Even Thai Girls Cry

by J. F. Gump

  Mike found an ad in the Pattaya Mail newspaper and called Min Travel. He made reservations at the Novotel Lotus for two nights and for one night at the Amari Airport Hotel. He packed the rest of his things and talked to Jem, the condo manager. She would hold his room for two or three weeks. If he didn’t come back by then, she could make no promises.

  At ten o’clock, Mike went to the bank and got a lot of extra money on his Visa card. He paid his condo bills, then he sat in his room and waited for Math.

  ***************

  Math’s flight left Phitsanulok that same morning at eight forty-five. She hadn’t slept all night. She was worried about her sister’s health and she was consumed with Mike’s words, “I have some bad news.” It was driving her crazy. What could he be talking about? Maybe he was going to tell her he didn’t love her and that she would have to go away.

  She tried to sleep on the plane, but the monkey-man dreams kept entering her thoughts. Maybe Mike was sick and dying or something. The idea terrified her. She was exhausted, but her thoughts of the monkey-man kept her awake. By the time she arrived at the Bangkok airport, she was sure Mike was dying.

  She collected her suitcase from baggage claim at ten thirty. She had enough money left, so she hired a taxi to drive her straight to Pattaya instead of taking the bus. She didn’t want to waste a single minute. As she rode, she prayed everything was okay with Mike.

  She arrived in Pattaya at two o’clock in the afternoon. Mike had asked her to call when she arrived, but she didn’t. Instead, she had the taxi take her directly to his condo. No one was at the front desk when she arrived. The manager was in her office and didn’t notice Math as she walked to the elevator.

  She rode to Mike’s floor and knocked on his door. When he opened it, she rushed inside and pulled him close to her. “Oh, Mike, I missed you so much. Please, just hold me for a minute.” And he did.

  After a moment, she loosened her hug, stepped away, and stared at him, hands on hips. “Okay, so what is this terrible problem you told me about?” She tried to sound glib, but failed.

  “I am so happy you are here with me,” Mike said smiling. “And I missed you very much, too.”

  “You did not answer my question,” she said, waiting. The seconds ticked past.

  His false smile faded. His voice was monotone as he answered, “I am going home in three days.”

  Math felt like she had just been hit with a sledgehammer. She didn’t say anything in return. She just stood and stared, numb, disbelieving. She could feel her knees weakening. Slowly, she sank to a kneeling position and cried. Mike sat on the floor beside her and held her tight. They cried together.

  When no more tears would come, they lay on the bed and talked. Math told Mike all about how Jabal and Sadayu had died. She told him about the funeral and the monk. Finally, she told him about Sawat, and what had happened to Nuang.

  Then she did not talk for a long time, but she wouldn’t let Mike talk either. Every time he started to speak, she would press her fingers to his lips. At last, after many minutes of silence had passed, she told Mike about her agreement with Sawat, why he had decided not to press charges against her. She told him what Sawat had done to her at her home. Lastly, she explained why Sawat had beat Nuang.

  When she finished talking, she asked, “Do you hate me?”

  “No, I could never hate you, Math,” he answered honestly.

  “Can you forgive me?”

  Mike thought of what he had done with Lek while Math was at the funeral. “There is nothing to forgive,” he said. His eyes avoided hers. “You have done nothing wrong. Nothing compared to what I have done.”

  “I don’t understand what you mean,” she said. “Can you say it again?”

  “I have betrayed you, Math,” he answered. “I have made love with another woman while you were gone.”

  He waited for her response, but she said nothing. After a moment he told her about Lek. He told her everything down to the smallest detail. When he finished speaking, he looked at her and asked, “Can you forgive me, Math?”

  She answered very slowly, as if reciting something she had read or heard before. “There can be no love without forgiveness. For if there is love without forgiveness, then it is not a true love.” She turned and kissed him ever so gently on the lips. “Yes, I can forgive you, because I love you truly.”

