Lost Memory of Skin

by Russell Banks

  “Yes”? What the fuck kind of answer is that?

  Think of a question that’s answered with “yes.”

  Trinidad Bob scratches his head in puzzlement. Yvonne peers around Bob and Benbow at the Professor and says, Ah, how about, “Okay if I visit the Kid in his pup tent on the beach on the far side of the trailer?”

  The Professor smiles and pulls a twenty-dollar bill from his wallet and lays it on the counter. Correct. She beat you, Bob. But here’s a couple of rounds’ worth. A bonus prize.

  Yvonne reaches into the cooler and pulls out two cans of Miller and sets them on the counter in front of her. Trinidad Bob does the same. Benbow pockets the twenty. He says, You may not be a cop. But you ain’t no Vietnam vet.

  The Professor moves away from the bar and starts walking toward the Airstream. Well, I sure wasn’t getting I-and-I at Woodstock the third week in August of 1969. So I must’ve been getting stoned and laid in Vietnam.

  Benbow calls after him, Here’s an answer, fat man! “BOHICA”!

  The Professor stops, turns, looks over at the quiz master, and coolly smiles. He tilts his head back a notch and crosses his arms over the bib of his overalls: What’s “Bend over, here it comes again”? Don’t worry, Benbow, nobody’s gonna get fucked this time. He turns and shambles on.

  Trinidad Bob says, Did he get it right, Boom?

  Shut the fuck up an’ drink your beer.

  Yvonne says, He ain’t no cop. But he ain’t no Vietnam vet, neither.

  How do you know that?

  He’s too fuckin’ fat.

  What is he then?

  I dunno. A fuckin’ professor. Like he said.

  Yeah, like you’re a cabdriver, Yvonne.

  Trinidad Bob laughs and slaps his palm on an imaginary buzzer. I got it! “How does Yvonne make a living?”

  Benbow says to Yvonne, Gimme, and extends his hand palm up.

  Yvonne pulls two twenties from her pocket and passes them over to him.

  Trinidad Bob laughs. How does Benbow make a living?

  Just shut the fuck up, Bob.

  The big gray parrot in the cage squawks and says, Shut the fuck up, Bob!

  CHAPTER THREE

  A PAIR OF WHITE-BREASTED TERNS DANCES along the shoreline. Farther out a cackling gang of gulls spots a cruise ship passing slowly from the Bay through Kydd’s Cut into the Atlantic, wheels, and speeds off to hunt and gather in the ship’s garbage-strewn wake. The Kid has pitched his tent and dropped his duffel and cooler beside the crumbling concrete breakwater where Benbow’s property meets the sea, a spot of bare ground with a clear view of the city and the Bay and in the distance the Causeway and the Barriers. The Kid’s bicycle leans against the spindly crutchlike limbs of a nearby screw pine that’s large enough to cast a platter of all-day shade over the nylon tent. It’s an intelligent almost picturesque campsite.

  A little exposed to the wind however. The Kid squats in front of his butane stove and with one hand cups his lighter flame against the blustery offshore breeze and struggles to get the stove lit. The wind keeps blowing his flame out, forcing him to start over: turn off the gas, pump up the pressure again, turn on the gas, shield the Bic, and flick it. The Kid curses—Shit, shit, shit!—and lets himself fall backward into a sitting position on the ground and stares angrily at the cold windblown stove.

  He ate half a watermelon for breakfast and a chunk of raclette cheese and most of a box of Kashi seven-grain stone-ground crackers for lunch but he specifically wants hard-boiled extra-large organic eggs for supper, at least two from the box of eleven perfect brown eggs plus one slightly cracked egg that he grabbed last night along with the watermelon, cheese, and crackers out behind Bingo’s Wholesome Foods. He’s got a craving for healthy food and knew he needed a nutritional break from his usual diet of Cheetos and canned stew. He rode his bike over to the mainland after dark arriving early at the Dumpster an hour before the store closed catching a primo spot where the hungry and the homeless Dumpster-divers line up by the chain-link fence behind the store all waiting as patiently and politely as the paying customers inside with their overflowing carts at the cash register. When the store closes and the workers shut off the lights and go home the scavengers one by one scale the fence each in his turn.

