It was the color Heidi noticed first, a bright rubbery red. The plants resembled crimson bananas growing out of the spongy soil set deep in a pocket of the roots of a rotting tree. “Look. Such an intense red,” she said, “almost fluorescent.” Moff turned and saw what she had found. As they drew closer, Heidi gasped and was immediately embarrassed that she had. The projectiles were the perfect likeness of erect penises with bulbous hoods, and the red color made them appear turgid and full to bursting. She turned away as if scanning about for other edibles. But Moff was still inspecting the plant.
“Seven inches long,” he reckoned. “What a coincidence.” He winked at her and she laughed weakly. He thought about teasing her further, but stopped, realizing at that moment not only that he was attracted, but that he had grown fond of her, even her quirks, and especially her newfound daring in spite of her fears. He wondered whether she felt a similar attraction to him. And she did, yes indeed. She liked that quality in him that was both rough and gentle. He was overconfident at times, yet these days, after his son’s illness, he seemed softer, protective, yet vulnerable. He could admit to his mistakes. All in all, she found him attractive. She liked the beard.
Moff bent down to inspect the plant more closely. “Might be a fungus,” he guessed. “The question is, can we eat it? Some fungi are delicious, some will turn your liver into pâté.” He noticed that a few of the plants sported small white waxy flowers. They looked like tiny chrysanthemums that had burst from wartlike bumps along the base of the hood.
“Hmmm, not a fungus,” he said. “Fungi don’t flower. The mystery deepens.” He ran his finger delicately around the head of the plant, then pressed and probed to determine its structure and texture. “Ah, soft to the touch yet firm,” he pronounced. He caught Heidi’s eye, and for five seconds, which was approximately four point five seconds too long, they stared at each other with slight smiles. This was his usual tactic with women, the gaze that let the woman know he was about to draw her in. But this time it was not calculated, and Moff was unfamiliar with the awkwardness he felt when he finally looked away and turned back to the plant.
“Isn’t it amazing how many things grow here?” Heidi said, trying to sound breezy. “There’s hardly any sun.”
“There are quite a few nonphotosynthetic plants,” Moff replied. “Mushrooms for one. Truffles. A shady area is essential. That’s why you find them in canopy environments. It’s a pity that the rainforests are being razed worldwide by greedy assholes. They have no idea how many species of incredible things are being destroyed for good.”
“They’re destroying rainforests here in Burma as well?”
“As fast as they can clear them. Some for wood, some for heroin poppies, and a lot so they can run an oil pipeline to China, which, by the way, American companies are helping them build.”
Heidi took a closer look at the plant. “Are these rare?”
“Could be. They’re some kind of flowering parasite. See how they’re latched on to the roots of this tree? They’ve been feeding off its root system.”
“You know so much about plants,” Heidi said. “I barely know the difference between a bush and a tree.”
“It helps if you own a five-acre nursery,” Moff said modestly. “I make my living growing the stuff that’s found in rainforests. Bamboo, giant palms.” He wiped at his damp brow with the back of his wrist. “Can’t say I’m too fond of the abundance of bamboo out here. But if we ever get out, there’s a hardy species I have my eye on that would be ideal for a zoo I’m working with.” He carefully pulled out one of the strange red plants and held it up. It was attached to a twin, connected by a ball-like root. The thing looked even more obscene, Heidi thought, like the sexual organs of conjoined twin satyrs. She tried to act nonchalant.
“Aha!” Moff exclaimed. “I thought it might be. Balanophora! Yep, right ecosystem, grows in Asia—China and Thailand for sure. Quite a few species. Sixteen, as I recall. This may very well be the seventeenth. They’re listed in the annals of Weird Plant Morphology. We’re all familiar with the bizarre humor in plant life. See the shape of the head? Most have more of an acorn pattern, not quite this smooth.” He extracted a few more plants. “I’ve never seen photos of anything like this,” he said, growing more excited by the second. “If this is a new species, it’s a beauty, longer and thicker than most, and completely red, instead of having a flesh-colored stem.” He inspected it from all angles.
