by Zolbrod, Zoe
“Shh,” he said. “I can’t help there’s no more. I want to make with you too many times. It’s okay. I’ll be careful.”
Robin twisted from under him. “No,” she said. For a moment, they weren’t touching. “Aren’t you worried about AIDS?” Then she swung her leg over his and put her hand on his smooth chest. His aubergine nipples were small as pennies. “Just go get some more,” she whispered. “That store is still open.”
“I feel shame. Certain kind of shame, how do you say that?”
“Embarrassment? You feel embarrassed?” She used her open palm to trace wide circles around his pectorals.
“I feel that. Today I already go to that store to get condoms. Same girl might see me there, think, wow, what’s he doing. Too much!” He giggled, pulled her on top of him.
Robin began kissing his neck. “It’s too much? Okay, then. We’ll wait until morning.”
“Noooo,” Piv said. He adjusted her hips. “Shhh. I’ll be careful.”
The whole conversation was husky and low. When the phone rang, Robin jerked. Piv scooped her to him with one arm. On the next ring, she wrapped tightly around him and hid her face in his skin. He answered the phone, speaking in Thai, “Krup.” He switched to English. With one ear pressed to the sheet and one against Piv, Robin heard his words as if she were listening from inside his body: “Abu told me ... I have that one ... Of course . . . Excuse me, but I think now is late ... No. Okay, I meet you ... Okay, yes ... No problem. Sure. Of course.” She felt his skin tighten as he reached to hang up the phone, then he curled into her, bringing his knees up so they pressed against her belly.
“Russian one. Volcheck. He wants me to meet him now, at Soi Cowboy bar. To give him the things from Mr. Rong.”
“Now?” Robin said. “But you’re in bed.”
“He says now. We have something that belongs to him. He wants that now.” Piv untangled himself, swung his legs off the bed. His face was blank. Robin reached up to touch his hip.
“I’ll go with you. Then we can go to the store after.” She smiled.
“You cannot. Not this place. It’s not for the lady.” He went into the shower.
He was dressed and with his hand on the doorknob before she said, “Aren’t you going to say good-bye?” He came over and kissed her without diverting his attention back into the room. When he left, she rose and straightened the bed, pulling the rough top sheet over herself, her sticky thighs, as protection against the air-conditioning.
Piv took another shower when he came home at 4:00 AM. He didn’t want to talk about his evening. “Shhh,” he told Robin when he found her questioning and awake. “You’ll see. He says for you to meet him in lounge at noon hour.” Piv rolled over and closed his eyes. Robin strained to hear him sleep. He didn’t snore; he barely breathed. She wondered if he was faking. She disliked Volcheck already.
Meeting him didn’t improve her impression. She had waited in the lounge for twenty minutes, nursing a Coke with lime, before he pushed through the door with a wobbling white woman in tow. He lumbered to Robin’s table and sank into a chair with a grunt; the woman minced behind him, waiting until he nudged a chair out with his foot before she sat. “You’re the American girl,” he said. He flicked his eyes at Robin before looking away. He was chewing on something. His cud, Robin thought. She could hear his breathing. “I want you to take this girl shopping.” He had a fringe of pale hair growing from the curve of each ear and hair in other places that shouldn’t need shaving, like the bridge of his nose. He patted down his clothing, taking a scarlet-edged handkerchief from his breast pocket and swiping at his brow before tucking the cloth into one inside coat pocket, fishing in the other one, shifting from buttock to buttock to dig in back pockets, then lifting his pelvis to reach into the front of his trousers. He brought out a money clip. “I have only American,” he said. He peeled off twenties and they scattered on the table. “You exchange it.” After half a year of colored money, the green looked anomalous to Robin, silly.
“She never left Russia before. She has nothing. Get her a few things. And something nice for under. Nadja.” He spoke to the woman briefly in Russian. “My girlfriend. What are you called?” he asked Robin.
“Robin. Robin Miatta.” Why had she given him her full name?
“Robin.” He rolled the word around in his mouth like it was a fruit pit. “Robin. Robin.” He switched to Russian. Robin could hear versions of her name speckling his sentences. The woman stuttered it once. She had full makeup on: foundation, blusher, liner, shadow, clumpy mascara. Robin wanted to flake it away with her fingernail, get to the wide prettiness underneath.
