But this man’s Caucasian, an undernourished hippie with stringy brown hair and an unkempt goatee. How long has he been in this part of the world? To my surprise, Mario waves at him. They’d seen each other earlier, copping at the house by the river. This guy was coming out as Mario was going in. I ask where he’s from. “North America,” he says. Mario tells me he’s Canadian, but I think he’s really from Australia. We’re trying to be cool and not ask questions, but Mario says the guy has made this trip many times before, and there are things I want to know. “How long is it to Bangkok?” I ask, for starters.
“About ten hours,” he says.
Ten hours? Ten hours in a Thai bus with five ounces of heroin hanging out my ass? The thought stones me to silence.
The bus pulls up nearly full, no foreigners. The locals eye us suspiciously as we make our way to the rear. Mary Motion and I take seats together; Mario drops into another on the opposite side of the aisle, in front of the Canadian, who settles himself by a window and watches the street. The seats are covered in plastic, the kind you see in houses where the furniture’s not paid for. They’re built for Thai comfort, too short and narrow for any of us.
As we pull away from the curb, an expressionless stewardess in tight saffron cotton slacks and a drab yellow blouse starts passing out trays with “dinner”—a fried chicken leg that must have been cooked about a decade ago, a sprig of parsley, a carrot stick, and a hard, very hard, roll. “Guess we got on the no-frills run,” Mary surmises. I wave the stewardess past. She seems to take this as a personal affront. She has none of Taffy’s robust flair; she could be one of my customers after a bad day on the street. She could be one of us, a little farther down the road.
A few minutes later she lurches down the aisle with a tray of drinks: orange juice in plastic containers. To soften her up, I take one but don’t drink it. “Good thing we ate before we came,” I say to Mary.
She looks pale. Her mouth twists. She says, “I don’t think I’ll ever like food again.”
The driver turns on a TV monitor attached by a chain to the ceiling at the top of the aisle. “Oh, good,” Mary says. “Entertainment.”
A kung-fu movie begins. It has Thai subtitles and consists of almost constant shouts, grunts, and screams at earsplitting volume. The villains all appear to be women. Women who die early in the film show up again later, in different costume, only to get killed again, more brutally, but still they won’t stay dead. When this movie ends another begins, all the same people, same plot, new weapons. This one’s even louder and more vicious than the first. Blood flows every few frames. I can’t believe no one else minds, but a number of our fellow travelers are dead asleep. I try to read but it’s hopeless, I can’t tune out the sound of mortal combat. I look past Mary out the window. Can’t see a thing. I shift in my seat; my arms stick to the plastic, and I’m cold—the air-conditioning’s on full. Then the bus slows and pulls off the road into an outdoor camp kitchen set under a large and splintery teakwood pavilion. The driver turns off the TV and shouts something in Thai. We have to get off. From the window we can see waiting military police. Has there been another coup, or are we in a lot of bad trouble? I look at Mario, who’s staring wide-eyed at the Canadian. “Just a rest stop,” he says. “Have some tea.”
I pull myself together, suck in my abdomen, tighten my ass. I don’t want to have any accidents. Outside, the driver and the hostess direct us to long picnic tables, where the other passengers are already sitting down to bowls of steamed rice and green tea. The air is almost as sticky as the plastic seats in the bus but now I don’t care; at least my goosebumps are disappearing. We file silently past the soldiers, who board the bus as soon as we’re all at the tables. We pantomime gratitude for the meal. They’re watching us, everyone is. We stick out like sore thumbs. There’s only one reason Westerners like us would put themselves through this torture, and everyone knows what it is. “How on earth could anyone think this is the safe way out?” I ask Mario. He can’t even speak, he’s so scared. “Really,” says Mary Motion.
Fifteen minutes pass before the soldiers emerge from the bus. Now they’re checking over the baggage compartment. I look for a bathroom. It’s an outdoor latrine. In total darkness I push the last ounce back up inside me but it still doesn’t go very far. I want a cup of coffee pretty bad but I don’t dare have one. When I leave the latrine, the others are already seated in the bus.
