by Cleo Odzer
"No, no! Not in the ashtray!" I'd exclaim. "Here, see it says SQUIRT HERE." For a moment our eyes communicated feelings our bodies couldn't.
"Oops, I did that again? I'm sorry. So when am I going to teach you to windsurf?"
"Soon."
The gorgeous German had brought to Goa the first wind surfboard anyone had seen. I couldn't imagine when he had time to ride it, though, since he sat in the Saloona. Every day, all day.
Also among the new group of fixers was Marco. For years Gigi and Marco had lived in a yellow-tiled mansion on the road to Calangute. Their successful hash import-export business had made them the centre of the chic and popular Italian group. It ended, though, with Gigi's death. Now here was Marco— or rather the ghost of Marco.
When Gigi maxed-out on coke and dope in Bombay, Marco had been jailed in Europe; he had missed her death and funeral. Now he seemed to be following her footsteps to doom. As Marco fell apart, so did his business, his finances, his circle of friends. He'd lost the house, sold his possessions, and existed somehow, here and there, with his daughter. Formerly elegant and stylish, he now epitomized the slimy junky—dirty, lying, hustling, stealing whatever wasn't tied down, and fixing anything he could lay his hands on.
At first I felt terrible for him. Over and over we watched my movie of their wedding—ravishing Gigi, brown hair gliding over her laughing face as she climbed into Greek Robert's jeep for the ride to Hanuman ice cream shop in Mapusa. We watched as she and Marco listened to the ceremony in the government office. Marco stared at the movie in fascination. Over and over. The jeep ride, the ice cream, the government ceremony.
"Show it again," he'd say.
"Again?"
He'd give me an Italian-type lift of the chin.
Then Marco became a problem. Objects vanished as he passed them—a Balinese mask, an ampoule of distilled water, a used needle. He pestered my customers. He borrowed cigarettes and beedies, hustled hits of this and that, and asked people to buy him soda.
I tried talking to him. "Marco, did you take that syringe?"
"What syringe?"
"Come on, I know you have it." I hated to sound picky, but I was reaching the end of my charitableness. "It's forty rupees if you're going to keep it—and listen, I'd rather you didn't hustle everybody like that. A little hustle is okay, but you asked every single person here for some of their stash. They're getting annoyed. You’ll ruin my business if customers stop coining because of you."
He made apologetic promises, but his eyes still searched the room for objects to steal.
I decided I could no longer let him in the house. The next time he came to the door, I didn't open it. I made him go to a back window instead. "I'm sorry. I can't let you in anymore," I told him. "I don't trust you. If you want to buy something, it has to be through the window."
I thought I'd never see him again, but he still came every day. How horrible. The only window that was the right height and not fully exposed to passers-by was a back one in the kitchen. Beneath it lay the garbage lump where the maid deposited things that couldn't he burned. It faced the Goan toilets and rested over the septic tank. Marco stood there in the trash to buy his drugs from between metal window bars. I felt a brute. I had trouble meeting his eyes as I handed him packets through the bars. He had trouble meeting me.
And then came Maria. Maria turned out to be even worse than Marco. What was happening to the Goa Freaks?
The couple Maria and Stefano, both Italian, had a little girl, four years old. Stefano wasn't a customer of mine, only Maria. Maria had been to the Saloona a few times for smack and coke, but the first time I paid attention to her was when she arrived towing a semi straight backpacker. Here was a real hustler, I thought.
"Ciao, Cleo," she said, as if we were best buddies. "Meet my friend here. What is your name again? He wants to buy coke." When the guy wasn't looking, she made a face and winked at me as co conspirator. "How much money do you have?" she asked him, keeping a grip on his arm while he dog in his pockets.
"Uh, you said I could score a quarter . . ."
She took the money from his hand and helped him count. "You have plenty. You can buy me a gram. I need some for later."
Not long after he bought her the gram, Maria had him out the door with a wave, a tolerant smile, and a see-you-later. Smooth.
I'd seen my share of compulsive coke fixers, but nobody equalled Maria, despite her useless veins. Like many women, she had difficulty getting into one. Men's veins were more prominent and visible. Sometimes Maria tried unsuccessfully for twenty minutes, practically in tears and totally obsessed with plunging the now-disgusting liquid into her arm.
