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Abandoning the family name felt as if I were disowning my parents, so at first, I tried names that would use all the letters, but in a different order. I started by reversing my name, but it didn’t work. Offenbach reversed becomes the unpronounceable Hcabneffo. But for the hell of it, I tried other names to see if reversal ever worked. My colleagues, Sam Nelson and Cindy Warner would become Sam Noslen and Cindy Renraw. It wasn’t fair I thought, and yet at the same time, something in me jolted. I looked at that name Renraw and felt a stab in my gut. The name sounded peculiar and yet familiar. And that was when I realized that there were far more surnames that end in er than begin re. What if that’s what Remsem was? Since there was no Remsem to be found, maybe he too had picked a name using the same method I was trying, by reversing his real name. I wrote out the letters and discovered Remsem spelled backwards became Mesmer. I punched Franz Mesmer into a search engine and was astonished to find that there was such a person. He wasn’t alive today but there had once been a famous, or infamous, historical figure by that name. Was Franz Remsen a disciple of Franz Mesmer?
Franz Mesmer was a German physician who created a theory about natural energetic transference that can occur between all objects, both animate and inanimate. In other words, he was like a new age healer, someone who does weird things and is scorned by the medical establishment. He had all kinds of unorthodox beliefs. For example, he thought that there were tides within humans that were affected by the external tides of the moon or the ocean. People scorned those ideas back then, even though nowadays, scientists call those tides circadian rhythms. Mesmer had a theory called animal magnetism and claimed he could cure people of all kinds of ailments. He believed that health was the free flow of energy through thousands of channels in the human body, and that illness was caused by obstacles to this flow. It reminded me of Chinese medicine and the restoration of chi energy.
I was convinced there was a connection between this man and the man Hank had contacted. But why had he chosen this particular name as his professional one? It surely had to be connected to what the original Franz Mesmer believed. When I had asked Hank about Remsem, he was vague. Said the guy had a warm smile and that he’d been very encouraging. Said he’d asked Hank to relax and trust the process. He’d even mentioned that he had held his hands and told Hank to let his energy flow through him. There had to be a connection between the present day Remsem and the historical Mesmer, but I couldn’t figure out what it was, so I kept researching.
Mesmer claimed he cured people by having them drink various preparations of iron and magnets to move the flow in their body. Had Remsem made Hank drink something? He had several different approaches to his work. He treated people in groups as well as individually. When it was an individual, he would sit in front of his patient with his knees touching theirs, pressing the patient’s thumbs in his hands, looking deep into their eyes. Sometimes he would place his hands on certain parts of their bodies, holding them there for a prolonged period. That reminded me of the Reiki treatments my mom got for headaches. Mesmer’s patients reported feeling peculiar sensations just as my mom claimed she felt.
In group treatment, Mesmer would fill large tubs with what he called magnetized water which was water that contained ground iron and glass. Patients would grasp rods that protruded from the water while at the same time all being connected to each other by a cord, to keep the energy flowing between them. He often ended the treatments by playing music on a glass armonica, something very much akin to the glass bowls I’d seen used in new age churches I’d tried out at various times.
If Remsem was following Mesmer’s practices he might be a good guy. After all, the original Mesmer had hundreds, possibly even thousands, of clients a year. The establishment didn’t like him, but he might be similar to a new age healer who could be considered a charlatan quack, or an amazing healer, depending on who you asked. Aunt Mary swore acupuncture had cured her knee pain, but most people I knew thought the idea of poking needles in their bodies was crazy. She’d persuaded my mom to try Reiki. Mom said she felt a tingling all over when her Reiki practitioner’s hands hovered above her body. But when I’d finally taken Mom up on her suggestion that I see him for help with endometrial pain, I felt nothing, and it hadn’t helped at all.
If the present-day Remsem was a good guy, why hadn’t he come forward of his own accord when Hank was arrested? Maybe it was because he knew that if his name were associated with Hank in any way, his reputation would be ruined. Except that if I couldn’t even find the guy, how much of a reputation did he have?
One thing I was struck by was how Mesmer swore he could cure people of things when other healers had failed. It sounded just like Remsem. Hank said Remsem had testimonials from people proving he had cured them when others couldn’t. So why had he disappeared? Maybe it was as simple as the fact that he didn’t know Hank had forgotten his name and had assumed that if the police wanted to interview him, they would contact him. Or perhaps he was scared. If he knew Hank hadn’t killed my parents and knew who did, maybe that same person had threatened him.
As I read more about Mesmer, I discovered that eventually he fell into disrepute. He claimed he had cured a girl’s blindness. It wasn’t clear whether he had or hadn’t, whether she was temporarily able to see and then lost her sight, but whatever had happened, he fell out of favor and was scorned by the medical establishment. Maybe the present-day Remsem was a doctor or therapist who lost his license. Perhaps that was why he flew under the radar.
