Lost Memory of Skin

by Russell Banks

  He could have made the call. You just dial 911 and say, Look for the missing college professor at the Route Eighty-three Canal at Lock one-oh-seven. Then hang up. And the Writer’s not wrong, the Kid did have his cell phone with him out there and if he was in NPR range he was possibly in cell phone range too. He pulls his clamshell from his pants pocket and checks the recent-calls list. His next-to-last call, he notes with relief, was placed the morning after the cops busted up the encampment under the Causeway and before he got fired from his busboy job at the Mirador when for a few moments that morning he thought of renting an apartment for him and Iggy to live in and called a few Realtors before he was interrupted by the two Babes on Blades. His last call was to his parole officer from Benbow’s.

  I never dropped no dime on the Professor, man. Not unless they got pay phones out there in the middle of the Panzacola. Which they don’t, believe me. But you already know that since you’re writing about it for your magazine and all.

  I didn’t know that. Never thought of it, actually. No pay phones in the Panzacola? Nice detail. Mind if I use it?

  Be my guest.

  Wonder if you’re out of cell phone range there. Did you happen to check your reception out there?

  Not that I remember. How come you hafta ask about stuff like this? Don’t you hafta be like some kinda expert on the Great Panzacola Swamp in order to write about it for a big fancy New York magazine?

  Not really.

  You ever actually been inside the swamp? Like in a canoe or a houseboat? Or even take a walk on one of those hiking trails they got for bird-watchers?

  Not really.

  But you’re okay with writing about it anyhow?

  Sure. Jesus Christ, what’s that!

  The Writer hits the brakes and brings the car to a sudden stop ten feet short of a gigantic mocha-colored serpent as long as the one-lane road is wide crossing the road slowly from left to right as if sleep-crawling over the hot pavement, sucking the heat through its scales into its cold blood as it undulates its way from greenery over concrete to more greenery and seems to be trying to make it last but is obliged nonetheless to keep moving in order not to get cooked by the sun-baked pavement or hit by a car or truck before succeeding in making it all the way across and into the safety of the jungle. Its head is as large as a Doberman’s and its swirling muscular body is as thick as the Kid’s body so that if its mouth could open wide enough it could swallow the Kid whole. This snake is evil. Its eyes are open but cold and not afraid or angry or curious and they’re nothing like Iggy’s, the only other eyes the Kid can think of comparing them to, eyes that always seemed friendly toward the Kid at least if not toward other people.

  Though he’s never seen a snake like this before—never seen a snake that’s so big and scary it blocks everything else out of his field of vision—he knows that it’s a full-grown Burmese python, one of those three- or four-foot-long pet snakes somebody got tired of feeding live mice to and dropped off one night in the Panzacola where it grew to maximal size and gradually moved its diet up the food chain to the top, so forget about mice and rats, now it’s eating deer and feral cats and dogs and the occasional pig that wanders off the farm into the swamp and if it got hungry enough it could grab and crush and devour without dismembering a human being.

  Despite the air-conditioning inside the car the Kid is sweating. His thumping heart rushes blood to his face making his ears ping like high-pitched alarms. His palms are wet and for a few seconds he’s afraid he’ll pee his pants. If he starts talking he’ll block out enough of his fear with his own voice and be able to control his body better so he says to the Writer, It’s a fucking giant python, man! Don’t get outa the car or do anything to piss it off ’cause even though they’re not poisonous like water moccasins they can move really fast on the ground and they can break every fucking bone in your body and eat you, man. They’re pure evil and they know no fear. In fact you better put the fucking car in reverse and back it the fuck up in case it decides to attack the car.

  The Writer laughs. He pulls out his iPhone and reaches for the door handle. I want to get a picture of it.

  Dude! Are you fucking nuts?

  The Writer ignores him and gets out of the Town Car and steps to the front fender a few feet away from the middle of the slow-motion body of the snake. He props his elbows on the hood and holds up his iPhone and snaps off half-a-dozen pictures of the serpent as it slithers past the car and slides into the gully at the far side of the road and disappears into the high grass and palmettos.

