Nine Island Read online

  I leaned forward: not a rat—too big. Not rabbit or raccoon, something cartoonish about it. Eyes too large for the face, and face too large for the body, which was the size of a puppy and ended in thin tail. The creature nudged between philodendron leaves, nudged near a woman’s pearl-toned heel, came close to having its ear ashed by cigar. Foreign rat? Imported with bananas from Ecuador? A big boot landed near it just then, and it slipped back into the leaves. When I turned to the bar, the conventioneer was leaning close to M, who whooped and skidded half off her stool, but he caught her elbow; her nails set themselves in his sleeve.

  She noticed me over his shoulder and said, Wait—hi! Weren’t you here earlier? When the soccer team was here?

  He snapped his eyes toward me.

  I’m heading out, I said around his shoulder. Want to walk?

  Oh no no no! she cried. I just got here! Didn’t I?

  Way too soon to go, the guy said, and gave me his back.

  Paid and left.

  And walking home in the sulfurous light, I realized: baby possum.

  The third outing was last night. This has taken almost a week. This time, a place closer to home: over by Publix, across from the marina with aisles of restless shark boats, their internal red lights blinking. There was the old faux New York restaurant and the new Corsican place—chose New York. Cold and loud inside. Walked up to the bar. Boiled eggs sat inside a big jar; I slipped one out and ate it. Ordered fish and wine and swiveled to face the situation. Two men, each alone. No. A woman appeared—one of Lino’s Russian light-girls! Neither she nor her man spoke. She pointed to the menu, and soon a plate of raw meat arrived. She pulled at it in tendrils with her fingers while he studied his cell.

  The other man also looked at his phone. Then suddenly palmed it over and stared dead at me. And bark ran over my skin.

  Sono chiuso! I wrote K beneath a street lamp. All done.

  Nope, she wrote, you’d rather bury yourself alive with those deadbeats and your dead poet and that dying old cat. It’s a kind of emotional anorexia—

  Switched off the phone.

  The moon was full, tide high, salt water slopping the seawall of Belle Isle. From the manhole bubbled foam. Airy pale damp puffs rose through the grate, hovered in a tender, jiggling mass, then drifted free and blew along the curb, flitted and skittered over the road.

  Sea foam. Sea girls once, who traded tails and tongues, in love, for legs that felt like knives.

  READ TONIGHT THAT a college girl has disappeared. Cameras on shop fronts show her, tall and lovely, loping along in the dark, looking drunk or drugged. These days, sure, she’s been drugged. What some boys like to do. Thin beauty loping along like a deer. A jewelry-store camera shows her amble past, then shows a man in an alcove see her. He waits a moment, looks around, follows. She lumbers into another camera’s view, the man now close behind.

  Think I’m lost, she texted a friend.

  Then she shows up no more.

  And now have read a long awful story: another college girl told a reporter she was raped. Drugged, yeah, and taken upstairs. But not drugged enough to forget what she saw. The faces of the seven above her in the dark, shining bottles in their hands.

  Seven men, or boys, or dwarfs, or gods, or wolves, or uncles, whatever.

  Turns out she imagined this story.

  This story.

  My friend S types me what he thinks: Why wouldn’t girls imagine rape. They’re being raped the moment they’re born.

  TEN MORE O STORIES of wanting and not wanting to transmute, and it’s already July.

  There’s the story about the girl in love with her father who sneaks into his bed when he’s drunk. But I’m saving this for nearly last.

  There’s the girl who tries to sleep with her brother.

  And the one in love with another girl who can’t figure out what to do.

  The first gets what she wants, her father, then begs to be extinguished. The second does not get what she wants and weeps until she dissolves. The third turns into a boy, gets the girl, is happy ever after.

  Between passages, I keep checking on news about the lost college girl. But nothing.

  Back to O and then back for news, but there’s never anything. Can’t keep dwelling like this.

  Have started researching options for the duck.