I needed to find Remsem so I could get answers. I scoured the internet for highly successful alternative healers, controversial new age practitioners, doctors whose licenses had been revoked, or people making exaggerated claims for healing. There were tons of them. Still, I read about each one and if they looked like they might be a possibility, I waited until I visited with Hank and then shared their details with him. It was complicated because the only thing I was allowed to take into the visitors’ room was my ID so I couldn’t even show him the entries for these guys on my phone. Sometimes I’d mail him a picture before or after the visit. But it was never the right guy. Hank lived for my visits, but after a while he told me it wasn’t fair of him to hold me back. He said I needed to move on, literally.
“Go back to Sacramento,” he said, but I told him I was done with the West Coast.
“Then find somewhere you can start having a life again. Whoever Remsem is or was, he’s fallen off the radar. We’re never going to find him.”
I knew he was right. There was nothing keeping me in Atlanta, not even a graveyard. I’d been pretty sure Mom and Dad wouldn’t have wanted their bodies to rot in coffins, and for myself, I knew I didn’t want to keep their ashes in a cabinet or on a mantelpiece. My parents had a weekend place in the mountains an hour north of Atlanta, so I’d driven up there and scattered their ashes in the river in front of the cabin. I thought about where I should move. I’d enjoyed the sunny climate of California and I wanted to find a lesbian-friendly place, somewhere that wouldn’t be Atlanta, but would be close enough that I could visit Hank. I figured Florida was the obvious choice. I didn’t fancy the big cities like Miami or Fort Lauderdale, or a party city like Key West. I decided to check out Orlando. Before I went, I was sitting in a local queer café and overheard a conversation that was to be a turning point in my life.
“I’m moving to Florida,” a woman was telling the guy she was sitting with. “A little town called Gulfport. It’s amazing. I was at a lesbian writers conference there.”
The man bristled. “Isn’t that politically incorrect? Shouldn’t it be a queer conference?”
The woman laughed. “This place is full of old-time lesbians who might be queer-friendly, but they still want their lesbian-only space. The town is crawling with women. Fucking lesbian paradise!”
The next weekend I drove down to Orlando but did a detour to check out the little town she’d mentioned. It took less than a week of being in Gulfport to know I’d found my home. I kept my real name for things like getting a job I could do online, but I decided that for everything social, I’d stick with my made-up name. I knew that whomever I dated might want to Google search me and ensure I didn’t have a string of angry girlfriends tweeting about me, or a few sordid crimes in my past. If I used my real name and someone looked for me online, they’d quickly discover who I really was. I couldn’t face that. I got a post office box for formal correspondence and Hank. When I moved in with Breezy, she only knew me as Ella Jay.
My life settled down. I wasn’t obsessed with Remsem but from time to time if I thought I’d stumbled on someone who might be him, I sent their details to Hank. It was a long, tedious process because every piece of mail received in prison had to be reviewed by staff there and we had to be very careful how we phrased our letters. If they thought we were cooking up some kind of revenge, Hank would be in big trouble. In theory mail was meant to be checked within a week of receiving it, but in practice the prison often claimed to be (and probably was) so short-staffed that it could take weeks for a letter to get through. I would send Hank information about the guys I thought might be Remsem, even though the name would be totally different, and weeks later I’d hear back: Nope, not him.
It didn’t take long for me to bump into the woman I’d overheard in the coffee shop in Atlanta who’d also relocated to Gulfport. We were at lesbian movie night at the library. She introduced herself to the audience as Fran and said she was an event organizer who could set up concerts, fundraisers, and parties. The next time I saw her, Breezy and I were at a trivia night where Fran was selling tickets for a fundraiser. She was everywhere. One of those types who throws herself into a community and seems to know everyone right away. She brought a lesbian comic to town, as well as a famous gay activist for a Pride event. She worked one day a week at the local Welcome Center, and she chaired the biggest fundraiser of the year, an evening of entertainment for a homeless recovery program. That fundraiser was the night that changed everything.
We knew parking would be at a premium so Breezy and I walked into town along the shoreline, watching pelicans swoop down to the water to claim innocent fish, and white egrets stalking regally along the sand. I admired the red and gold sunset while Breezy grumbled about the heat. Inside the auditorium we saw familiar faces everywhere. Unlike other events, the usual wafting aroma of beer, whisky and wine was absent. People toted juice, water and sodas, catching up with each other while Fran urged everyone to take their seats. Kat and Gordy waved to us and we made our way to a row in the middle of the room. Eventually, a hush descended, and Fran was able to start the evening. She told her getting sober story and was followed by others who talked about how addiction had led them to homelessness and how much they appreciated the Hope House. Then Fran introduced the entertainer.