“What do you mean by new species?” Heidi said. “You mean it’s a mutant?”
“Just that it’s not identified, not in the taxonomy where people keep track of such things. Of course, the people here might have a name for it. Big Red, for all I know. Wow, this is incredible....” He caught Heidi staring at him with a bemused expression.
He grinned. “Hey, if it’s a new species, I could get it named after me.” He drew his finger across as if reading a plaque: “Balanophora moffetti.” He looked at Heidi again. “I’m kidding. Some scientist would first have to verify that it is indeed an undiscovered species, and it would probably be named after him. Though sometimes they name it after whoever found it.”
“I saw it before you,” Heidi teased.
“Right you did! So it would be Balanophora moffetti-starki.”
“Balanophora starki-moffetti,” she corrected.
“If I married you,” he said, “it could be Balanophora moffettorum and cover us both.”
Her mouth opened and she was about to speak, but she could not think fast enough for a witty rejoinder. Married. The word had surprised her. In the silence, they heard birds calling. He was about to tell her he was only joking, but that would make it seem as though he could not possibly see her in that light.
Finally she said, “I’d keep my name. But don’t worry, I’m not keen on having a plant that looks like that named after me.”
Now he felt reckless. He stood up. “We could still get married.” The last two weeks had forced him to look at time and risk differently. His mind had once been focused on the future—future projects, future clients, future expansion. These days life existed in the context of before and now.
Heidi laughed. “You’re ridiculous. Stop joking.”
“I may not be,” he said. She grew quiet and looked at him, full of wonder. He tipped her face toward him and gave her a light kiss. “Nice. Best kiss I’ve had in two weeks.”
“Me, too,” she said softly.
And with that permission, he slowly wrapped his arms around her, and she grabbed on with surprising fierceness. At this point, let me simply say that they let the wild side of the jungle overtake their senses. I shall leave it to your imagination as to what exactly transpired. After all, it would be inappropriate to reveal the details, which were, I might say, quite extensive.
AN HOUR LATER, Moff and Heidi gathered up their clothes and a few other plants that they knew for certain to be edible or useful: plenty of ferns, young bamboo shoots, more of the medicinal sweet wormwood, and the lemon-scented leaves of a bush that, when ground into a powder, helped deter the creepy-crawlies from coming into their tree huts. They placed their haul in the woven rattan baskets they had brought along, and returned to camp with a sense of dual accomplishment. The children ran toward them, shouting welcome, tugging on their hands to lead them to a plank by the cook fire, where they set the morning’s haul.
Black Spot’s daughter picked up the red penile-looking plant. The women who did the cooking quickly took the plant from her. One of the old ladies called out to Black Spot, who in turn yelled for Grease and Salt.
“You’ve seen this before?” Moff asked Black Spot.
“Yes, yes,” he said. “Many times. Very good plant.”
Moff was disappointed. It seemed the plant was not undiscovered after all.
But in fact, the plant was not officially known to the rest of the world. The tribe had found it just a few years earlier, and in taste-testing it, they discovered that its shape was good advertising for its potency. It was
an aphrodisiac, and quite an effective one. A sliver of the plant, chewed slowly, could endow a man with the prowess of a twenty-year-old. It also resolved any prostate plumbing problems. And it had a similar arousal effect on women, though this was not supposed to be discussed, for fear of an outbreak of lascivious ladies running amok.
Black Spot, Grease, and Salt would regularly make forays into the jungle. Whenever they found even one of these rare plants, they raised the bridge, scurried down the mountain with their treasure, and went into Nyaung Shwe, where they turned to a trusty network of sympathetic Karen and a man who was experienced in discretion and turning a huge profit.