“Piv calls me Nok. It’s Thai. Do you like that better?” Robin looked at the woman. “Is it easier for you to say Nok?”
Volcheck scowled and brushed the names away with his hand. “You carry the money. You watch her. Bring her back here at five o’clock. I want receipts. And give the money that’s left to me. It’s not hers.”
Robin picked up the twenties and started counting them. Volcheck stood. “How much did I give you?” he asked.
“There’s a hundred and twenty here.”
He took them from her hand and thumbed them, then added two more from his roll. “That’s enough. That’s more than enough for her.” From his jacket pocket came a small notebook; he muttered in Russian as he wrote.
“And excuse me,” said Robin, wrapping the bills around her finger. “But Abu promised to give me something for the errand I just ran for him. You got everything last night. Since he’s not here, are you the one handling that?”
Volcheck breathed out hard like a horse, a sound that meant no. “But I’ll pay you for today.” He let flutter two more twenties then shook his suit back square onto his wide shoulders. Robin envisioned herself leaving the dollars there, walking away, but she slid the money off the table. One bill had stuck to her sweating Coke glass.
Instead of taking Nadja to Siam Square or Silom Road, Robin headed across the river to a district with newer construction. Palmed weeds still grew around the scrubby lots of high-rise apartment buildings, and dogs occasionally ambled in sunshine down the sois. She hoped this might be less overwhelming to the Russian woman, whose wary posture—arms crossed, shoulders hunched, legs sealed together-contrasted with her playful, revealing clothing. The taxi let them out across the street from a shopping center. On the sidewalk, Nadja tugged on her short red skirt with one hand while keeping the other across her chest. Her eyes darted under a stiff brow. Robin had been to this mall before, with Piv, to see an American movie with Thai subtitles. Forrest Gump was playing now. Robin had expected to see more farangs in this district because of the theater, but she spotted none on the busy street. “Come on,” she said to Nadja. When her words only got a stare, she gestured.
To cross the six-lane road they had to use a pedestrian’s flyover half a block up. When she was with Piv, Robin no longer noticed when she was the only foreigner in a room. Walking with Nadja past crowded street-vendor booths, though, she felt self-conscious on the other woman’s behalf. They were in a middle-class neighborhood, and in Bangkok people never gawked or shouted farang, farang the way kids might deep in the countryside, but Robin suspected a constant stream of covert stares. These didn’t alight on her. Nadja, tall anyway, wore wedge-heeled sandals and was quite meaty in her skirt and glimmery top. Robin nudged her and rolled her eyes to commiserate, to help her through. She’d been missing female company. In Turkey, she and a French woman had once traveled together quite companionably for a week using only their limited shared vocabulary and a whole host of eye signals. Language didn’t have to be a barrier. But Nadja’s eyes just bugged further. Black dust powdered the skin beneath them, specks of mascara or of soot.
“What is it you need to buy?” asked Robin once they were inside. The first display was a bin of tiny, padded, pastel bras that would never fit her charge. “Do you want a shirt?” She plucked at the corner of her own. “Some pants?” She wagged her loose-legged co
tton ones. She knew Nadja couldn’t understand her, but she had to at least try. “Or more stuff like you already have?” She swept her hand down Nadja’s frame. Very polyester, but then Russians weren’t known for their fashion. Robin urged her toward the women’s department, to let her wander and decide. So much for a bonding shopping trip. Then Nadja touched Robin’s elbow and put her hand high on the center of her own chest. She shook her head. “Nyet. No,” she said.
“No?” Robin asked. She stared at her face, tried to read something there. “No what?”
Nadja held up one finger and opened her white vinyl clutch purse. The clasp was gold-colored with small blue and green rhinestones. “No.” Her eyes on Robin, she stirred her hand in the purse’s contents, then offered it over. Robin took it. A cosmetic smell wafted from the satin inside. There was a gummy cosmetic bag, a pink-handled hairbrush, a small flip-stack of photos, a toothbrush in a plastic bag. Robin looked up with a question.
“No, no, no,” Nadja said. Her kohl-rimmed eyes were almost a dusky purple. They were glassy, flinting, scared. Was she really Volcheck’s girlfriend?
