by Jo Watson
We finally reached the end of the line of traffic and stopped. That was it. There was nowhere else to look. Annie threw herself down on the embankment next to the road. We were both wet and out of breath, and my ribs were killing me.
“Fuck. I didn’t sign up for this, Lilly.” She rolled over onto her back and lay there, not caring that people were looking at her strangely. “I taste blood. I actually taste blood. Is that normal?”
I sat down next to her feeling completely disappointed. We’d been so, so close.
Now what?” Annie asked.
“I don’t know.”
“You know him, where would he go?”
“Backpackers lodge,” I suggested.
“Which one?”
But I didn’t have an answer for her, and the only thing we could do was to systematically go to all the backpackers lodges and ask for him—and so began our long, tedious, and ultimately unsuccessful hunt for Damien through the backpacking underworld of Thailand.
Let me tell you a little something about backpackers—they can easily be divided into two groups. Hippies with dreadlocks and dirty feet and young, drunk students. By the end of the day, after visiting ten lodges, Annie and I had somehow managed to drink two rounds of shots with the students, who promised to relay my message to Damien if he checked in—although I suspected that two minutes after we left they would forget. We had also reluctantly had one very small puff of weed from a hippie who had insisted that the clarity of mind the magic herb would provide would help us find Damien. (I was desperate, okay, and by that stage maybe a little tipsy, too.) But as the day went on, I started to suspect that Annie might have had more than one puff.
“This is so much fun…” She was literally skipping down the street. “I feel like a student again, except that now I can afford not to sleep there and I don’t have to hang something on my door handle when I want to have sex in my room and I don’t need to eat leftover microwave popcorn for breakfast…” She laughed loudly and abruptly stopped. “Oh my God, I am soooo hungry.” She turned and looked at me with this goofy grin, and I couldn’t help but laugh at her.
Annie had always been the truly cool one. If ever you wanted to know what you should be wearing and what bag to have on your arm, she was your go-to girl.
The sun was setting over Phuket and the streets started to buzz and hum with activity. We passed a street vendor selling various types of foods on sticks. Annie bought several of them and wolfed them down in a few bits.
“Mmmm-aaaaah,” she moaned. “This is so good. You want one?” She waved a meaty stick at me, but I had far too many butterflies in my stomach to even consider eating. “Oh please don’t tell Trev I’m eating this, we’re supposed to be doing some weird liquid detox together.” She rolled her eyes. “Lemon juice, maple syrup, and cayenne pepper, I kid you not.”
I quickly wondered if this might be a good opportunity to talk Trev with her. As Jane says, when all of your friends don’t like your boyfriend, that’s got to mean something.
“So you and Trev, hey?” I tried to sound casual.
Her face lit up. “I’ve been dying to tell you, but didn’t know if I should…he’s asked me to move in with him. And I know it’s only been a few months, but it just feels right.” She squealed with delight and looked so happy I suddenly felt bad. Who was I to judge after all?
“So where to now?” she asked as we wandered through the market aimlessly, looking at all the pretty, shiny things but resisting the temptation to purchase them…Well, except maybe just that one handbag and an adorable little necklace that would look great with a pair of earrings I owned. We walked farther and farther into the night and I started to wonder whether I should try to find that strip club, on the off chance that I would find him there. The chances were slim, though, probably zero. But I had no other leads and nowhere else to go until they sent the map.
But in the red-light district, everything looks the same. It’s red and luminescent and the streets are lined with boys in short skirts. We must have walked around in circles for an hour before finding the club. It hadn’t been an easy find, and on the way we’d been solicited by at least five men. Well, at least I knew if my current career didn’t pan out, I could move to Thailand, buy a pair of Perspex heels and a short skirt, and probably make a good living.
We stood outside for a few minutes. I was too nervous to go inside. What if Damien was behind this door? And if he was, what was I going to say to him?