  Grinning in triumph the Writer returns to the car and gets in and clicks through his iPhone photos. Wow! Amazing! My editor’s going to love this. Perfect ending to the story, a twenty-foot Burmese python living in America’s Great Panzacola National Park. And I’ve got photographic proof.

  Crossing his arms over his chest the Kid slumps down in his seat. You’re just lucky he wasn’t hungry right now. That snake is evil, man. Pure evil.

  Where do you think you are, Kid, the goddam Garden of Eden? Snakes aren’t evil any more than they’re good. They’re just following their nature. Which as long as we don’t screw them up by putting them in cages and zoos is snake-nature. Good and evil, Kid, that’s strictly for us humans. It’s only human nature that’s divided into good and evil.

  No way, man. Everything in the universe especially human nature is good and evil mixed. But that fucking snake is pure evil, man. Which is why God put him in the Garden of Eden. Don’t you read the Bible?

  The Writer smiles, drops the car into gear and drives. A few miles farther on as they approach the Appalachee ranger station the Writer says to the Kid, I’m going to assume there’s no cell phone service out there in the swamp. For my article. But also with respect to the question of whether you called the cops and told them where to look for the Professor’s body.

  Thanks. A lot.

  But if you didn’t do it, who did?

  Whoever put him there, I guess. Or else the Professor himself called it in.

  Right. But judging from the condition of his body, the Professor must have been in the canal since he first disappeared, which was right after he dropped you off out here. Hard to phone in your location when you’ve been underwater for four days and half-devoured by crabs and eels. So it must’ve been whoever put him there.

  I guess.

  But why would the person or persons who chained him to his van and drove it into the canal want the body discovered?

  Beats the shit outa me. Anyhow, they were bicycle locks, not chains.

  And why would the police decide so quickly that it was suicide?

  Like I said, beats the shit outa me. Is this what writers do all the time, sit around asking themselves questions that can’t be answered?

  Yeah. And when they can’t answer them they write about them.

  Why?

  To give somebody else a chance to answer them.

  Does it work?

  Sometimes.

  The Kid lightly taps the DVD in his cargo pants pocket. He brought it with him from Appalachee because he thought he might see the Professor’s widow at the canal and if so he planned to give it to her then and there without comment and just walk away whistling. But she wasn’t there. Now he’s almost glad she wasn’t because he’s thinking of telling the Writer about his interview with the Professor, get the Writer’s take on the Professor’s story and maybe even let him watch the DVD even though he promised he’d not give or show it to anyone but the Professor’s wife Gloria.

  Then he changes his mind. He can’t let the Writer play the DVD on his computer. That would rip up his deal with the Professor and it would be like he stole the ten K from him instead of being paid legitimately for a job yet to be completed.

  Maybe he could get away with telling him about it though. Don’t tell him everything. Long-story-short kind of thing. See if he thinks it’s one of those unanswerable questions the Writer likes so much.

  CHAPTER SIX

  WHEN THE KID
AND THE WRITER ARRIVE at Turnbull’s Store Cat and especially Dolores are eager to hear all about the recovery of the disappeared professor’s body from the canal which the Writer gladly reports in detail, even including his speculation as to how the police knew to search for it at that exact spot. The Writer is the excitable talkative type and seems to want to upgrade Cat’s and Dolores’s level of excitement as if to compensate for their generally low-key personalities. The Kid tries fading from the scene inside the store and hangs back by the door at the edge of earshot with Einstein and Annie. Something about hearing the Writer’s version of events makes him uncomfortable: in his telling the story gets simplified and crude even though everything the Writer says either is factual or if the facts aren’t known is rational.

  The Writer checks his watch and announces that he’s off to interview the ranger for his magazine article before the man leaves the park. As he passes the Kid at the door he asks him if he plans to spend the night in the houseboat and the Kid says why the hell not, he’s got no place else to stay and he’s already paid for it, so yeah.

