Working at the Library

This short story was ‘inspired’ by a Facebook ‘spam’ email chain sent out (for my book launch) by a well intentioned family member. 

The setting and characters are from the Fat Assassins book. Any
resemblance to any persons living or dead is completely coincidental.
The circumstances of this story are completely fictional ...
(but inspired by true events and you know who you are!)

*  *  *

    “Jennifer! Git over here....there’s something wrong with this computer.”

    I sighed and walked around the library counter. “What’s wrong?”

    Ruth pointed at the screen. “I’m trying to get on the Facebook, but it ain’t working.”

    “What error do you get when you try to login?”

    She typed her password and hit enter. “It just gives me this message.”

    I leaned down to read the error.

    Your account has been blocked for sending spam. For instructions to unlock your account, click here.

    “It looks like your account was compromised and sending junk email. Click that link.”

    She squinted at the screen before clicking the link. “Okay. Now what?”

    “Type in your email address and hit enter.”

    She followed the instructions and we waited for the page to load. A photo
of Ruth in a halter top eating a sucker popped up on the page.

    “I got to get on here. Jackie’s waiting at Sacred Care nursing home for me to go viral.” She preened. “I drive him crazy, making him wait ‘til Tuesday for some of this. I’m learning to video chat next week. Does this computer have a camera? It should really be in a  room so folks can Skype in private.”

    I ignored her and focused on the screen. “Holy crap, you’ve got three hundred and sixteen messages.”

    “I’m very popular.”

    “I think you’re account has been hacked.”

    “Well, how would you know that?” She snipped, offended that I didn't believe her celebrity status.

    “Looks like this was sent to all of your friends. Let’s have a quick look at the latest message to see if it was something you sent or if somebody used your account to send out spam. ”

    I clicked the top message, and a series of angry messages from her Facebook friends
greeted me. I started reading them in reverse chronological order.

    I’M DRIVING OVER TO YOUR HOUSE AND YOU’RE GONNA TAKE ME OFF THIS DAMN MESSAGE!!!!!

    TAKE ME OFF THIS F’ING MESSAGE!!!

    I DON’T EVEN KNOW THESE PEOPLE! WHY AM I GETTING MESSAGES FROM THEM?

    SHUT THIS THING OFF!

    THIS IS MAKING MY PHONE GO CRAZY

    I’M GETTING A MESSAGE EVERY TWO SECONDS!

    STOP IT

    MUTE, QUIT, STOP, CEASE

    QUIT

    MUTE

    QUIT

    MUTE

    MUTE

    MUTE

    “What did you do?” I shoved her out of the way and started scrolling through the rest of the messages to find the source of the cyber mutiny.

    “I didn’t do anything.” She huffed, rolling the chair out of the way.

    I quickly scrolled through another fifty messages of MUTE. I slowed down as I reached earlier messages.

    HOW DO I TURN THIS THING OFF?

    TYPE MUTE TO SHUT IT OFF

    After Jackie posted that advice - everybody started sending MUTE spam to the entire list trying to unsubscribe. And the endless stream of mutes began.

    When MUTE didn’t stop the spam, someone else offered more advice: MUTE ISN’T WORKING. TRY QUIT.

    So everyone started spamming the word QUIT to the entire group.

    I shook my head. Jeez......that explains all the angry messages!

    “Did you send an email to your entire Facebook distro list?” I asked her.

    “What are you talking about? What’s a distro list?”

    “Did you send an email to all of your Facebook friends?”

    “I don’t think so.”

    I gave her a skeptical look and continued my quest for the original message.

    WHY AM I GETTING THIS?

    YOU NEED JESUS

    SOMEONE ERASE THIS CRAP

    I’M REPORTING YOU TO FACEBOOK

    I finally reached the source of the email frenzy and opened her original message. I gasped as a giant naked photo of Ruth stretched across a bear rug filled the screen.

    “How did that get on there?” Ruth scrambled to minimize the image. “I don’t know what that is.”

    “Well, that’s the message you just sent to a hundred of your closest Facebook
friends and that’s why your account was suspended.”

    She gasped and covered herself like she was still on the bear rug.

    “Just do a Google search for delete Facebook message and you’ll figure it out. I’m going to audit the card catalog” I walked off, blinking my eyes trying to erase the image.

    “Damn Facebook! I shoulda stuck to sexting.” Ruth muttered to herself.