The Memory Thief (2 page)

It was at school that the real difference began to show. Letters spoke to Hannah before any of her peers, and she was reading
two-syllable words by the end of the first month. She was marked very early by her teachers as
excellent
. And the other students would sometimes call her Nerd
before
they would think to call her Holy Roller.

Not so for Bethie. If the teacher bothered to call on her, it was only to be disappointed. Words never came easy for Bethie.
Her parents paid for speech therapy, and when there was no improvement they were told it was a maturity thing. Bethie simply
needed to outgrow her stuttering. Mother tried bribing her for smooth words, but by the time Bethie was eight she had switched
to punishment instead. When vinegar on a stuttering tongue didn’t work, Mother decided not to notice it anymore.

But there was always punishment waiting for Bethie at school. She rode the bus to a long gray building with different teachers
and shuffled classes every hour. She wore a white men’s-style shirt and a dark gray floor-length skirt every day. Her hair
was smoothed back as tight as it could be, her face without a smile. And when people spoke to her, even if it was a curious
stranger asking
Gosh, are you hot?
Bethie shook her head coolly, her eyes narrowing in anger.

Hannah tried more. She wore yellow because she knew it complemented her hair. And kool-lots, because even though they were
baggy like some joke of a skirt, they at least showed her feet. Hannah’s hair was braided loosely, so strands of gold could
work themselves free and glow around her face, like an accidental halo.

But both of the girls were teased viciously. Their classmates called them Polyester Pollys. And they never drank Kool-Aid
with their lunch. If they did, without fail someone would yell, “Watch out! The Jim Jones girls have gotten to the Kool-Aid
again!” When they jogged the slow mile at PE, where everyone else wore the snazzy gym uniforms of shorts and tanks, someone
always snickered about them doing the Holy Roller shuffle. And it was true. Nobody can run far in a floor-length skirt. Sometimes
Hannah wondered if that was the point.

When Father announced he’d won the lucrative bid to strengthen the bridge that spanned the Cooper River, and that they’d spend
the summer in South Carolina, it was the holy
Yes
both girls had been waiting for. It was an escape for Bethie. From all the kids that knew she couldn’t speak smoothly. And
from the teachers who wouldn’t look at her, hadn’t looked at her since first grade, when they “socially passed” her to please
her parents and let her stay with her sister.

For Hannah, it meant adventure, like in the books she loved. It meant, simply, the gates were opening.

They left behind a house filled with so many rooms they could spend the day without ever bumping into one another. And traded
it for a shack on the marshes of James Island. A two-bedroom, one-bath, company-owned box that Father insisted on. He’d turned
down the offer of a renovated historic condo within walking distance to the Battery and Rainbow Row. He wanted the mosquitoes.
The mud crabs and the culture. He wanted to feel like a real southerner, even if he couldn’t sound like one.

Each of them smiled as they unpacked. Hannah and Bethie smiled over the joy of escape. Mother and Father over the excitement
of their daughters. Over the pleasure of an extended vacation in a southern beach town. Over the promise of their old life,
waiting for them back home.

One morning their first week there, Father rolled a used bike out to the girls, as they sat by the marsh. “You could explore
a bit, if you want. The tourist traffic hits the other beaches. And the shoulders are wide, so you could stay on those.”

Hannah squealed with joy and ran to the bike. Father noticed Bethie standing behind her. “Both of you girls.”

Bethie smiled, but she never sat on that bike. Even if she wanted to, it was always gone before dawn. Hannah spent her mornings
on the beach. It was two and a half miles from the shack, and if she set her mind to it she could be there in under twenty
minutes. She rarely did, though, preferring instead to take her time and learn the details of her summer home.

Like the pile of oyster shells at the end of a gravel drive that served as the only sign for a motel, a long brick rectangle
hidden in the woods that served fresh-catch steam buckets on picnic tables in the front yard. Or the miles of marsh, with
its smell that turned her stomach at first, until the days passed and she forgot to notice it. And the palm trees that lined
Folly Road, like something from a paradise postcard.

She set her alarm clock based on the tides. And if she reminded herself before she went to sleep, she could usually wake up
just before it rang. She’d turn off the clock and dress quietly in the dark. Bethie would lay perfectly still, her pillow
touching Hannah’s.

