Inhabited

by Charlie Quimby

  Vaughn had been wintering in the shadow of the Broadway bridge on a strip of bank nobody else wanted. He didn’t even have a tent and it was not a camp, just a flat ledge barely concealed by some scrub and so narrow that if he rolled over he’d tumble all the way to the river. With lined coveralls over layers of polar fleece, triple socks, wool mittens inside insulated choppers, and a balaclava, the mummy bag kept Vaughn from frost bite and hypothermia. The key was not going to sleep damp or too drunk.

  One frigid night, small feet pressed across the nylon, moving tentatively toward the opening cinched around his face. Zipped in with arms pinned at his sides, he held still and slitted open his eyes, expecting a stray cat, not the skunk whose whiskers now brushed his skin. A long few minutes passed as the skunk sniffed at his alcohol breath and pawed the hood’s ice-encrusted aperture before moving on. A night later it came back, curling up for a short stay. After a week or so of this routine, he named her Lucinda. If he was going to sleep with a skunk, it seemed better that it not be a male. There was something thrilling about submitting his face to a creature with the power to blind him, and a sense of intimacy developed that he dared not mention to the men who drank with him before stumbling off to their lonely camps. Lucinda’s pong was mild, no worse than campfire clothes, and he began to accept it as her body’s natural perfume, a wild pungency that stirred feelings he hesitated to categorize. She was not a pet. He had considered taming her with nuts and dried apricots, but feared the treats would change the careful balance of their relationship. No begging and no obedience; their warmth and snuffling and trust felt three-quarters like love.

  He drank a bit less to stay alert for the faint crimp of her paws across fresh snow, for her light scuff through the brush. She arrived without regard for time, stayed as long as it suited her, left for no apparent reason, yet her steady attendance seemed deeply faithful. Perhaps she was only guided by the weather. One day Lucinda stopped coming. What a sick fuck he was. Dumped by a skunk. After three nights without her he made a ruckus in the park, punched the wrong wino and ended up in detox.

  Word in the tank was the liquor store on the far side of the river had a close-out bourbon that in Vaughn’s more discriminating days had been his favorite. Crossing the bridge meant heading from booze territory to meth land where there were people he preferred not to encounter. He had once been robbed in the bridge’s concrete-chute walk as night traffic rolled by and the river passed underneath. But it was daylight now and he counted out the change for his trip. He climbed the pedestrian path to where it looped back over the bridge and had walked almost to the river’s edge when he caught a familiar scent. He stood right above his hidden camp and hadn’t detected Lucinda down there. Had she just come by?

  A dump truck hurled past, slapping a wall of engine heat against him but it was the perfume that swelled in his head. He scanned the traffic lanes and saw impossibility. A concrete barrier. Noise. An impassible gap between the divided spans. His skunk followed a friendly, well-traveled corridor beneath the bridge. Yet his heart knew. He breathed deeply and looked again. Black tires pounding black fur into black pavement, the dark rectangle so flat and indistinct the cars no longer bothered to avoid it. How many nights had he listened to the hum and thump over expansion joints above his head without catching the fading tang of Lucinda’s death?

  He gulped the bittersweet air, leaned over the barrier and drew a long blast from a passing horn. There was no way to tell if it was her. There had to be other skunks, less clever, less wary, less his. He waited for the light at the crossroad to slow the onslaught and stepped out waving his arms. He had been hit before and wasn’t afraid. The cars would have to move over because he would not give up this ground. He hadn’t counted on her being frozen and sealed to the deck. He stripped off his gloves and dug with bare fingers to find an edge free of ice. His breathing came fast and a drip formed at the end of his nose. His blackened nails turned red but he felt nothing except the cold of his tears.