I ask the driver if he’ll turn down the volume, I want to get some shut-eye. He nods and closes the door. We’ve taken on new passengers here; there isn’t a single empty seat. I sink miserably back into mine. Mary says she’s so tired she thinks she can fall asleep. “Me, too,” I say, and a few minutes later I start to drift off, but suddenly the sound-track volume increases again and soon it’s back to the level it had been before. I catch the Canadian’s eye. “How much farther is it?” I ask.
“Relax,” he says. “We’re not even halfway there.”
We stop two more times during the night. The other roadside rests aren’t as grand as the first—one is barely more than an oversize shack—and all they serve is tea. As day breaks I begin to see road signs to Bangkok. Still the TV blares kung-fu. I can’t wait to get off. I can’t wait. When we pull into the city, twelve hours have gone by, it’s nine a.m. I think only of the sample nesting in my cunt.
The Bangkok air hits us like a wall of mud. This has got to be the most inhospitable place in the world; New York is a cool mountain stream by comparison. We get our bags and tumble into a waiting cab, move out into the worst rush-hour traffic I’ve ever seen. The world could easily be coming to an end. And we still have to get out of the country.
An hour later we’re no nearer our hotel than when we started. We seem to be driving in circles. The driver says he’s looking for the quickest route. Eventually, he finds one.
At the hotel we book rooms for half a day and go upstairs to pull ourselves together. The second the door closes behind me I’m reaching for the sample. In no time I have powder in my nose. I leave the hotel refreshed.
The airport terminal now resembles a department-store bargain basement on a luggage-sale day, teeming with people as anxious to leave as we are. Bags lie all over the floor in long snaking lines. We sit on ours and wait for an inspector to check them through.
The agent at the customs desk checks the passports of two English boys in front of me and gives them a careful once-over. He tells them to remove their sunglasses. Uh-oh. I hadn’t intended to get high before plane time, but that bus trip … that air … the perspiring crowds. I take off my shades and hold my breath. If Uncle Willie could get out of Nazi Germany, I reason, I ought to get through a Thai airport. It’s in my genes.
The agent questions the English boys about where they’ve been and what they’ve been doing. With some reluctance, he lets them pass—providing they never return in his lifetime. I hand over my passport. The agent doesn’t even look at the date. He barely looks at me. In a minute, I’m on my way to the gate. Mario and Mary are right behind me.
At the gate the buzzer sounds again, and again I have to empty my bag, let the inspectors examine the penknife. They judge it to be harmless. But as we enter the boarding area, an airline official pulls us aside and my heart moves into my throat. “Excuse me,” he says, “but can you wait here a minute? There seems to be a mixup on the tickets.” He moves away, our boarding passes clutched in his hand.
“This is nerve-racking, isn’t it?” I say.
“I wish you’d get rid of that knife,” Mary pouts.
I insist I need it for the dope. She doesn’t answer. We’re pretty tired of each other by now, and we still have ten thousand miles to go.
Two minutes before takeoff the airline attendant returns and hands us new tickets. We’ve been moved from coach to first-class. “Sorry for the delay,” he says.
It doesn’t take long to figure out what the problem was. This is a British-owned airline, a class-conscious company if ever one was. Everyone in c
oach is Indian or Pakistani or Chinese; with few exceptions, everyone holding first-class tickets is Caucasian. It’s a rotten situation to be party to. On the other hand, it’s nice to have a comfy seat and eat on china with heavy silver service. We eat with gusto. We’re going to be in Singapore two days, time enough to shit and put all the stuff back where it came from. I drink two cups of coffee and smile all the way down to the ground.
The Singapore airport is the world’s easiest place for a smuggler. They seem really glad to have you in their country. They don’t look at your bags or your passport, they wave you on through. And Singapore itself looks a lot like Beverly Hills without the Spanish influence. The hotel our travel agent picked for us is a four-star job on a hill covered in oleander, jasmine, honeysuckle, and palm. After Bangkok, this is truly Shangri-la.
Mary Motion and I share a room again. It’s enormous, with a fully stocked bar and a view of half the island. I don’t feel the least bit tired now. I smoke a few lines and climb into the tub for a soak, first removing two of the ounces. The other three are deep within the recesses of my body, and I try to push these two up to meet them, but no go.