I’d thought about it on the plane for hours, but I still wasn’t any closer to figuring it all out. How would the logistics of a relationship with him actually work? Was I going to explore the world with him? Was he going to come back to South Africa with me? A long-distance Skype relationship?
Nothing had physically changed between us since last year. I still had a life and a job back home, and Damien also had a life. And our lives were still very different.
Last year Damien had said that maybe love wasn’t enough…I hoped that wasn’t true anymore.
“Hey.” Annie clicked her fingers in front of my face. “Stop overthinking it, Lilly. Let’s just go inside.” Annie pushed the doors open, and I took a deep breath.
But Damien wasn’t there. Instead some blond beefcake was thrusting his G-string bum into the air and slapping it with his hand—a sight that I wish I’d never seen. This guy was so muscular that he had nothing even vaguely resembling a neck; his head just kind of attached straight onto his shoulders. We watched on as he bumped and grinded a bit more, with the same kind of horrifying fascination you get when you drive past a car accident—until the song was over and the houselights came on.
“So not my type,” Annie said, sounding amused. I couldn’t agree more. But judging by the wads of cash being flung at him, the crowd clearly didn’t seem to share our opinion.
“Oh my bejesus, well if it’s not Miss Infamy herself.” I looked up and saw my two old strip-club buddies, Mark and Francoise. “You look beautiful, that hair of yours! Speaking of which”—he turned his attention to Annie now—“who is this stunning redhead beside you?”
“This is my cousin, Annie.” Annie extended a hand and Mark pulled her into a friendly hug.
“It’s always nice to meet a fellow red…and they say blondes have more fun.” He winked at her and ran his hands through his hair dramatically. “Now come. Your cousin must have a drink with us. And I won’t take no for an answer.”
“I can’t believe I found you here,” I said, sipping the champagne that had already been shoved into my paw as soon as we sat down to join them.
“Oh, this is our little tradition, we always come here before the party.”
“Do you have any idea where the party is going to be this year?” Annie asked.
“Nope, we haven’t received the map yet. But that’s half the fun, isn’t it?” He winked at her.
“So…” A conspiratorial smile swept across Mark’s face and although he raised his eyebrows at me, his forehead didn’t move. It remained as smooth and silky as Botoxed marble. “So…where is Damien? We were secretly hoping to see him here tonight, I mean, who can forget that little show he put on for us, and of course, who can forget your little smooch. I think every man in this club harbors a secret crush on him.”
“Smooch? You didn’t tell me about that.” Annie nudged me.
“It was so hot.” Mark jumped in. “And I said to Francoise right there and then…they are meant for each other. You can just tell.”
“Mmmm.” I sipped my champagne melancholically. “It didn’t really work out like that.”
“No, my babes, that’s shit. Don’t you think, Fransi?” Fransi just grunted as usual.
“That’s why I’m here actually. I’m kind of here to—”
Mark cut me off as he laid a tender hand on Francoise’s shoulder. “Hear that, Francoise? She’s here to win him back. Isn’t that the sweetest thing you’ve ever heard?” Another grunt from him.
“I’m hoping that I will—”
/>
Mark cut me off again. “Find him at the party. Ahhh. So divine.”
Suddenly he jumped up clapping. “Well, you guys must come with us, we must all go together! We’ll help you find your guy and get you there safely. It would be mad fun! Don’t you think, Francoise?” He looked at his partner and, this time, I noticed a small smile quivering at the corners of Francoise’s mouth. I was completely taken aback. It was somewhat disturbing actually.
“We’d love to come,” I said.
“Let’s drink to it then!” Again another round of expensive champagne, which I must say wasn’t mixing too well with the two shots from earlier and the puff of weed that had not given me clarity of mind—remind me to never do that again.
“I’ll drink to that,” I said slightly reluctantly before we all clinked glasses. Then suddenly, and almost scarily, Francoise opened his mouth, and it looked like words were finally about to come out.
And they did.