  With rare exceptions they honor the three rules of Dumpster diving: first-come first-dibs; never take more than you need; leave it cleaner than when you arrived. Since you can only take what the Dumpster gives, you can’t control your menu much. But everyone on the streets knows that upscale shoppers and the people who prepare their food are fussy about their diet and in a nice convergence of economics and marketing the high-end organic and natural foods stores like Trader Joe’s, Whole Foods, and Bingo’s throw out more and better food—especially fresh produce, meats, fish, bread, and dairy products—than the big chain supermarkets like Publix and Price Chopper. If there’s a single cracked egg in a dozen the entire box goes into the Dumpster. If one avocado is bad the entire bag gets tossed. A spot of mold on a cheese wheel disqualifies the wheel, one head of lettuce with rusted tips ruins the crate, and a few bruised apples in a basket spoil the basket. The day before their sell-by date whole boxes and trays of baked goods, milk, hamburger, chickens, even steaks and chops get thrown out. It’s a feast of imperfect but perfectly edible organic and all-natural pesticide- and preservative-free groceries.

  Back when the Kid was gainfully employed he had enough cash in hand to pay for his food and though no one ever told him he knew there was a fourth rule in the Dumpster-divers’ code: If you can afford to pay at the register inside, do it. Leave the castoffs for those who have no choice but to forage for food or starve. Now that he’s been fired and has no prospects for future employment he’s decided that even though he’s still got a few bucks left in his pocket it’s okay to hit the high-end Dumpsters and fill his pantry. With no more than what he can carry back in his bicycle basket however—the watermelon, cheese, crackers, and eggs. Enough for two days, possibly three. If he can get his fucking stove lit so he can cook some of these eggs.

  The Professor approaches the Kid slowly from behind, unseen. He’s wary and anxious and not sure why. He has no reason to be afraid of the Kid and is confident that the fellow will eventually consent to be interviewed on the subject of his present circumstance. How a citizen of Calusa becomes homeless is common knowledge. At least among Calusans who, like the Professor, view homelessness as a social blight, who regard it sociologically as a community’s debilitating, possibly fatal disease and who, when naming its causes, point to alcoholism, drug addiction, mental illness. Commonplace observations. It’s not as easy, however, to identify how a citizen of Calusa becomes a convicted sex offender. It’s the combination of the two that intrigues the Professor—men who are both homeless and convicted sex offenders—and their growing numbers here in Calusa and across the country. It shouldn’t be hard to get the Kid talking about his homelessness. But it may be difficult to get him to tell the truth about what he did to end up a convicted sex offender. He’s bound to be evasive about that. They all are.

  Once again the Professor feels like an anthropologist who has ventured deep into the jungle and has stumbled upon a survivor of a tribe long thought to be lost or exterminated. He mustn’t frighten or anger the lad. He needs to be sensitive to the Kid’s cultural norms, even though he’s mostly ignorant of them. He can’t project onto the young man his own middle-class, academic cultural norms and assumptions. His first task will be to obtain the fellow’s trust, to overcome his understandable suspicion that he’s being objectified in the Professor’s eyes, that he’s viewed as a curiosity or as part of a social science research project, rather than as a human being.

  Once he’s obtained the Kid’s trust, he’ll try for friendship. He can’t pay him for his trust and friendship, of course; that would corrupt the truthfulness of the subject’s narrative. But when the Professor learns what the fellow needs—other than a safe, more or less permanent home and social respectab
ility, both of which the Kid will probably never be allowed to possess again, if he even had them in the first place—he can offer him certain types of small help. Occasional transportation, the odd household item that the Professor and his wife would otherwise put into a yard sale, and possibly, if he needs a job, help finding one.

  This could turn into a long-term project and could eventually produce important data and proposals for dealing with both sexual offenders and the problem of homelessness here and elsewhere. For the Professor, the stakes, like the opportunities, are high. He has tenure but wouldn’t mind acquiring a Distinguished University Professorship. Or an offer from a Washington think tank.

  Can I give you a hand with that?

  The Kid turns and peers up at the huge man blocking the late- afternoon sun. Yeah. Stop the fucking wind. You’re big enough.

