The lost conversation - What's up , What's up...

The lost conversation- What's up, What's up...

It was October 5th, 2021. Around 10:00 am Katherine unlocked her phone and saw a WhatsApp text from her friend saying, "it's urgent. Call me when you can." Kathy never saw this type of text from her friend, and there was a hint of suspense and anxiety in the eyes of Kathy.

Kathy came to the patio and called her friend on Whatsapp audio call; after a few rings, Amy picked the call, and the voice was not audible. There was the wind blowing, and Kathy's hair was all over her face; she adjusted her hair, and the tone of ringing was on.

Amy: Hey Kathy, can you hear me?

Kathy: Yeah, I can hear your voice but not audible.

Amy: Listen, I need to tell you an important thing. What's up? What's up !!

Kathy: I am well, how are you?

Amy: No, Listen Listen.......beep ... Reconnecting.....

Kathy: I cannot hear voice.....Reconnecting... Reconnecting... Call Disconnected......

Kathy tried to call Amy on Whatsapp but couldn't connect. Various thoughts are spinning up in Kathy's mind. She sensed a kind of danger and suspicious thoughts. Recalling the conversation, What was Amy trying to communicate? Is she in some trouble?

Kathy came near the Buddha statue in the hall room and stared at the idol for a few minutes. After that, she drank a glass of water, tried to relax as much as possible, and tried to connect the dots. 

She recollected Amy saying about a strange man following her after coming out of the office to the parking lot continuously for the last four days. The strange man was wearing a black leather jacket, black hat and driving a black car. He followed her from hacker way to Bayfront expressway, where Amy took the exit to University avenue. Kathy recalled a similar childhood situation at the botanical garden visit. Is it the same guy who followed Amy in 1995?

However, Amy didn't see his face clear as he is an expert in driving by not revealing his face.

Kathy was telling Amy that he might be one of your employees from the other team. Don't worry about him, Amy. Call me if you feel insecure in any given situation.

Amy: Alright, then we'll catch up later.( This was the conversation from 10/03/2021)

Current day:  Kathy tried to call Amy on her direct number, but the voice says currently not available. She heard the same message 15 - 20 times in a row.

Kathy was 27 year old who runs an online boutique shop, and Amy was an IT professional for one of the FAANG companies.

Kathy thought of calling 911 or visiting Amy's office, but at a point, she felt that she was overthinking. 

Kathy was not much into technicalities except using Facebook, Instagram, and Whatsapp. While on contrast, Amy was a techie geek, programmer, ethical hacker, and a loyal friend to Kathy. She is the one who gave the initial idea of an online boutique shop. 

Time passed mid-afternoon just thinking about Amy with varieties of thoughts in Kathy's mind. Kathy forcefully had lunch, controlling herself that no danger would come to Amy. She heard some sounds outside the patio where kids(around 13~15 yrs) were playing some games. Out of curiosity, she opened the front hall windows and saw them playing childhood games such as hide n seek, basketball, etc. 

Past Conversation:

 Kathy remembered her relationship with Amy back in 1995 where they both were raised in the missionary school. Amy was sharp in her studies, but Kathy was good at drawing different flower images, trees, etc. They both had spent the quality time since childhood sharing each other opinions, thoughts, and feelings. Kathy was always attracted to nature, flowers, and nursery gardens. During the school trips, Kathy's morale rose if it was a visit to botanical gardens.

It was during one of the visits to the botanical gardens where the strange incident happened. A black jacket, a Black hat, and a black car were following the school bus, and the weird guy was watching Amy closely from a long distance. Amy went to Kathy and told her about the BBB guy. 

Kathy: Ignore him. He might be some random guy, don't look at him. No need to worry, Darling !!

Amy: with low confidence, said ok.

Later that day, Amy had a bad dream about the BBB guy even though she couldn't see his face correctly. She didn't tell this to Kathy. After that, she never saw BBB guy anywhere !!

Current day:

Kathy closed the windows and sat on the sofa, recalling if something was related to the BBB guy in the childhood botanical garden. Is he is the same guy who is following us? or at least Amy for now :::

If yes, why is he following, and what does he want?

Now Kathy was really worried, and she got sweat all over her face. Trying to control she picked up the landline phone and pressed 

9 .................................

1...................................................

1....................................................................

Before she pressed the dial sign, she heard the ringing tone of her phone.

Kathy hanged the landline phone and received a digital phone call.

It was one of her customers whom Kathy will deliver five bouquets every day, but the delivery location varies though.

Ohhhh Laura(Customer), I am sorry I couldn't deliver the bouquets today as I am in some trouble now, will talk later. I am sorry.

Kathy was about to take the landline, and she got a WHATSAPP message from Amy.....

It was written as below.

call me....5:00 pm 

call me..........5:01 pm

Kathy was pale, she clicked on the video call button, and after 15 seconds, she saw Amy's face in the video call. A sense of relief on Kathy's face. Hey Hey...tears came down from Kathy's eyes.

Amy: hey, why are you crying? is something wrong....hey, hey

Kathy: I am fine, never mind. She cleared her eyes. Alright, why did you call me in the morning and turned your phone off?

Are you out of your mind? seriously......I called you 30 times....to your WhatsApp, Facebook and tried to contact you on Instagram,,,,,,,,I was so worried,,,, lots of different thoughts, danger thoughts,,,,, finally I saw you... I am glad... I am glad...Amy...

Amy: are you done crying? Can I answer now.....Miss Kathy.....

Actually, WhatsApp, Facebook, and Instagram servers have been down since the time I called you..... I knew about that information ten minutes before as I was one of the members of the DevOps team. We observed the security threats before servers were about to down.

I called you to tell you that you won't be able to access WhatsApp, Facebook, and Instagram for a couple of hours. Because most of your customer orders come from Facebook, and you use WhatsApp for getting delivery locations.

I also texted you to call me... call me (these are the messages delivered to Kathy after the servers are up)

When I was saying Whatsapp servers went down......before a few minutes earlier..........maybe that may be echoed,,, to you .....

What's up What's up...

(Amy: Listen, I need to tell you an important thing. What's up? What's up !!)

Kathy: Oh my lord.......

Amy: Laughing by seeing Kathy's face.

Kathy: Ok, we'll talk later. I gotta go.

She hanged up the phone and called Laura from WhatsApp contact and told her that she would deliver the order in the next 15 minutes. Kathy received orders from all of her customers followed...

As a courtesy, Kathy delivered the flower bouquets at a fifty percent reduced price.

Ending Notes:

  When Amy met Kathy the next evening after that call, she told about the black jacket, black hat, and black car guy- who was the new security team guy recruited in the office premises. Their company name is BBB security(Black jacket, black hat, and black car). This was informed to Amy by one of her colleagues.

Assumption: Since the current BBB guy is a security person, then the childhood BBB might be some random guy with random reasons.

October 5th, 2021, around 10:00 am --- Whatsapp, Facebook, and Instagram have network outages.

So many small vendors across the world have faced difficulties in the orders, locations,.. delivery addresses. etc

When Kathy opened her windows on the day of Amy's lost conversation, she saw kids and young boys playing around the community. Since there were no social media due to the outage of WhatsApp, FB, Instagram except twitter,,,, children, boys, and girls came out to socialize naturally,,, socialize through physical games.

Technology made man a digital animal rather than a social animal......