‘Are we in a race?’
‘No, this is my natural pace, my
Mum taught me to walk fast.’
‘Slow down,’ Simon says and then he
speeds up in order to get in front of me as if we really were having a race. I
speed up but as soon as I do, Simon stops short. He starts riffling through his
pockets and comes up with some coins. He drops them into the hands of a beggar
I didn’t see, sitting in the shadows.
I start walking again. We end up speed
walking, talking and laughing until we reach the junction. ‘Where are we going?’
he asks.
‘To the Israeli restaurant,’ I say.
‘The Israeli restaurant? Which
one?’
‘The one around the corner, the
girl we are meeting is Israeli,’ I say.
‘And I have met her before?’
recalling our conversation in the taxi.
‘Yes, you have met both people
before, their names are Pete and Eva,’ I repeat for the third time that
evening.
‘Eva?’
‘Yeah, as in Ever,’ I say.
We arrive within minutes of each other and
settle down to our orders.
‘Don’t ever get married’ Simon says
to the couple in front of him.
‘Er, Simon, it’s a bit too late for
that,’ I say quietly. The couple look at him uneasily and then they look at me:
Who is this drunken fool you have brought? I pretend I don’t notice
although I am acutely aware of the undercurrent of unease. Simon is distinctly
unaware of anything except his own thought processes. He doesn’t miss a beat.
‘Ah, then congratulations, may you
both be very happy together.’
He carries on nursing his beer whilst we
eat our food, he looks up at the male half of the couple, ‘What’s your name?’
‘Pete,’ he replies
‘You don’t talk much.’
‘That’s because I have nothing to
say.’
We finish our food and then head out into
the city, I keep my eye on Simon to make sure he isn’t staggering into people
and again he stops. He starts looking at his belongings and then looks at me,
‘Do you have any coins?’ I fish a couple out and give it to the beggar who has
a baby beside her. Simon feels sorry for the baby, I think it reminds him of
his own baby at home with his wife.
We sit on some seats on the street and
order drinks from ‘the 60 baht guy,’ Simon spills his beer all over the table
and pavement. He doesn’t seem too bothered by it. His attention wavers and soon
he is standing up and wondering into different shops nearby. I ignore his
behaviour, I guess I am used to it, and carry on the conversation with Eva and
Pete. Soon enough Simon has disappeared, the remnants of his beer still
dripping from the table.
My phone rings, I look at the display and
Simon’s name is flashing.
‘Hello?’
‘Hello Rachael, this is Coin, is
Simon there?’
‘No Coin, he has disappeared. I
don’t know where he has gone.’ Pause. ‘If I see him again, shall I get him to
call you?’
‘No, I don’t want to speak to him
ever again,’ another pause. ‘Okay Rachael, thanks.’
‘Okay Coin, I’m sorry I am not much
help’
I feel strange speaking to Simon’s wife, I
know she doesn’t like me because Simon and I are friends, I get the feeling she
doesn’t like any of his friends.
....
At closing time I walk out of the bar, my
arms interlinked with Eva and our other friend, Jay. Pete left us earlier and
the three of us are sweaty with excess, a pungent sweet/sour perfume of
alcohol, sweat and bodies which rises and mingles with the crowd. Our voices
are joyful, our faces flushed and intentions fluid. The euphoria of dancing has
not yet worn off.
We weave through impossibly skinny Thai
women and men who are selling their wares and bodies to the seekers of carnal
and material delights under the polluted neon sky. Everything is for sale on Khao San Road, even
at 1am. Baht is thrown about in a football match of commerce – the road reminds
me of a hangover of some street festival gone stale.
Just as I am about to hail a taxi, I see
him lumber down the pavement. He hunches as he lurches, diminishing his tall
lanky frame.
I call out, ‘Simon! Simon!’
He twists his head slightly but his pace
continues. I call out again and start running towards him and soon I stand in
front of him, challenging him to defy me. He is drunk, still. He takes a minute
to focus and then finally recognition settles temporarily.
‘Where have you been? Your wife
called me. She wants you to go home,’ I say.
‘I’ve been home and now I am out
again.’
‘Are you okay?’
‘I’m fine.’
‘You don’t look fine. Are you
sure?’
‘Yes,’ he says impatiently. ‘Stop
looking at me like that.’