  The Professor chuckles. He’s used to chuckling; it’s his default form of laughter. He believes that overt, open-mouthed laughter makes him look too much like a jolly fat man; thus he tends not to laugh at all and rarely even smiles. If he must show pleasure or amusement or delight, he’d rather be seen as a chuckler, another stereotype, perhaps, but a slightly more serious one than that of the jolly fat man. He eases himself down to the ground and takes a position next to the Kid that effectively blocks the wind. The Kid tries again to light his stove and this time succeeds. The two sit there and watch the flame flare yellow and settle quickly back into a steadily purring blue blur.

  Thanks.

  You’re welcome.

  For several minutes they are silent until the Kid stands and visits his tent and returns with the carton of eggs, a gallon jug of water, and a blackened saucepan. He pours three inches of water into the pan and sets it on the stove and sits back down on the ground beside the Professor.

  Fresh eggs, man. Organic.

  Pretty thin pickings, I’d say. For a growing boy.

  Yeah? You into hitting on me or something? You some kinda faggot?

  The Professor chuckles. Not in a million years, Kid.

  What’s with them old-timey overalls, then? They look pretty faggoty to me, if you wanna know the truth. Especially on a guy built like you.

  I just spent the day pretending I’m a carpenter building a house. It’s a volunteer project, Habitat for Humanity.

  What’s that?

  We build houses for poor people. Remember Jimmy Carter?

  Yeah. Sort of. He was like the president way back.

  Correct. The thirty-ninth president of the United States, and afterward he did volunteer work for Habitat for Humanity. Among other good things.

  I s’pose he wore old-timey overalls too? And hippie sandals.

  Not while he was president.

  That’s good.

  So how do you like it here at Benbow’s? Better than under the Causeway?

  The water in the saucepan has come to a boil. With a spoon the Kid carefully places two eggs into the pan. He seems to consider the Professor’s question for a moment. Finally he points to his electronic ankle bracelet and says, I can’t stay here, except for a coupla days at most.

  You can’t? Why not? Benbow’s is surely more than twenty-five hundred feet from a school or playground.

  Yeah. But I don’t think Benbow’s is what it seems.

  What is it, then? If it’s not what it seems.

  I dunno. It’s sort of like a movie set maybe. That dude Trinidad Bob says among other things they shoot lots of commercials here but my parole officer says they’re only pretending like it’s some kind of funky island beach club with old guys hanging out making like they’re fucked-up Vietnam vets or something. They’re like wearing Vietnam vet costumes, she says. For TV and fashion magazines an’ shit. Mostly models in bathing suits and underwear and other filmy items. A lot of the models are under eighteen. At least that’s what my parole officer told me. I hadda let her know where I was living after I left the Causeway, and she checked in with Benbow, who ended up telling her they had a shoot scheduled this week for Gap Kids or something and there’s gonna be lots of little kids running around posing for the cameras in bathing suits and underwear. Besides, Benbow’s sort of paranoid about having me camped out here in the first place. Me and people like Paco, we attract attention from cops an’ shit. There’s probably a certain amount of illicit substances being circulated, if you know what I mean. Due to the fashion industry being here so much. And who knows what the fuck they really photograph and film out here? Other than Gap and magazine fashion ads.

  Who’s Paco?

  A biker dude from under the Causeway. Friend of mine. He came out here when I did.

  We just met. I think he suspects I’m an undercover cop.

  Paco’s like a part-time mechanic at a biker garage up in North Calusa. He’s got a job at least. Unlike me. But Benbow’s not cool with him being a permanent resident. He told me he’s gonna move back under the Causeway tomorrow. I guess I will too.

  But why?

  No place else to go, man. Same as with Paco. Same as with everybody who was living there. They’re all gonna come drifting back to the Causeway eventually. Too bad. I kinda like the view here. The sewer factory stinks when the wind’s offshore, but that’s only about half the time. Plus I was hoping maybe I could get Benbow to hire me to help smoke the fish when it comes in and sell it to people or tend bar or something. Or just keep the place cleaned or painting it. I’m good at that. But he doesn’t want it cleaned or painted. They need it looking fucked-up and funky. For the cameras. I guess it turns people on. The desert island fantasy.