“Pouvons-nous dîner avant tout?” he said in a high-pitched voice that took me by total surprise, since it completely contradicted his über-manly exterior.
“Of course, dear,” Mark said to Francoise before leaning over to us and whispering, “He’s French. We’ve been together for five years and I swear I don’t understand a word he says!”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Do you remember when cell phones first came out? How they were the size of small children and how when you needed to talk on them, you had to pull out the long antenna that could easily poke someone in the eye? Remember when texting was cool and futuristic and predictive text was new and revolutionary? Phones didn’t have cameras and GPS and Facebook, and you couldn’t tweet that you had just posted a picture on Instagram while tossing birds into pigs and simultaneously tracking how many steps you were taking on your pedometer app.
Soon our phones will be capable of reading our minds and sending friend requests to people we haven’t even met yet. I was terribly grateful for all this technology when Mark suddenly screeched…
“The map! They’ve sent the map.” Within seconds we were all huddled around his phone looking at the precious GPS coordinates lighting up his screen.
Mark quickly typed the coordinates in and soon a polite-sounding American lady with a soothing yet strangely commanding voice was telling us to travel north. By now I was practically bubbling over with excitement, while next to me Mark seemed to be exploding with it.
“I’ve always wanted to do this!” He jumped up clapping his hands and almost losing his phone in the process. “This is going to be awesies.” He was still clapping so wildly that Francoise, Annie, and I felt compelled to join in, even though we had no idea to what we owed the enthusiastic clapping and jumping up and down to.
“We’re going to be going on an elephant ride through the jungle and then canoeing…yay!” He shrieked even louder.
“Yay!” I joined in, too, because that really did sound exciting. I mentally chuckled as I tried to imagine what my reaction to those two things would have been this past year.
Surprisingly Francoise seemed to be quite the organizer, and in under two minutes he had hailed a taxi (a proper one, one with four wheels and real doors that opened and closed), loaded our luggage into the trunk, bought snacks and ice-cold beers, and was ushering us into the backseat while talking loudly in French.
And then we were off.
The drive out of Phuket went by in a flash of excitement, and we soon came to the great Sarasin Bridge at the northernmost tip of the island, an impressive long bridge that joined the island to the mainland. Some hours later and we arrived at our final destination, the Phang Nga province. Even though it was morning, the humidity and heat was already unbearable and we felt it the second we climbed out of the air-conditioned taxi.
“Oohhh, this is amazing,” Mark said while looking around. And it was all pretty amazing. We were surrounded by an enormous lush green tropical jungle. The jungle was so dense and thick that in between the massive green foliage, everything was pitch black. Every so often the green was punctuated by a splash of red, where a large alien-looking flower peeped out from behind the thick green curtain. Huge vines hung from the branches above us and also wound themselves around and over the trees in an intricate weblike structure that seemed to cover the entire jungle.
“Your man is somewhere in there.” Mark was suddenly behind me pointing into the dense bush. “Oh em gee, maybe he’ll come swinging down for you from a vine, hopefully with his shirt off like Tarzan.” He nudged me in the ribs. “No, I have a better idea. You should go swinging down from the tree without your top on!”
Annie laughed at this. I wasn’t convinced. “Um…” I gave Mark a stern look. “There will be no swinging from vines!”
“Fine.” He sighed dramatically, seemingly genuinely disappointed that I wouldn’t consider some form of vine swinging. “But I hope you’ve planned something—some kind of big, grand gesture?”
I glanced over at Annie—she was very aware that I still hadn’t come up with a plan. “Not yet,” I admitted.
Mark looked at me with wide blue eyes. “Please tell me you at least know what you’re going to say to him. I mean…you’ve come all this way, what are you going to do?”
He suddenly put his hand on his hip and flicked his hair back, I assume in an attempt to imitate me, although I don’t think I’ve ever done that before. “Surprise, Damien, it’s me!” His imitation of me was horrible, and he made me sound a little like a drunken Cher.