  A truck side mirror nearly clipped him. Heads and fists shook. The coal-rolling diesel engulfed the lane in a foul black cloud. Hopeless. Vaughn bellied back over the barrier, his throat thickening until he thought he might strangle. From the walkway he saw his ground cover with the bag wrapped in it, mashed in the snow with concealing branches pulled over, leaving the bare brown spot, so obvious from above, the imprint of the invisible man. He took a deep diver’s breath, as much as he could contain, and headed for town, over the viaduct that crossed the tracks and past his regular liquor store and past another. He held everything inside but couldn’t stop his breathing. Had he exhaled the last of his friend or was some of her still coursing in his bloodstream? The thought made him cry for Lucinda and then he was crying for himself and when he reached the Salvation Army he was crying for the whole friendless and faithless world. They took him in and when he refused to wash his hands, they told him he might get an infection and they couldn’t have blood around the others. He wanted to tell the lady in the blue gloves they could have the blood if he could keep Lucinda’s smell on his fingers. Instead he covered his face, whispered the only prayer he knew and accepted the bar of motel soap the woman dropped in his hand like a quarter.

  Every day before his next meeting, he walked the mile to the bridge to declare he hadn’t added any booze breath to the air and to take in Lucinda’s fading essence. It lasted as long as he needed it. The world stank but Lucinda taught him it only reeked in warning. A skunk’s spray was its last resort.

  Inappropriate or illegal use of computers may result in loss of computer privileges and/or loss of library privileges.

  –Library Code of Conduct

  Isaac explained to the young woman at the Information Desk that he had lost his library card. He hated how irresponsible that made him sound.

  Kristin responded with the smile of someone not yet resigned to explaining simple things over and over. “We can issue a new one today. You just need a picture ID.”

  “I lost that, too—in a fire.” He should have said that before. It would have made her more sympathetic. And that he had a library sciences degree. He told her a funny story from his library internship days about patrons always scanning the ISBN barcode instead of the CIP barcode. She seemed puzzled. He shouldn’t have mumbled.

  “Perhaps another patron can vouch for you,” she suggested.

  He didn’t see anyone. Usually the library was full of people he knew. Other staff would recognize his face, he was certain, but would they vouch for him? He dropped the name of the public services manager. His many job applications surely had lodged him somewhere in their system. Linda Cornish had even interviewed him once.

  Kristin’s expression made clear she wasn’t going to bother a manager over a lost library card. She searched the screen for a solution. “I could look up your record, and give you a guest pass just for today. What’s your address?”

  He gave her the Day Center’s mailing address. Would the fact that he shared it with a hundred other library users throw up a red flag?

  Kristin leaned forward. “I’m sorry, that’s not coming up with your name. Do you have anything that could confirm your current address—a recent utility bill or a rent receipt?”

  He tried to laugh. “Who comes to the library with a rent receipt?”

  “Do you happen to know your library card number?”

  An even more ridiculous question. He was probably the only person in history who could answer it and when he did, she didn’t even notice. Two clacks punctuated a string of rattles. Were all government computers equipped with amplified keys?

  After the screen refreshed, she said, “I’m showing your name at a different address.” She waited for his answer, fingers poised.

  His mother’s house. He’d never changed it. That had been another time, another life when he still imagined himself working in a library far better than this one. He gave her the address.

  She nodded, clicked once and peered at the screen. Her friendly manner tu
rned opaque. “I’m sorry, Mr. Samson, but your library privileges have been suspended.”

  “On what grounds?” he blurted, too much like a lawyer. He switched to sounding baffled, like the innocent man he was. “It must be a mistake.”

  She made a fine adjustment to her keyboard’s position as if resetting her patience. “I can’t answer that. I’m afraid you have to leave.”

  It had to be a mistake. His record was clear of fines. He’d always observed the rules of comportment. To be humiliated in his home library! He couldn’t let this stand and he let Kristin know it.

  She lifted the telephone receiver and cupped her hand over her mouth.

