Pim

I met Pim in one of those road side bars that never seem to do any business. At least not any drinks business. There’s drink in the bar but nobody ever seems to be drinking them. My kinda place. I was on the island of Ko Tao driving some automatic piece of crap that could barely make the hills. I was thirsty so I stopped at this bar. It was just a shack really; just a simple wooden construction on the top of a hill with a view looking down onto the beach. A fridge rumbled in one corner. A transsexual slept on the floor under shade afforded by the wicker style roof. Sleeping off a drunken evening she looked like she needed a shave and to “put her face on”. Now and again she huffed and rolled over. A heavily pregnant tail-less cat glanced up and then fell on its side panting. I took a seat and ordered a beer Singha. It came out warm so I ordered some ice. There was no ice. I drank it warm. I gagged slightly. Perfect.

A Thai girl with long curly hair tied up in a bun came up and occupied the bar stool next to me. I lit a cigarette. She looked over, eyes darting, the way a cat catches a glimpse of a mouse; Restrained stealth. Her shoulders moved up and down as she goes for the kill.

'You want to come to a party tonight?' She asked.

'What kind of party?'

'A swimming pool party.'

'I forgot to pack my speedos,” I tell her.

'You wear speedos, those tight little things?'

'No.'

'Then how you forget to pack them?'

'I didn’t it - it was a joke.'

'Not very funny joke.'

'Speedos aren’t funny either. They offend me.'

'I think you are strange man.'

'Yeah. That’s what they say.'

'Who say?'

'Everybody.'

'Why everybody say like that?'

'Listen baby, when everybody around you is saying that you are strange and you are thinking that you aren’t strange then it doesn’t take a genius to understand that you are the one that is strange and they are the ones that are alright.'

'You ARE a strange man.'

'That was the crux of my comment, baby.'

'Very strange.'

'Yeah. I can live with it. Normality bores me.'

'What is normality?'

'I consider it to be mainly a consensus.'

'What’s a consensus?'

'A general opinion,'

'Do you want to come pool party?'

'Yeah,' I said.

And then silence. I finished the beer and went back to my bungalow. Read a detective novel took a shit and hit the shower. I slipped on a shirt and a pair of jeans. I walked out onto the veranda and waved at a bunch of backpackers. I had a hazy memory of making a move on one of them a couple of nights ago. A Finnish girl with a clear Scandinavian complexion and beautiful teeth. I got knocked back. But no harm in trying, if you keep buying the lottery tickets….

Five hours later we made it to the swimming pool party. About two or three hundred kids dancing around in their underwear drinking buckets of booze and acting like fools. Sort of thing you see in Hollywood teen movies, you know, when the rich kids parents are on vacation and the brats storm the palace.

There were two swimming pools and the beach was close by. Kids were puking and pissing on the beach. Real classy. Real Thailand.

I normally hate parties but this seemed ok watching the amateur twenty something’s drink their chemical whiskey. I was on the vodka. I know what that Mekong shit can do to a man. I’ve lost a few days, a few good friends and a lot of self respect on that stuff. I was feeling sober but knew that tomorrow a hangover was in the post, even on the vodka. These kids were drunk out of their minds but tomorrow they will probably go scuba diving, hand-gliding or mountain biking and not have a touch of a hangover. Me, I only have to look at a beer and the old temples start throbbing. Well, I guess I had my turn of hangover free drinking and they will have their turn of hangovers one day.

Pim was getting a lot of attention from the young Farang blokes. She did look good in a red cocktail dress and hair made up well. I would have been happy to let her go with one of them as she wasn’t mine, but for some reason she wouldn’t leave my side. These Thai chicks get so clingy. All the sport goes out of pulling in the Land of smiles. Like fishing in a lake so full of carp they can hardly move in the water. Just dangle your rod and reel that baby in.

The night turned into early morning. We had a few more drinks and got out of there.

We hit another bar and I managed to shake her whilst she was in the John. I did a runner on the motorbike. For reasons best left alone I have had my fill of Thai girls. I had decided that I wouldn’t go with another Thai girl UNLESS she had a catwalk figure, a European university doctorate degree in medicine, and a family close in with the generals and the politicians that run this country. Or to put it more simply; I had decided NOT to go with Thai girls anymore. Aim too high and you will never hit the target. It’s a philosophy that kept me free and single throughout my early twenties. I thought I had problems then. I later discovered as Joseph Conrad once observed that 'women are the perfect curse'.

With this in mind I returned to the bungalow and shut the door falling into a booze induced sleep. That no-mans land separating drunken tiredness and fatigued wakefulness. The calm before the storm.

An hour or so later a knock at the door. Pim. She had somehow found me. I was too tired to tell her to go away. I let her stay and told her she will not receive any money in the morning and I will not be performing any bedroom magic. She seemed pretty cool with that.

'I don’t need money,' She said 'Only sleeping.'

She took off her dress to reveal a 30 cm scar running from her lower abdomen all the way up to between her breasts. I tried to ignore it. I couldn’t. I looked again. The scar was deep and the stitches were not yet taken out. She had been taken apart and sewn back together again. I tried to look away but I kept returning to her disfigurement. She read my thoughts.

'I know I am ugly. I lost my baby. He died inside whist I was giving birth. They had to cut him out.'

'Jesus,'

Now I have seen the caesarian section before. This doctor must have either been drunk, drugged or unqualified.

'Do you think I am ugly?'

'No baby,' I told her. 'Just go to sleep'

The morning arrived and she left without any mention of money. We had made it a couple of times. But I was doing it out of charity rather than anything else. I felt like she was gonna open up at any given moment. I’ve received my fair share of charity fucks, so I thought what the hell.

I came back to the bar a few months later and asked the ladybody if she had seen Pim.

'Last I heard she married a German.' She told me.

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