Kiss of the Sun (9 page)

“All right,” Jarrell said. “Let's take a look.”

Slinky clicked the thumbnail and the page loaded. A scene filled the page: The symbol, rendered in metallic 3-D, against a backdrop of stars. Floating in the sky, just like in Martha's dream. She involuntarily took hold of Jarrell's arm. There was nothing else on the page but the outline of two boxes asking for username and password.

Slinky clicked around on the page. “Hmm,” he said. “This is the only match, and it looks like we're going to need some magic words to get any further. Any ideas?”

Jarrell looked at Martha. “None offhand.”

Slinky placed a large hand over his chin. “We could try to brute-force it, but that might take a while.”

“How long?” Jarrell asked.

“Maybe twenty-four hours, maybe a century. Depends on the strength of the password.”

Slinky tapped on the keyboard, opening a black terminal window on the screen, then entered a series of commands and hit return. The black window in front rapidly populated with lines of code that scrolled toward the top. In the window behind it, Martha could see the edge of the metal emblem as it continued to revolve.

“Okay, I'm running Hydra. It's my best password-cracking software.” Slinky slid the metal chair backward with a scraping sound and stood. “It will run through several hundred thousand common passwords and variations. Let's let it cook for twenty-four hours and see if anything floats to the top. Meanwhile, shall we enjoy this lovely day in Shangri-la?”

By the time dusk fell over the marsh, a number of Slinky's other “guests,” those staying in the other dilapidated boats and cruisers, had begun to emerge and mingle. The loud hum of the marsh insects fought with the thump of music emanating from large speakers in front of a DJ booth, where a man in a red fedora decorated with a turkey feather was spinning a mix of rap, rhythm and blues, and bebop. The lightbulbs strung between the poles that surrounded the platform glowed in the twilight, each with its own cloud of gnats, though the cool temperature was keeping the mosquitoes at bay. A few couples had begun to dance in the open area in front of the DJ booth. Slinky was making the rounds, still wearing his sunglasses, smiling.

As she crossed the platform toward the bar with Jarrell, Martha was acutely aware of her otherness as the only white person at the affair. And she could hear, inside her head, the protective voice of Dr. Goodwin telling her she wasn't ready for all this. But if not now, when? Now was what really mattered, wasn't it?

“Professor Humphries,” said a young man in a shiny silver blazer with close-cropped hair and a goatee. A young woman with winged magenta eyeliner hung at his side, her arm draped over his shoulder. “I thought you'd left us for the big city.”

“Just back on a little business, Clem,” Jarrell said. “This is a friend of mine, Martha Covington. She lives out on Shell Heap. She's a writer.”

“Oh, you're the one who wrote that book about Shell Heap, right?” Clem said. “It's a privilege to meet you.”

Martha felt a pleasant tingle inside. With her isolated island lifestyle, she had little awareness of how far her reputation had spread.

Slinky stepped up, plastic cup in hand. “Everybody having a good time?”

“Cool vibe, Slink,” Clem said. “You do know how to throw a shindy.”

“Y'all be sure to get some shrimp over there and try some of the special bug juice,” Slinky said, waving a ringed hand toward the bar. Towers of plastic cups were stacked next to a yellow Coleman barrel with a spigot. Next to the bar, someone was dumping an enormous plastic bag of raw shrimp into a cooler.

They continued to mingle for a few minutes, chatting with some of Jarrell's old friends and acquaintances. Then the DJ music stopped, and Martha heard someone shout, “C'mon, ring dance, y'all!” She turned toward the sound of the voice and saw a young man in jeans and a white T-shirt walking toward the center of the barge with an empty burlap sack across his hands. He held it out as if he were presenting the Golden Fleece. The partygoers were putting down their drinks and calling out things like “Hell, yeah!” and “Let's go!” The crowd began to form a circle as he ceremoniously placed the sack on the deck.

Jarrell took Martha by the hand and led her toward the circle. “This is an old Geechee tradition. C'mon, it's fun.”

“Sure,” Martha said.

The revelers began to clap and stomp in a syncopated pattern. A woman brought out a wooden washboard and ran a spoon up and down the ribs, adding a rasping rhythm. The young man in the T-shirt went to the center of the ring, folded his elbows like wings, and started to waggle, thrusting his head forward like a turkey. Martha and Jarrell joined in the clapping, and as the dancer's birdlike moves around the sack intensified, he added intricate foot shuffles. The crowd began to sing:

Watch that star, oh watch star,

Watch that star, see how it runs

If you see that star in the western sky

Better watch that star, see how it runs.

