Chapter 11 Yaa - The girl in the black dress shimmering beneath the lights

A black dress shimmering beneath the lights she was perfect, short cropped hair, voluptuous smile, there was a subtle intelligence translated through the way she moved and the look in her eyes.  Descending to dance below the stage I concentrated my gaze in the hope of catching her attention.  She was looking out, but she wasn’t looking at me, she had an air of detachment, as if in control of her world and indifferent to the forces around her.  As the slow song marked the end of the night I was stuck, crowds surging towards the exit, I couldn’t see her.  ‘Fuck’ I cursed as I glanced over passing heads, preparing for another night alone as I turned to see her, not leaving, not moving, she was looking straight at me. 

For a moment I couldn’t believe it, almost too perfect, the most beautiful girl in the show and now her eyes staring into mine.

“I was watching you dancing, I’m Paul,” I said as I crossed and stopped in front of her.

She nodded lightly as if following a script and waiting to cut in with the next line.

“I see you already.”

“When?”

“I on the balcony all night watching you dance, my friend think you gay.”

“Ha, and what do you think?”

“Maybe gay.”

“You’re from Chiang Mai?”

“From Bangkok, come Chiang Mai for holiday, not the same as Chiang Mai girl you can see.  People see me they think super star come Chiang Mai.”

It was true, the look, the dress, she paused and restarted.

“Where you go?”

I shrugged.

“I go see my friend in bar, you want play pool with me?”

On the bike I followed her directions, her arms wrapped around me as the breeze rippled across my face.

“You know why I go with you tonight?” she whispered “Because you’re the first man who ask my name.  Many man come to talk with me tonight French man, Israeli, English but you know what they say? They say they want to fuck me.”

I felt a tingle at her thoughtful delivery, my strategy finally delivering the best girl in the room.  Entering the bar she was like some fifties movie star, an air of graceful confidence as she strode forward and floated around greeting friends. I pulled up a stool and watched as male the eyes followed her, they could look all they liked, she was mine tonight.

“You play pool?” she asked.

Joining her at the table I racked the balls.

“I have something to show you,” she said opening her phone to start a video.  A girl being fucked by a horse she wore a look of fascination.

“How can do? So big,” she said.

As it came to an end we began the game and governed by whiskey I was going to win.  Alcohol adding a steely nerve to my game I cleared three balls off the break.    

“If I beat you tonight, I bite your ass.”

“What?”

“If I beat you, I bite your ass, O.K.?”

Nodding, I watched as she took the table with a professional grip, clearing all but one of her balls.

“I think I get to bite your ass,” she said.

Winning the game and taking the next two we moved to a set of leather sofas.

“This Nen, good friend,” she said introducing a frumpy girl in a white dress. “Take care of me when I come Chiang Mai.”

I looked at the glass on the table,“You don’t drink?”

“Drink milk,” Nen replied.

“You known each other long?”

“One year, meet last time I come Chiang Mai. Where you live?”

“Near Chiang Mai University.”

She shook her head.

“Why live so far?”

“Do Muay Thai, stay near Lanna boxing.”

“Oh, you boxer,” she said looking me up and down, “you sure?”

Chatting for another twenty minutes she asked if I was ready to leave and the routine followed as it had with the Yakuza sister, returning to the room, her showering her feet, reappearing to stand playfully at the end of the bed.    

Unzipping the dress she lifted the straps and let it fall to the floor.  No bra she stood in black g-string, a small heart shaped tattoo on either breast.  Climbing to the bed she kissed me gently, sliding my penis from my trousers and closing her lips around it.  For a time slowly caressing, then moving back and removing her underwear and rubbing herself as she sucked a finger.  

“Wait.”

“O.K., not need condom, I not have sex for long time,” she said.

“No wait, have problem, sometimes here hurts,” I said pointing to the end of my penis and repeating the explanation until I decided I’d done everything I could.  It was wonderful, a feeling I’d not felt in four years.  Unused to the intense sensation I came quickly, collapsing and taking her in my arms.

“You not have boyfriend for long time?”

“Have before, but finish five month already.”

“Thai?”

“Boyfriend France, stay together one year, but no good.”

I looked down to her face.

“Live with boyfriend in Bangkok, at first very good, but later have phone call every night, go to another room to speak.  I know it girl, but cannot say.  I smart in many thing, but not in love.”

“This say what?” I asked running my fingers across the tattoos on her breasts.

“Say girl promise, when I split up with boyfriend France I have.  If I go with man now will not be like him.”

Leaving on Sunday she gave me her number and disappeared.  Spending a while showering I grabbed my Good Food Guide and decided to investigate Mexican Food. I’d never really tried it in England other than tinned chilli con carnie and homemade made burritos but the Americans at the camp raved about it. 