  Mike thought he had no more tears left in him, but he was wrong. He held onto Math and cried heavily at her forgiveness. Later, he called for a taxi.

  The ride to Bangkok and the two days that followed were quietly somber. They talked a lot but said very little. They didn’t speak of his leaving, or if he would ever return. Math told him about her monkey-man dreams and he laughed at her. The dreams, he said, meant nothing.

  Math tried the home pregnancy test and the results were positive. But the directions said there could be false indications and that two positive tests were required to be 100% sure. She wasn’t worried. She would try again in a couple of days. They made love only twice, but it was enough. Saturday morning came with surprising swiftness.

  At the airport, Mike promised to call her when he got home. He made her promise she wouldn’t go to Phitsanulok. Math agreed and said she would go to her sister’s house in Chiang Mai. Also, she promised she would not cry when he left. Mike waited until the last possible moment before stepping through the doorway into Immigration Control.

  Once he was out of sight, Math was overcome by a feeling of complete emptiness. She sat on a bench in the airport and cried until she was physically sick. When she stopped vomiting, she went to the domestic terminal and bought a ticket to Chiang Mai.

  Chapter 19

  Thirty minutes after exiting Immigration Control, Mike’s flight departed. As usual, the plane was packed. They hadn’t even reached cruising altitude and the air in the cabin was already bone-dry. Mike supposed that was the airlines method of keeping body odors to a minimum, but it was hell on his sinuses.

  Flying coach was not his first choice but all of the business class seats were already booked. Luckily, he managed to get an aisle seat. With little else to do, he whiled away the time thinking.

  He had been working in Thailand for nearly three years. His company had been contracted to expand an oil refinery. It was a cake job and everything had been going as planned. Now, it was all falling apart. First the Thai economy had gone bust and then the oil market nose-dived; the banks had pulled in their claws. The project was dying from lack of funding. No, it wasn’t dying; it was already dead. It was too bad. Under other circumstances, the expansion would have made the owners a lot of money.

  His thoughts drifted to Math. How long had he known her. Five months? Six? He counted forward from the day he met her. It was easy to remember that day; not because it was the day he had met her, but because that day had been the grand opening of a fancy new restaurant in Pattaya. Mike had treated Lek, Toy, and Toy’s boyfriend, Eduardo, to dinner that night. He had still been vying for Lek’s attention then. He had met Math that night by pure accident. Funny how things work sometimes, he thought.

  He recounted the time. He could hardly believe it was less than four months. He felt like he had known her all his life. So much had happened in those few months that it didn’t seem possible. The most impossible thing of all was that he had fallen head over heels in love with her.

  You are stupid, he chided himself silently. What do you really know about her? Not a whole lot, he concluded. At least nothing he could explain to anyone. He could imagine himself saying, “I have fallen in love with a girl who ran away from home at sixteen and wanted to be a bar-girl.” Or how about, “The girl I love shot her ex-fiancé with a pistol only twice because she missed on the third shot.” It seemed he didn’t know a whole lot about her that was good. Then why did he love her? Maybe he didn’t. Maybe he was just lonely, as she had once said, or maybe he was simply caught
up in a fragile time of his life. Then again, maybe he really did love her. He couldn’t decide. To him, Math and his feelings for her were enigmas he couldn’t explain. He fell asleep and dreamed of Math.

  Chapter 20

  While waiting for her own flight, Math watched the outgoing planes, wondering which one was Mike’s. She watched and wondered until it was time for her to board.

  Her flight to Chiang Mai was only the third airplane ride of her life and it was not a good one. The plane flew into a violent storm. As big as the plane was, it still jumped and bucked like a wild water buffalo. She was embarrassed when she became extremely nauseated. She was glad the airlines had been thoughtful enough to put air sickness bags in the seat pouch with the magazines.

  She was still queasy when she stepped off the plane in Chiang Mai. Instead of collecting her suitcase at the baggage pickup, she went directly to the women’s toilet, washed her face with cold water, then sat in a stall until she felt better.

