Chapter One: The Words He Missed

“Did you plant a spy in Legal?” Lin smiled and said nothing about Lacuna. When he opened the extension manager, there was no new program in it. His browser’s extension list was empty too. Yet whenever he reopened the contract, the crimson note remained. At lunch, he went to the pharmacy on the corner. When the payment screen lit up, a note appeared beside the price of his mother’s medicine. [Same dosage, second shelf to your right, forty percent cheaper.] The generic had identical ingredients. The clerk said it had arrived that morning and had not received a display label yet. Small pieces of luck relaxed him. The extension began to feel like an unusually attentive friend with a gloomy temperament. Then came 6:12 p.m.