  Good. Call a manager. Linda Cornish could settle it and he could start his search for information about the lost eye. He knew every infraction that could lead to suspension, and he was innocent of all twenty-two. He had damaged nothing, maintained good hygiene and harassed no one. Had brandished neither weapon nor indecent body parts nor left packages unattended. Neither smoked, chewed tobacco nor eaten in an unauthorized place. Not played loud music, tampered with software or solicited signatures, or sold any products, including illegal drugs. And never brought in a bicycle, skateboard, animals, alcoholic beverages, shopping cart or other oversized objects.

  Linda Cornish emerged from a back room, formidable as a thunderhead in a black and purple sweater shot through with silver. If there were an ugly Big Bang sweater contest, she would definitely be in the running.

  “Why am I suspended?” he demanded.

  She blinked at him as if he were an extra in a police lineup.

  “Inappropriate use of a computer,” she said.

  “Impossible. What’s the evidence?”

  “The letter went out yesterday.” Linda Cornish presented a copy, a little too smugly, he thought.

  “Well, I haven’t looked at porn, sent spam—whatever this means—ever.”

  “It doesn’t matter. Your card was used. You can establish another person did this without your knowledge or consent or you can request readmission in six months. Those are the options.”

  Those were not the only options. What about taking his word for it? He couldn’t go six months without access. The library was his oasis, his vocation. They wouldn’t ban his brother if he lost his card. They’d believe a soccer mom. His outraged arguments only stiffened Linda Cornish’s posture.

  Sam the security officer appeared at his elbow. A retired cop, Sam now relied on his white fringe and mellow manner to keep the peace. And a taser. When did Sam start carrying a taser?

  “I lost my pants in a fire. Someone must’ve found them and took my wallet.”

  “That sounds far-fetched,” Linda said.

  Not on the river. He should’ve just said he lost his wallet.

  “So why didn’t you report it?” Sam asked.

  “Who reports their library card’s missing when they lose their wallet? You wait until you need it!” He was trying to be reasonable but couldn’t help shouting.

  Sam had heard a million lies and crazy excuses, maybe even I thought it burned up in my pants but I guess a guy stole it. He tilted his head toward the exit.

  It was humiliating. Being treated like a child pornographer instead of a colleague! When had any bureaucracy ever moved this fast? It had to be a plot. They thought he was reading subversive materials. He was a threat to the other librarians. When had the Library of Congress recruited any of them? They were waiting for this chance! Sam had a grip on his arm now. They passed the long face-out rows of new releases. The books judged him as beneath their interest, their titles chattering. Being Mortal. Demon Camp. Capital. Little Failure. World Order. This Changes Everything. He stiffened his free arm and raked clear three yards of shelf before Sam pulled him away. Isaac let the momentum pitch him into the Friends of the Library sale table. More books scattered. Four hands on him now. Pushed into the parking lot. The heat hit him hard. Doors closed. Laughter. He looked around, didn’t see anyone. Oh, no, not the voices. They had been so quiet. Quiet so they could listen. Listening until they heard the thing that would hurt him the most.

  In the old days, the voices gave him very bad advice. They convinced him to order extra-large, triple pepperoni pizzas for breakfast. They told him anything with Michael Jackson’s picture would be valuable some day. At their urging he stole single socks from the college laundry room, filled them with sand and slung them on rooftops. They whispered that the saplings in a neighbor’s yard would grow into hanging trees, so he snapped them off.

  Now a voice said he needed a computer. Finally, a voice that knew what it was talking about.

  But he had to be careful. A computer would demand electricity, Internet access, software, a place to sit, shelter from the elements, safety from thieves. A computer needed a house more than he did. And then the house required its own things: furniture to arrange and appliances to feed and cookware for every eventuality and pictures to display and treasures to lock up and TVs to drive away loneliness. Silverware drawers and dish cabinets and spice racks and pantry shelves to organize. Patio furniture for sitting outside. A garage to hold band saws and compressors and lawnmowers and artificial Christmas trees and kayak paddles and snow tires. A room for each activity, a niche for every knick-knack. Shoes paired, socks matched. Clothes assigned to closets, hangers and drawers, arranged by color and function, season and wearer, clean and dirty. Exhausting!