Only when the water pulled back from the shore could she find curling starfish, sea urchins, and perfect-circle sand dollars.
She’d pick them up carefully and sometimes take them home to Bethie. “Look,” she’d say, as she showed her sister. “Treasure’s
in the low points.”

She had packed only two pairs of kool-lots, but that was what she preferred to pedal in so that her feet were free to move.
She still wore the polyester blouses, buttoned at her wrists and collar. Hannah had been taught not to care about “pretty.”
Modesty was the coveted prize. Sometimes the competition could even get catty. Young girls at church would go through fads
of wearing head coverings, even though the rules didn’t require them for unmarried women. But
pretty
took on a new meaning in that beach town. Golden skin was the standard. When Hannah passed nearly naked people on the streets,
her forehead beaded with sweat on a ninety-five-degree day, she knew her polyester confused them.

Sometimes after sunrise, Hannah would relax in the sand and wait for the others. The old lady that walked her little black
dog. The man who liked to jog and treated the rock piles, the ruins of old fishing piers, like enormous hurdles. They knew
her, too, as part of their usual scene, and always gave a curious but friendly nod. Their arrival meant the day had begun
and the world was awake. Hannah would hop on her bike and pedal furiously, letting the wind shake the sand from her. Then
she’d ride down to the fruit market, a collection of little tents where fresh produce was sold. She’d pick up whatever Mother
had requested, usually peaches or sweet corn. Sometimes a bag of boiled peanuts for her breakfast.

James Island taught her how to eat. Showed her what fruit tastes like when it’s still warm from a ripening sun. How fish is
meant to be eaten, no more than a few hours from the ocean. Handing somebody a ripe Carolina peach was the same as giving
them your best smile. Passing a bowl of shrimp and grits was as clear as any
Love you
could get. Food was a language there.

One evening, Hannah was bored after supper. With her parents’ permission she pedaled down to the market, even though she’d
already been that morning. She was watching people inspect the fruit, how they thumped the melons and squeezed the peaches,
when she saw it. A yellowed paper taped to the market tent pole.
OYSTER ROAST! FRIDAY AT SUNSET. FOLLY BEACH. LIVE MUSIC!

She biked to the beach. In the distance was music. At first, just practice runs on old guitars. A few beats of a drum. Then
they started for real, jumpy songs with the moan of a harmonica. There was smoke in the air, and far away the glow of an oyster
fire. She pedaled closer, until she felt the good time rippling from them like the waves at high tide. Bronzed bodies were
everywhere, and Hannah did not try and blend in. She had lived through too many bad days of school to believe that she could.
Besides, she was taught from a very early age that she belonged to a separate and holy people. Compared to holy, separate
was always the easy part.

Past the crowd, toward the shore, people worked furiously. They were icing down beers and sorting buckets of oysters. They
weren’t naked like the others, each of them wearing a black T-shirt with the letters CSM stitched on the pocket. And they
weren’t listening to the music. Instead they were listening to a woman calling out instructions. “They runnin’ outta beer.
C’mon now, ice that down and get it to ’em.”

Money flew their way—for the buckets of oysters roasted with corn and potatoes, for the Dixie cups filled with sweet tea,
for the bottles of beer. The music pulsed louder and stronger, all while the black-shirted CSM team circled the crowd and
weaved through them, passing out goodies in exchange for fistfuls of money.

Hannah kept looking back to the woman. Her black skin glistened by the fire. She controlled everything. From the volume of
the band—
They need to turn that speaker up
—to the amount of seasoning in the oyster buckets:
Don’t get too heavy with that Ol’ Bay.
It was her money, too. Boys with young muscled arms were slinging buckets for her and handing wads of cash back. But it was
what was behind the table, just fifteen feet back, that made Hannah stand up and take a step closer.

A full moon hung behind her, its glow bouncing off the white tops of each new wave. She saw naked shoulders pushing into the
water, cutting through the pull of the waves. They crashed over a boy, and he sank low. She stood, waiting for him to resurface.
And waiting some more. Until it was time to return home. She left, uneasy.