“Yo, Mario!” I call through the door. We have connecting rooms. When the door swings back I hold out one of the ounces, put an inquiring look on my face.
“No problem,” he says. More service with a smile. I hate that grin of his, that honeymoon leer, I envy it, and I don’t know what I’d do without it. The other ounce I poke back wherever it’ll ride and we go out in search of the Hotel Raffles.
Somehow, we never get out of the cab. This has less to do with the effects of the junk than it does the neighborhood, which has gone to seed. Raffles’ striped awnings sag, its rattan porch furniture looks ragged. I figure we’ll come back in the evening when the place is sure to have a little more romance. Right now it looks abandoned. I ask the cabdriver to circle it. I wonder which of these chairs was Mr. Maugham’s? Did he sit there, night after night, his Singapore Sling perched on the rattan arm, listening to the characters who would people his stories of the East? We circle again. Was he here with Noël Coward? The conversation must have dazzled. Or were they just cruising the boys drifting by, eating lotus flowers? No one is as interested in this as I am. “But what about the Singapore Slings?” I point out. “We can’t leave without having at least one.”
“I’m tired,” Mario says. “We can come back later.”
“Yeah.” Mary nods. “Let’s get the shopping in before the stores close.”
We drive aimlessly around town awhile, marveling at the clean streets and the neon-lit vertical malls. Eventually we go inside one, where I buy a duty-free camera and some film. I haven’t been using the Polaroid much. The only pictures I’ve taken feature landscapes and statues, not us. I’m not keeping a diary or sending postcards, either. I don’t want anyone knowing we’ve been here. I realize I’m happiest staying in my room, smoking my dope, pouring my drinks, and taking in the view. I can just about see Raffles from the hotel window, if I lean out far enough. I stretch out on the chaise. Finally, finally: I’m on vacation. At last, I’m away from my life.
I sleep ten hours, dead to the world. When I’m up, we get together to discuss: should we let the passports go? Mario thinks it’s stupid but I want to cover my tracks. It’s not so bad staying here. On the other hand, I really want to go. We go. Out comes the K-Y and in go the ounces one more time. I’m better at this now, they slide right up. Before I think about them again, we’re in Tokyo.
There seem to be thousands of people waiting at the Tokyo quarantine. We have to get a health stamp before we can change planes. We stay in line two hours, then wander through the terminal. That evil ounce is threatening to escape me again. On the plane I have to go into the head to fix it half a dozen times.
The flight east is shorter, but long enough for me to think up a few stories to tell customs. I’m nervous about my passport. I’m nervous about the dope. When the stewardess announces our approach to JFK, I go in the bathroom one last time.
We go through separate lines at customs. As I set my bags on the counter, I see Mary Motion and Mario sail out the door to waiting taxis. A female agent looks carefully through the pages of my passport. I smile at her. She doesn’t smile back. “You’ve been in Bangkok?” she inquires.
“Yes,” I say, ready for what comes next. “Dreadful place it is, too.”
“I see you were only in Bangkok a few days. May I ask why you were there?”
“Vacation,” I say. Just be yourself, I think. Be honest and they won’t see through you.
“That’s a long way to go for a few days’ vacation,” she says.
“Well, it wasn’t just a vacation,” I admit. The agent is searching my face. “I’m a writer,” I tell her. “I had this idea to write a guidebook for women traveling alone. A lot of women do, you know. Bangkok was my first stop.”
“Why Bangkok?”
“I got a deal on the ticket,” I explain. “See?” I show her the price. “They were having a sale.”
“Do you often travel alone?”
“Not always. Well, yeah. I guess so.”
“That’s a pretty useful idea,” the woman says. “A guide for women travelers.”
“Well, it’s a big world out there. There are lots of places to see.”
She pages through my passport again. “I hear Bangkok is, well, a pretty wild place, if you know what I mean.”
“It’s horrid,” I say. “Not wild. Unless you mean environmentally. The air stinks, the food stinks, and the hotels are completely awful.” Isn’t this enough now? Can’t I go?
