She glanced at the BTS map printed on the wall of the air conditioned car and realized she had only two more stops before this reverie had to end at the Mo Chit station. The terminus was next to Bangkok’s popular Chatuchak Park with its traditional Weekend Market and where the perennial kite-flying battles were waged. She smiled again, remembering Khemkaeng’s investment in Buddhist karma by spending two baht to free a sparrow. And how he hiked clear across the vast expanse of dried-out grass of two soccer fields in order to buy her an ice-cold grape Fanta soda, her favorite.
There was no question that she liked him. He was wonderfully decent, the most polite and considerate person she’d ever met. And, though she never liked confessing it even to herself, Rachel Marie was struck by his appearance. Khemkaeng’s face was handsome but not overpowering, made more appealing by his self-effacing smile and thoughtful wit. She had never once seen him with a strand of hair out of place or a stained shirt collar. He was careful to give Bangkok Christian School the finest possible image by wearing a well-pressed suit and shined shoes to work every single day of the year.
But what does he think of me? Her lips moved in the moonlit sheen of the train window and she blushed, realizing she’d whispered the question aloud. Any casual observer could see that Khemkaeng enjoyed Rachel Marie’s presence. He lit up whenever she walked by the office, and she imagined Marilyn and John knew about the Thursday evening meals and religious conversations. But was he simply being nice, and availing himself of a helpful soul willing to provide complimentary tutoring in Bible Doctrines 101? Or was there more?
Do I want for there to be more? The train slowed down and came to a complete rest at Mo Chit. A few hundred meters away was the central bus terminal where passengers embarked on adventurous road excursions on the spider web of highways running throughout the entire kingdom. She sat, alone with her thoughts, waiting for the same train to reverse course and head back into the city.
Two old men, their gait slow as they shuffled onto the car, ignored her and shared a seat on the other side, mumbling in a muted Thai conversation she couldn’t hear. The train jerked once, then began to head south again, the trees and telephone poles whizzing past her window.
“Jesus, I don’t even know what I want anymore,” she murmured, confused but at peace with her Savior’s leading. It was much too soon to know what she would ever do if things with her new friend turned romantic . . . which up till now seemed remote. Beyond a proffered hand to help her out of a boat, there hadn’t been the slightest hint of anything like a date or any mention of feelings. “You are very kind, Rachel Marie” was about as Valentine-y as Khemkaeng had gotten so far.
She exited the train two stops from her apartment, where she remembered that a McDonald’s restaurant was nestled in between an electronics store and a bustling Internet café. Fishing in her purse for loose bills, she requested some French fries and an apple pie to go with her small salad.
“One hundred four baht, please.”
“Okay.”
She nibbled on the hot fries, remembering walks along the beach with Adrian where they teasingly divvied up a Happy Meal. Jerking away a French fry usually led to a smirk . . . and a lingering kiss. One went with the other. Rachel Marie hadn’t been kissed since the night of Jisoo’s funeral, and a wistful longing settled over her as she took tiny, lonely bites of the pie.
She thought of Adrian’s hard, brittle questions and doubts about the resurrection, and compared that with Khemkaeng’s eager nod: “Yes, of course. I can see that the life of Jesus, today and now, is surely true. Yes, it is so.” Matters of faith almost seemed easier to her Thai friend, but perhaps that was because his only barrier was the unthreatening formality of a cultural system he was willing to reconsider.
She still had feelings for Adrian, she reluctantly admitted. But of course, those deleted emotions were buttressed by intense jolts of chemistry, memories of kisses and the physicality of his strong arms around her. How could Khemkaeng, whose romantic repertoire consisted of opening a car door, compete with that?
Rachel Marie gathered up her napkin and empty pie wrapper and carefully put them in the trash container before going out into the brightly lit street. The sky above was clear now as she went up the stairs to the BTS station for the short hop back home. The patriotic taste of the fries lingered in her mouth. She curled her feet up onto the seat, hugging her knees to her chest, and wished that her new best friend would come back home.