The dancer stepped out of the circle and tagged a woman named Melva, who took her place in the center, improvising her own version of the dance, holding her hands up to the sky, then shimmying them down toward the deck, and finally up again.

Melva completed her turn, came back into the line, and tapped Jarrell, who smiled as he trotted around the sack, standing erect, arms folded, kicking his feet. Martha felt herself swept into the rhythm and spirit of the dance, and she didn't hesitate when Jarrell stepped out and tagged her, flashing a smile and a wink.

She stepped into the center and started to move, hesitant at first, and then she began to bounce and twirl and skip. She surrendered to the moment, lifting her hands to the air, her chest pushed out in the cool night air, spinning. The concussions of the circle of hands and stomping feet seemed to propel her, and she twirled faster and faster, until the circle became a blur of shouting faces, the lights on the poles a whirling vortex of fireflies.

She felt herself becoming dizzy and stepped out, laughing, and tagged the next dancer in the line.

“You all right?” Jarrell asked.

“Yeah. Just a little dizzy. I better get a drink of water.”

She made her way toward the bar, but before she got there, someone stuck a plastic cup in her hand. “You look thirsty,” a woman said.

“What is it?” she asked, looking into the clear liquid.

“Water,” the woman answered. Martha took a sip of the cool liquid and immediately felt a burning sensation, like a drip of acid rolling down the back of her throat.

She felt dizzier, and suddenly disoriented. The shouts and claps now sounded like a demon chant. She looked around, spotted their cabin cruiser, and moved toward it, pushing through the sweating bodies, head swimming.

As she neared the edge of the barge, a hand fell on her shoulder.

“Hey, you all right?” Jarrell asked.

“I just need a moment. I'll be back,” Martha said, forcing a smile. She didn't want Jarrell to see how sick she really felt. She just needed a few minutes to be quiet, to compose herself.

She made her way through the cabin door, closed it behind her, put the plastic cup on the counter, and went into the head. The sounds of the music outside throbbed through the walls.

She turned on the faucet, leaned down, and cupped her hands. She took a drink of water, then shook her hands off and put them on the sides of the sink, stared at the drain, and waited for the spell to pass. Her head felt flushed, full of roiling blood, and she was breathing hard.

Wait a few seconds, and you'll be fine. Then you can go out again.

When she glanced up to check her appearance, the face in the vanity mirror was not her own. It had ashen skin and matted hair. One eyeball dangled from its socket by a sinewy thread; the other was sunken, shriveled. The skin stretched over yellow teeth like a rictus. The maw opened and closed, rasping a single phrase:
Help me, Lovie.

Martha started to scream, then forced the sound back down into her throat. She jerked her head away. “No.”

Yes. Butcher's hook at me, Lovie. Look what you've done.

Martha felt tears welling up in her eyes. She gripped the sides of the sink and resisted turning back to the mirror. “I have to leave this room, I have to go away.”

Take a good look. Why?

Martha squeezed her eyelids tight, began counting out loud. “One, two, three…”

I'm dyin'. I'm part of you, and—

“One, two, three…”

You really think you can be with that boy? Can you? Answer me, Lovie.
Lenny let loose a sputtering cackle. Martha could smell a toxic mix of sickness and decay.

Think about it, Lovie. Just think about what you're doin', before you bugger up another life.

Martha slitted her eyes. She wouldn't let herself look directly at the mirror, but in her peripheral vision, she could still see the knob of his head.

That would just be unethical, innit? Think of what you're doing to him. Do you really think
you
can have a mate like that?

Martha dug her fingernails into the palms of her hands. “Maybe I can.”

That cackle again, that sputtering mocking.
Sure, Lovie. And maybe you'll marry the bloke. Think of that. Just imagine the droolin' love children you'll produce
.
Maybe one day he'll come home and find you cookin' them for dinner.

“No!” Martha grabbed a hairbrush on the front of the sink and smashed the handle into the mirror, turning Lenny's mocking face into a spiderweb of cracks. “No!” She pulled the brush back to smash it again, but before she could, a hand closed around her wrist.

“Martha…”

She spun around and buried her head against Jarrell's chest, sobbing. He put his arms around her and guided her out of the bathroom.