  Muscovy ducks are considered exotic. If I call Animal Welfare, they’ll euthanize.

  Muscovy ducks are not pelicans, as the lady at Pelican Island observed, so no, they will not adopt her.

  Two ornithologists at the University of Miami had no idea what to do. Ditto Florida International.

  A Muscovy duck website recommended capturing the duck and taking it to a duck shelter.

  A veterinarian specializing in exotic animals also suggested capturing the duck and taking it to a duck shelter.

  Both website and vet said that to catch the duck, just grasp it by the neck.

  There are no duck shelters within five hundred miles.

  This Sunday, taped behind glass on the board in the mail room was a notice:

  Due to a flood in the Men’s Spa, it will be closed until further notice. We apologize for the inconvenience.

  (Actually “inconvenience” wasn’t spelled within miles of right, but I didn’t have the heart to transcribe it.)

  Then on Tuesday, taped in the same place:

  This notice will serve as an announcement that the Men’s Spa has reopened.

  But then just today:

  Due to a flood in the Men’s Spa, it is closed until further notice. We apologize for the Icoveninance.

  What’s going on? I asked a woman in the elevator.

  She regarded me. Then said, Things are happening.

  (Had only pictured dirty men clogging pipes in disgusting ways.) Happening how?

  Well, the new board is just like the old board, she said. Except for who gets the money.

  For what?

  She stared at me. The pool.

  But I thought—

  She shook her head.

  So someone’s—

  We’d reached her floor. She nodded, put a finger to her lips, and slipped out.

  TONIGHT HAD DATE with N and her husband. Just one flight up, so I took the stairs, which open to a balcony at each landing. Walked down the hall and through a door out to the curved concrete balcony. Designed this way for rescue from fire by helicopter? Don’t know. But that stairway balcony is much closer to the bay than my own, so I stood out there to gaze at the shining water. Way down near our dock floated a long palm frond. Flange, not fin or tail. Went into the dim staircase, up, and out to the next landing. When I looked down at the bay again, the frond suddenly shot off.

  Ran down the hall and when N opened, said, Shark!

  What?

  Quick.

  But she had a bottle of wine in her hand and was drifting toward the kitchen, where from the shadow emerged the form of P.

  A shark, I said. I just saw one.

  I’m not surprised, he said, appearing from the kitchen—appearing, close up, much more than four years younger than N. Pinguis, healthsome, gray-gold hair, eyes like evening sky.

  P, this is J, called N. I guess you’ve figured that out.

  You’re not surprised by a shark?

  Of course not, he said and gave me a glass. Bay’s full of them.

  How do you know?

  He shrugged. I’ve seen them.

  Sure they were sharks?

  Yes.

  No, I said. Things look like them. Dolphins, tarpon . . .

  He regarded me patiently. I will send you a photo.

  N came out, and we clinked glasses and stepped out to the balcony, the bloom of moist air, distant cityscape, sky.

  I’ve been worrying about that lost girl, I said.

  It’s awful, said N. Any news?

  No news.

  Which isn’t good news, said P.

  But
you never know, N said.

  That’s true.

  We sipped.

  So what about the mysteries in the men’s spa?

  An awful lot goes on in that spa, said N.

  But the flooding?

  P shook his head. It’s a funny old building. Lots of history and politics.

  Someone would flood—

  P smiled. Sure. Someone who isn’t happy.

  With the new board?

  Could be.

  Well, Lino, I said, you know Lino—

  Everybody knows Lino, said N.

  Lino says the guys in the old board are all in the mob.

  Actually, P said, Lino’s the one who’s supposed to be in the mob.

  Little Lino?

  P crossed his arms and nodded.

  Oh, they just say that, said N. People say so much junk.

  P shrugged. Could be true. I believe it. Once upon a time, anyway. Or still. Who knows? He’s a shrewd little guy. He did want a new board, after all. And got one.

  We gazed at the skyline, the Venetians, the pool.

