The Cursed Canoe

by Frankie Bow

  “What was that?” Sherry asked.

  I could no longer pretend I hadn’t heard anything.

  “It’s Dr. Rodge. He plays these—”

  “Excuse me, Dr. B. This won’t take long.”

  Sherry stood up and walked out.

  “I am able to pick up and attract any women I desire,” Rodge’s voice announced. I heard a brisk knock on Rodge’s door.

  “I read and meditate every day. I am wise and—”

  All at once, the voice and the background music went silent. Sherry returned to my office a few seconds later and settled back into the visitor chair. I glanced over at the wall separating Rodge Cowper’s office from mine. Still quiet.

  “Thanks, Sherry. So. You were saying, about your assignment?”

  “Yeah. I realized, there’s so much information out there for everyone to see, if the wrong person gets ahold of it, they can do a lot of damage. The rest of my group is waiting for me to decide, and I’m feeling kind of overwhelmed, to be honest. I just wanna get through this.”

  “You have some ideas, though?”

  “Oh, I have some ideas, all right,” she said miserably.

  “At this point, I’d say pick something and go with it. If you find you need to make some changes later, do that. No one expects you to get everything right on the first try.”

  Sherry blinked and stared, as if I had said something tremendously insightful.

  “You’re right. Thanks! Oh, and, uh, Dr. B?”

  I looked at her expectantly.

  “Never mind,” she said. “It’s no big deal.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  SHERRY DIDN’T COME to class the next day.

  I didn’t give it much thought until Emma stormed into my office that afternoon, interrupting an important conversation between Pat and me.

  Pat gallantly conceded the visitor chair to Emma. He refused, however, to concede my point: musicians have to work with a finite number of chord progressions, so naturally they’ll end up with similar-sounding songs. You can’t expect pop music to be too original, I explained, or else it’s not pop music anymore. Pat seemed to believe that musicians should be able to come up with completely original compositions all the time. I asked him how many songs he had written, and he accused me of changing the subject.

  Emma plumped down angrily in the vacated chair, and Pat perched on the edge of my desk.

  “My muffler fell out this morning,” Pat said when he caught me staring in horror at the dirt crumbling from his filthy jeans onto my desk.

  “And?” I demanded.

  “I had to fix it in my driveway and I didn’t have time to change afterward.”

  “Well, thanks for all the rat lungworm parasites, and the leptospirosis, and—what’s that flesh-eating thing that lives in soil, Emma? Strep? Staph?”

  “Staph,” Emma said. “Yeah, that’s kind of gross, Pat. You could have taken a shower and changed into clean clothes.”

  “I would’ve been late to class,” he said.

  I didn’t mention the condition of Pat’s car, which was the real problem. Most people don’t have to duct-tape their mufflers back into place before they drive to work. Pointing out things like this to Pat tends to result in the kind of unproductive conversation where people end up making cutting remarks about other peoples’ automotive choices.

  “Next time you should stop by the car wash,” I said. “And then get out of the car and walk through yourself.”

  “Hey,” Emma interrupted, “are you two done bickering? I have something important to ask Molly.”

  “We weren’t bickering,” Pat said. “I was explaining to Molly that if she listened to “Holiday” and “The Shore” and “The Passenger,” she’d realize they were all the same—”

  “No, they are not all the same song. Yes, there are superficial similarities, but you can’t make a chord progression off-limits simply because someone, somewhere, has used it already.”

  “It’s not just chord progressions,” Pat said. “I can’t believe you, of all people, are defending plagiarism.”

  “That is totally unfair, Pat. I—”

  “Molly,” Emma interrupted, “Did Sherry come to your class today?”

  “What? No, she didn’t, now that you mention it,” I said. “Why, what’s going on?”

  “She never showed for practice. We only had five paddlers today. We had someone fill in. Girl from the mainland.”

  “You were lucky to find someone on such short notice.”