CHAPTER NINE
“No, Missie Stone, you hold this way.” Daeng perched the badminton shuttlecock in her left hand and then gave it a gentle nudge so the serve barely cleared the net. “Don’t make it go high or they slam on us.”
“Okay.” Rachel Marie had promised the girls she would join them for a mini-tournament organized by Ronald, a gangly Filipino student teacher who covered P.E. classes for the middle grades. “Now let me try.”
With just three courts available, and so many girls wanting to play, all games were doubles competitions and played to only a score of eleven. She did three serves, all of them wobbly but passable as they flew diagonally into the designated court.
“Still too high, but okay.” Daeng blushed as she shared the gentle critique.
“Sorry.”
“No, you play good, Missie Stone.”
The girls were all clad in yellow gym shorts and T-shirts with the BCS logo. Rachel Marie was thankful she had tucked a change of clothes into her rolling tote bag so she could move around the court easily.
Ronald gave a signal, and the teams began furiously batting the little feathered birdies back and forth. Despite her inexperience, Rachel Marie was fairly quick on her feet and she did enjoy an advantage of several inches over most of the girls. When one opposing shot floated right toward her at a tantalizing height, she swatted it viciously for a slam, accepting Daeng’s squealing high five with a grin. Still, the pair came out on the short end of an 11-7 final score.
“It is okay, Missie Stone,” the short girl consoled. “Next time we play better and win, I think.”
“Uh huh.” She could see the admiring glances of several of the girls, who giggled as she walked off the court and handed her badminton racket to Vuthisit. “Good luck!”
Her T-shirt was slightly damp as she peeled it off in the faculty restroom and changed back into her regular outfit, dabbing her face with a wet paper towel. She was still adapting to the oppressive humidity in Thailand; even in the school’s air conditioned buildings, if she walked too quickly down the hallways or had to carry something heavy, beads of perspiration popped out on her forehead.
Rachel Marie had a moment of solitude before the children were due back in the room, and she ducked down to click on Yahoo Sports for a surreptitious peek. She wasn’t as big a baseball fan as Bucky, but in their years growing up, she had gotten used to playoff games buzzing in the house as he and Dad rooted for the Giants while discussing homework. Most afternoons now, she would quickly check and see if her Dodgers won, wincing inwardly if three yellow boxes in a stats logo indicated that last night’s game was still underway and the opposing team had the bases loaded. But with October and playoffs just two weeks away, Los Angeles seemed to have the western division sewed up.
“We must come in now, Missie Stone?”
She jerked her head up. “Uh huh. Tell the other kids to hurry.”
“Yes, okay.”
The kids found their seats and she perched herself on the corner of her desk in her favorite casual position. “Okay, men and ladies. Listen up.”
She explained that 6C had been invited to do the chapel program in two weeks, and that she had a really good idea they would all like. “But first we need to talk about music. A little bird told me, Vitaya, that you sing so beautifully people’s hearts stop beating when they hear you.”
All the girls squealed their approval as the blushing girl covered her face with both hands. “Is true, Missie. She sing really good all the time.” Surapee, her best friend, did a
nasal imitation of a current American pop hit. “She sing that song at lunch every day.”
Rachel Marie smiled. “So you can help me?”
The girl nodded, embarrassed but pleased.
“And I think you should pick maybe two of your best friends to sing with you.”
“Yes, okay.”
“Now.” The teacher scanned the others. “Do any of you gentlemen play something like a guitar? We need to show everyone that God has given 6C overflowing talent.”
Sunti, a shy boy always quietly humming as he did his math, raised his hand. “Yes, Missie. Not so much, but I can do some.”
“Really? You know lots of chords.”
“Yes. Okay, I think.”
“Excellent.” She looked around. “Anybody else?”
Siroj, who had settled down and turned into an affable class leader, spoke up. “I can do drums if you wish.”
“No way! Really?”
He nodded, a bit of his cocksure bravado reemerging. “My father play drums in night club for Novotel Siam Square Hotel. Only on weekend, but he show me how to do.”