  At least he doesn’t want the pool destroyed, I said.

  Think so?

  What?

  P laughed. Like I said. Lino and the mob. None of those guys gives a damn. Except for who gets the contract.

  Oh, the pool, the pool, the pool, said N. It doesn’t matter. I mean, it’s just a stupid swimming pool.

  I looked at her, but she was staring away. And like everyone, a liar. For her it is not just a swimming pool: when she’s in it, she’s free of that body. You can see.

  Well, P said, it’s a hell of a lot of money for people. Plus the jackhammering, all the trees hacked down—

  Oh, I know, I know, said N. I’m being stupid and selfish.

  I wouldn’t go that far, P said quietly. Don’t be so hard on yourself.

  It’s these drugs. They make me so . . . stupid.

  After a moment P said, But speaking of our pool, did you know someone died in it once?

  Really!

  During Art Basel. He was floating there at dawn, fully dressed. In a tux. Or maybe I’m making that up. Everyone assumed it was some kind of art. No one even called the front desk.

  Who was it?

  P shook his head and looked at N. They both shrugged and said, That’s Miami.

  We drank and looked at the deepening sky, a point of light becoming Venus beside a brightening slice of moon.

  Did he drown?

  Not sure, P said. But he didn’t jump, anyway, like people thought. Look at the distance from the building.

  N got up just then for a new bottle, leaving a wet circle on the table.

  We sipped our wine and watched the dancing light-girl appear in the dusk, and I thought of the girl who does the boats, and the one who went loping into the dark, and the one thrown into a Dumpster.

  Drugs? I said.

  Sure, probably.

  Now, at home, am sitting on the balcony. In the gym across the way, that box of light high in the dark sky, the dark-haired girl is running. Tall and slim, she stares at the metamorphic blue clouds but looks like she sees nothing.

  On a balcony beneath her, a man talks into a square of light, a red point of light in his hand drawing spirals.

  Beyond them both, a white point of light swells in the sky. Then a second, behind it, and a third: the first glows large and swings west.

  Above them all, starry Orion and his sword tilt over the sea.

  And beneath the stars, the girl runs on and on in her box.

  Even running, you can stay still.

  Or staying still, you can run.

  Trees in a breeze.

  If you count the swaying of trunk and branches, the wind passing through leaves, how far does a tree travel through air?

  Beneath my hand—sudden green glow.

  Sorry, Devil. Chiuso.

  But when I clicked, no Devil: on the screen was the duck. Sleek black feathers spotted white, delicate barnacles crowning her beak, her pink-ringed black eye baffled.

  Hello, duck friend. We must do something! She is getting thin. Can you meet on Sunday?

  Yes! I typed with eager thumbs. I’ll bring—

  Another glow.

  Another picture. No message with this one, nothing but blue-green water, our bay. In the middle was a tiny slim shadow. I scrolled and zoomed until I found it: a hammerhead shark. So small in all that blue.

  I zoomed as close as I could, then looked a long time at its weird scalloped head, its strangely delicate gills.

  AT SOME POINT I have to ask myself: have I been wrong about how I view this situation? If I consider the evidence?

  The history of single-celled wandering, I mean. The chronic inability to either merge or divide, to be with another or split into two, into more than just me.

  As if the intimacy issues, as K says, would not even let a tiny homunculus in?

  I am no country for men.

  Not even a little baby.

  Revirgining is beside the point.

  I’ve been virgin all along.

  A tree.

  FIVE SIX SEVEN eight nine ten eleven twelve thirteen fourteen fifteen—

  Rest on the pool’s cracked lip, gasping, wet chin on slick wet arm.

  And gaze down at light zigging through the transparent blue, down to the dissolving concrete.

  —one two three four five six seven eight nine ten eleven—

  Palm fronds glimmer and sweep the blue ion sky.