"Maria!" I'd say, spotting the glop in her syringe. "You can't fix that! Yuk! The blood in there coagulated fifteen minutes ago."
Her concentration wouldn't waver. With drops of sweat dangling from her bangs she'd continue prodding.
"It's STUCK!" she'd wail eventually in the most pitiful tone imaginable. "The needle's clogged!"
"Well, of course. Look at that stuff. It's turned to jello."
Not allowing it to go to waste, she'd remove the needle and squirt the disgusting goo into her mouth before starting over.
All of Goa knew about Maria. Having run out of money long ago, she hustled from everyone. She was very pretty, very cute, and very good at what she did. Since I made bhongs and lines for the people around me, she made herself my best friend. She was terrific—emptied ashtrays, fetched sodas, collected money, opened the door for Bach when he barked. Charming and funny, Maria told stories that made people laugh, enchanting the masses with her Italian accent and her big brown eyes. She brought me many customers, people I'd never seen before, picked up from who-knew-which beach. It was amazing the way she finagled strangers into buying her drugs.
As the season progressed, the hippies, backpackers, and tourists began to leave, and the Goa Freaks who still had money began to run low. Soon I noticed that the profits at day's end did not match the amount of packets supposedly sold. Maria was stealing my drugs!
One day I caught her—Maria with her grubby hand in my metal box. "Ah, Cleo, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. . . "
Furiously, I grabbed her by the hair, threw her out the door, and kicked her down the steps. She landed in a shrieking heap at the bottom. I slammed the door.
She stopped coming alter that, but I could tell when she sent someone to buy drugs for her. Whenever I found an unknown, straightish, backpacker-type on my doorstep, I knew Maria wasn't far away. Sometimes I'd see her hiding behind the well, waiting.
As the season progressed I had fewer and fewer customers, and the customers had less and less money. In April I learned the most important lesson of the drug retail business—NEVER GIVE CREDIT!!! Too bad it took me so long to figure that out.
Maria owed me money, but she was one of many. I had a discouraging list of people indebted to me. Since I never gave credit without holding something as collateral, I possessed a staggering amount of bric-a-brac. By the end of April, I had eight watches, five rings, four passports, three gold chains, two tape players, two silver bracelets, one silver belt, a silver candlestick holder, a radio, a pair of almost-new cowboy boots, a gold locket, an ivory elephant, a shapeless piece of jade, a piece of amber with a insect frozen within, a Swiss army knife, pictures of loved ones . . . None of this junk, though, served as currency when it came to resupplying my store.
Uh-oh—I was in trouble.
And I'd never paid Lino the rent money for the year. Though I'd earned a fortune that season in profits. I'd consumed a fortune in drugs and given away another fortune's worth. Now, as I lost customers to the approaching monsoon, I felt the weight of the credit I'd given. I tacked up notices saying NO CREDIT. Alas, too late. I could only afford smaller and smaller quantities. Soon Rachid stopped his man from delivering to my door. Because I could afford only a few grams at a time, I sometimes had to traipse to Mapusa twice a day. Soon the Saloona didn't work anymore.
Lack of capital
caused the major problems. I needed more cash on hand to purchase stock from Rachid's man in Mapusa. How could I get it? I had to recall the money owed me. But how? Some people had already left for the monsoon. Those who still came could barely afford what they were buying, and if I pressed them too hard, I might lose the few customers I had left.
Maria. That traitor! She owed twenty-six hundred rupees. If I could recover that, I'd be in bester condition.
I went to Stefano, her boyfriend and father of her child, to demand payment of Maria's bill. Poor Stefano. I was hardly the only one with whom Maria had this conflict. Half the beach had approached him with the same complaint.
So, no help there. My cash problem worsened. Paradise Pharmacy, my most reliable buyer, also lost customers to the monsoon. They stopped their weekly order. What to do now? I had no choice-I had to sell some of the baubles I was holding as security on debts. What did those people think I was, anyway? Credit Lyonnais? I spread the word that the last opportunity for people to reclaim their property had arrived. Come now and get this junk of yours or you'll never see it again. Only one person took me up on it and reclaimed his passport. I waited one more week, then went to Mapusa in a taxi full of merchandise.