  “No, Molly, we weren’t. We’re out on the water, halfway to the breakwall, and I see she’s just holding her paddle in the air, not stroking. So I ask her what’s she doing, and she says, ‘I wanted to see if the boat still moved.’ Like she’s carrying all of us.”

  Pat laughed incredulously.

  “She was in five,” Emma continued, “right in front of me. Ooh, I wanted to crack her across her big head.”

  “You had your paddle,” Pat pointed out.

  “Yeah, my three hundred dollar Black Pearl. So we just turned the boat around and dropped her back on the shore. We went back out with five paddlers. So yeah. I was hoping you’d know where Sherry is.”

  “I had kind of a strange conversation with her yesterday,” I said.

  “What about?” Emma asked.

  “She seemed stressed out about her assignment, but she’s doing well in the class. There must be something else going on. Maybe it had to do with Glenn and Davison.”

  “With what?” Pat asked.

  “She had a thing with Davison Gonsalves while Glenn was out of town,” Emma said.

  “Hm. It’s hard to keep up.”

  “Do you think she knows about you and Donnie?” Emma asked.

  “I don’t think so. Davison apparently told her that I’m dating his father, but fortunately Sherry doesn’t know that Davison’s father is Donnie.”

  “I still can’t believe Sherry is Donnie’s mysterious ex-wife,” Pat said. “It’s too much of a coincidence.”

  “I’ve been going back and forth on this. It’s hard to imagine Sherry and Donnie as a couple, but yesterday she told me she had an ex here in town, and they had a kid. A boy, in fact. So now I’m on the Donnie was her ex-husband bandwagon again.”

  “I dunno,” Pat said.

  “You’re still not convinced?”

  Pat considered that for a second before he came back with,

  “Six-four-one-five chord progression, and the same strumming pattern. Are you still not convinced?”

  “Eh, you two,” Emma interrupted. “Focus. What else did Sherry say?”

  “I don’t know. I can’t think of anything else. Oh, she did go next door and tell Rodge to turn off his affirmations.”

  “Hooray,” Emma said. “I thought it seemed less embarrassing than usual in here. Anyway, Sherry’s not answering her phone. I left a bunch of messages for her and now her mailbox is full. I even called the police.”

  “What did they say?” I asked. “It hasn’t even been twenty-four hours, has it?”

  “They pretty much laughed at me. The guy wouldn’t even take down the information. I’m worried. I mean, I’ve never even known her to be late. Have you?”

  Pat and I traded a look. I knew what he was thinking: whoever did away with Kathy Banks was still out there. And now Sherry was missing.

  “This is unusual for Sherry,” I said. “Her attendance has been good. Except for one time when she was half an hour late to class.”

  “Maybe the Student Retention Office can help,” Pat said.

  I started to object—my reflexive reaction to anything involving the Student Retention Office—but I realized Pat was right. If anyone could find a missing student, it was the SRO. Their Customer Relationship Management system used state-of-the-art predictive analytics to flag students at risk of leaving. When one did drop out of sight, the SRO’s army of Outreach Specialists would email, text, phone, and even drive out to visit the last known address. They were tir
eless, ceasing only when the straying student returned to the fold—or threatened to take out a restraining order.

  “You’re right, Pat. They’re probably our best hope. For Sherry to miss both class and paddling practice is unusual. No one has class right now, right?”

  “No one in this room,” Pat said.

  “Funny, Pat,” Emma said.

  “We have some time then. We can go up to the Student Retention Office right now.”

  “Emma and I can’t go up there with you, Molly,” Pat said. “You know they won’t discuss your student in front of us.”

  “Oh, right. FERPA.”

  The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act forbids revealing information about students except under very specific circumstances. Most of the time it serves as a shield, to defend against interfering parents and unstable exes.

  “Last time I went up to the Student Retention Office was for that retreat,” I said. “It didn’t go so well.”

  “Sorry, Molly.” Emma shrugged. “We can guard your coffee machine while you’re gone.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  PAT WAS RIGHT. NOT only did the Student Retention Office hate sharing anything with faculty on general principle, but Federal law placed strict safeguards on student information. I had to do this alone.

