Goa Freaks: My Hippie Years in India

by Cleo Odzer

  I had had my period in months. How many? Four, five? Could I be pregnant? Never. Me? I hated kids. I looked at my skinny reflection in the mirror. Impossible. I should probably stop taking the pill.

  I went back to the living room to join Neal and the mirror piled with coke. CLICK, CLICK, SCRAPE, SQUEAK, SQUEAK.

  Our first week in the monsoon blended into one coked-out weird day. We hardly noticed the echo of the rain sealing us in. The dimness of the cloudy daylight blended with the dimness of the kerosene night light. The long day stretched itself into a week. Then the coke was nearly finished.

  "I'm going to Bombay," said Neal. "We should find out if there's news from your aunt. I'll pick up coke from Sukalatchi Street while I’m there."

  "Check Joe Banana's first. Maybe Aunt Sathe sent a telegram here."

  No mail at Joe's. Neal left for Bombay. That night, there was a knock on the front door. I was surprised. I hadn't thought there was anyone left on the beach to come visiting. Apolon and his family used the kitchen door.

  I couldn't believe the pretty face I found on the doorstep. "Hello, Miss Cleo."

  "Serge!" I leaped on him, knocking him off the step. He wrapped his arms around me.

  "It feels so good to hold you again," he said. "I missed you." We kissed on the damp sand under the dark sky.

  "Where have you been? You just disappeared," I asked and kissed him again. "I'm so happy to see you!"

  We went inside and sat under the platform holding each other.

  "I had to do business. Make money."

  "What are you doing back here in the monsoon?"

  "Why, I came to see you, of course. Had to see Miss Cleo. But I was afraid you'd be gone and that I wouldn't find you till next season." We kissed some more. "Why are you still here?"

  I sunk my forehead into my palm and groaned. "OOOOOhhhh. Nothing worked right. I invested money with Tish and Junky Robert but haven't heard from them. Then I sent a girl to Bermuda and she disappeared. I don't know what happened to that scam. Neal just left for Bombay to see if there's a telegram."

  "Are you and Neal together, then?"

  "NO! That's finished, really. I can't bear him anymore. I want to be with you. You're the one I love." I kissed his cheek, his neck, his ear.

  "Does Neal know this? Or does he think you're still together?"

  "Well, I don't know . . . Yeah, I guess he thinks we're together. I've told him it's over, but I don't think he believes me."

  "You missed him again."

  "When he returns. You'll stay, right? You're not going to leave, are you?"

  "I've come thousands of miles to see you, Miss Cleo. I’m not leaving you now. You'll tell him, though? I love Neal. He's my friend. I don't want to create a problem."

  "I'll tell him. He knows already. Besides, you'll be here with me."

  "Look how skinny you are! Even skinnier than before. You must eat. When was the last time you had a meal?"

  "I ate a candy bar yesterday."

  "A candy bar! That's not food. I make you something. What do you want?"

  "I'm not hungry."

  "You must eat something. What will you have? A cheese omelette?"

  "Ooo, yum! Cheese omelette!"

  As usual, I couldn't eat more than a bite of the huge thing he cooked. "I can't eat another mouthful. I explode."

  "You hardly touched it. Come on, I made it just for you."

  "No, no. Stop. Take it away. Later. Maybe I finish it later. Let my stomach recover a while from the shook of nutrients."

  The next morning, Neal returned.

  NO.

  Not yet!

  Full of energy, he burst into the house like a tornado of good cheer. "Hi, cutie. I'm back!" He giggled, dumped his bag on a cushion, and shook his wet bangs. His clothes dripped water into a Pool at his feet. "Hi, Serge." He turned back to me. "It's really raining out there. You should see it."

  "That was quick. I didn't think you'd be back so soon."

  He giggled. "Well, you see, I never made it to Bombay. The airport's closed for the monsoon. I spent the night in Panjim thinking I could board a boat, but the boats aren't running either. We're marooned here. I had no idea it was like this during the monsoon. It's unearthly. Like being stranded on another planet."

  "The buses are running," said Serge. "I got off one yesterday."

  "You did?" Neal giggled again. "I can't imagine why anyone would WANT to be here at this time. I know why we're here. I thought you had more sense."

  "I've spent many monsoons here—in Colva," said Serge. "Until year, I stayed in Goa three years without leaving. I like it in the rainy season. It's peaceful and quiet."