  I rather doubt he’d hire you to help sell the smoked fish. But maybe he could use you to tend bar.

  All he needs for that is the other dude, Trinidad Bob. Trinidad Bob’s part of the act. Like he’s a prop. Even the old dog out there is a prop. And the parrot. You see the parrot in the cage by the bar?

  I did.

  The whole fucking island’s like a movie set. Probably the whole city of Calusa is. Maybe we’re all only props, like Trinidad Bob and that old broken-down dog and the parrot. You kinda look like a prop, y’ know. Like one of those TV wrestlers from WWF. You could be Professor Humungous Haystack.

  Very funny. But won’t the police just come back to the Causeway and throw you out again?

  Yeah. Prob’ly.

  Where will you go then?

  I’m starting to think three hots and a cot.

  What do you mean?

  Jail, man. Get myself busted for shoplifting a six-pack from a 7-Eleven.

  You can’t mean that!

  No money, no job, no legal squat. You got any better ideas, Humungous?

  The Kid reminds the Professor of Huckleberry Finn somehow. Here he is now, long after he lit out for the Territory, grown older and as deep into the Territory as you can go, camped out alone where the continent and all the rivers meet the sea and there’s no farther place he can run to. The Professor wants to know what happened to that ignorant, abused, honest American boy between the end of the book and now. After he ran from Aunt Sally and her “sivilizin’,” how did he come years later to having “no money, no job, no legal squat”? In twenty-first-century America.

  How old are you, Kid?

  Twenty-two. Why?

  Just wondering. How long have you been living like this?

  Like what?

  Well, under the Causeway. And now here. Homeless. And on permanent parole, so to speak.

  Little over a year. Since I did my time. And I’m not on permanent parole. Just ten years. Nine to go.

  How much actual time did you do?

  Three months up in Hastings. Minimum security. I got three months off for good behavior, though. Or it would’ve been six months.

  You want to tell me what you were convicted of ?

  No, not especially. Anyhow, you can look it up.

  Not if I don’t know your real name.

  No shit.

  So do you want to tell me your real name?

  What is this, a fucki
ng quiz show?

  The Professor chuckles. Quiz shows seem to be on everyone’s mind today. The coincidence amuses him and the irony comforts him: quizzes, tests, exams of all kinds are his specialty and have been since he was a schoolboy answering every question correctly on every test from kindergarten through graduate school; going off the charts on IQ tests, pulling perfect scores on his SATs and GREs; and even after graduate school rising through the ranks and becoming the highest nationally rated Mensa member before he was thirty years old. More recently he has moved beyond Mensa to the even more exclusive Prometheus Society, which requires applicants to take the Langdon Adult Intelligence Test, a test specifically designed to winnow qualified membership down to the one-per-million level, compared to Mensa’s paltry one-per-thirty-thousand. The Professor likes tests. It would be more accurate to say that he likes questions, questions with answers that nearly no one other than the Professor can answer. One person in a million.

  It shouldn’t be difficult to answer the question of the Kid’s real name. No need to sit around waiting for the Kid to volunteer it. All he has to do is Google his way onto the National Sex Offender Registry, click find offenders, then search by location, and type in Calusa. A map will pop up pocked with little colored boxes, each box representing the location of a convicted sex offender, color-coded red, yellow, blue, and green to indicate the nature of the offense. Red is for offenses against children; yellow is for rape; blue is for sexual battery; and green is for “other offenses,” which is everything from “second-degree sodomy” and “second-degree sexual abuse” to “lewd and lascivious behavior.” That’s probably the Kid’s color, given the relatively short length of his sentence.

  Blank boxes indicate the location of a school or playground. For a city the size of Calusa there would be thousands of blank squares and hundreds of green squares on the map, and it would take a while, unless he were lucky, for the Professor to click randomly onto the Kid’s box, and suddenly there on the screen he’d see a mug shot of the Kid, with his real name beneath it, a descriptive history of his convictions, his age at the time of the offense and the age of his victim, last known address, employer’s address, his race, height, weight, eye color, date of birth, and markings. Everything the Professor needs to know in order to start finding out what he wants to know.