“Kemet, stay in charge of the office. If anyone calls, say the boss is out.”
They left.
Now it was just Mrs. Eleanor and me in the office.
She was finishing her Tupperware.
My opportunity had arrived.
I couldn’t lose a second.
I quietly pushed my cleaning cart toward the coffee area where the electric kettle and the outlets were. I looked at Mrs. Eleanor. She was still eating, her eyes fixed on the computer screen, probably watching a show.
I took a deep breath and took out the small bottle of water. I plugged in the kettle’s cord, but left it halfway loose. Slowly, I started pouring the water—not inside the kettle, but directly onto the outlet on the wall.
Fast.
A small sharp crack, a blue spark jumping from the outlet, and a smell of burning.
Immediately, the circuit breaker in the corner of the office tripped. The entire office went dark. Mrs. Eleanor’s computer shut off. The sound of the show stopped.
“My God, what was that?” Mrs. Eleanor screamed, nearly spilling her Tupperware.
I ran from the coffee area, my face pale. This time, my fear was genuine.
“I was plugging in the kettle and suddenly it sparked. It smells like burning. I’m so scared.”
Mrs. Eleanor, being a careful and older person, genuinely panicked at the thought of a short circuit.
“Girl, I told you to be careful with electricity. Where did it happen?”
She turned on her phone’s flashlight and rushed toward the coffee area.
I pointed to the outlet that was still smoking slightly.
“A spark jumped out there. That scared me so much.”
“Don’t just stand there scared. Go flip the main breaker switch. It’s by the entrance. Hurry,” Mrs. Eleanor ordered while trying to pull the burnt plug out of the wall.
This was it. It was all I needed.
She was in the coffee area. I had to go all the way to the door to flip the breaker. The path from the door to the accounting department was perfect.
“Yes. Yes, I’m going.”
I grabbed my phone, turned on the flashlight, and ran to the main door where the electrical panel was. I opened it and pretended to be confused for a moment.
“Mrs. Eleanor, there are so many switches. I don’t know which one it is.”
“It’s the biggest one, the red one. Flip it up,” her voice shouted from afar.
I flipped the breaker.
Click.
The office lights turned on.
“It’s back on, Mrs. Eleanor. What a fright.”
“Come here and help me. This outlet is all wet. Bring a dry cloth and clean this up immediately.”
“Coming!”
I ran in, but instead of going to the coffee area, I went straight to Mrs. Eleanor’s desk.
My heart felt like it was going to jump out of my chest.
The computer had power. Trembling, I pressed the power button to turn it on.
While waiting, I strained my ears. I still heard Mrs. Eleanor grumbling in the coffee area.
“What a disaster. A short circuit like that and it could burn up all the equipment.”
The computer turned on. I quickly inserted the USB drive. My hands were shaking so much I missed the USB port several times.
Calm. Calm, I told myself.
I opened “This PC.” I didn’t know if she had put a password on the file. I went to the D: drive, to the accounting folder, then “internal,” and there it was: GOLDMINE.xlsx.
I held my breath and double-clicked the file.
A dialog box appeared.
Enter password.
Darn.
I froze.
Password? What was the password?
What do I do now?
Mrs. Eleanor was about to leave the coffee area. I panicked.
I looked at her desk. A yellow Post-it was stuck to the screen. “Santi’s bday 15.”
It must be it, I thought, trembling.
I typed “santi15.”
Enter.
Incorrect password.
My God, that wasn’t it.
What could it be?
I looked at her desk calendar. Mrs. Eleanor had a day marked in red: December 25th, Christmas.
I typed “1225.”
Enter.
Incorrect again.
“Kemet, why are you taking so long? Where is the cloth?” Mrs. Eleanor shouted. It sounded like she was coming out.
I was desperate. What to do? Should I leave?
No.
I looked at the computer again. I remembered that Mrs. Eleanor was a careful person. The password must be something she would never forget.
I remembered the file name: GOLDMINE.