“I'm sorry,” Martha said.

“What happened?”

“I saw something.”

“Hallucination?”

Martha nodded and squeezed her lids closed, letting loose a sheet of tears that ran down her cheeks.

Jarrell pulled a wad of toilet paper from the roll and dabbed her cheeks.

“I thought I was okay. I thought I was better now. I thought—”

Jarrell picked up the plastic cup, sniffed it. “You drank this?”

“Just a sip. I thought it was water at first.”

“It's called white lightning,” Jarrell said, pouring it down the sink. “No wonder. I should have kept an eye out. Are you okay now?”

“I think so. But I don't know for how long. I'm sorry about the mirror.”

“To hell with the mirror,” Jarrell said. “I'll take care of it. I just need to know if you're okay.” He put his hands on her shoulders and maneuvered her around to the sofa. He brushed her hair aside, placed his hands on both sides of her face, and looked her straight in the eye. “Are you all right now?”

Martha nodded, leaned her forehead against his shoulder. “It wasn't the drink, Jarrell. I only had a sip.”

Jarrell placed a tender kiss on her lips. “We're both going to be all right. We've just been through an incredible amount of stress in the last twenty-four hours.”

“Okay.” Martha smiled. The voice of Lenny was gone. There was only Jarrell's lovely face.

“We have a lot of business tomorrow. For now, what say we turn in?”

Later, lying in the sleeping berth with the porthole near her face, she heard no further voices. Only the muffled hubbub of the party on the adjoining barge. With Jarrell in the next room, she felt safer. But it was a long time before she felt safe enough to sleep.

The following morning, the surrounding marshland was quiet except for the buzz of cicadas and the twitter of birds, their songs filtering through light patches of fog that were starting to break up. The interior of Martha's head had also grown quiet as she and Jarrell followed Slinky across the planked deck toward the business center. Quiet, or perhaps temporarily dormant. Such was the pattern of her illness—in periods of psychosis, the peace of quiet mornings could unravel throughout the day, leaving her in a state of shrill frenzy by nightfall.

“Let's see what Santa brought,” Slinky said as he unlocked and opened the sliding glass door. The computer that had been running the password-cracking software now displayed a screen-saver—floating quotations from Malcom X, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Nelson Mandela. Slinky sat down and typed in his admin password. The desktop terminal window came up filled with lines of code, no longer scrolling. The final line said,
SEARCH COMPLETE. NO MATCHES FOUND.

“Sorry, folks,” Slinky said. “Looks like there was no cheese down this hole.”

“And you said Hydra is the best?”

“Hydra is great for cracking passwords, but it still depends on a little bit of luck. It helps when some dumbass uses a simple or common password root. Maybe you aren't dealing with dumbasses here.”

Slinky clicked on the browser window and brought it to the foreground. The metallic symbol was still there, revolving slowly in space. He moused up to the drop-down menus along the top of the screen, clicked, and brought up a page dense with programmer's script against a white background.

“What now, Slink?” Jarrell asked.

“I'm just taking a look at the source code. It's JavaScript, and I can see the password strength requirements—it needs at least one number and one symbol. That's a moderately strong password. But not unbreakable, if…”

“If what?” Jarrell asked.

“If you have the right seed, the kernel.”

“What do you mean by kernel?” Martha asked.

“It's the essence of a password. A lot of dumb shits will use the name of their pet for example, or their kid, and tack letters and symbols on the beginning or end. Like ‘ampersand Fido twenty-seven.' That's a strong password…unless you happen to know the guy's really into his dog. The Hydra program can run through hundreds of thousands of variations and suffixes and prefixes until it finds a match.”

“That could help if we knew who's using this portal,” Jarrell said. He was holding the mug with his fingers wrapped around it.

Martha pulled her reporter's notebook from her purse, flipped through her pages of notes. She got to the page dated October 15, where she had written down notes about their conversation with the Atlanta lieutenant. “Well, there's that guy Somis told us about who had the symbol tattooed on his wrist.”

“Problem is, we don't even know that punk's name,” Jarrell said.

“What about Jimmy Lawrence, the Atlanta police commissioner? Somis thought he was connected somehow.”

“Yeah.” Jarrell snapped his fingers. “Lawrence was the one who sprang the punk. Maybe he uses this portal.”

“So, how old is this Lawrence dude?” Slinky asked.