  ON MY WAY to the duck rendezvous, wondered about the other duck person. The name on the messages seemed to be Xla. Female? Basque? Who cared about this duck? Someone who walked the causeway, looked around, wasn’t sealed by earbuds. Possibly someone who cycled or drove, but this did not seem likely.

  Good luck with Duck, darling! wrote my mother.

  Okay, okay.

  Xla and I had agreed to bring water, food, gloves, sheet, pet carrier. The hope was to lure her out with food and water, nab her, jam her into the carrier, and transport her to the Miami Beach golf course, to join a Muscovy flock.

  Stultifyingly hot and bright, and you can’t carry a parasol while catching a duck. Wore a big visor instead, making a halo of shade around my head that did one-ninth the job. Early July: sun highest overhead?

  We’d decided on this awful hour because the duck seems denatured by the heat and spends the hottest hours in her shrub.

  I got there first, saw the duck huddled in the sea grape. To wait for Xla, I climbed down to the rocks by the water into a thin slant of shade.

  Voices. Climbed back up to a black-haired girl and sulky-looking boy in a red baseball cap.

  Hello, she and I said. Okay, how shall we do it?

  Once it’s out eating, said the boy, we should surround it, and one of us should be holding the sheet, and we should slowly draw in close—

  I think we should all three already be holding the sheet and corner her into the shrub, said the girl.

  But then it’ll just go deeper in the shrub.

  But otherwise she’ll bolt and go into the water, I said.

  Or the street, said the girl.

  It won’t go into the street.

  She might.

  Listen, the boy said, I’ve told you how we should do it. You should listen to me. You never listen to me.

  I do! cried the girl. It’s just—

  No, you don’t, and you want my help, and I do not give a fuck about this duck, but I came here to help you, and now you won’t listen.

  Wandered away to see how the duck was doing. Even deeper in her shrub. She was thinner—and trembling. Climbed back down to the rocks by the water to wait the conflict out.

  After a few minutes, the girl’s face appeared.

  Okay, she said.

  Climbed back up.

  So what do you want to do?

  We’ll put out water and food, and then when she’s eating, he
’ll chase her from behind to where you and I are standing with the sheet ready to catch her.

  Well, that sounded not likely. But who knew. We all walked away toward the causeway as if we were just casually leaving, and then I acted as though I were just coming to feed her like any ordinary day. I put down a dish of water and strewed Grape-Nuts in a line that would draw her away from the shrub. The three of us quietly got into our positions, not too close to the duck, and waited.

  The “A” bus motored by. A moped.

  She came out cautiously, gulped the water, and was nibbling at the Grape-Nuts when the boy charged from behind. She fluttered and flapped, galloped past the girl and me, dropped down to the water, paddled off.

  The three of us stood on the verge and watched as she sailed away, past anchored yachts, a black-and-white blot in the distance.

  Well, I said. She won’t be back soon.

  The boy shook his head and walked up to their car.

  I guess that might be it, said Xla. He doesn’t think—

  I understand.

  Yeah. He doesn’t think we should spend our time on a duck.

  Okay, I said. Will you still bring water?

  Of course! she said as she scampered to the Mazda that was already revving.

  Slick with sweat and burning, I staggered back over the bridge and past the Dumpster into the building, barely able to see.

  Well, maybe Duck likes being where she is, said my mother. Maybe she doesn’t want to leave.

  Fine, I said savagely. Except that unless I feed her and bring her water, she’ll die.

  Have you thought that maybe you’re keeping her there by feeding her? Maybe if you didn’t, she’d go.

  She can’t! Her wing’s clipped! She’s stranded!

  There was a pause. Then my mother said, Darling. Don’t you think that perhaps you—

  Yes, I said, yes, I know. I know this is not a real way to live. I know this. It’s better to be involved with people than ducks. But right now, you know, I’m on a deadline, and there’s not much time—

  And I wrenched the conversation back to her blood pressure and whether she was doing her leg exercises and drinking enough water and eating anything other than grilled cheese, and soon she was sick of me, too.