a flat top griddle on my stove and I take every opportunity to use it; I love that thing. We were making sausage and pancakes. Jack Cade wasn’t much of a father, but he taught me to cook – and we made most everything from scratch since we were usually broke.

“That’s bullshit,” Michael said, “you wouldn’t have your privilege if you didn’t have money. Money is power, kiddo. And you know it.”

Michael thinks I inherited my wealth. I have never told him that I use the electronic banking system to syphon money. He isn’t ready to graduate to full-blown pirate. He thinks we are just playing. I allow it, but someday soon I will raise the curtain. For now, I am laying a broad foundation, showing him a little here and a little there.

He was manning the spatula, the ham-handed fool. I said, “See the little holes on the pancakes, Mickey? That means it’s time to flip those suckers.” He dropped one half on, half off the griddle.

“Oh, sorry. I’ll clean it up.” He went in search of paper towels.

I flipped the others, checked the sausage, and salvaged the flopped one, wiping the stainless around the stovetop with a rag I keep on the warming shelf. One of Jack’s frequent odd jobs was line-cook in a busy lunch joint. He taught me to multitask on an eight burner. “Don’t hassle over it,” I called, “I got ‘em.” Michael was rooting around in the pantry.

I checked the toast in the salamander and said, “What the hell are you doing in there?”

He returned with an empty towel tube and a porcelain cream pitcher in the shape of a dairy cow. “This is cute, where’d you get it?”

I said, “Be careful with that, it’s rare.” I lied about finding it in a curiosity shop in Seattle. It was actually one of the few items that Jack gave me. I bet he found it in someone’s garbage or stole it. I said, “I don’t use it; it’s too fragile. Put it back, ‘k?”

We ate and lounged. Snow drifted by the uncurtained industrial windows near the kitchen table. The city sky looked like a dirty steel pot; the snow would probably turn to sleet in a few minutes: fucking New York winters. I poured more coffee. Michael read on his laptop. I said, “Here, give me that, have you ever heard of an ACH file?”

He folded the last pancake, poured syrup on it, and stuffed it in his mouth. Licking the excess from his fingers, he spoke around the mouthful, “Nope.”

“ACH stands for Automated Clearing House.” I opened a text file from one of my cloud drives and spun the screen toward him. “It’s just a text file.” I pointed at a line. “The funds come from here, and flow there. This is the amount, and this is the bank. The rest is a description. Files like this move all the money in the world.”

He was chewing. “Hmmm.”

I said, “You have to be a bank to upload one– but it’s easy to hack in and insert extra lines into an existing file. They upload them every night and download return files in the morning. That’s it. That’s all money is. Numbers in a text file.”

He wiped his mouth and finished the last drips of his coffee, tipping the mug over his opened mouth and smacking his lips. Michael had some peculiar, yet endearing habits. He said, “Show me.”

I lifted my sweatshirt and stuck out my tongue.

“Very nice,” he said, “but that’s not what I mean. Yeah, no, do something. Show me how money moves. For real.”

“Ok smart-ass. But I have to set things up, and it’s Sunday, so we have to wait. If you really want to see an ACH hack in action, we’ll do it Thursday when the most deposits are made. Files drop at midnight; Friday morning is the best time to withdraw funds.” He was standing behind me now with his hand inside my sweatshirt, massaging my left tit. I leaned my head back against him.

“So,” he said, “We can do it later? Good. That leaves this morning free.”

Michael is such a horn dog. That’s part of the reason I keep him around.

*

Making an ACH file is cake. As I told Michael, it’s just a simple processor file, like the ones the SUXNET virus infiltrated to take control of Iranian centrifuges. As long as you give the processor proper instructions, money moves. If there are insufficient funds the transaction comes back in a return file.

ACH transfers are internal bank to bank transactions, and normally banks are the only ones who use them. But banks give FedWire network access to certain non-banks. They call themselves financial services; collection agencies, check recovery firms, and the like. I have access to everyone, but these companies are easier to hack than a bank. Unfortunately, stealing from a bank is a one shot deal; you can never do it the same way again. I’d been planning a project for months that I would initiate on Thursday. Michael and I would craft a file to move small amounts from several sources. These transfers have to be masked through many accounts to avoid detection long enough cover erase our tracks. I’d to show Michael a map of the transfers, he likes graphics. ACH hacking is more art than science; it’s a slight of hand.