Oh, god—look at this. I must look like a burglar, standing in the market place clutching eight watches. Ridiculous. But there was nothing else to do. I chose a spot where I could partially hide behind stalks of sugarcane. On one side of me sat an Indian woman with a stack of papaya; on the other an Indian woman with bananas.
"BA-NA-NA," cried the one.
"PA-PA-YA," yelled the other.
Well, okay. Here goes. I closed my eyes and took a breath.
"WATCHES! EUROPEAN WATCHES! COME CHECK THEM OUT!" I felt like a Class A retard. Must have looked like one too, hiding there in the sugarcane.
"GENUINE MITSUHISHI CASSETTE PLAYER!" Yippee, was this really me?
"BA-NA-NA!"
"AUTHENTIC TEXAS COWBOY BOOTS!" Had I really said that? Now I knew I was an asshole.
"BA-NA-NA!"
"BOOTS!"
One or two people stopped, gave me knowing looks, and browsed through my wares.
"You have maybe a Panasonic record player?" one asked.
"Sorry, no."
"You can get?"
Did I look like an international electronics distributor, standing there in a fish market with eight watches on my arms? Or did he think I would steal one for him?
"Sorry."
After being bargained down to nothing, I sold one watch and then went to the woman from Paradise Pharmacy for help. "Try that store across the square," she whispered. "Ask for the manager."
Obviously a fence, the manager had no doubt about how I'd acquired the collection of jewellery and assorted plunder. I felt exactly like the breaking-and-entering lowlife he imagined me to be. Of course he paid only the minimum. He evaluated the gold chains according to the weight of the gold; the same for the beautiful locket. I could have gotten more if I'd continued hawking them in the market, but I lacked the patience and the confidence. How embarrassing! I wanted to bury my face in a cowboy boot.
I kept the passports as long as I could, but eventually those too were sold, this time to Rachid.
"I will take all the passports you can get, darling. Two hundred dollars for an American or a Swiss passport, one hundred for other nationalities." Apparently passports were more valuable than gold.
One day Marco came to my back window with news and a request. Maria lay in the hospital in a coma. Could I contribute to the find they were collecting to pay her hospital bill?
"Of course," I answered. For weeks Maria had been a best friend to me. It didn’t matter if the friendship was partly a hustle; the relationship had existed. She was a fellow Goa Freak. She belonged to my Goa community. We had to help each other. "What's wrong with her?" I asked.
"She collapsed unconscious last night."
"What about dope? She shouldn't withdraw on top of whatever else is wrong with her. Does the hospital know about her drug habits?" Marco shook his head. "Maybe we should put dope in her I.V. bottle. Just enough for her not to be sick. I tried it once; I think it'll work."
"I'm meeting Stefano this evening at the hospital. Want to come?" he asked.
"Okay.”
Stefan (Maria's boyfriend), Marco, and I met later in Mapusa and discussed how to get dope into Maria's unconscious body. I gave Stefano half a gram to hold her a few days. I only saw Maria as a faraway bundle in a bed.
The three of us set up a schedule of shifts to sit with her. I had the morning, since it was the only time I could get away without losing a lot of customers. It would mean sacrificing much of my sleep time, though.
I arranged for a motorcycle driver to pick me up every morning at nine-thirty. Eeek, now I was more tired than ever. I needed even more coke.
Within day Maria was alert and mobile but scared and totally miserable. I continued my shift to keep her company and prevent her from leaving before she recovered. I stayed at her side until Stefano or Marco replaced me as sentry. She cried.
"Ah, Cleo. Thank you for coming. You're still my friend, no? You don't hate me like the others, do you? You know, I'm so sorry. I never meant anything bad. Please be my friend again."
There seemed to be two Marias there. One warm, sensitive, and terrified, crying over not wanting her daughter to see her in the hospital. The other was crafty. Her eyes gleamed as she scanned me to determine where I'd hidden my coke. The transition as she changed from Maria to Coke Amuck Maria was dramatic and unmistakable. Her face underwent a metamorphosis—the tension of the muscles, the shape of the eyes, the curl of the lila. Her body would stiffen like a predatory animal. I never mistook which one I was dealing with. I couldn't communicate with Coke Amuck Maria. She didn't listen. Her answers came brief and vague as she concentrated on discovering the whereabouts of my stash. I kept the coke taped to my body, beneath my clothes. Coke Amuck Maria was so skilful at gaining access to it, though, that if I left the hospital with it intact, I felt a sense of accomplishment.