  Will you be taking the boat into the swamp tonight?

  Not after seeing that fucking snake, man. I’m gonna keep it tied tight to the dock. I got a dog and a parrot to protect.

  The Writer laughs at that. How about I drop by later for a visit? Check out what it’s like to cruise the Panzacola in a rented houseboat.

  Whyn’t you just rent one and take it for a ride yourself ? Maybe you’ll run into one of those giant snakes and snag some more pictures.

  No time. And not necessary, Kid, since you’ve already done the boating for me. Anyhow I’ve got to get back to Calusa tonight. Early flight to New York tomorrow, he says and hurries off to interview the ranger.

  The Kid shrugs and reaches down and scratches Annie’s boney forehead. The dog lies down and closes her eyes with pleasure and flops her tail twice against the tile floor. From his cage Einstein watches the Kid and Annie with what looks like empathy for both. The Kid is surprised by how relieved and glad he is to see Annie and Einstein after being away from them for only a few hours and they seem relieved and glad to see him too. He thinks all three of them must be scared of being abandoned and their shared fear is drawing them closer together. Of course they don’t know about his past habits and longings and his many failed attempts to be a normal person but then they’re animals—or rather an animal and a bird—and are therefore innocent and if the Writer is right they are beyond good and evil and cannot judge him. And will not abandon him. And he will not abandon them.

  Dolores has walked up behind the Kid and touches him on the shoulder startling him. I spoke with Cat, hon, and he says it’s okay for you to stay on the boat and keep it tied up in the slip, if that’s what you want and can afford to keep renting it. It’s off-season anyhow. Not much call for houseboats this time of year.

  Cat watches from the far end of the counter, his expression halfway between a scowl and a look of defeat.

  In a voice that’s practically a whisper the Kid says to Dolores, You don’t mind having a convicted sex offender in the neighborhood? It’s gonna be on the Internet watch list, y’know. Where I’m living.

  Whatever you did, hon, I don’t believe you’re a danger to me or Cat. Are you?

  I’m not a danger to anyone. What I did was I guess just stupid and confused. And I’m not as stupid and confused now as I used to be.

  That’s what I figured. C’mon, I’ll help you take your pets and your bags to the boat, Dolores says and she lifts his duffel and Einstein’s cage and walks from the store. Einstein hollers, Man overboard! Man overboard! and Dolores laughs and tells him to shut the hell up and he obeys. The parrot seems to like Dolores.

  The Kid takes Annie’s leash in hand and grabs his backpack. As he leaves he stops and turns to Cat for a second. Thanks for letting me stay on awhile, Cat.

  Thank Dolores. She’s the one with the soft heart.

  Hey, I’m really sorry I lied to you, man. About the army and all that. It was very disrespectful.

  Beats me, though, why everybody wants to say they been in combat when they weren’t anywhere near it. It’s like wanting to say you worked in a meat processing plant when you never got closer to meat than eating a Big Mac. Consider yourself lucky, Kid, that you didn’t get sent over there. And don’t be ashamed to admit it next time somebody asks. You got enough stuff you should be lying about. You don’t hafta lie about your military service too.

  Yeah. Thanks for the advice.

  So what got you kicked out of the army anyhow? “Don’t ask don’t tell”? You’re not a gay guy, are you?

  No. I got caught distributing porn films to my outfit in basic.

  Jesus! G’wan, getthefuckoutahere. Next time lie about that too. Say you’re a gay guy or something.

  The Kid can’t tell if Cat is serious or not. But he’s right, the next time someone asks him about his military service he’ll admit it right up front, he’ll say he got shit-canned by the U.S. Army before completing basic training. If they ask him why he was discharged he’ll say it was because of “don’t ask don’t tell” and they found out he’s gay. It’s what he should have told brandi18. It would have saved him a world of trouble.

