She said, “I saw her recently and she’s lost a lot of weight.”
I said, “Well I guess cancer is not all that bad is it? At least she’s losing weight.”
And instead of laughing she just shook her head like this was true. “I know. I know.” Then she asked me why I was here and looked so sad.
I told her I wanted to see Walt Whitman, but it was closed.
The girl looked at me confused, “No. It’s not. The Walt Whitman Mall doesn’t close until like 10 at night.”
I said, “No, I mean the Walt Whitman birthplace. The poet? You know where he was born?”
“Oh,” the girl said. “I didn’t know he was a real person. I just thought that was the name of the mall.”
So I smiled. I smiled and I heard these lines. If you want me again look for me under your boot soles. Failing to find me at first keep encouraged/missing me one place search another/I stop somewhere waiting for you.
I listened to Whitman’s words and I looked out from the window and all I could see was one thing through all of the trees.
It was the Walt Whitman Mall.
It shined in the darkness now and I knew what I had to do. I had to steal a copy of Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass from the Walt Whitman Mall the next morning.
The next morning I didn’t even say anything about my plan to Kim. I waited for her and her mom to leave so they could go see her grandma. I told Kim I was going to take the car and fill it up with gas. I was Okay.
I didn’t know the way really but I felt something was guiding me. I felt something was guiding me when I saw it appear in front of me like a temple — the Walt Whitman Mall.
I felt something guiding me as I parked the car. It was so early there weren’t any people inside. I found the bookstore on the mall map and kept thinking about the only rule I knew about shoplifting.
The rule: If anyone catches you, run like hell.
So I walked down the empty mall and went inside the bookstore. There was a mousy looking girl working behind the counter, and she didn’t even look like she was awake. I didn’t even know what I was going to do with the book after I stole it. Of course, the bookstore girl was drinking coffee and typing stuff into the computer. There was a part of me going, “What are you doing Scott? What are you doing? What the fuck are you doing?”
But I didn’t stop.
I just walked to the literature section and I scanned the W section. Wilde, Wolfe, Woolf.
No Whitman.
So I scanned again, Wilde, Wolfe, Woolf, and Richard Wright’s Black Boy.
No Whitman.
So I went over to the fiction section thinking someone had put it there by mistake. I scanned the shelf — Wouk, Tom Wolfe, Alice Walker.
No Whitman.
Wouk, Wolfe, Alice Walker.
I scanned again. Whitman? Whitman? No Whitman.
I walked over to the counter and the girl working behind it asked, “May I help you find anything, sir?”
Of course, I knew asking her a question and having her notice me was going to make this a lot riskier.
I kept saying inside my head, “Just leave Scott. Just leave. What are you doing?”
But I said it anyway, “Yes, I am looking for a copy of Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass.” She didn’t say anything but typed it into the computer. It was like she couldn’t speak without the computer screen telling her what to say.
The computer screen blinked a new screen and then she said, “Oh I’m sorry, we don’t have it in stock for some reason. But we might be able to order a copy for you.”
I just shook my head “no” and heard a voice inside my head. Look for me under your boot soles/I stop somewhere waiting for you.
And so I turned away and drifted back to the literature section: Wilde, Wolfe, Woolf.
No Whitman.
Wilde, Wolfe, Woolf, Richard Wright.
No Whitman.
He wasn’t there.
And then it was like I was lost in some strange spell, a strange spell cast over me by a WITCH. This was a witch who wasn’t good or bad. I looked back at the counter where the book girl was and she wasn’t there anymore.
All I could see were books. There were books about all of the people I knew. I took a couple of them off the shelf, but they were all written in these strange languages that I didn’t recognize.
Imagine: Books telling the future stories of all the people in our lives.
And so that’s when I saw it. It was a book called The Life and Death of Scott McClanahan. It was such a slim volume. It worried me, but when I opened it up there were only blank pages — all blank pages except for the last page. On the last page was a poem written by Walt Whitman but signed with my name, a poem stolen by Scott McClanahan.
You will hardly know who I am or what I mean
But I shall bring you sickness and loneliness nonetheless.
If you want me again look for me
Under your Nikes
Failing to fetch me at first give up
Missing me one place go home
You’re a Goddamn stranger here.
I stop nowhere waiting for you
But I am always out there
— running…
— running…
And then there was a muzak song drifting inside my head. It was like a whisper song and I was singing along.
You’re the one that I want
You are the one I want
Woo hoo woo hoo
Honey
The one that I want
You are the one I want
Woo hoo woo hoo
Honey
And so I fucking ran.
THE PRISONERS
I used to teach this class at the federal prison in Beckley, WV. On the first day I called up education from the phone at the main desk. I was so nervous and fifteen minutes later the prison guard, Kincaid, showed up. He was walking towards me, all sawed off and with these big linebacker arms. He searched me and had me take off my shoes and put them back on.
He said, “My name’s Kincaid and I’ll give you a piece of advice. You can’t trust anybody in here.”
He took my keys and left them at the control desk saying, “We keep your car keys so if there is ever a hostage situation, they can’t put a gun to your head and have you drive them off the premises.”
I couldn’t tell if he was joking.
He took me inside the prison and it took fifteen minutes just to go through six or seven locked doors, which crashed like cars when they opened and closed.
SMASH.
SMASH.
We walked along and he told me sometimes guys will get in fights just so they can go to solitary, and if I noticed anything in my class to let him know.
He said, “I guess they pick up some morphine or heroin along the way and they like going to solitary so they can shove it up their ass and enjoy it in privacy.”
I finally just stood there thinking, “I don’t think this guy is joking.”
I was already paranoid from a report I read the week before on the Columbian drug cartels sending hit lists through written code. I was worried the guys would put these hidden messages in their essays ordering the death of someone on the outside. I imagined drug cartel guys breaking into my office to steal the essays and get the codes.