  "Serge, old boy! Can you sell us coke? Or don't you have any left?"

  "How much would you want?"

  "Looks like we might be here a while. What do you think?" he asked me.

  "Looks like we’ll be here forever. We need half a ton."

  "Maybe a few ounces. Could you handle a few ounces?" Neal asked Serge.

  "I don't know . . . I need to keep some for myself. One ounce for sure, maybe two. I see how much I have."

  Why did Neal have to come back? Everything seemed to be moving too fast. In an instant, Neal stepped back into place and Serge assumed visitor status. Serge physically withdrew from me under the influence of Neal's presence. Wait a minute, wait a minute. This was not how I wanted it. I wanted to be with Serge, not Neal. What happened?

  I became annoyed. Why had Serge retreated to the other side of the room like that? He was supposed to be over here with me. I felt isolated, left by myself to handle the situation.

  Neal sped around the room as if nothing had changed. Frustrated and confused, I grasped the half-eaten cheese omelette that had been lying there since the day before and threw it in Serge's face.

  Neal giggled. Serge's hurt look told me he didn't understand. Well, good. I didn't understand, either. I stormed out of the room, leaving him to pick up the pieces of dried egg that had flown all over.

  I paced the carpet in the bathroom, opening cabinets and drawers, touching things, looking in the mirror. I changed my dress for one I picked up from the floor. Since the maid stopped coming in, things continued to he wherever they'd been discarded.

  I still had coke stashed in the safe, so I didn't have to go back to the living room right away. Instead, I puttered around the bathroom.

  Eventually Serge joined me. His brown eyes were wide and he wasn't smiling. Sadly and patiently, he told me he was going to the house in Colva to see about the coke.

  "You'll be right back?"

  "Do you want me to come back?"

  "YES! Aren't you going to stay with me?"

  "You know I want to be with you. I don't know what you want . . . You threw the cheese omelette in my face! I'd made that specially for you." I hugged him. "Come right back, okay? Please." I snared a clump of his hair in my mouth.

  "I'll be here as soon as I can," he said, but I kept holding him. "I'll have to leave now to get back by tonight," he added, trying to pull away. I didn't relinquish my embrace. "The sooner I go, the sooner be back." I tightened my grip and wrapped a leg around him.

  We laughed together.

  When Serge returned that night, the relationships were set. I was with Serge. I knew it. Serge knew it. I guess Neal knew it.

  It didn't matter anyway. As soon as Serge returned to sell us four ounces, the three of us divided the house into three separate realities. The otherworldliness of the extreme weather warped even further the eeriness of our already-strained perceptions. It was like being in another dimension—soft, cloudy, speedy, and of course wet. It was hard not to notice the wetness of the cushions, the soggy saris hanging from the ceiling, our clammy clothes. In that respect, our three universes shared a common element. Nothing stayed dry during the monsoon. Even the wood of the stairs and the tile of the floor felt damp. And shortly, everything assumed another monsoon characteristic—mouldiness. Everything, everything, everything was damp and mou
ldy.

  Serge took over a window ledge under the stairs. He filled it with coke paraphernalia—his needle and syringe; my soup spoon, now best into a silver twirl; a champagne glass of water. Serge stayed at his window ledge fixing one shot after another after another after another. Sweat poured from his temples and blood ran down his arm. Obsessed with the surge of coke as he squeezed the liquid drug into a vein, he never noticed the Hood of water outside the window inches from his face. The tie wrapped around his arm was held down by his foot at one end and pulled out by his teeth at the other. Serge exclaimed "Oh, wow" regularly, like a stoned cuckoo clock marking time. There was a rhythm to them. As soon as he withdrew the emptied syringe from his arm, he'd draw water from the champagne glass to clean it out. This he'd squirt in an ashtray, and then he'd begin the process again—coke in the spoon, a dash of rain water, stir with the end of the needle, into his vein . . . "Oh, wow."

  His preoccupation was okay, though. I hardly missed him. I'd be crouched in coke-fantasy delight on a four-foot-square world map. Foot on Bolivia, once over Antarctica, I would sail my finger on the Pacific as my eyes scanned for land. "Where's Tahiti? I can't find it! Where's Tahiti?"