  When she went to the baggage carousel, her suitcase was nowhere to be found. Apprehension gripped at her, but she didn’t panic. Probably an employee had picked it up, thinking it was not going to be claimed. Or maybe it had been stolen. She tried to push that thought aside but could not. She went to the airline counter.

  “Kaw thort ka, excuse me.” Math said very polite, very calm. She didn’t want the lady behind the counter to know how worried she was.

  “Sawasdee ka, good morning,” the woman replied, just as polite. “May I help you?”

  “I have lost my luggage,” Math replied. “I was late getting to the baggage claim. When I arrived, my suitcase was not there. I am afraid it has been lost.”

  The lady smiled comfortingly. “I am sure it was picked up by one of the attendants as forgotten baggage, or it was put on the wrong flight by mistake. We can check in the separated baggage area. If it’s not there, it will probably show up later today or tomorrow.”

  The lady led the way and Math followed. The lost baggage room was filled with an incredible mixture of boxes, bags, and suitcases. Math searched through them all. Her suitcase wasn’t there.

  Now she panicked. Almost everything she owned was in that suitcase. Her clothes, her shoes, her make-up, her stomach medication, and the charger for her handy. More than just the things she needed for Chiang Mai; it was everything she needed for anywhere. Math was on the verge of tears as she explained to the airline lady how badly she needed her bag.

  The woman was sympathetic and promised she would do everything possible to find her luggage. She asked Math for a number where she could be reached when they located her suitcase. Math started to give the lady the number for her handy then realized that without the charger, the cell phone could be dead by tomorrow, if not sooner. She said she had no phone number and asked if she could call the airlines instead. The lady gave her a business card and said to call later. The lady seemed sure her baggage had probably been left in Bangkok and they would have it in Chiang Mai by that evening or tomorrow at the latest. Math thanked the lady and promised to call. As she walked through the airport, she wondered if her bad luck would ever stop.

  Outside the terminal, Math took a taxi to her sister’s house. As the taxi moved its way across town, she had the discomforting thought that maybe Nuang had not come home yet. Surely she would have. It had been almost a week since she had left her sister at the temple. On the other hand, Sawat had beat Nuang very severely. She remembered hoping at the time that Nuang didn’t have any broken bones in her face. No, Nuang would be home, she was sure of it. Still, she wished she had called Nuang before she left Bangkok.

  No one was home when Math arrived. She asked some of the neighbors if they had seen Nuang. One woman had seen Surat as recent as yesterday, but no one had seen Nuang for several days. Math was worried. Nuang might be in the hospital for all she knew. But there was no way for her to know for sure. The monkey-man dream entered her mind. She pushed it away. She prayed that her sister was okay.

  Math stood in front of Nuang’s house, fretting over what she should do next. She could wait for Surat to come home, but she didn’t feel comfortable staying at his house with him if Nuang wasn’t there. She trusted Surat and wasn’t afraid anything would happen, but she was sure the neighbors would talk. Gossiping was the one thing Thai people liked to do more than eat. Nuang would be embarrassed if Math stayed in their house alone with her husband.

  She decided to get a hotel room for the night and worry about what to do later. Maybe Nuang would be home tomorrow, and maybe her suitcase would show up and she would have clean clothes to wear. She flagged down a motorcycle-taxi and asked the driver if he could take her to the nearest and cheapest hotel. Mike had given her money before he left, so paying for the hotel would not be a problem. Still, she didn’t want to waste it. If Mike never came back to Thailand, the money would have to last her until she could find a job. Mike had given her as much as she could make in two months, but it would disappear quickly if she wasn’t careful how she spent it.

  The hotel turned out to be a dump, but it was cheap and within walking distance of Nuang’s house. The hotel clerk made her pay in advance for the night. The room was hot and it had no air conditioning; just a single ceiling fan above the bed. There was a TV, but it only had sound and no picture. There was no telephone.