  IT’S NEARLY NIGHTFALL WHEN THE WRITER strolls aboard the Dolores Driscoll. He finds the Kid in the gloom of the cabin seated cross-legged on his cot among a batch of loose sheets of paper, some of the pages on his lap, others fallen to the deck, several held in his hands. With small surprise the Writer notes a Bible lying among the papers on the cot. The Kid’s normally suntanned face is chalk white and his hands are shaking. The Writer pulls up a folding chair, sits down, and asks the Kid what he’s reading.

  Some weird shit, man.

  The Bible yours? I didn’t take you for a Christian particularly.

  I’m not particularly. The Bible’s not what’s weird. It belonged to a guy I knew. I ended up with it and started reading in it by accident, you might say. Same as these papers. They’re like printed-out e-mails that I guess the guy was saving for a case. Or in case of a case. Something like that. He’s a lawyer. Or used to be a lawyer.

  The Writer can see that the Kid is upset by what he’s been reading, upset and perhaps frightened. Do you mind if I take a look?

  Be my guest, the Kid says and he gathers the sheets of paper, takes a moment to put them carefully in sequence, and hands the packet to the Writer.

  As the Writer reads his eyebrows lift and he purses his lips as if to whistle. Then he does whistle. Who is this guy, Big Daddy?

  I’m pretty sure he’s the guy I know, the lawyer, since they were in his stuff. I sort of got them without his knowledge, I guess, and forgot to give them back. His name is Shyster. Actually his real name is Lawrence Somerset. Used to be some kind of big-time state politician named Larry Somerset who was on TV a lot until he got caught for being into kiddie porn and arranging over the Internet to set up a love nest for a couple of little girls supposedly being pimped by their mother. Only it was a sting and there wasn’t any mother or any little girls either. You maybe read about him in the papers or heard it on the news. It was a big deal for a while when he first got caught. Mainly because he was this big state legislator with a wife and grown kids and all, and when he opened the motel room door for what he thought was a couple of little girls but instead turned out to be the cops, he was naked or almost naked with a dildo in his hand and a kiddie porn DVD playing on the TV. Asshole probably had a hard-on too. And I thought I was stupid.

  Good lord! How on earth do you know a man like that? the Writer asks and the Kid briefly describes life beneath the Causeway, its unintended necessity and nature. He adds that he doesn’t know where the Shyster has been living since the hurricane and points out that he never liked the guy anyhow and especially doesn’t like him now after reading these e-mails which the Shyster must’ve been saving in case he needed to keep the other guy from blowing his whistle on even worse things than kiddie-dipping. The Kid calls the
other guy “the recipient.”

  The one who calls himself Doctor Hoo?

  Yeah.

  Let me take a wild guess. Is that our professor?

  ’Fraid so. Read the rest.

  The Writer asks if there’s a reading lamp and the Kid places a kerosene lantern on the table next to his chair and lights it. A splash of orange covers the wall behind him and shadows dart around the cabin like bats. The Writer resumes reading. The two of them remain silent. When he reaches the end of the stack of e-mails, the Writer exhales loudly, passes the e-mails back to the Kid and simply says, Jesus Christ.

  Yeah.

  Did you know your professor friend and this guy Shyster or whatever he’s called were coconspiring pen pals?

  No. But they didn’t either. Check the dates on their e-mails. They’re all from a couple years ago, back before the Shyster got busted and did time. They’re from when he could still legally use a computer for e-mailing and cruising the Internet for kids. I didn’t know the Professor back then. Or Shyster either. And since it sounds like Big Daddy and Doctor Hoo never actually met in person in real life, despite being heavy into swapping kiddie porn websites and exchanging kiddies-for-hire contact info, when they did meet in real life under the Causeway a few weeks ago it was a kind of coincidence and they didn’t know who they were meeting so they didn’t recognize each other.

  Why on earth would this Shyster want to keep these e-mails? They’re disgusting.

  Maybe he thought he could make a deal with the cops. Like if he turned in his pen pal they’d let him get rid of his anklet and get off parole and maybe get his old law license back. I dunno. Everybody makes deals if they can.