Jarrell looked at Martha. “He was there at the fundraiser. How old would you say?”

Martha brought his image to mind—salt-and-pepper hair, tailored suit. “I'd say late forties, early fifties.”

“All right then, we start with Facebook,” Slinky said. He cracked his knuckles and brought up a new browser tab.

“What if he isn't on Facebook?” Jarrell asked. “He's pretty old.”

“Nowadays, old people are the
only
ones on Facebook.” Slinky started typing. “I always start there. It's a great place to find out his kids' names, his pets' names, his hobbies and interests. Is it Lawrence with a
u
or a
w
?”

Jarrell told him, and they leaned over Slinky's shoulder as he started clicking through search results. “Look,” Jarrell said, pointing. “He's got a public Facebook page. Click on it.” Slinky paused and turned toward them.

“Um, listen, this is the kind of challenge I like to sink my teeth into, but y'all need to give the master a little space, some room to work. Know what I'm saying?”

“Okay.” Jarrell glanced at Martha. “Isn't there anything we can do to help?”

“I'll tell you what would be really dope. I've got fishing gear under the deck hatch of the houseboat. How about y'all go out and catch us a string of channel cat? I was thinking we might throw a fry this evening.”

“I think we can handle that assignment,” Jarrell said.

The water was as still as glass in the shady cove where they sat anchored, disturbed only by the occasional thrashing of the stringer of catfish that trailed in the water from the end of Jarrell's skiff. In just over two hours, Martha had reeled in two catfish, and Jarrell had hooked three more plus a bluegill. They sat in peaceful silence as Jarrell slowly clicked his reel with the same focused, quiet concentration that her father had employed on their fishing trips when she was a child.

Martha heard voices nearby, whispers in the trees and the grass, in the branches overhead, in the Spanish moss that hung from every limb like the beards of ancient prophets. It was that familiar static, the ever-present background noise that Martha had become adept at ignoring during her year of therapy and life on Shell Heap. But now the voices were getting louder, harder to tune out.

Martha felt a slight tug and reeled in her line. When the hook came out of the water moments later, it was baitless and dangling a wet clump of moss. She pulled the moss off, threw it into the water, and took a fresh bait pellet from the plastic bag on the floor of the skiff.

As she fitted the pellet on the hook, she spotted a pale shape hovering deep down in the dark water below the boat.
A really large fish,
she thought, and she hurried to prep the hook. She paused when she realized the shape wasn't moving, at least not forward or backward. Instead, it was getting larger, rising toward the surface. Her skin tightened and prickled as she started to make out an even larger shape connected to the pale smudge, a dull, olive-colored form almost as long as the boat itself.

Martha froze, unable to breathe, as a pallid face broke through the surface of the still water and looked up at her, floating like a cadaver.

You shouldn't be here, Lovie.

Martha gritted her teeth and clenched the cork handle of her pole, willing the vision to disappear.

Lenny's mouth moved.
Your little green pills aren't workin' so well anymore, innit? You're startin' to get the collywobbles.
He grinned, exposing crooked, yellow teeth.

“No!” Martha punched the water with the handle of her pole. The vision dispersed into ripples.

“Get another bite?” Jarrell asked.

She turned to see him looking toward her. “False alarm,” Martha said. “I just thought I saw something.”

“Are you okay?”

Martha nodded. She was determined to keep her hallucinations at bay. Things were difficult enough for Jarrell already; she didn't want him to start worrying about her mental condition.

Jarrell started reeling in his line. “We've already got a pretty good haul. What say we take a break and go ashore for a few minutes?”

They beached the skiff on a sandy spit of land covered in pennywort and patches of sea oats. They made their way across the sand toward a shady grove of sweet gum trees and alders. Midday sunlight filtered through the foliage.

“Check it out,” Jarrell said, pointing. There was something in the grass, round and gray, about the size of an army helmet. Martha thought it was a stone at first, but then she noticed that it was moving. They walked toward it for a closer look.

“Son of a gun,” Jarrell said, smiling. “A gopher tortoise. I haven't seen one of these in a coon's age.” He squatted next to it and touched the shell with his finger. The tortoise paused and pulled its wrinkled head back briefly, then kept on walking. “We used to see these fairly often when I was a kid. We used to write messages on their shells.”

“Really? What would you write?”