The way coke nuts got their paws on coke was almost magical.
But I also saw a real Maria there, a desperate and sad Maria who needed not to be hated. I brought her flasks of coconut milkshake and Five Star candy bars, and we played games. She was bored and miserable. One day I brought my projector and movies to cheer her up.
"Ah, Gigi," she exclaimed as we watched Gigi and Marco's wedding. "She was my good friend." The scared look came into her eyes again.
One morning I arrived to find Maria gone. She had signed herself out. No, she hadn't paid the hospital bill. And no, the hospital would not give me back my projector and films until the bill was paid. Sorry.
The end of the season came and passed. My business trickled to nothing as the last stragglers fashioned scams and left Goa. Every day another house was boarded up against the monsoon. I had to get out of there. Meanwhile, not only had I not paid Lino the year's rent, I'd once again accumulated a large bill with the maid, Apolon's chai shop, Joe Banana, and Gregory's restaurant.
Then the business died completely. No more coke. No more smack. No money. Uh-oh.
I scrounged the beach begging bhongs from whom ever had something. Alehandro was still usable as a last resort, but' even that source dried up as Alehandro made plans to move to Bombay. Every week another credit-giving chai shop shut as its owner prepared for summer toil in the rice field. When Apolon's chai shop closed, my trouble deepened, for that had been my last source of food.
I had to do something, but what? Realistically I knew I was incapable of handling another run. Aware of the mistakes I'd made the previous monsoon, I knew I was even less shipshape than then. My brain was scrambled by coke and exhaustion. I couldn't trust myself to carry through another scam. Besides, no one was begging to hire me. Bony, and with the diamond back in my nose, I didn't look like the candidate most likely to cross an Immigration desk unmolested.
Poor Bach—I barely managed
to keep him fed with peanut butter. Then, in desperation, I hooked up with Birmingham Phillip. He had dope, a bhong, and food for Bach. Egads, a Birmingham Boy! Had it really come to this? Fortunately he was too smacked-out to think about sex or romance. I packed my house and moved to his place by Nelson's Bar. Nelson Bar, the Birmingham Boy hangout. Bad scene here. Real bad. Horrible. Oh, help.
One day I spoke imploringly to a tree in front of Phillip's house. I caressed its hark. "Please," I beseeched it, "get me out of here. I can't feed Bach anymore." I looked for a spot that wasn't overrun by crawling things and laid my cheek against it. "Please help me, tree. Maybe Bombay would be better. At least there'd be people there. Help me get to Bombay. Or anywhere. Help me, tree. GET ME OUT OF HERE!"
The next day I went to my house to pick up clothes. While inside I heard a motorcycle roar to a stop. Strange. There hadn't been a motorcycling visitor in at least two months.
A knock.
I opened to see a customer of mine from the days of smokers and sniffers.
An orange person. A Rajneesh sannyasi. "HEY, HI! I can't believe it! What are you doing here?" I asked.
"I came to see how you were. Need anything?"
"Wow, do I ever! Could you take me to Bombay? Oh, PLEASE! Get me out of here! I'm trapped." He nodded.
But I would have to leave Bach. Aw, Bach. It was impossible to bring him with me. I wrapped my arms around my furry companion. He licked my ear. Don't, worry, Bach, I'll be back. Then be able to feed you the tasty treats you deserve—prawns in wine sauce every day.
I ran to Laura, who hadn't been off Anjuna Beach since the time we'd been in Bali. I knew she'd be there.
"Sure, I take care of Bach," she told me, "but he didn't stay with me last time, and I doubt he’ll stay now."
Oh, my little Bach. Forgive me. There's no way I can survive the monsoon down here.
After two days on the bike, we arrived in Bombay. My orange friend dropped me at the Crown Hotel—disgusting, loathsome, and cheap. Without cheer I waved goodbye as he headed back to Poona. Maybe I'd have been better off starving in Goa after all. Now what?