  For hours, days and weeks, with Serge riveted to his window ledge, I planned my next scams—the ones that would go down as soon as we heard from Aura Sathe and Lila.

  "We need a midway stopover so Customs doesn't get suspicious," I said. "Where is Tahiti?"

  Neal would be nearby chopping coke. CLICK, CLICK, SCRAPE, CLICK, SQUEAK, SQUEAK. His limp satin pants clung to his legs as he lay stretched out in his own coke rapture, leaning on an elbow. He'd use the rusty mirror to scratch his beard as he told stories nobody was listening to. ". . . remember Petra in Venice," he said. "I think that was here she met . . . or was he there writing poetry? . . . Well, one day . . ."

  "Here it is!" I exclaimed. "I found Tahiti. Look, it's over here by the States. This is perfect. I'll take the cases to Tahiti, coming from over this way. Then you rake those dumb cruises out of L.A. and meet . . ."

  "Oh, wow."

  " . . . Petra performing at that time . . . " CLICK, SCRAPE, CLICK, SQUEAK.

  "Oh, wow."

  SCRAPE, SCRAPE.

  ". . . nobody would suspect anyone coming from Tahiti . . ."

  "Oh, wow."

  SQUEAK, SCRAPE, SQUEAK, SQUEAK. ". . . gondola capsized . . . "

  ". . . or let Aunt Sathe . . ."

  "Oh, wow."

  The air was hick with humidity and coke rainbows. Every day brought a new insect—one bigger, stronger, and moving in a different way than the old insect it had consumed. It marked the passing of time. "What kind of bit:; Co we have today? Does it crawl on my map? Hop on my lap? Slither under my knee?

  ". . . and then Blind George showed up . . ."

  ". . . and then we visit these Islands here . . ."

  "Oh, wow."

  CLICK, SQUEAK, SCRAPE. Something jumped on Neal's glass block and landed in the coke. "Hey! Look at this. Powered beetle! Whoa, little fellow, having fun in there?" It didn't hedge. "Look at him. It’s stoned! Immobilized." Neal pushed the insect with his finger.

  ". . . go through Alaska next? It's up here . . ."

  A drop of sweat fell unnoticed from Serge's hair and landed on his nose, where it slid to join the previous drops in the wrinkles of his harem pants. He let the tie slip out of his mouth as another syringeful soused his brain. "Oh, wow."

  "Look at this bug go. He's staggering!"

  ". . . Alaska is good because it's part of the U.S. Once you get in there, you're in. Who would search anyone going to Alaska? . . ."

  "Oh, wow."

  "Watch him waggle! Hey." Neal leaned over and put the glass block between me and the North Pole.

  "Want to go to Alaska?" I asked as I took the line of coke. Our eyes met.

  "How're you doing?" he asked. I smiled.

  "Oh, wow," came Serge's muffled voice.

  I jumped up. "I need a super line to get me to the bathroom and back." I scraped a pile of coke to the centre of the glass block and snorted.

  I started to hand the block to Neal, but pulled it back. "Wait. One more. The bathroom's so far away."

  After snorting the second mound, I strode unsteadily to the door. As I passed Serge, I caressed a handful of his hair. "Oh, wow," he said, staring his arm.

  To reach the bathroom, I had to pass the dining room and the kitchen. Water had leaked in from the side door, and a stagnant Pool covered most of the dining-room floor. I walked a few feet through water my wet footprints followed me into the bathroom.

  I really had to do something about the toilet. The tank on the roof was empty, so the toilet couldn't flush. At least two weeks' worth of business had accumulated in the bowl. Pew! Maybe I should remove the cover from the tank and let the rain fill it. I'd be taking a chance, though, because if a leaf blew in, it might wreck the delicate system. I had to think of something soon. The smell was inching its way to the rest of the house. Without the maid coming every day, entropy was setting in.

  I looked at myself in the mirror. Mistake. Oh, look at me! I moved a hand to my tangled head. What a mess. I grabbed a brush and matte a half-hearted swipe at some hairs. Impossible. I'd never get those knots out. I threw the brush down and contemplated the pile of clothes that covered the table, the chair, and a corner of the floor. I took off the blue dress I'd been wearing for who-knows-how-many-days and put on a red velvet one. I dropped the blue dress on the floor.