Rachel Marie recalled that there actually was a drum kit the high school students used for their worship services. Khemkaeng can probably get one of the bigger boys to set it up for us. “Okay, then. That’s fantastic, you guys.” She thought for a moment. “Why don’t we pick our favorite three songs right now, and then I’ll tell you about the play I think we should do.”
Last week she had dragged Ellen over to a Burger King for a two-hour brainstorming session. “Look, I know BCS brought you and me out here to really try and inspire everybody with good teaching and, you know, on-fire Christianity. So every chance I get, I want to borrow good ideas from you. And if I think of something edgy on my side, share it right across the aisle. I figure the two of us can team up for some amazing stuff.”
The two newcomers had decided one of their most potent weapons would be old-fashioned fun. And humor. “These kids just love to crack up,” Ellen grinned over seconds on milkshakes. “Are you kidding? The same joke every day for a week, ha ha ha ha ha. And I figure if parents get the idea their children adore coming to school and that we’re having a great time–while still learning what we need–the word of mouth will bring all the little brothers and sisters along.”
Fist bump. Ever since, Rachel Marie and Ellen had traded comedy videos and PowerPoint gag files and new winner-take-all game contest ideas, each more outrageous than the one before. John Garvey made his way down the second-story corridor one afternoon, shaking his head in bemusement as gales of laughter rang out from the two side-by-side classrooms. “It sounds like Saturday night at the Improv,” he mock-complained, “and you ladies are having a competition to get on the Tonight Show.”
“Sorry.”
“No, no, no. I love it! When the kids are happy, so are the moms and dads. Keep it up, you guys.”
After talking with her bosses, Rachel Marie had fired off an SOS email to Sue Baines, asking if she could scrounge around and find a cute Bible skit involving as many characters as possible. The New Hope pastor got a clever primary-age spoof of the parable of the good Samaritan, complete with trendy cultural jokes Thai students would get. After tweaking a few of the lines to fit the Asian setting, Rachel Marie printed out the Bangkok version and ran off copies for all her kids.
Now, with her own students gathered around, Rachel Marie whistled for attention again. “Pipe down, little monsters. We’re going to put on a show and get Miss Mercado and the kids in 6A to help us.”
There was a cheerful hubbub as the kids argued about which songs they liked best, and who should get to play the robbers in the skit. Rachel Marie assigned Nancy, the one child with an Americanized name, to take notes as they settled on various roles.
“And Missie Stone, you can be the donkey!” Duchanee fell over, laughing, as the class erupted.
She was still smiling to herself as they trooped down the hallway after the final bell. Khemkaeng, coming the other way, paused to chat with two of the boys before entering her classroom.
“You are doing well?”
She felt her pulse race. Nattily dressed as always, he wore a double-breasted coat which was dangling open, and a silk tie populated by tiny Thai elephants. “Yeah. We had a good day. Even though Daeng and I got skunked at badminton.”
“Oh? You know how to play?”
Rachel Marie shook her head, laughing. “Well, just in terms of batting it back and forth. My serves are too high, the kids tell me.”
He nodded. “Yes, badminton is always a game of placement. Serves must either be low and short, or high and very deep in the court. Try to keep the opponent moving and not able to slam.”
“It sounds like you play some.”
“Yes, a little.”
“Well, anyway, keeping it low is where we weren’t very good. They popped us right on our skulls a few times.”
He flashed his perfect smile, basking in their shared camaraderie. “After my long time in Singapore, I was hoping to perhaps come and see you again. And discuss Bible topics as well. Can you come out for supper time?”
“Sure. That’d be good.” May as well say it. “I really missed it last week. Thursday evening’s a very nice part of my routine here.”
For the first time she could remember, Khemkaeng seemed flustered. “Oh.” He wet his lips, an uncharacteristic tic, then recovered. “Yes, I enjoy it as well. You give me many good things to consider, Rachel Marie.”
