Farang Nightmare, Asian Dream

I wanted to stay in bed for another half an hour but Stephanie was already downstairs. I could hear her banging around in the kitchen. It was not the cheerful clattering of a happy housewife. It was the bad tempered banging of a premenstrual female. A sure sign that she was in a bad mood again. Or was it the same bad mood she had been in yesterday. These days it was hard to tell where one bad mood ended and the next one began. I knew it would only get worse. The longer I stayed in bed, the more likely it was that some innocent piece of crockery would get smashed to smithereens as her bad mood invariably gave way to outright rage for no apparent reason. I hated Sundays.

She used to be such good fun. We used to spend Sunday mornings in bed together. That hadn’t happened for years. I don’t know what went wrong. Ever since we got married it seemed, our relationship had gradually deteriorated. Now, we just tolerated each other and we didn’t do it very well most of the time.

I swung my legs over the side of the bed and sat there for a moment. I felt the knocks on Sunday mornings much more than I used to. Today’s highlights were a set of stud marks down my inner thigh and my right eyebrow felt a bit swollen. My knees were always stiff in the mornings. I should quit really before I did myself any permanent damage. Thirty was about the right age to pack it in I reckoned. I could squeeze out one more season then call it a day. I was delaying the decision as long as possible because as long as I played rugby I had a legitimate excuse to get away from my little pit viper, at least most Saturdays and one evening in the week for training.

I pulled on my jeans and hobbled down the stairs. Stephanie was standing at he sink. She appeared to be trying to drown a saucepan.

“Good morning my little fun bunny, any coffee?” I chirped.

“Get it yourself,” she barked, “Can’t you see I’m busy.”

Ah well, I sighed to myself at the thought of facing another day of wedded bliss. I shook the kettle. It was empty but I wasn’t going to interrupt the saucepan drowning session to fill it. There was more than a chance that she’d swing round and bash me over the head with the damned thing if I wandered within range. It wouldn’t be the first time.

“I’ll make some toast,” I offered. “Do you want some?”

“There’s no bread” she growled, as if that was my fault too.

As sure as eggs are eggs, my beloved would not be happy until she had provoked a fight but I would try to delay the inevitable for as long as possible. I took the opportunity to get away from the danger zone and said cheerily, “OK, I’ll walk down to the shop and get some.” A walk to the shop would get my creaking knees moving again but more importantly would put some distance between me and the wife-from-hell if only temporarily.

“Take the dog with you” she snapped. “He hasn’t been out for two days.”

Milford was our four year old Golden Retriever. He had been my wedding present to Stephanie. Although she loved him to bits at first, she had soon tired of him as she did with most things. She pretty much ignored him these days. It was me who walked Milford every morning before work and every night before bed. It was me who bought his food and me who fed him. As a result, Milford liked me best and in truth, life with Stephanie could get so bloody difficult sometimes, I rather liked using Milford as an excuse to get out of the house for a while. He had been walked yesterday morning in fact so the ‘he hasn’t been out for two days’ comment was inaccurate but not worth contesting. I had not walked him last night though because I had come home rather late and slightly inebriated after a particularly fierce local derby match. C’est la vie.  

I put my coat on and signaled Milford to come. I never had to call him twice and off we went.

It was one of those cold, dark January days. The sky was a menacing grey and tiny flakes of snow were being blown around in a very cold wind. I zipped up my coat and made off in the direction of our little neighbourhood convenience store. To walk there and back usually took about an hour.

As we walked my thoughts turned inwards. Why was life such a frigging drag? What had I done to deserve this she devil for a wife? I had tried so hard. I had worked my balls off trying to give her everything she wanted only to find that once she had it, she wanted something else. The house repayments were crippling me and why the frigging hell she needed that bloody great Volvo was beyond me. Now she was on about getting an au pare if you please. The lazy cow. Thank Christ we didn’t have any kids.

Tomorrow morning, being Monday meant that I would be up at five-thirty and on the cattle train to the city before seven. I had a key meeting scheduled for nine and my presentation was not finished yet. I knew full well that if I tried to finish it at home Stephanie would see that as some kind of personal snub and throw yet another tantrum. I resigned myself to getting up half an hour earlier so I could finish it on the train into town. The things I had to do to keep the peace!

One of these days she was going to push me too far and I was going to bolt.

“Teerak…..teerak. Are you OK. You’re talking in your sleep”.

I opened my eyes. Lek’s pretty oriental face came into focus. She was leaning over me, her brow slightly creased with concern. I felt the reassuring heat of the tropical night envelope me as I woke and the tension and stress in my body evaporated as reality took over. With huge relief, I realised that I was safely at home in Bangkok.

Lek kissed my face softly. My hand stroked her long black hair as if to confirm she was really there. She was. I pulled her closer. She wrapped herself around me and rested her head on my shoulder.

“Teerak, you OK now? I think you dream something bad” she whispered.

“Dream something bad?!” Jesus, that didn’t begin to cover it. That was a full blown nightmare! Lek kissed my neck and squeezed me gently. I squeezed her back.

“It’s OK now” she purred. “You have very bad dream, that’s all”.

Union Hill

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