  I left Pat and Emma in charge of my coffee machine and started up the hill by myself. I wondered how Sherry’s disappearance might be related to what happened to Kathy Banks. Sherry and Kathy were on the same paddling crew. Kathy’s demise had guaranteed Sherry a seat in the race, but what explained Sherry’s disappearance?

  They both seemed to have some relationship to that for-profit education company, which had physical campuses in all fifty states and Canada. Sherry had attended one of their schools, and Kathy had a slight physical resemblance to one of their former employees.

  Sherry and Kathy had something else in common: they had both flirted with Emma’s husband. I had seen Sherry give Yoshi that playful swat at dinner, and Emma had complained to me about Kathy’s brazen advances. I was sure Emma was joking about cracking that woman over the head with her paddle, though. Emma would never actually do something like that. Would she?

  I hadn’t been paying attention to my surroundings during my trudge up the hill. One minute I was ruminating on Sherry and Kathy, and the next minute I was standing before the gleaming new entrance to the SRO’s office complex. The automatic plate glass doors slid apart with a sigh, disgorging a blast of chilled air. I took a breath and strode in.

  I took a quick inventory and decided I felt perfectly fine. Unlike the last time I had come up to this building, I wasn’t feeling dizzy or panicky. And I knew why: I no longer felt responsible for what had happened to Kathy Banks. That was the good news. The bad news was I was sure Emma had something to do with it. I decided not to mention my suspicions to Pat. He already seemed convinced that Kathy was the victim of foul play, and I didn’t want to put Emma in his crosshairs.

  A Student Retention Office henchperson scurried over as I entered the lobby. She wore a ruffled red and white floor-length muumuu. Her streaked sandy hair was pinned on the right side with a crimson hibiscus.

  “Molly,” she said, “We’re glad you’re here. We’ve been wanting to meet with you.”

  How did she know my name? I imagined a poster in the SRO’s back office featuring photos of the campus’s ten least cooperative department chairs.

  “That works out,” I said. “I had a question for you too. I have a student who’s gone AWOL.”

  She ushered me into one of the hushed breakout rooms adjacent to the reception area. Its warm, recessed lighting was a pleasant change from the bare fluorescent tubes humming away in my office.

  I stood by the wall-length saltwater aquarium and watched the fish dart around among the manicured seaweed. One fish looked exactly like a lemon. I wondered if it was actually called a “lemon fish.” As I was reaching into my bag to retrieve my phone and look up “lemon fish,” I heard a noise behind me. In the aquarium glass, I saw the reflection of a woman standing in the doorway.

  I knew who it was. I hadn’t seen her since the day I’d shared a stage with her at the faculty development session.

  “Hello, Molly.” She stood in the doorway at a safe distance. “I hope you’re feeling better. Um, you look like you’re feeling much better.”

  I sighed and turned around.

  “Hi, Linda. Listen, thanks for taking the time—”

  “No, no, thank you for coming up to see us!”

  Instead of a sari, Linda wore a simple blue “ethnic” print tunic, flowing trousers, and a chunky necklace that looked like bocce balls strung together. She invited me to sit at the polished koa table and seated herself across from me. In the chair closest to the door. Which she left open.

  “We’re so glad you came up to see us,” she said. “We were going to contact you anyway. We wanted to touch bases about Dylan.”

  Why is it so hard to use the analogy properly? No one knows less about baseball than I do, and even I know you can only touch one base at a time. The term “touch bases” sounds like triangles sliding back and forth on their bases, randomly colliding like bumper cars. Which, come to think of it, may be as good a metaphor as any for the way we communicate around here.

  “Dylan from Larry Schneider’s class.” I nodded. “Kathy Banks and I discussed his case before she passed away. Well, of course it was before, I mean it couldn’t have been aft—anyway, I don’t know if you have her notes or anything?”