“I don’t know what I’m going to say yet, but I’m sure it will come to me.” At least I hoped to hell it would.
I think Mark must have seen the worried look on my face, because he was suddenly by my side taking my hand. “Don’t worry. I’m sure it will be fine.”
“Don’t they say love conquers everything?” Annie said as we all started walking through the dense jungle.
“Yes it does,” I said faintly, hoping with all my heart that it would be the case this time round. Love had to be enough this time. It had to be, because I needed Damien in my life as much as I needed air to breathe.
Being inside the jungle felt like being inside a hot, suffocating greenhouse, and I instantly broke into a sweat. We continued carefully down a small path, following some small red arrows as we went. Although I couldn’t see any animals, any giant hairy spiders or whale-sized snakes, I got the distinctive feeling that the jungle was alive with all sorts of creatures: hidden under the moss, disguised on the leafy floor, and concealed suspiciously behind the large leaves. I tried not to think about the TV show I suddenly remembered watching a week ago about the king cobra, which was indigenous to Thailand and had a venom that could kill a person in minutes. Instead, I focused on what I was going to say to Damien. Was I prepared to leave my life behind and travel with him? This time, a year down the line, the answer was definitely yes!
We soon came to a large clearing in the bush where we found a small village, made up of only a few bamboo houses. They were all very quaint and well built; some of them even balanced elegantly on stilts and one or two were actually built into the trees like a child’s dream tree house, complete with rickety rope ladders. A few local village children ran around outside playing, while others busied themselves with the morning duties of washing clothes and cooking. Our arrival caught their attention, and they started calling out to us in greeting, waving and smiling as we approached, prompting a young man to appear and gesture for us to follow him. He ushered us to the back end of the buildings, where about ten other people had already gathered. My eyes immediately scanned the crowd for Damien, but he wasn’t there. Some of the other people looked vaguely familiar but that didn’t seem to matter at all, because within a matter of moments everyone was hugging and greeting one another like long lost friends. You really couldn’t help but get caught up in the party spirit. I had felt that contagious feeling the year before, and this year was no different.
We were still talking and laughing when another
man came around the corner pulling two elephants behind him. I’d never been this close to an elephant before and I was momentarily taken aback. They were incredible to behold, imposing and intimidating with their strange gray leathery skin and long trunks. But despite all this, and despite my steadily growing misgivings about riding one of these beasts through the jungle, they were, in fact, remarkably calm and surprisingly affectionate—especially after we’d fed them some lettuce.
Each elephant had a kind of box strapped onto its back, which allowed for five people to climb in quite comfortably. So my BFFs and I hopped in, together with a gorgeous—and I mean simply stunning—German woman named Friederike, whose profession could only be model or actress or Miss Universe (if that counts as a profession?). Although I’ve never been attracted to a woman, have never “kissed a girl and liked it,” I simply couldn’t help but stare at her. Women like this always make me feel self-conscious and at least two sizes bigger than I really am. But I had other things to think about right now, like holding on to the sides of this little box for dear life as the elephant stood up.
Riding an elephant is an amazing experience; you move through the world in a kind of slow, rhythmic sway. None of us said a word, and the only sound we could hear was the cracking and snapping of the jungle under the elephant’s huge, deliberate feet. Our journey took us deeper and deeper still into the rainforest, crossing green rivers as we went and climbing up steep rocky slopes, until we finally stopped at a large green pool of water.
A soft, delicate mist hung over it, giving it an ethereal quality. It looked like something plucked directly from the mystical Middle-earth depicted in Lord of the Rings. Once we’d disembarked, we made our way to the shoreline, where a few canoes patiently waited for us.
The water was a deep emerald color, surrounded by a brilliant palette of deep greens and blacks created by huge rocky overhangs. As we rowed across the water a gentle tide softly pushed us forward, making it much easier to navigate down the winding river. But some parts the river became so narrow, framed on both sides by large rocky cliffs, that you had to use your oar to push yourself along.