  Well, she sighed, surveying her home for the night, at least it would be better than sleeping in an airport or a bus terminal. She took a quick shower, then put the same clothes back on. She hadn’t eaten since early in the morning and she was hungry. She decided to go out for some dinner. Maybe the room would be cooler by the time she returned. She checked her cell phone, the battery was still charged. She clipped it back onto her waistband and left the hotel.

  Math found a street-side restaurant and ordered her favorite - Thai noodle soup with beef and chicken. She spiced it up with sugar, mild fish sauce, and a generous helping of ground, red-hot peppers. When Mike had heard about her ulcers, he had made her stop eating spicy foods. She knew the hot peppers would not be good for her ulcers, but Mike wasn’t here to make her feel guilty. Without the peppers, her favorite soup was not the same. After she had finished eating, she waited for the meal to do something nasty to her stomach. Nothing happened. Maybe Mike was wrong about the hot peppers being bad for her.

  Math called the airlines from her handy, but her suitcase had not yet been found. The man who answered the phone said it was early and that she should try again later.

  It was still daylight and Math knew the room could not have cooled down much, if any. She decided to walk to the shopping center located not far away. It would pass the time and it would be cooler there than on the street or in the hotel. She looked at almost everything in the store but didn’t buy anything. By the time she looked at her watch again, two hours had passed.

  Outside, darkness had fallen. Math started back toward the hotel. The street was mostly deserted, and she didn’t feel safe. A Thai lady walking alone at night was not a good idea, especially in a strange city. As much as she hated to spend the money, she flagged down a regular taxi to take her back to the hotel.

  She called the airlines again. This time she was informed that the lost baggage department had closed for the day and that she should call back in the morning. “Damn it,” she said to herself in the same tone that Mike used.

  The room was cooler than before, but not much. She removed her blouse and inspected the armpits with her nose. They smelled awful. If she had to wear the clothes another day, she knew she would truly smell like a farang, especially without her deodorant to help hide the odor. She washed the armpits of her blouse as best as she could in the bathroom sink. It helped, but she could still smell the sour stench.

  Later, she took a long shower. At least she would smell clean for the night. She tuned the TV to a station playing music and then lay down on the bed with the overhead fan blowing air on her. In ten minutes she wa
s asleep.

  Chapter 21

  Mike woke up as his flight was preparing to land in Tokyo. It dawned on him that he hadn’t called to tell Susan he was coming home. He wasn’t sure if was by pure forgetfulness, or if he had subconsciously forgotten on purpose. Whichever it was, he didn’t care.

  Many of the men who worked in Thailand got very excited at the thought of going home. Mike couldn’t understand why. He only got depressed whenever he thought about going home. He had not even gone home this past Christmas. He had called and sent presents, but he hadn’t gone home. He used the excuse that it would screw up his tax break. It wasn’t true, but he didn’t care. Math had been living with him then and he hadn’t wanted to leave her. He felt only mildly guilty at his decision.

  On the flight from Tokyo, he toyed with the idea of getting a motel room and not going home at all. By the time he reached Detroit, he had decided the motel idea was pretty stupid. He considered calling Susan during his layover, but he never did.

  At the Pittsburgh airport he rented a car and drove to his house. It was snowing, but the streets were mostly clear. He hadn’t driven a car in several months and now here he was driving in the snow on the hilly streets of Pittsburgh. He was nervous as hell. He hit a few slick spots but arrived home without incident. He parked on the street.

  It was Mike’s Saturday night, but twelve hours away, in Thailand, it was already Sunday morning. His body couldn’t decide what time it was. Traveling west to east always played total hell with his internal clock.

  He rang the doorbell for several minutes but no one answered. It was mid February, the snow was blowing, and he didn’t have a coat. He was freezing. He unzipped his suitcase in the trunk of the car and rooted around until he found his home-side key ring. Shivering, he tried the keys one by one. He had almost decided that Susan had changed the lock, when the last key opened the door.