  If he wasn’t careful, this could start something.

  Calling Shelly was like talking to the bank. His sister-in-law served as his payee when he was drawing Supplemental Security Income. He used his SSI funds sparingly to accumulate a cushion for when he was no longer considered incompetent. Not that he was now.

  “Computers always get you in trouble,” she said.

  “I got my degree on a computer,” he said.

  “You know what I mean. You get immersed in the craziness on the web and you don’t come out. That whole thing with the Library of Congress guy.”

  “Garrison.”

  “If you’d stayed off the computer, you’d never have tied the library internship to the NSA.”

  “They’re both located at Fort Meade!”

  “And you’d never have tried to track down Garrison at the Reagan Library, which convinced you he was involved in the whole Edison thing.”

  “That whole thing with Edison was real,” he said. “General Electric had light bulbs and radios and clocks in every house in America. They were about to take over the country and when Herbert Hoover figured it out and tried to stop them…”

  “You wouldn’t have taken the Winnebago to California and then your dad wouldn’t have pressed charges.”

  “…they crashed the stock market so the country was already in a panic and Hoover was afraid to make it worse, so he broke up the company into GE and NBC and RCA. Then RCA invented TV, and NBC controlled the programs, and GE brainwashed Ronald Reagan and groomed him to be their President of the United States. You can look it up.” There was a lot more to it, of course. A lot more.

  Shelly sighed much louder than necessary. “Nobody cares about that. My point is, it all goes back to the computer. You need to stay grounded. The Internet is too much like your brain. It makes things seem connected in ways they really aren’t. Are you taking your medications?”

  Technically, it was none of her business. “I’ve been feeling better without them.”

  “Isaac…stopping your meds because you started feeling better is not the best plan. Neither is buying a computer just to research a lost glass eye.”

  “I’m banned from the library. I’m doomed without books or a computer. Are you going to help me or not?” Silence. “Please, I’m trying to do a good deed. I’ll buy something cheap. Don’t make me beg for my own money.”

  “Can we meet at Best Buy? I don’t think I can bear Walmart.”

  “Or you could just send me the cash,” he said.

  Shelly paused. She may have been considering how much easier it wou
ld be. “No, Isaac,” she said, “I don’t think I can do that.”

  Isaac locked his bike near the store entrance. The greeter chirped a welcome and eyed his backpack. Shelly waited by the Samsung display, aiming her assistant principal stare at him as if he’d been running in the aisle.

  “What?” He hadn’t done anything. With Shelly he was still working off the backlog of his offenses.

  “Let’s just do this,” she said. “I’m glad to see you’re okay.”

  Isaac cared nothing about distinctions among the models. All computers started out as cute kittens and soon fattened into demanding yet unresponsive cats. He found a notebook computer at a price that satisfied Shelly and disappointed the salesperson, who nevertheless mentioned the extended warranty. To Shelly. The offers continued at the checkout: credit cards, discounts, loyalty points and protection plans.

  Isaac didn’t want the box. It would advertise he’d gotten a new computer.

  “You should keep everything in case you need to make a return,” the clerk said.

  “If it’s a piece of crap, why do you need the box?”

  The clerk looked at Shelly. She turned her head toward Isaac.

  “Uh, you can return it if you’re dissatisfied with your purchase for any reason,” the clerk recited.

  “I won’t be dissatisfied if it works. And if it doesn’t work, you can’t put it back on the shelf. What if I’m dissatisfied with wasteful packaging?”

  “Let’s go,” Shelly said, snatching the box and the receipt and striding away. But Isaac didn’t leave.

  “Sir, you can return it if you’re dissatisfied with the packaging. But we ask that you bring all the contents and packaging, your proof of purchase and a photo ID. Otherwise, there may be a missing item deduction.”

  “Why would you need my ID if I have the receipt?”

  “It’s company policy. So we can track returns and exchanges. This helps prevent losses and keeps our prices low.”