Lost in Pattaya (14 page)

“But, we must have
something in return, something that compensates for the venom that has been
spread by the snake. Maybe, we should cut the snake’s tongue off, or, maybe we
should cut off his head,” Thuy Binh spoke and smoked at the same time, thick
grey fumes rose from her mouth and nostrils. She held a long oriental pipe by
its stem, from the bowl of which a fluid stream of smoke rose.

By now the owner
was incoherent, his voice simply shaking in the tremor that his entire body had
assumed.

Miho placed the
Tanto
on the owner’s shoulder, leaving him no option but to snort in the vast
quantity of drug that was replenished by the doctor onto the surface of the
mirror in front of Thuy Binh. She was cocktailing him with cocaine and heroin,
her favourite trick.

In about ten
minutes the brothel owner fell to the floor, unconscious while the doctor bent,
administering intravenously what would make the owner’s heart beat wild till it
imploded, killing its host and allowing Thuy Binh to put in place a new trusted
manager for the crown jewel in her empire.

A wave of guilt
swept over me, for it was me who had stumbled upon the notion of per-capita
revenues from each establishment, a metric that revealed the deceit of the
victim that lay inches from death near my feet. In some sense it was me who was
killing him, my first victim.

“
Suay,
spare him, I cannot be the reason for his death. I will revive the profits that
this
shit-mouth
has wasted. Please ask the Doctor to revive him. He is a
just pimp, a simple man, stealing money, maybe for the education of children,”
I too was stoned, but the physical union with the femme-fatale on the Yacht, it
put the winds of courage in my sails.

Miho, she moved to
my side, wavering, seeking directions, with her eyes, from Thuy Binh.

“Remember, the
Lord is a beggar, and he begged. This man, he deserves the mercy of the one who
laid him bare, me that is. Give him a chance,” I moved towards the doctor.
“Doc, save this wretch, please..”

“What if I am not
in a mood of mercy?” Thuy Binh, she stared blood shot, straight into my eyes.

“Our Lord favours
the compassionate.” I strode up to her and bent, taking what remained on the
mirror of death, heroin-cocaine infused by the nasal fluids of the dying pimp.

Besides him I lay,
besides the dying pimp, whispering softly “Don’t worry. Try to breathe steady,”
from the corner of my vision, I saw Thuy Binh, smiling gently.

Mine and Thuy
Binh’s sexual union, consummated upon the rhythmic waves of my pelvis, across
the South China Sea on a private Yacht, was that the bedrock of my begging
being accepted by her?

All things must
pass away, but in my passage, I saved one life only, that of the cheating
brothel owner.

Part 3

Kawai’s Kingdom of Cards

Through the years
I spent with Thuy Binh and Miho, my ears were pricked to the happenings in
Singapore. More specifically, we planted moles from private agents, which
helped track Li Ya’s travel plans with her parents. The months went reeling by,
since I too had assumed duties in the prostitution ring, always acting on
behalf of, and under the directions of
Suay
, a name that came to stick,
meaning ‘
a
beautiful
vista’
in Thai.

The owner at the
prime prostitution den, he repaid debts many times over and the winds of our
business blew fair.

If I really had my
way, I would have implemented a simple Human Resource management tool, since
the business we ran was about managing bodies and a simple
Information
System
would go a long way in bringing efficiencies that any business of bodies needs.
They heard me out for a few days, before
Suay
laughed almost
continuously for about four minutes. Eventually I too had to laugh-off
reluctantly with them the stupidity of my suggestion.

My physical
condition was not that great but I disciplined myself in small measures, often
joining Miho on her morning swims before succumbing to narcotic and drink at
sun-down, as was routine in the house of Thuy Binh and Miho.

Thuy Binh and I
never made love. Miho observed us closely, searching for hints of intimacy,
which I am certain she was picking up. Two individuals having been physically
together are almost impossible to tell apart. The more they try to seem apart,
the more revealed they stand. From her vantage, Miho could merely harbour
suspicion; she could not voice it, since she too stood to risk it all, her own
existence and that of the prostitution ring. They had to be together, Miho and
Thuy Binh, for their whole to function. Their personal union was a statement in
authoritative unity, which if broken, would lead the dogs in. Their teeming had
a desirable effect on adversaries, instilling deep, fear of retaliation. Their
teaming was a problem of human jealousy. It was not straight forward, and I
knew I could become the cause of their falling apart if I was discovered as
Thuy Binh’s secret lover, the first fatality being me. I took immense care in
masking the escapades of adult pleasure that I had savoured upon the Cross.

The constant
chatter from Singapore kept us abreast of happenings there, and in about two
years the first opportunity of an encounter with Li Ya presented itself.