I told him I was busy until Thursday so I’d have enough time to get everything ready. The file we made would syphon off a few thousand micro-amounts and aggregate them in forty other accounts around the world. No one would notice, and even if they did, unauthorized debits are always refunded. The complexity makes them impossible to trace.

From there I’d shuffle them around over a couple days. Bellagio called it crossing. Eventually they will be posted in an off-shore account and withdrawn. We’d end up with ten thousand or so, but Michael would be suitably impressed. I would put his transactions my insert for the check recovery company and his tests would upload at the same time as my attack. I never burn a bridge without making it worth my while.

My project will involve much larger sums and have bigger consequences. It makes me wet just thinking about it.

fin

Chapter 6 A Mouse and a Strawberry Mark

“Most people don’t realize that two large pieces of coral painted brown, and attached to his skull with common wood screws can make a child look like a deer.”
–Kurt Cobain, I Hate Myself and I Want to Die

I have a misshapen body. I know, I know, I should love myself. But society is completely fucked, and there’s more urgent shit to worry about. At least that’s what I tell myself. My Russian swim trainer, Bella, told me when I was a kid, “People in your society hate themselves, Theodora. They’re taught to despise their bodies.” I knew what she was talking about.  Everything in my life from TVs to billboards told me my body was wrong, and that everything would be fine if I’d just buy the right deodorant, eat the right cereal, or wear the right fucking shoes. I spent my entire life trying to block that bullshit out.

Jack said I was born in the ocean, but he never said more. I was a water craving geek, and geeks like me live inside our heads; we ignore our bodies anyway. So I dealt with it by not dealing with it.

Looking in the mirror, my eye is drawn to these freakishly wide shoulders, a broad torso made to look even wider by my large breasts: a swimmer’s back exaggerated by a little waist and generous hips. “Proud mama hips,” Bella called them. And after years of swimming, my thighs and biceps are muscled and large. I look like a cartoon.

I stand there and wonder, who the hell are you? Where did you come from? My body looks alien; not the Theodora in my mind. Bella sniffed when I said these things. She’d say, “You have strong arms and legs, smooth olive skin, thick, healthy hair. You will never be a great swimmer, but great is overrated. You’re a big, fast, beautiful girl, pchelka.” I didn’t buy it, I was never anyone’s little bee.

I have too many freckles; my checks are covered with them. You don’t even see my nose and lips; melanin spots dominate. And my eyebrows are always trying to grow together into one. I’d curse out loud when I tweezed them; but it was a losing battle. I gave up. My eyes are my redeeming feature. Jack called them Seven-Up bottle green; they are large and almond shaped.

When I turn profile to the mirror, my belly sticks out too much. My hair, which grows like kudzu, needs to be cut again; the damn braid is always in my way. In this evening light I look like an unfinished charcoal sketch, distorted, out of proportion. Dark smudges for my brows and pubes, and that braid snaking over my shoulder, curling at my hip, impossible to brush out, bound so it won’t escape.

My hair is dark but not flat black like Michael’s. Even right after he shaves his face and bald head are a shadow against his pale Irish complexion; like his hair absorbs the light. Together we look interracial.

Dirty blond, that’s me, with a tinge of red. Irish? Greek? Russian? I have no idea; Jack changed the subject when I asked. I have no real birth certificate or social security number, only forgeries.  During a rebellious phase, before I realized there was nothing to rebel against, that Jack would let me do anything I wanted, I shaved off my hair. Once gone I noticed a mark on the back of my head. At first I thought it was a birthmark, an oval port wine stain about the size of a lemon. But I snapped a picture with my phone and made a Photoshop enlargement. The characters look vaguely oriental, but I can’t figure out what they mean. They may be the key to my past, but so far, Internet searches lead nowhere. If Jack knew anything, he wouldn’t tell me. And since we lived such a transient life, there are no records. I remain a misshapen mystery. I have that one hidden mark and a small scar the shape of a mouse that I can’t remember getting. But, only my most intimate relations will ever get a glimpse my little mouse.

fin

The entire story so far can be found on the Theodora Smith page