3PM Beer

The beer is in front of me; goading me. Rivers of condensation slide down the misted glass. You could say it’s only a beer but this would be wrong. It’s a unique experience just waiting for me. It’s my beer. It’s my antidote to the thick blue air and the heat that has my shirt sticking to my skin. It’s something that will cast aside the lingering memory of last night and put me right back into this moment.

Last night bugged the hell out of me.

I was out floating from bar to bar. I wasn’t drinking that much and I wasn’t switching bars with any great speed. Eventually I ended up at this small place that I’ve never spent that much time in before. I didn’t know the staff and I didn’t know any of the girls. One of the regular or semi regular customers kept throwing this look at me as if I was an unwelcome visitor. He was a big fat guy with a big fat moustache. He had that I-own-this-place look about him. I don’t like to stay any place I’m not welcome but a couple of young girls started flirting around with me and joking with me and suddenly I felt welcome enough to ignore him. I bought some drinks for the girls and the guy just turned to face the optics behind the bar and supped on his whisky.

I was being shown family photos when I first saw this very pretty young girl sitting slumped on the chair against the wall. She was staring at me with that please-pay-my-bar-fine look. There was no particular sexual promise in the look other than that in this situation sex was a given. It was just a look that said pay-up-and-take-me-out-of-here. I didn’t think this was something I wanted to do.  

“She like you,” said one of the older ladies.

“Does she?” I said, hoping to signal a tone of indifference.

The older lady raised her eyebrows twice as if she knew that this particular girl was “the one”.

Within a couple of minutes one of the other girls said “my friend she like you.”

“Does she?” I said. “That’s great.”

“Please… If you don’t take her go she have to go with the fat man.”

I’ve heard this line and variants of it a million times. The idea is that you’ll feel sorry for and protective towards a girl who probably sleeps with three to five different men a week but who, this month, is low on her bar fine quota. They know farang don’t really have much understanding of the whole bar fine quota situation so a situation is manufactured where you’ll be saving some pretty young girl from a fate worse than death.

The thing is… It doesn’t matter how well you know a particular string of manipulation. It still works. I’d had enough beers not to care too heavily about the meaning of anything. I’d pay the bar fine and be the gentleman.

Her name was… I think her name was Beer… Or was it Bee? Something like that. Once her bar fine was paid she slumped next to me and kissed me on the lips. She tasted like raw alcohol mixed with nicotine and candy.

“I like you. Where you take me go?”

“Where do you want to go?”

She shrugged… “Anywhen.”

The fat man shot me a filthy look. Maybe the story was true for once.

About an hour later we were sitting in some green-lit karaoke bar on Sukhumvit Three Million and Six. She kept asking me for money for this or that song and I kept giving it to her because… Well… I’m just a sweet guy and there’s something about seeing someone happy that works for me.

“I’m going to be sing-star,” she said.

“Really?”

“Yes. Everybody think I’m bullshit but one day everyone buy my CD and cly.”

Once she had the mike she really went for it too. She got deep into the drama of every song. Whether you speak Thai or not you could tell which songs were about heartbreak. Thinking about that all the songs were about heartbreak but she really knew how to double up and act it. She knew how to make the tears fall from her eyes as she missed those impossible notes.

“I like to sing sad song. Life sad.”

I bought a bottle of whisky and found myself a couple of really good Thai friends willing to share a drink and their opinions with me. “Your girlfriend?”

“Not really,” I said.

“She sing very bad. Maybe she good in bed.”

“Who knows.”

At about four thirty the owner of the karaoke place said it was closing time and blamed the police. My Thai friends swore for a while about the police but I kept my mouth shut. There was a short time hotel nearby so we booked in. She went off to be sick in the toilet and I went straight to sleep.

At some point in the middle of the night there was some kind of sex. It was the kind of sex you can have in the middle of the night and deny all knowledge of in the morning if you feel so inclined.

When she woke up she draped herself over me and told me that I was a good man for her. I told her that this was definitely not the case and paid her a reasonable amount of leave-me-alone-forever money.

That sounds bad. I paid her. She was a hooker and I paid her for sex. The end. No more story.

It was just that she shot me this look of total hurt.

And it wasn’t because I was such a good guy or that she loved me. It was just that she wanted out and there was no way for her to get out but by finding some fairly okay-off stupid farang.

I love Bangkok. Anyone who lives in Bangkok and complains about how sad or grim it all is is a fucking idiot. But sometimes… Sometimes that’s how it feels.

Luckily I have this beer in front of me.

© Turkfist. All rights reserved.

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