Mason Lee checked his inbox with the kind of tired precision only years in IT support could instill. Rows of flagged emails, urgent requests, and recurring password reset tickets blurred together like a dull digital sea. Most days, the only excitement came from a new type of malware or a system crash caused by someone clicking on an obviously suspicious link and blaming "the system."
He took a sip of stale breakroom coffee, still wearing yesterday's sarcasm like armor. He was three hours into his shift and already regretting not pursuing that wildlife photographer career his aunt once suggested. But just as he was mentally calculating how many vacation days he could string together for a possible existential crisis, something blinked at the top of his queue.
Support Request #0001 — House Call for Author Juniper Rhodes.
A house call?
He blinked again, rereading the subject line. That wasn't standard.
Mason clicked the ticket open, eyebrows arching.
"Author struggling to transition to digital workflow. Reported multiple instances of lost files, corrupted manuscripts, and mysterious keyboard malfunctions. Prefers handwritten notes but is willing to adapt. Please assist with digitizing process and troubleshoot technical issues. Client is reportedly 'very particular' and has a history of accidentally deleting work."
His mouth twitched.
"History of accidentally deleting work." Charming.
He pulled up the internal notes, half-expecting this to be a prank ticket. But no—his supervisor had approved it with a personal note: "Sending you because you don't scare easily. Good luck."
He exhaled slowly, grabbing his toolkit and jacket. The address was about thirty minutes away—just enough time to question every life decision that had led him to becoming tech support for a novelist who apparently fought with her keyboard.
The cottage was nestled on the edge of a sleepy neighborhood full of crooked garden fences, hand-painted mailboxes, and cheerful flower beds. It looked more like the setting for a Hallmark film than a crime scene of technical incompetence.
Mason parked in the gravel driveway and approached the door, a faint hum of music—or possibly typing—floating through a half-open window.
He knocked once. Sharp. Professional.
The door swung open almost immediately.
Juniper Rhodes stood there, wrapped in a sweater that looked like it had seen one too many coffee spills, a pen tucked behind one ear, and paint streaked on her cheek like war paint. Her hair was piled in a gloriously messy bun, and she squinted at him like he might be selling insurance.
"You must be Mason," she said.
"That's me," he replied, holding up his ID. "Tech support. I'm here for your... keyboard battles."
Juniper raised a brow. "Excellent. Come on in before I accidentally delete the internet."
She turned and padded inside barefoot, and Mason followed, instantly enveloped by the scent of old paper, lavender, and the distant memory of baked goods. The place was cozy—but not in a minimalist, Pinterest-y way. No, this was lived-in chaos. Teetering stacks of notebooks, half-drunk cups of tea, and a shocking number of gel pens decorated every available surface.
"Nice setup," Mason remarked, sidestepping a rogue pile of index cards.
"I call it controlled creative entropy," Juniper said with mock solemnity. "It's where the magic happens. And occasionally, where manuscripts go to die."
She led him to a desk where an ancient laptop sulked beneath a tangle of cables and an external hard drive that looked suspiciously like it had been used as a coaster.
"So," Mason said, setting down his bag, "walk me through your issues."
Juniper plopped into a rolling chair and spun once before replying. "Let's see. My laptop crashes if I sneeze near it. Files vanish like they've joined a witness protection program. I press one wrong key and everything deletes. And last week, I might have leaned too hard on the spacebar and nuked my entire draft."
Mason paused. "Nuked?"
"Poof. Fifty thousand words. Gone."
He tried not to wince. "Any backups?"
Juniper winced harder. "Define backups."
Mason inhaled through his nose. This was going to be a long day.
He pulled on his gloves—metaphorically—and got to work. Over the next two hours, he walked her through basic digital hygiene: file organization, automatic backups, cloud syncing, and keyboard shortcuts. She watched him like a wary cat, occasionally nodding, frequently interrupting.
"Wait—if I save it here, does that mean it's also in the cloud thingy?"
"Yes, and also on the external drive."
"What if the cloud explodes?"
"It won't."
"But if it did—would my manuscript survive in a bunker somewhere?"
Mason pinched the bridge of his nose. "That's not how clouds—or bunkers—work."
Despite her barrage of oddly phrased questions, Juniper was surprisingly quick to adapt. Her typing was chaotic but enthusiastic. She accidentally exited the program twice. At one point, she spilled tea on a USB cable, yelped, and immediately offered him cookies.
"I bribe with snacks," she explained.
"It's working," Mason said, mouth full.
She tilted her head. "You're very... precise. Do all IT guys come with a user manual?"
"I prefer structure," he replied. "It reduces failure."
She smiled. "I prefer inspiration. Even if it leads to disaster."
The power flickered suddenly. Her laptop screen blinked.
Juniper gasped. "Oh no. Not again."
"Stay calm," Mason said, already reaching for the power settings. "It's a system glitch. I've seen worse."
"I once turned my screen upside down," Juniper offered. "Still don't know how."
He rebooted the system, fixed the power draw issue, and silently questioned the state of modern literature.
By the time everything was stable again, Mason had installed remote access software, set up three-tier backups, and labeled each desktop folder. Juniper watched with the air of someone witnessing black magic.
"You're a wizard," she said.
"I'm just very good at reading error logs."
She handed him a fresh cup of coffee—thankfully not near the laptop this time.
"I think you might have saved my career."
Mason chuckled. "Let's just call it a successful reboot."
She smiled, lingering by the doorway as he packed his bag.
"Thanks for not judging me too harshly."
"I'm trained to be patient," he said with a smirk.
Juniper crossed her arms, eyes playful. "So... should I call you next time I accidentally turn my typewriter into a paperweight?"
"You own a typewriter?"
"Oh yeah. It only bites sometimes."
Mason raised an eyebrow, intrigued despite himself.
As he walked to his car, he glanced back at the little cottage glowing with character and chaos.
Support Ticket #0001 was technically closed.
But somehow, it felt like something had just begun.