Throughout Myanmar, the power of the plant had grown quickly into fabulist lore. One seller cautioned his customers to try only a small amount, for he knew of a formerly love-hungry wife and her once inattentive husband who were now both hospitalized for sexual exhaustion. There was also talk of an ancient man who fathered three sets of twins with three beautiful sisters. Then there was the middle-aged virgin lady who once was too rigid from disuse to bend into the shapes required for lovemaking and who now had the flexibility of an acrobat. The effects of the plant were reputed to last for at least a week. It was also a preventative against one of the most terrifying and deadly conditions a man could develop, koro, which caused the genitals to be sucked up into the body. Once they disappeared, the victim died. No wonder the red plants were revered as “Second Life.”
With the money earned from selling the plant, Black Spot and his compatriots would buy supplies in discreet amounts from various shop owners, including dreamed-of foods, bolts of fabric, and of course, fermented delicacies. Then they would ascend the mountain and remain until they had more treasure to take down. It had been a long while, however, since they had found another plant.
Black Spot asked Heidi and Moff if they had seen more of the plants.
“A half-dozen,” Moff answered.
Black Spot translated to his compatriots. “Where are you finding this?” he said. “You can show me?”
“Sure. Is it good to eat?”
“Very good, yes,” Black Spot said. “But only for medicine. Not for everyday eating.”
“For what sickness?” Moff asked.
“Oh, some very bad sicknesses. Koro is one. I am not knowing the English word. You having this, you are wanting to die.” His compatriots nodded.
“I guess it’s not what we thought it was,” Moff told Heidi, and they laughed.
Black Spot motioned for Moff and Heidi to enter the thick rainforest and retrace their steps. With Heidi’s compass, they pushed aside the cloak of green leaves, and forged their way back toward the jungle bed where they had so recently made love.
15
A PROMISING LEAD
Tonight the ragtag citizens of the jungle were grouped in front of the television according to the hierarchy of the divine. The twin gods sat in front, their grandmother between them. Black Spot, his cousin, and other cohorts squatted in the second tier. The women and children stood behind, and those with missing limbs sat off to the side on mats. It was nearly time for the nightly rerun of Darwin’s Fittest. My forlorn friends had not watched it over the past days; the demands of malaria had required their total attention.
Black Spot and the old grandmothers motioned that their honored guests should come join them. Mes amis declined. Instead, as had become their routine, they seated their morose and silent selves on logs and stumps by the campfire. Dwight sat next to Bennie. They had had a rapprochement: Dwight had apologized for taking his irritations out on Bennie, and Bennie had admitted that he was not adequately prepared for the trip. “You got thrown into this at the last minute,” Dwight said. They recognized that they all needed one another. They did not know whom they might need in an emergency or for comfort if matters really became dire.
The ember-red logs threw a nervous dance of light on their faces. In the early days of their plight, they had spoken urgently of ways to get out of No Name Place. As their unscheduled stay lengthened, they anguished over the possible ways to be saved. During the malarial scare, they bargained with God and the tribal powers that be. And when all were on the potholed path to recovery, they learned that the boatman had lost his mind and now had delusions that Rupert was a god. Would they go insane as well?
They ruminated over what their families and friends back home might be doing to find them. Surely they must have contacted the U.S. Embassy in Myanmar. A search party of American planes was probably doing aerial scans right this minute. My friends did not know that the Myanmar military government limited where the Embassy staff could go searching. And thus, the search was going on only at tourist destinations that the junta wished to showcase, and where Harry Bailley, consummate television star with a mellifluous and persuasive voice, could give his poignant updates.
The mood that night was grimmer than usual. Earlier that evening, Esmé, in a burst of frustration, cried out: “Are we going to die out here?” Only a child could have voiced that taboo question. Marlena reassured her, but the question hung in the smoky air. They sat quietly, knowing that another exotic illness or a dwindling supply of food could place them on the brink of extinction. Would they indeed die? Each of them imagined the news of their demise.
Wyatt remembered that his mother, who had had breast cancer, pleaded that he stop going on his thrillingly dangerous adventures. “You risk not just yourself but my heart,” she had said, “and if anything bad happens, it will be a hundred times worse than my cancer ever was.” He had laughed off her fears. Now he saw in his mind’s eye his mother staring at his photo: How could you do this to me?