She wondered idly what would happen if she were to suddenly lean forward and give this handsome man a good old all-American kiss. Consider THIS, mister. Instead she smiled. “Shall I just work here and get caught up until five? Like always?”
“Surely.” He was his careful self again. “I can come by then and we will find a nice place for a meal.”
“Okay.”
“Do you wish for a particular menu?”
Rachel Marie laughed, her fluttering pulse back to normal. “You know what? I’ll teach you the names of all Jesus’ disciples, plus all their wives and girlfriends, if you buy me a large cheese pizza that tastes like California.”
“Really?” His eyes widened. “I too like pizza. That is probably my best American food.”
She peeked at her watch, already hungry. “Do you know some good pizza places?” She vaguely remembered seeing a Pizza Hut from her perch in the Sky Train.
“Narai Hotel has an excellent pizza restaurant in their lobby. Not far from here. Shall we go there?”
“Sure.” She almost blurted out: It’s a date. Just in time she swallowed back the rejoinder and settled for a cautious smile. “I’ll see you in a little while, then.”
“Okay. By the way, John has received an email from your friend in America. Pastor Mike Russell from your New Hope Church. He will come to Thailand in November and do our Week of Spiritual Focus for all students. So we can thank him in person for sending you to us as an excellent teacher.”
* * *
Narai Hotel was a few kilometers from the school, and it took Khemkaeng several minutes of circling before finally spotting a parking spot. “Most hotels in our city have no parking lot as in America,” he observed. “Since tourists often arrive in a bus or limousine.”
They walked leisurely down two blocks of small tailor shops and displays of bootleg DVDs on their way to the restaurant. “How much for those movies?” she wanted to know.
“Hundred fifty baht. But all are copies only, not legitimate.”
“Really?”
“This is one of our country’s problems,” he confessed. “Films and music and computer software are stolen and then copied. Very cheap. But this is an impossible situation for the recording artists. Or the company which makes films. Or creators of software. We steal from them so much. How can our nation allow this all the time?”
They slowed for a moment, and she spotted a garish DVD jacket carrying a film title she had seen advertised in a movie poster on the BTS train just the wee
k before. “So this same film which is playing in Bangkok theaters is already for sale here?”
“Yes.” He shrugged. “You see the dilemma, then.”
“Sure.” Rachel Marie clutched at his sleeve as they skirted a huge crate of mangoes which had spilled from a vendor’s portable serving cart onto the grimy sidewalk. “Why don’t the police crack down?”
“Sometimes they try. But the suppliers pay bribes to the officials, and much corruption is overlooked.”
The pizza was exquisite, and Rachel Marie blushed as she scarfed down one piece after another. Khemkaeng noticed her appetite and beamed. “You like this pizza?”
“It’s incredible,” she stammered, her mouth full of the gooey tomato sauce. “Why didn’t you bring me here before now? I thought we were friends.”
He grinned. “From now on, this will be a monthly appointment.”
“You’re on.” She held out her cup and he gave her a refill of the cherry-flavored soda, deliciously cold with its slivers of ice.
It was a perfect night as they lingered on the outdoor terrace after dinner. The conversation drifted over to the question of salvation and how a person could be sure of their home in heaven. Khemkaeng, despite his urbane aura, was now almost childlike in his curiosity and growing enthusiasm for the beauty of God’s redemption plan for a lost world.
“You see, this is very foreign to a Thai mind,” he admitted, holding up both hands.
“How come?”
“We always believe in merit and good works. When we live a life of purity and sobriety, this is positive karma. In the next life, then, perhaps we are born into a better existence. And higher and higher and so on.”
“And . . .”
“So when your Christian Bible tells us, ‘No, salvation is a free gift of love. You cannot earn or qualify . . .’” His dark eyes were sober, diligently probing hers.
“This is grace,” she said softly, impulsively taking his hand. “Salvation which is absolutely and completely free. Without qualifications. In America we would say, ‘With no strings attached.’” He nodded to show that he grasped the significance of the idiom.
Love In a Distant Land: Rachel Marie Series Book One Page 12