They were
transiting through Bangkok, where they planned to stay a couple of days before
heading further to the Gold Coast for vacations and Li Ya’s eventual admission
to University. It was probably Georgy’s work that was keeping them in Bangkok
for a couple of days.

When I suggested
that the time was right for me to meet Li Ya and win her back, Thuy Binh
agreed, since Li Ya would be old enough, about eighteen, leaving her to meet
the consequences of her own decisions.

“Go down to
Australia and see her. Not in Bangkok, I cannot ensure your safety in Bangkok,”
she said.

“Why not?”

“Kawai, he will
find out. And if he knows we are in Bangkok, he will come after us,” she said.

“Come on, Bangkok
is a big place. I can go in alone and see her before slipping back out,” I
said. “He may not even know who I am.”

“He knows
everything and is waiting to seek his revenge on us,” Thuy Binh and I, we were
alone on the beach. Behind us in the balcony about twenty metres away, Miho
reclined lazy in a hammock.

“He won’t know, I
can just take a bus and get in . . . ”

“Miho and I were
his top prostitutes before we ran away . . . ” she said, glancing up at Miho
who simply lay rocking in her hammock.

“What?”

“Yes it is time to
tell you a few things. Miho is younger but not as young as you think she is. I
was only eight when Kawai’s pimps bought and sold me into prostitution in
Bangkok. I met Miho after about four years in the business, on a night when a
client demanded two girls,” she said.

The years of Asian
women are revealed on the back of their palms, which wrinkle and darken in line
with the proportionate passage of time. The rest of their observable bodies’
remain almost intact, till years cannot be hidden anymore. It is the reason why
Asian women succeed, with a haul of medals when they compete in the ring of
prostitution.

“You mean you and
Miho were prostituted by Kawai?”

“Yes, for a few
years before we escaped, we would have killed no one, nor would we have run,
had the simple business of prostitution persisted. The brutality began with
Kawai’s pimps unleashing the most violent customers upon me and Miho. We had to
fall in love with each other; I mean amidst all the pain, she and me became
dependent on each other, stealing away intimate moments of gentleness with each
other, knowing the brutality that awaited us in the room around the corner.
Kawai knew we were lovers and often made Miho watch while I was being
brutalised. He wanted to break us, instead, his ways brought us together.”

She paused and
looked around, ensuring we were by ourselves.

“I don’t look back
with remorse, the pain was for a better life,” she was smiling as she spoke. My
instinct was to hold her and soothe her, but I checked my affection. Miho was
close by, and the roots of her poisonous possession were only becoming clear to
me now.

In my auditor
life, I would have signed, or made another sign terms of confidence, before
listening to or revealing what she told me.

“Running away from
Kawai . . . Miho planned it, waiting patiently for a night when we were sold
together to a customer. She made the first kill, setting up a chase that lasted
two years . . . It was a long painful journey, let’s not go into it now. I can
tell you she was brave and often, we were lucky, buying the local police, just
in time for us to escape Kawai’s claws. In those two years we came to settle in
Pattaya, slowly wrestling this island’s business away from Kawai.”

“How did the two
of you manage to beat a gang lord?” I asked.

“It was a
combination of luck and terror that we were able to spread and thrive on. Just
before I took control of the ring in Pattaya, the violence became rampant
enough for the police force to intervene and facilitate a truce, un-mindful of
the money that we are all ready to feed them for our dominance. I was twenty
then and Miho had enough blood on her hands not to be seen as a mere child. The
truce has held, but I know if we are caught in Bangkok we won’t be spared. And,
if he is found in Pattaya, we will feed him to the sharks.”

I imagined a
twenty year old lady gang leader, fucked and sodomised almost as a passage to
the top, from where she now ruled. From the top she would have ruled well,
since she knew the hidden intricacies of the trade she conducted. Given her
past, it was virtually impossible for her to fail.

The
Cross
,
it was anchored at a swimming distance from the beach we sat upon. The vessel’s
silhouette against the evening sunburst brought memories back, of my maritime
lovemaking with Thuy Binh. In that instant, reason failed and I moved my hand
across the sand, placing it on hers, not realising that Miho had emerged from
the beach-house, and was approaching us from behind.

Thuy Binh pulled
herself away, rose unnaturally, and spoke to Miho in Thai, “I need you to go to
the city and check on the doctor at the brothel on
Walking
Street
.”

“Do you suspect
anything
?”
Miho asked, looking askance, sensing I am sure, that her
departure would leave her beloved mistress to me all night. My conjecture, at
Miho sensing my bond of union with Thuy Binh was not misplaced. In a few
minutes, Miho was in the beach-house again, putting on her Sarong and
collecting her weapons before attending to the assigned business of the night.