Arriving at the Art Cafe outside Thapae Gate the interior had a breezy freshness, lemon décor, green diner style booths. I took one by the window and my thoughts drifted back to the night before.  My ex-wife had been a fantastic lover and when it ended I’d feared I might not have it so good again, but last night had been better.  Not just the sex, but the way we’d met, the casualness of the arrangement, the missing condom.  I thought again about what I was experiencing in Thailand.  When it had only been about The Legion I’d been able to push in a singular direction, and for a while it had been novel, a relief not to have to think about anything, but now I was feeling there were other extremes to test; the quest for the perfect food, the perfect night, riding a motorbike to the limit.  If I imprisoned myself in The Legion it would all disappear, five years locked away, would it be enough? To be the ultimate soldier, was that really what I wanted?   

My first experience of a restaurant burrito was satisfying, the contrast between the chilli and the cool sour cream delighting my appetite, the bread soaking up the remnants of the previous night’s whisky I finished and rode to an internet café reading an e-mail from my best friend Stuart. 

‘Sounds like your having a fantastic time buddy, as you’ve probably gathered life here hasn’t changed.  Just started a new job working for a company selling log cabins, it’s a marketing, no idea what I’m doing.  Olly’s just come back from doing his fitness test for The Marines.  Spent three days in Exeter and passed; now waiting for his enlistment date.  As for footie, Liverpool still awful, Benitez has to go.  I told you he wasn’t good enough, another Houllier.’

I hadn’t made a single call home since arriving, the occasional e-mail, but other than that I’d been incognito.  It was the way I liked it, cutting myself off, I never carried a phone, the idea of being in reach wasn’t the way I wanted it.  The e-mails I did receive bearing out my suspicion life at home moved happily without me. I was better here, they were better there.  Finishing up a reply I took Yaa’s number and called from the in-house phone. 

“Helloa”

“Yaa, it’s Paul.”

“Helloa.”

“Yaa, it’s Paul.”

For a moment I thought she’d hang up.

“Paula, oh Paula I not think you call me, oh that’s good.”

We arranged to meet outside McDonald’s on Monday night. 

Back in my room I lay in bed gazing at the ceiling, I wasn’t lonely anymore but thinking about another week of training my enthusiasm had evaporated.  It had become like my jobs, every day moving through mindless routines.  No matter how hard you pushed, always able to push harder.  It was like the biblical story of pushing the rock up the mountain only to watch it tumble down and start again.  Some days I wanted to prove myself, to show the trainers what I could do, but more often than not I was just feeling the need to keep the discipline, hold on until I was clear about what I was going to do. 

Something was keeping me in Thailand, but it didn’t seem to be the plan anymore.  It was feeling connected, every one of my antennas finding a place to connect; new people, new language, the place, time to read.  If only I could find a way to stay in a place like this I thought.  Stay in a place where I feel alive but there was the meaning, the contribution I wanted to make with my life, how could I make that in a place like Thailand?

I pulled out my diary reviewing the ticks against the calendar and the itemized list of expenses, still over three and a half thousand in the bank I asked myself again ‘Do I really want The Legion? Want it like the fighters want the fight?’.  I recalled a line Meryl Streep delivered to Robert Redford in the movie Out Of Africa ‘I used to think there was nothing you wanted, but that’s not it, is it? You want it all’. And I did, I wanted to see life whole, to feel its extremes.  That’s why I’d studied philosophy, why I’d read, why I travelled travelled, an upward spiral towards the best a life could offer.  If I couldn’t have it I’d rather be dead.  If I could only have it for a short time, I’d rather have it and be gone.  It was the reason I couldn’t join The Legion.

‘So, where can I go?’ I asked myself.  Home didn’t seem like the answer, every one I knew seemed to have become their job and I knew there wasn’t a job for me.  I saw why it was important, all doing our bit to maintain our world's but everyone seemed so lost. Top to bottom people moving in a system with only a vague comprehension of where it was taking them.  It was possible to go through a whole life like that, taking orders, towing the line.  In my first job I’d chased status, but now work brought time to do another type of work, a type of most people didn’t recognise - the perfection of a life. 

Flying to Hong Kong a couple of months before I’d read about a property developer who’d described work as I’d thought it should be ‘When I get up in the morning I’m not going to work, I’m doing what I love’.  Being passionate about what you were doing seemed to be the key, but for me that had to mean doing something meaningful.  So many jobs were about turning cogs, selling people things they didn’t need, I wanted to work on the system.  Give people a way of valuing the things which couldn’t be measured, time with friends, time in coffee shops.  That’s what I’d been trying to do, but it had become too much, the idea of The Legion a break until I found an outlet for my ideas and now I was ready to return.