I look at Simon. He has a new mark on his
left cheek, whether it’s from a wall he has fallen into or from his wife’s
hands I do not know. The previous scratches on his face have almost
disappeared. His hair and skin are pale, almost Nordic, his blue and red eyes
are awash in alcohol. When he drinks colour fades from him, he becomes a
photographic negative of his own existence. The dark rings under his eyes only
serve to highlight this image. I am torn between wanting to hug his misery away
and shaking him violently so he sees sense. These contradictory feelings within
me usually facilitate the sarcastic and flippant aspect of my personality which
I display in order to skim the surface edge of something I have no idea about
and probably shouldn’t pry into.
I don’t know how but we end up sitting on
the step of a doorway. The women whose presence I left abruptly look at me and
then at the taxis and I tell them I am going to stay out a bit longer. I walk
up to them, hug them and watch them climb into a taxi – to an unconsciousness I
desperately long for but is increasingly difficult for me to achieve.
‘I didn’t know she was married. You
could have told me,’
‘I’m sorry. I didn’t think it was
important.’
‘Someone should tell them they look
like lesbians, holding each other like that.’
‘You should see the way we dance’ I
say, visualising the spectacle of our intertwined bodies in the club down the
road.
We huddle as if we were cold in this
tropical city and discuss some of the teachers I work with in my school. Simon
doesn’t like any of them, I know the feeling is mutual. It is a curse and a
blessing of my existence that all of the social circles I move in are
unbridgeable. Then we discuss the imminent arrival of the newest resident in
our block of apartments, Bill. Our mutual dislike for the boy temporarily binds
us in a un-Buddhist like reverie.
A man comes up to us; his hand
outstretched and asks for some money. Simon speaks to him in Thai. I notice
that Simon hasn’t given him anything so I reach for my bag.
‘Don’t give him anything.’
‘Really?’
‘Not this guy.’
I stop rooting through my bag and Simon
tells him to leave us. He staggers down the road. We watch him.
We talk about the people in our apartments
again. ‘Everyone loves you’ he says.
‘Good, I love them.’
‘I don’t love everyone... Do you
remember the time when you first introduced yourself and I just left?’
‘No.’ I say, genuinely forgetting
that any experience like that had occurred. Normally my memory would hold onto
a snub like that, keen to interpret any actions I come into contact with.
Our conversation jumps between the past
and present, po-going to a happy tune. Then suddenly he says what has been on
his mind throughout.
‘Have you ever been in love?’
And the image of Kale appeared so clearly
that I was sure Simon could see him too, ‘Yeah’ I say.
I start to feel heavy and old, suddenly
aware of my experiences accumulating. In innocence, and to my detriment, I used
to believe life was like a tape that could be rewound and taped over and have
suffered this misguided notion most of my adult life. I am a drunkard with a
selective memory without touching a drop.
‘So have I, and I still am seven years
later,’ Simon visibly sags. He kisses my shoulder and slides onto the pavement.
His head is practically level to mine and he links his arm around one of my
calves as if it were a teddy bear he could sleep with at night. My body is
unaccustomed to such touch, having been celibate for a time longer than I care
to remember. My leg becomes an anchor for his feelings as he dredges up the
emailed events that have been happening to him lately. A woman from his past is
back again, contacting him and it’s making him question his life. This is the
same woman who he has been in love with since she left him at the graveside of
their best friend. It is a transgression he can’t forgive or forget which has
left him struggling ever since.
‘I love you’ he says.
‘Oh, I love you too Simon’ I say,
ruffling his hair like a mother would.
His eyes look at me as if I really could
be his Saviour, he looks at me imploringly, drunkenly, as if I am the rock who
will save him from the storms of alcohol.
‘You are the most magical person in
my life’
I don’t know what to say to such
meanderings, I know he habitually forgets what he says. I smile.
‘You should go home,’ he says.
‘Yes’ I say, thinking about the
eight hours of teaching I have the next day.
‘Let’s have a drink first’
‘Okay,’ we stand up.
As I walk and Simon staggers into a dark
alleyway, he asks me, ‘Rachael, do you think I am good looking or devastatingly
good looking?’
‘Er.... neither’ I say, remembering
our repetitive conversation about Simon’s looks, he smiles and laughs to
himself.
So we walk to a bar I know from a previous
incarnation but the music is heavy, the atmosphere dark and I don’t like it. I
dismiss it and favour the all night cafe on the corner of Khao San. Simon is
following me, drunkenly speaking to the vendors along the road side. Then he
walks through a group of girls, I see him laughing with them – he is like a
child with a new toy. He disappears and I enter the cafe alone.
You can read my short stories here: Gracie's short stories
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