Moff pictured his former wife raging for his having taken their son on a trip he knew was dangerous. She would try to believe with every inch of her soul that Rupert was still alive, while hoping that he, the husband she divorced for his insensitivity, had been snatched by the hands of fate and had his last breath choked out of him.
Vera remembered the stories of people who refused to believe that their loved one had perished in a plane crash, a sinking boat, or a collapsed mine. The words “no survivors” were only conjecture, and sure enough, days after the funerals had been held by other families more resigned to tragedy, the beliefs of those optimistic people were miraculously fulfilled when the presumed dead came home healthy and no worse for wear other than being famished for good ol’ home cooking. Was it the strength of love that allowed the miracle? How much did her own children truly love her? If they were already mourning her, would that lessen her chances of ever being found?
Heidi was contemplating ways that would enable them to survive. Perhaps there were other medicines. The Karen grandmothers would know. And they’d better prepare now for rain. She made a list in her head of various situations they should be ready for, and the proper responses. Foremost, if the soldiers came and started firing indiscriminately, would be to run into the jungle and hide. And then she had another thought: Perhaps she and Moff might make another foray into the jungle to find a few secret places.
Bennie was the only one thinking of the future, of going home to a joyful celebration. Before leaving on the Burma Road trip, he and Timothy had agreed to open Christmas gifts after he returned. More than likely, Bennie thought, Timothy had rewrapped his gifts with yellow ribbons—so like him to do that—and perhaps he had added more lavish presents; cashmere would be nice. The store tags would already have been cut off, reflecting Timothy’s certainty that his beloved would return. But then he pictured Timothy taking down the tree, paying the bills, and sifting clumps out of the cat-litter box, a chore that had been the source of their most frequent arguments. It was a mundane life they’d led, but even the mundane was precious and he wanted it back.
Out of the blue, Dwight laughed. “Tomorrow I have a teeth-cleaning appointment. I better call and reschedule.”
Now others remembered unpleasant tasks waiting for them at home: A car that needed a dent taken out of the fender. Dry cleaning to pick up. Unwash
ed workout clothes left in a locker at the fitness center, probably mildewed by now. They focused on trivial matters they could most easily give up. All else was unbearable to consider.
Their voices dropped to silence again. The campfire flames illuminated their faces from below, giving their eyes dark hollows. I thought they resembled ghosts, which is ironic for me to say. Many imagine that the dead have the same spooky look, which is nonsense. In reality—and by the very fact that I have consciousness, I have a reality—I have no look other than what I picture myself to be. How strange that I still don’t know the reason for my death, whereas I seem to know all else. But your thoughts and emotions after death are no different from what they were when you were alive, I suppose. You remember only what you want to remember. You know only what your heart allows you to know.
In the distance, by the jungle’s entertainment center, the shrieks of children mixed with happy, animated chattering. “Numbah one! Numbah one!” they chanted, repeating the boast of the ratings for Darwin’s Fittest. The show had begun, announced with its characteristic theme music and opening. Bass fiddles rubbed and vibrated in a borborygmus crescendo, lions roared, crocodile jaws snapped, and fragile-necked cranes honked warning.
Bennie stood up, his eyes stinging from the smoke. He secretly loved all the reality shows, the awfulness of them—the cruel elimination rounds, the role-switching with calamitous consequences, and the makeovers of people with missing teeth, bad hair, and recessive chins. He glanced toward the television. Oh, why not? Pabulum was better than the conscious pain of despair. He walked over to the happy side of the camp.
In the blackness of the jungle, the screen was bright as a beacon. He saw the female host of Darwin’s Fittest in her same safari hat and dirt-stained khakis of two weeks or so ago. This time, she had artfully applied a swath of mud to her left cheekbone. The two teams of contestants were building canoes, carving them out of balsa wood. Their clothes were transparent with sweat, which left, as Bennie noted, no bulge or droop or crease unhidden. He could see that the fittest, whose bodies were fat-free specimens of healthy living, were detested by the others, as they should be.