Read Online Lost Memory of Skin by Russell Banks - Free Book Online

waves at the Kid, flips his hair and cruises in a half-circle up to the Kid’s table and stops.
    Hello, Kid. A little early to be working the street, isn’t it?
    The Kid gives him a cold stare and looks down at his map. It’s a very detailed map of the entire city with the Calusa Isles segment scaled at five hundred yards to the inch.
    Oh, I forgot, you’re holding down a regular job now. Like a real quote family man unquote.
    Fuck off, Molly.
    Molly spins in a feigned huff and walks away. The Kid retrieves his cell phone from his backpack and punches in a number.
    Parc Bay Realty. How may I help you?
    He says he’s calling about a furnished studio with kitchenette and bath. Always he asks first for the price and then the square footage. It’s the drill—the same old Q’s, the same old A’s. Regarding price he’s looking strictly at the low end. Location is irrelevant as long as it’s within biking distance of his job but he knows it’s reassuring to the rental agent so he politely inquires into the related questions of neighborhood safety and building security. While the woman at the other end goes on about how it’s perfectly safe even after dark and the building has excellent twenty-four-hour security he dots the street address on the map with his ballpoint and draws a circle with a diameter of two inches—one thousand yards, three thousand feet—around it.
    There are a half-dozen kindergartens, day care centers, public and private schools, and three or four public playgrounds inside the circle. There are kids’ ballet studios, martial arts studios, art classes, music classes, and SAT preparation classes located inside the circle. Inside the circle everywhere you look the children are already gathering.
    He makes an appointment anyhow to come by and check out the room as soon as he gets off work at the Mirador and she says fine. He takes a box of Marlboro Gold from his backpack, knocks a cigarette loose, and lights it. He asks about pets and she says no dogs or cats.
    He says, Oh, followed by a longish pause. How about a pet iguana?
    She knows what an iguana is. She asks how big is it.
    Not big, he lies. It sleeps all day and can live in a box under the bed. It doesn’t make any noise and won’t damage anything.
    She says she’ll have to see it first and then decide.
    He’s okay with that. He says he was thinking of giving him away anyhow. To a friend, he lies again.
    Then she asks his name. As usual he wants to tell her Kid. But no way he can get away with it. End of interview. He knows what she’ll do with the information as soon as he gets off the phone. He says his real name anyhow. He has to.
    They say good-bye and he clicks off. He imagines her going straight to the Internet to run his name. He’s been through all this before—how many times? Fifty? A hundred? It’s a total waste of time, energy, and hope and he knows he won’t bother to show up at the appointed time and place. Even so he’ll make a call to a second agent. And a third. And probably a fourth. Before finally once again he’ll give up the search for a home.
    It’s an hour before the Kid has to be a busboy again and pedestrian traffic has thickened somewhat with tourists, brunchers, and dog walkers strolling past the café and grabbing seats nearby in increasing numbers until all the tables are taken and the Kid has noticed a clutch of people gathered by the headwaiter’s stand staring pointedly in his direction. He folds up his map and is about to leave the café and does not see the two bottle-blond girls in bikinis Rollerblading his way until they circle his table eyeing him like a pair of hawks riding a rising thermal high above a distracted mouse. As their shadows cross him he looks up and instinctively ducks. He wishes he had a hole to dive into. One bikini is pink polka-dotted, the other is tiger striped. Both girls wear carefully tousled honey-colored manes, black fingernail polish, lovingly applied makeup, and the