Page 36 of Secondhand Secrets

“Oh yeah…” Jamie’s voice pitched upward, and she tapped Greg’s hand with the back of hers. “Chip once told us about her. Remember that games night last year, playing Settlers of Catan? We all got drunk and started talking about our ‘one that got away.’”

“That’s right.” A wide and goofy grin took over Greg’s face, his pale blond fringe flopping over one brow. “Chip said this chick was the closest he got. And let’s not forget, I told you all it was a stupid conversation. We’re not even in our mid-twenties and don’t yet have enough data to collate a worthwhile answer. So, I’m still right, by the way.”

Matt burst into laughter. “No, dude. You’re the only one who lacks any data.”

Greg rolled his eyes, and Jamie just smiled, her dark brown stare on a glass saltshaker she’d swiped from the table’s center and now twisted between her palms.

Hoping to stop any future uncomfortable silences, Ally peered around the table and retrieved her unanswered question from earlier. “So, umm… why San Fran?”

Jamie leaned back into her lemon vinyl seat and paused her saltshaker tinkering. “We’re hoping to make it all the way to Silicon Valley to catch some tech conferences.”

Greg shrugged his shoulders, his oversized cobalt t-shirt hanging off his reedy frame. “Yep, Michelle Ibanez is doing a talk on the next generation Haskell type system, and it’s bound to be a life-altering experience.”

Ally’s face turned cold, and she looked to Jamie for support.

“No one in their right mind expects you to know who that is.” This time it was Jamie’s turn to roll her eyes. “I think if I hear him mention Michelle Ibanez one more time, I might whack him over the head with the lightsaber he insisted on taking on this trip. ”

Matt shook his head, seeming to settle in Ally’s presence, the upward tick of his lip directed at her. “As if my car didn’t have enough people and stuff crammed into it.”

“Hey guys, Chip really should be joining us on this trip, don’t you think?” Greg leaned over the table and eyed his friend. “What with his big news, imagine the networking he could do in The Valley.”

Ally peered amongst the friends again, confusion weighing heavy on her overly tight brow.

“Nah, dude, he’s too busy getting his shit together in time to put on a half-decent show.” Matt bumped Greg with his shoulder.

“Show?” Ally frowned, feeling even more the least intelligent person at this table. “Big news?”

“Oh, it’s more than big news.” Matt leaned toward her, his brown eyes wider and lighter than before. “It’s—”

“Hey, guys. No.” Jamie glared at Matt, then Greg. “Let Chip tell—”

“Chip got a call from Encode.” Greg’s smile grew, and the wild glint in his eyes made him appear almost manic. “He’s a finalist for this year’s Graduate Fund.”

Jamie growled and threw her head back as though she wanted to nothing to do with Matt and Greg and whatever ensued next.

“Oh… okay.” Ally’s voice creaked while she searched for more words, her attention bouncing between the three friends. Chip’s friends. Who knew more about his news and unintentionally made her feel about as bright as a beaten-up lump of coal. The more they spoke, the less she understood.

Matt tilted his head at Greg. “This guy works at Encode so got the jump on this year’s finalists via the company newsletter. Chip’s idea would have to be out of this world to make it this far.”

“What’s Encode?” She turned to Greg. “What’s a Graduate grant?”

“Encode is one of the biggest tech companies our side of the country, and each year, they offer a grant for new graduates to have one of their ideas made into an Encode product.” The wide excitement in Greg’s eyes made Ally’s tummy churn and a jittery pain grow in her chest. “Imagine that, fresh outta college and already in charge of a project you created. I’ve seen glimpses of Stonewall. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t jealous I didn’t come up with those goods.”

Jamie toyed with the saltshaker again, giving the impression she tended to fidget even without Ally’s earlier clumsy introduction. “What did he end up doing with the buffer overflow problem?”

Though Jamie’s attention stuck on Greg, Matt was the one to jump in with an answer. “Oh, maybe he rewrote the memory allocation code! He could have pulled it out into a separate library and then refactored the rest of the code. Might even be able to open source it all later. It’s bound to be gold.”

“Not a bad idea.” Jamie nodded and pushed the saltshaker away as though she once again noticed her restless habit. “Although, I would have just rewritten that part in a memory-safe language. Instead of using C, maybe use Java or even Erlang for bonus fun. Write it as a daemon and then call out to it via RPC. It’ll probably increase latency, but you won’t need to worry about overwriting anything you shouldn’t on the heap, so practically zero chance of segmentation fault.”

Matt stared off into space before offering a mumbled, “Yeah, maybe…”

After that, everyone just fell into a confusing silence, where Ally couldn’t tell if the conversation had truly died or if the others just puzzled through the current trouble-shooting related topic.

Meanwhile, she felt just about as clueless as ever, if cluelessness meant having a mind that worked double-time to understand, only to draw constant blanks…

Why hadn’t Chip told her about making the finals of this grant thing his friends fawned over?

Maybe I mean less to him than I assumed.

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