“Did you go anywhere in Thailand other than Bangkok?”
“No, I hated it too much. It made me sick. The food made me sick, the air made me sick, and frankly, some of the people made me sick, too. It’s really not a place for women,” I conclude. “It’s all sleazy sex clubs, massage parlors, and cheap cheap clothes. I couldn’t wait to get out of there.”
“I believe you.” She puts the passport down. “Did you acquire anything while you were in Thailand?”
“Just a few trinkets,” I say. “Nothing of value.”
“Open your bags, please.”
She shuffles through them, looks at the passport again. I can see she’s thinking pretty hard, but I go on explaining what everything is, the lead elephants and the linen shirts. I keep the sapphires hidden but show her the camera and the receipt.
“You seem kind of nervous,” she says. “Why are you nervous?”
“I’m not nervous,” I say, forcing a laugh. “I just have to go to the bathroom.”
She raises an eyebrow and seems to catch the eye of someone behind me, someone in uniform no doubt. “Is there a publisher for your book?”
“Not yet,” I say, “but soon.”
“How do you pay for trips like this?”
I’m not prepared for this question. “This one was a gift from my dad,” I say.
“Sorry your trip didn’t work out the way you wanted,” she says then. “Welcome home.”
I could expel the ounce right there. “Good to be back!” I say happily and fly out the door.
From the cab the city skyline looks like the cradle of love, but it fills me with dread. I haven’t told Kit when to expect me. I thought it would be safer if she didn’t know. “Call you from the airport,” I’d said, but there hasn’t been time. I find myself hoping she won’t be home when I get there. I have a feeling I won’t want to stay.
GLAD TO BE BACK
Pack your bags,” I say when Kit opens the door. She looks dressed for combat. “Hurry. We’re leaving town.” I head for the bathroom.
“Why, what’s happened?” she says, following me, bewildered.
“Nothing,” I say. She says, “Where’s the dope? Do you have it?”
I sit on the toilet.
“I’m really glad you’re back,” she says. “You wouldn’t believe what’s been going on.”
“I’m glad to be back. Ve
ry glad.” I reach for the sample. “What’s happened?”
“That’s it?” she says, panic defining the shape of her mouth. “That’s all of it?”
I explain we have to wait till I shit for the rest, and lay a generous line on the dresser. “Can you go to Bebe’s and get me some coke? There wouldn’t be any coffee made, would there?”
“I’ll make the coffee. I’ll go over there. Why are we leaving town?”
“I just don’t want to be here for a while. I don’t want anyone to know where I’ve been. How soon can you be ready?” I call the hotel in Montauk and book a room.
“Honey called. Grigorio’s in town, they’re getting married in two weeks.”
“So soon? Why are you dressed this way?”
“Vance and Jean-Paul—they got into a fight. Guns and bats. It was horrible.”
“They were here together? While you were doing business?” I won’t bother to unpack.
“Last night—no one else was here. I wish they had been. I was sure someone in the building would call the cops. I’m really glad you’re back.”
“When are they getting married?”
“Soon. A few weeks. They can’t wait anymore.”
“Last night you were freebasing?”
“I know, I know. I’ll never do that again. I thought cops were coming in the window. I thought there were giant bugs in my hair. I was sure we were under attack.”
“Let’s go now. I’ll rent a car. Ask Bebe if she’ll feed the cats.”
“Honey wanted to see you as soon as you got back. I told her you were visiting your father.”
My father. We haven’t even spoken in a year. Thanksgiving it was, he called. So, he said, you comin’? I didn’t know I was expected. Of course you are, he said. Hadn’t he mentioned it? He must’ve forgot. I’m always welcome, he said. I supposed we could make it in time for dinner, if he picked us up at the train. No problem, he started to say, when I heard the wife making noise in the background. Was I coming alone or with Kit? With her, I said, or I don’t come at all. Apparently, he said, there wasn’t enough food to go around. Not enough? I was shouting by now. Not enough food on Thanksgiving? We went to Honey’s instead. Lots of food, lots of fun. Plenty of love to go around.
The Story of Junk Page 25