Gold reminded me of money, of power.
“Kemet!”
Mrs. Eleanor came out of the coffee area.
I startled. I quickly pulled out the USB drive. I had failed.
I grabbed the first cleaning cloth I found.
“Here I am. I was looking for it,” I said.
Mrs. Eleanor looked at me.
“Why is your face so pale? What a mess. Get out of the way.”
She walked toward her desk, grumbling.
“With a short circuit like this, I don’t know if the computer survived.”
She sat down. She double-clicked the GOLDMINE.xlsx file. The password box appeared.
I was standing behind her. I held my breath.
Mrs. Eleanor started typing. I strained my eyes. I couldn’t see her fingers clearly, but I saw the characters appear.
“Eleanor1978.”
The file opened.
My God. The password was her name and her year of birth.
Mrs. Eleanor checked a few numbers and muttered,
“Fortunately, I didn’t lose the data.”
Then she closed the file.
I stood paralyzed. I had the password, but I had lost the opportunity. Mrs. Eleanor would never let the computer shut down again. The outlet was broken. I couldn’t repeat the trick.
I felt completely defeated.
I spent the rest of the day working like a soul in torment, but fate hadn’t abandoned me.
At the end of the afternoon, Zahara started her exhaustion act again. She clutched her stomach, grimacing.
“Zo, I don’t feel good,” she whined.
Zolani rushed to her, worried.
“Are you feeling sick again? Do you want to go to the doctor?”
“I think if I go home to rest, I’ll feel better. Can you take me?”
Zolani nodded and turned to accounting.
“Mrs. Eleanor, the quarterly accounting will wait until tomorrow. Zahara and I have to leave now.”
“All right, Mr. Jones,” she replied.
Zolani and Zahara left.
The other employees also started to leave. About ten minutes later, I noticed something.
Mrs. Eleanor picked up her purse and walked out, but she left her phone on the desk, plugged into the charger.
The office door closed.
I was alone.
A minute later, the door opened again.
It was Mrs. Eleanor. She walked in quickly, went straight to her desk, and grabbed her phone.
That’s when she saw it.
I had already turned on the computer again and inserted my USB drive. GOLDMINE.xlsx was open, and a progress bar was copying the file into my drive.
Her face changed color.
“What are you doing, Kemet?” Her voice trembled.
I didn’t know what to do. I was finished. She was going to scream. She was going to call Zolani and I would lose everything.
“I… I…” I stammered.
The progress bar showed 100%.
Copy complete.
Mrs. Eleanor saw the message. She looked at me with a complex expression, a mixture of anger, fear, and something else.
Desperate, I knelt down.
“Mrs. Eleanor, I beg you. Please, don’t tell Zolani. He is so cruel. He wants to divorce me, leave me with a fifty-thousand-dollar debt. Him and Zahara. I have to save myself. I have to save my son.”
Mrs. Eleanor raised her hand, signaling me to be quiet. She quickly went to the door and peered into the hallway. No one.
She firmly closed the door and locked it.
She turned to me, still kneeling.
“Get up,” she said, her voice cold. “What do you want that for? Tell me the truth. You already know everything, don’t you? About Zolani and Zahara.”
I was in shock.
“Ah, you know,” she said bitterly. “In this company, who doesn’t know? Only you, who he thinks is stupid. I came back because I forgot my phone. But it seems I came back at the right time.”
“Mrs. Eleanor,” I started crying. “I beg you. He is so cruel. He wants to divorce me, leave me with a fake debt. I have to protect my son.”
Mrs. Eleanor looked at me for a long moment and sighed.
“I know. I’ve been working here for a long time. I know what kind of person he is. He uses me to falsify the books, to evade taxes. I’ve turned a blind eye because of the money, but I’m also a woman, and I’m disgusted by the way he treats you.”
She bent down, pulled my USB drive out of the computer, and handed it to me.
“Take it. Pretend I didn’t see anything. Pretend I didn’t come back today.”
I couldn’t believe it.