“You know, just a message to someone. You'd just scratch it with a rock, or use a Magic Marker. Something like ‘Joe heart Betty.' ”

“Would the person write back?”

“If the person you liked saw the message, they were supposed to leave a whelk shell on your stoop. That's how you knew they liked you back.”

Martha smiled at the thought. “Did you ever try it?”

“Yeah, I did. One time. Back when we lived out on Daufuskie. I wrote a message one time to a gal I liked named Jolene.”

“Did you get the shell back?”

“Nope. Never did.”

They watched as the turtle legged its way across the grass, in no particular hurry, until it tunneled into a tall thicket of briars and was gone.

“I love it here,” Jarrell said. “I want to be back. Someday.”

“What about your political career?”

“There's so much more to life. There has to be more than just ambition, you know? There has to be balance.” He paused for a moment. “Let's go over there,” he said. He took Martha by the hand and led her to an area shaded by oaks where the grass gave way to an expanse of white sand alongside a wide spot in the river. Jarrell spread out his flannel shirt and they sat on it.

“Dammit, we've got our whole lives. We can have this.”

We?

Martha caressed his shoulder, felt tears welling up in her eyes, and pressed her face against his T-shirt.
No, we can't.

“Jarrell…I'm not who you think I am.”

Martha heard a soft whump nearby. She glimpsed over Jarrell's shoulder. A great blue heron was taking flight nearby, its enormous wings scooping the air, hauling it skyward. She looked back at Jarrell. His eyes were still on her.

“Hey, my mom liked you, and she was a tough sell. If that's not an endorsement, I don't know what is.” He gently put his lips across hers and his arms around her. Martha's tears met his face, and she surrendered to a continuum where there were no boundaries between madness and sanity, nor between their bodies, nor between her tears and the brine and the marsh water that surrounded them.

Slinky's guests had thinned out for the evening, and Martha, Jarrell, and the few remaining tenants held a barbecue on the peninsula, gathering around a pit fire to dine on the fish they'd caught along with hush puppies and Styrofoam containers of coleslaw. Slinky invited them to join in a few hands of poker, but Jarrell and Martha politely declined and retired to the Heron's Nest.

Martha lay awake for a long time in the sleeping berth, lulled by the gentle lapping of the marsh water. Moonlight shone through the porthole. Her hand lay atop Jarrell's biceps, a faint paleness against the dark landscape of his form. As she lay there, she could smell the island, its grasses and smooth sun-baked driftwood, could feel the glow of the sun in his skin.

Maybe I can't have this forever, but just let me just have it now. Just for a little while.

When she finally fell asleep, she began to dream about her parents, her trips to the lake. Happy, carefree memories of the time before. Fishing trips with her father. Walking outside the cottage at Lake Hartwell at night, looking up. A sky full of stars, and her father pointing out the faint band of the Milky Way. Then she saw a large bonfire crackling in the night. The fire was near a rock overhang, and the flames reflected off a rock, illuminating a series of figures painted on it—primitive drawings. Men with wings and horns, dancing. Martha heard a rhythmic sound—
thwap thwap thwap
. The paintings began to move in the firelight, dancing, filling up Martha's field of vision. The drawings turned into real men—figures in feathered hats dancing, swaying to the rhythm. In the center, a man wore a wolf headdress with pointed ears, his head tossing.

Thwap thwap thwap.

The beat became louder and the fire crackled, sending sparks toward the sky. Martha looked up and saw a great black disk floating there. It was backlit by a ring of fire, blocking the sun, turning day into night, revealing the stars. In the center, the molten shape of two triangles—

Martha's eyes snapped open. “Jarrell—that symbol. I think I know what it is. It's an eclipse.”

She reached out, groping in the dark to find his form next to her. She sat up. The bed next to her was empty. The berth was dark; no light came from the porthole next to her.

“Jarrell?”

Thwap, thwap, thwap…

The sound she'd heard in her dream was still there, had persisted into the real world. She heard the door to the cabin snap open, rapid footsteps across the deck. The bedroom light came on and Jarrell stood there in his jeans and sneakers.

“Get dressed, quick! Get all your stuff. We've got to go!”

The thump grew louder as Jarrell pulled his T-shirt over his head and Martha grabbed her shorts and shirt. She heard voices outside. A blistering white light slid across the cabin window.

“What's happening?” she asked, hurriedly closing the snaps on her suitcase.

“I think they've found us.”