Two weeks later she was pedaling down the road when she passed the pile of oyster shells. There was a sign by the shells that
day:
Cora’s Steampot Motel. Help wanted
.

Maybe it was the way the fire made that woman’s skin glisten like the inside of an oyster shell. Maybe it was the thought
of all those black CSM T-shirts. Or maybe a part of her was still waiting, wondering if that boy had ever surfaced. Whatever
the reason was, Hannah pedaled down the drive and stared at the brick rectangle, a neon sign flashing
CORA’S STEAMPOT MOTEL
in the front window. A smaller one hung on the door.
Rent a Room, Get a Bucket!

The front desk was empty, except for a little bell to ring for service. She tapped it shyly and waited.

“In the kitchen,” a big voice called from inside.

“Ma’am,” Hannah called out. “I’m here about the job?”

“Come on back. Shut the door good ’cause I don’t want no more flies.”

Hannah stepped past the front office, closed the door but kept her hand on the knob. Inside, she noticed the entire middle
of the motel was the kitchen. With each side framed by long skinny halls dotted with four doors each. The kitchen was filled
with a freezer, a double stove, and two double refrigerators. In the corner of the room was an enormous sink, filled with
metal buckets.

The woman from the oyster roast stood by the stove. She looked Hannah up and down and started laughing. “Sissy, git in here.
Somebody’s here ’bout the job.”

A younger woman walked in and burst out laughing, too.

Hannah was used to being everyone’s favorite joke. And there in that
kitchen, she knew she was ridiculous. With sweat staining her shirt, her collar thrown open in a desperate search for relief,
and beige kool-lots clinging to damp thighs.

“Keeps the mosquitoes off at least,” she mumbled, looking down at her feet. “Haven’t had one single bite since I’ve been here.”

“What she talkin’ ’bout? Mosquituhs?” Sissy said, still laughing. The woman at the stove tilted her head to the side, a big
grin still on her face.

“You think we’re laughin’ ’bout your clothes, don’t you? We’re laughin’ ’cause you the most unlikely shrimper we ever seen.”

“Shrimper?”

“Yeah.”

“I thought you were hiring a maid or a waitress.”

“You never eat here, have you?” Sissy asked. “We hand out buckets, but after that everybody serve themselves. We just catch
it and cook it. If they need a drink refill, they walk in and git it. They need another bucket? They walk in and git it. We
ain’t needin’ any waitress help.”

“Well now, wait a minute,” the older woman said, as she peeled a potato slowly. “We don’t need a waitress, exactly. But I’m
tired of makin’ beds up, ain’t you, Sissy? And at dinner, there’s always somebody that don’t know the rules. Leavin’ their
bucket on the table. And the boys run late with their deliveries, too, and one of us has to run down to the dock to get the
catch. If we hired her to pick up those loose ends, maybe we could focus on the cookin’ a bit more. Maybe we could finally
start servin’ that key lime pie you’ve been wantin’ to make and charge a robbery for.” She looked at Hannah carefully, and
didn’t laugh this time. “My name is Cora. And this is my steampot motel.”

“I can clean tables very well,” Hannah said. “And I’ve been making my own bed since I was four.” She looked them both in the
eyes, the way her father had trained her. “It proves you’re trustworthy,” he liked to say.

“I believe you.” Cora nodded. “Put this apron on, and I’ll show you the buckets we need rinsed.”

“She’s gonna git hot with that apron on top of all them clothes,” Sissy said.

The apron was a thick, canvaslike material, hanging well below Hannah’s knees. It was made to help protect from steam burns
and hot water splashes, as the buckets were being prepared and served.

Hannah looked at them. Under their aprons they were nearly naked. Braless under their tank tops, big breasts spreading wide
and draping over their stomachs. They wore cutoffs, flip-flops, and long leatherlike gloves reaching up to their elbows.

“Wanna run home and change?” Cora asked kindly.

For a moment, Hannah sounded like Bethie. She stared at the ground and stammered about how the heat didn’t bother her. About
how her skin was sensitive to the sun. But she could feel them staring at her, and she could nearly see her lies swirling
with the hot steam in that room.

“Stuff like this is all I have,” she finally said, shrugging her shoulders.