  I looked round the dim room. Smoke clouded the glass of the kerosene lamp. I opened a cabinet but could hardly see inside. I closed the cabinet and opened a drawer. Birth-control pills. Still hadn't gotten my period. I closed the drawer and slid open the sliding door of the closet. It was filled with the clothes I never wore. Or at least nothing I'd worn since the period stopped coming.

  "Hi." It WAS Serge. He came in and dried his feet on the rug. The pupils of his eyes were enormous. I looked in the mirror. So were mine. He came next to me and, side by side, we gazed at our reflections.

  "Cleeeeeeeeeeeo." It was Neal. "Where'd everybody go?" he said, coming in and drying his feet. "Want a toot?" He offered me the glass block. I took it, and he too turned to the mirror. He shook his bangs at his image, made a face, and said, "I need a bath. The ocean's too rough to go swimming. Why don't we go out in the rain?"

  I handed him back the block and asked, "So, want to go to Alaska? It'll be easy. Look, Show you where it is." I left the room, followed by Serge and, a few seconds later, Neal. I waded through the water in the dining room. White casserole dish containing a whole cooked chicken sat on the table. It had been there untouched since Apolon brought it two days before.

  "Hey," said Neal, "should we order another chicken?"

  "Why?" I answered. "We never eat them."

  "Maybe this one's still good," said Serge. He lifted the cover and peered at the food. He sniffed and took a bite. "It's good."

  I returned to the living room and knelt on the map. "I'd also like to go to Africa."

  Neal came in and said, "I wonder if there's mail at Joe Banana's."

  "AUNT SATHE!" I exclaimed. My finger kept tabs on Africa while I looked up at Neal. "We have to see if there's news from Aunt Sathe!"

  "Maybe go later and check," Neal answered before becoming distracted by the hallowing saris.

  Serge continued chewing and sat at his window ledge. He picked up his syringe. "Do you think it's August vet?"

  I looked at the map. "Oo, look! Casablanca!"

  A week went by, then another two. We forgot all about Aunt Sathe in our psychotic cocaine ecstasy. Life grew wetter and then darker as one by one the lamps ran out of kerosene. At first Serge filled them from plastic bottles he found in the kitchen. When those ran out, he used the kerosene from the stoves. Then we made do with less and less light. On rare occasions, if someone remembered to ask, and if Apolon agreed to do it, the Goans filled the bottles. But as their field work became more time consuming, and as we gre
w crazier than ever, they stopped coming altogether.

  For the most part, the house was now lit solely by three blackened lamps. Serge had one on his ledge. Neal and I had one on the other side of the living room, and the bathroom had the third.

  Even though I was "with" Serge, it seemed I spent more time with Neal. Serge had rented a motorbike and would leave periodically to do I didn't-know-what I-didn't-know-where. I always forgot to ask. I knew he ate. In spite of everything, he seemed to be keeping himself in better condition than Neal and I were. When he was in the house, he spent the time at his window ledge with his syringe, fixing one shot of coke alter another. When he wasn't at the ledge, he soon fell asleep. So, although I more or less hated Neal (who could remember?), I usually awoke to find myself lying next to him. Well, Serge always fell asleep in the middle of the room! And at the wrong time!

  One day I woke up on the floor with a hole in my chin. OW! Pain and my cry had woken me. Alerted by my yell, Neal peeped over the platform edge. (I guess I'd fallen asleep next to him again.)

  "What happened?" he asked. "What are you doing down there?"

  "OOOOOOOOw." I tried to hoist myself off the floor, but raising my head made me dizzy.

  Neal giggled at me. "You fell off the platform in your sleep?"

  "It hurts. OOOOW. I just woke up. I don't know what happened." He climbed down. "Here, let me look."

  "I can't move my head. I'm dizzy."

  "One second. Let me see!"

  "OOOOWWWWW."

  "You cut your chin. You must have hit a corner of the step on your way down."

  "My head. It's killing me. Where's my smack?"

  Neal brought my stash while I bled on the Rajasthani rug. "Maybe you should have stitches."

  "NO. I don’t trust those Indian doctors. I'd be scarred for life."

  "You might have a scar anyway."

  "Oh, no. Get me a mirror."

  Serge was out. By the time he returned, I lay propped on an elbow, unable to straighten my head. When he saw my bloody face, he rushed to my side.