“Y’all know I have friends everywhere. Today I’m thrilled to introduce someone I met years ago in North Carolina. I brought him to an event in Georgia, and now he’s agreed to come on down to Florida. Charlie is an amazing guy, a man who can cure your smoking habit, make you quack like a duck, or give you the confidence to achieve your dreams. Not only is he a skilled hypnotist, Charlie has agreed to appear for free tonight. He’s going to briefly share with you his own recovery process and then he’ll perform his act. If you like what you see, he’ll be here for the weekend and you can set up individual appointments with him.” Fran looked down at the piece of paper she was using to introduce him. “His promotional blurb asks, why pay thousands of dollars for therapy when Charlie can cure you in one session?” She looked back up at the audience. “And here to prove it to you, is the man himself.” She waved her hand toward the curtain. “Please welcome Mr. Charlie Deslon.”
I listened to her introduction and something inside me started hammering. I didn’t even know if it was my head or my heart. I thought about everything Hank had told me about Remsem. He’d said that very same thing: why spend thousands on a therapist when one session was all it would take with this man? I’d been looking for an alternative healer. What if all I’d really needed to find was a hypnotist? All these months and years of searching wasted. I felt sick to my stomach. But there was something else. That name. Charlie Deslon. What kind of name was that? I couldn’t wait until the intermission. I whispered to Breezy that I needed fresh air and quickly exited the hall, stepping outside into the evening air. I tapped the name Charlie Deslon into my phone’s search engine. His website came up right away with testimonials by the dozen.
“I lost 80lbs!”
“I quit smoking!”
“I aced an important interview!”
But what interested me more was what I saw before I clicked through to his website. All the search engine entries below that first one. “Are you sure you don’t mean Charles Deslon?” Google asked me, showing a long list of entries for Charles Deslon. The first entry was in French. Although my knowledge of French was rudimentary, even I knew that “un médecin français nait en 1750” meant that he’d been a doctor born in France in 1750. The same era as Mesmer. I felt the air around me close in. My breathing grew shallow and the next entry almost made my heart stop. “Jealous defender of the system of Mesmer.”
How had I failed to put it all together sooner? I knew that the word mesmerized originated from Franz Mesmer, and yet because all the articles about him focused on animal magnetism and alternative medicine, I’d somehow missed the bottom line. Franz Mesmer was a hypnotist. And now here was another hypnotist using the name of someone who’d been a disciple of Mesmer.
It couldn’t be a coincidence. Charlie Deslon must belong to some group of hypnotists who took the names of famous hypnotists. Maybe he knew Remsem and could lead me to him. Or...a thought was pushing forward from the back of my mind. What if Charlie Deslon and Franz Remsem were the same person? What if Remsem took the name Deslon after my parents’ murder? Or what if he used both names, depending on whether he was the good guy or the bad one?
I had to get Deslon’s picture and information to Hank. I would write to him as soon as I got home. Better yet, I could print out a picture and description, drive up to Georgia and show it to him. Then I remembered what those prison visits were like. How they enforced the rules about bringing nothing in with me. I hated the body searches I had to endure. What if I drove all the way up there with a printout of the website and they confiscated it? I decided that even though it would take longer, I’d mail it to him. As always, I coded my letter to him so that it would look innocuous, a simple note stating that I’d finally found Mr. Right. Instead of sending a printout of the website I just sent a photo I’d taken when I’d returned to the auditorium. Two weeks later I heard back. It was him!
I hid the letter in my dresser—I usually destroyed Hank’s letters once I’d read them—so that I could confront Deslon with it when I found him. In my anxiety when I left Gulfport Saturday, I forgot all about it. I got Deslon’s email address from Fran, opened a new Yahoo account, and emailed him. Said I was a psychology student and that his presentation had fascinated me. My focus was hypnotherapy and I had some questions for him. As luck would have it there was a national psychology conference taking place in Atlanta, so I had the perfect excuse for being up there. I wasn’t sure how I was going to confront him, but I figured once I was there, things would fall into place.
I arranged to see him on the Sunday so that I could go see Hank right after. I bought a cheap phone to use in Georgia and gave Deslon the contact number. On Saturday morning I went kayaking, just as I told Breezy I would. I was disturbed to see a crack in the side of the kayak, so I dropped it off at the kayak repair shop on my way out of town. I turned my phone off and removed the SIM card so I could fully focus on the task at hand, and so that nobody could track me if they had a mind to. Then I set off.
Everything went perfectly until Sunday. And then everything started going wrong