Before leaving,
she came back on to the beach and handed Thuy Binh a pistol with a miniature
Tanto,
“You know I don’t like to leave you by yourself. This guy is useless when it
comes to protecting you or himself. Please keep this gun and the sacred blade.
Peaceful is the Lord who protects you and I pray you don’t ever need to use
these,” with that Miho moved away, firing up the chocolate Camry, leaving us by
ourselves on the beach.

The loss of
reason, it followed a silly logic, one of reaping pleasure from another’s body,
unseen and away from Miho’s glare. We ate quickly at the beach-house and
sprinted through the sea water, our arms and legs powering us through the final
stretch towards the yacht, where I tasted the liquid salt of sea, off each and
every inch of my lover’s body. Only when spent did we shower and recline back
on the deck.

After a few hits,
we settled for wine and fruits, warm humid sea breeze soothing us with the mist
of sea.

“Wait, let me
steer a few kilometres away from the beach so we are truly by ourselves,” she
said, moving to the small but efficient bridge, commandeering the vessel with
the confidence of a seasoned sailor for about fifteen minutes into the dark of
sea, before ratcheting the anchor into the ocean depths.

We curled,
puppy-like in love as I held her body, wanting to show her the tenderness that
men are capable of.

Later we drank a
bit more on the upper deck, a couple of Merlot’s before descending into the
vessels belly where we fell asleep naked, having made more lingering love for
about an hour.

Not heading back
to the beach-house that night was the last nail in the death of reason, the
point from which things started to fall rapidly apart and into the deepest
abyss of my final loss.

On the following
morning as the sun spread its colours across the ocean again, Thuy Binh
awakened me to a dull ache from the alcohol and coke of the previous night. She
seemed distant and worried as she quickly wrapped on her Sarong.

“We seem to be
drifting, something is wrong, quick, get dressed,” she said, moving towards the
one-person wide spiral-stairwell leading to the open deck above.

I was only a few
minutes behind
Suay
, and when I emerged, it wasn’t the vastness of the
ocean on one side with our empty stretch of beach on the other that greeted me;
my vision instead was marred by the ugly claustrophobia of a loathsome giant
metropolis – Bangkok. The polluted coastline loomed only a few hundred meters
away from us, the mouth of her black-hearted river spread like an evil smile,
as if wanting to dissolve us with the industrial liquid acid-waste that spewed
out from the city’s sewers and into the blue crystalline purity of our ocean.
As I moved forward, the outcome of my failed reason lay in tatters. Miho, she
was on the bow with her naked knives spread alongside, like pets meant to keep
mute company. Small bits of her clothing had been bitten away by her knives,
her hair was dishevelled and her face had been washed clean by rivers of tears
from her big luminescent bloodshot eyes, which widened further as they looked
at me. Thuy Binh was kneeling besides her, cradling Miho’s head in her lap,
caressing her forehead, trying to open conversations while Miho stared pan
dead, her gaze burning right through me as she gritted her teeth in anger, tightening
the grip around the handle of her
Tanto
. Thuy Binh raised her right arm,
fanning her palms at me, wanting me to go away, which I did, since the image of
the beast that had possessed Miho was too frightening to be in the vicinity of.

Miho had witnessed
the intimacy between her mistress and me. From that discovery, her convolution
of thought would lead to a breakdown of measurement. On some such
thought-avenue, she may have taken herself to be all but finished, now that she
had lost her mistress to another. Further, in her night of anguish she may have
steered the Yacht towards Bangkok, and into the gaping hell where Kawai was
Prince. My instinct was to pack and leave, for which I was ill prepared since
we had not planned on a journey of any sort on the previous evening. All the
same, I grabbed a dry-bag, ruing the persuasions deployed by me in wooing Thuy
Binh on the previous evening. I threw what I could into the bag, a few sachets
of coke, a few threads of clothing, a towel and a small army knife that I found
in the drawer.

“Quick you have to
swim ashore, time is short, just follow my instructions,” Thuy Binh entered,
locking the door to the lower deck, hastily scribbling on a post-it. “When you
get ashore, call the doctor and ask him to make arrangements to get us out of
here. No cell phones,” she opened the safe, embedded in the hitherto hidden
wooded teak panelling, and gave me wads of US dollars.

“Why don’t we just
turn around and motor back to Pattaya, we will be there in a couple of hours at
most. I can’t see anything quicker than the
Southern
Cross
in
these waters,” I tried to remain calm, reasoning with her.

“We have lost
power, we are drifting, she has a broken transmission, we can’t sail back. You
go and find a hotel in the city. Meet me around sunset at the temple of the
monkey-headed god at the southern end of Patpong. If you don’t find me there,
look for me at sunrise near the lake in Lumphini Park. In case we don’t cross
in the next week, you are on your own. Now go and get in touch with the doctor
immediately. May the lord go with you,” from the safe she extricated a pistol
too and handed it to me along with a small box of bullets.