  “Yes,” Linda said, “we have Kathy’s records.”

  “So you know the class is still full, and there are several students on the waiting list. It wouldn’t be fair to move him ahead of the other students waiting to get in. What I’m concerned about, though—”

  “This letter is from our EEO Office.” Linda slid the paper across the desk to me. “Dylan filed a complaint—”

  “A complaint? About what?”

  “As department chair, you are required to make sure the teachers in your department abide by the guidelines outlined in the letter in order to avoid creating a hostile learning environment for him.”

  I read the letter.

  “This sounds like Dylan is not required to meet course deadlines. Am I reading this correctly?”

  “Your teachers are expected to work with him on an individual basis to complete his work on a schedule that’s mutually agreeable.”

  “Linda, I don’t think it’s going to be ‘mutually agreeable’ when one student gets exempted from the deadlines that apply to everyone else. How are the faculty supposed to—wait a minute, does this say he’s allowed to use his phone in class?”

  “His parents need to be able to contact him. Denying him the use of his phone at any time, including during class, is tantamount to discrimination.”

  “Isn’t there any other support we can give him, other than letting him ignore the course syllabus? I mean, this poor kid was talking to me about conspiracies and lizard people. I’m worried that he might—”

  “That’s not your call, Molly.”

  “No, you’re right, I’m not a psychiatrist. But don’t you think the other students will think it’s unfair that Dylan gets a pass when the rest of them have to follow the rules?”

  “The teachers aren’t permitted to disclose a student’s accommodation plan to other students.”

  “The professors won’t have to disclose anything. If Dylan’s chatting on his phone with his parents in the middle of class, it’s going to be pretty obvious what’s going on. I’ll pass this letter along to the faculty and I’ll advise them of their obligation to comply. Just be ready when the other students start complaining, that’s all I’m saying. Listen, there’s something else I need to discuss with you. A student named Sherry DiNapoli. She’s disappeared, and... I need your help.”

  I walked out of the Student Retention Office with mixed feelings. Things hadn’t gone well for poor Dylan, I didn’t think. He needed
help, not a free pass to play with his phone in class. On the other hand, Linda had agreed to put Sherry on the Early Intervention list. Sherry was about to get bombarded with repeated e-mails, phone calls, texts, social media messages, and physical mail to all of her known contact numbers and addresses. Subjecting Sherry to the SRO’s special brand of stalking and harassment might sound a little inhumane. But if Sherry was in trouble, it was worth it.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  IT WAS PAT’S FAULT that I was late for my lunch with Donnie. I had been heading out of the campus parking lot on my way to Donnie’s house, just as Pat pulled in. I saw that he was driving an aged but respectable Mercedes Diesel. Emma rode in the passenger seat. Naturally, I had to back up, re-park and go over to examine the car.

  “Pat,” I exclaimed, my surprise shoving aside tact, “I thought you were broke! How could you afford this?”

  “The ad revenue from Island Confidential,” he said. “It’s modified to run on used cooking oil. The car, not the website.”

  “You get ad revenue? That’s so...corporate! I don’t remember ever seeing ads on the Island Confidential website.”

  But Pat did have advertisers, and apparently there were enough of them to allow Pat to buy himself a car with a decent paint job (an inoffensive tan) and a muffler that would stay put without duct tape.

  “Ad revenue is what pays the bills.” Pat perched comfortably on the hood. “Not even I could live on what they pay part-time instructors.”

  “Why do you do it then?” I asked. “I mean, not that we aren't lucky to have you.”

  “Library privileges. I need the databases for research and fact checking. Otherwise, you’re right. It’s not worth it. Anyway, you both have your ad blockers turned off for Island Confidential, right?”

  “I don’t bother with ad blockers,” Emma said. “They slow down your computer.”

  I peered into the car’s windows. The tan leather upholstery was worn to a dark gray at the edges but overall it looked like it was in good shape. This was by far the most deluxe vehicle I'd ever seen Pat driving.