“It’s okay.” Customers kept streaming in the store, women wearing neat sandals, matching sets, teenagers with platform shoes poking from tight black pants. Robin stepped toward Nadja and took her arm. She could smell the woman’s perfume and body heat dissipating into the air-conditioning. Nadja’s nipples rose through her blouse and Robin winced for her. She handed the clutch back.
Nadja took it but shook her head urgently. She said something in Russian. She opened the white purse again and pantomimed a sweeping grab. Looking, Robin could see that the pale blue lining was pulled away in one corner. A brighter, centered square with small threads dangling indicated a former pocket.
“You were robbed?” Robin said. “You need a new purse?” They were communicating, but Robin still didn’t understand. This was a story she didn’t know. She reached under her shirt to her money belt and brought out all the cash she had with her: five hundred baht. She was embarrassed because she’d been sweating and the money smelled like her skin.
“Here,” she said. “This isn’t that guy’s; we don’t have to give it back to him. He won’t know you have it. At least you can use it to call someone.”
Nadja took the baht and tucked it in her blouse, then pressed her purse to her chest.
“Can I help you call someone? Should we go to a phone?” Robin made the gesture of dialing, of holding the receiver to her ear. “Is there someone who can help you? Who should know where you are?”
No answer. But the money seemed to calm her. Robin kept her arm on Nadja’s shoulder while they shopped. They looked hard to find big-enough blouses, T-shirts, skirts-all of them meant to be sexy. They spent the equivalent of a hundred and thirty-five dollars, then bought ice cream cones at the food court on the top floor of the store. They licked silently but in a din; dressed-up children were performing lip-synch routines to music that bounced against the skylight and the white floor. The little girls had pink lipstick on, circles of blush, and they were very expressive. Robin watched the miniature, practiced dancing. Then she turned her head to see Nadja staring with blank concern at nothing at all.
“Will you be okay?” Robin asked her. Nadja angled her head to show the frustrated effort she was making at comprehension. The two of them looked at each other, both of their foreheads furrowed, and cheerful pop music clattered around them.
Chapter 11
I don’t like this Russian boss, Russian Vol. I make Robin go alone to meet him at noon. I say to tell him I’m asleep, but after she leaves he’s coming to my room, pounding on the door. “Open the door,” he says. “I pay for your room.”
I open the door with no shirt on to show I was sleeping. I smile at him. “Good morning,” I say. “We stay late last night. Wow. Excuse me while I take shower. I’ll meet you in lounge. Few moments please.” But he comes past me and sits in the chair. “Excuse me,” I say, but he doesn’t leave. Why do I need to be with him too much? Last night I sit with him in Soi Cowboy fuck bar. We don’t have conversation, getting to know you, talk about our countries like with Abu. No, nothing like that. Sometimes I talk for him. He tells me to. He speaks good English, but he doesn’t like to try with people who don’t speak so good like him. He makes me ask mamasan, bar manager, how much for that girl, for one hour if she leaves right now? How much for that one, number sixty-six, for all night? How much business does Soi Cowboy lose because of Naga Entertainment Plaza, do girls cost more there? Mamasan looks at me funny. I tell her please excuse, I don’t ask for me, I ask for that one there, that farang.
Some Thai men, they go with prostitutes, sure, this is popular. In every town you can do this. But for me, no, I don’t like it. I don’t like to pay for the lady. These ladies are poor ones, come from the North, the Northeast, very poor, they have to. I don’t have to. Russian Vol makes me ask about this, but I don’t want to do anything with them, no. And maybe he doesn’t want to, or else it’s costing too much, because when we leave that place he doesn’t take the Thai lady. Three come after him and touch his arms, say, “Why you don’t like me? Why you don’t stay?” but he doesn’t take them.
Today after I shower I follow Russian Vol to one lounge in another hotel building. We drink in there, and he chews on his straw. Then he says to me, “How much you think you’ll need for tomorrow? For your guys in customs?”
I don’t know what these words mean, so I smile. I look up at video screen, and I laugh like it’s very funny there.
“Hey, dumb shit! For your guys at the airport? What do you usually give them?”
“No problem.” I nod to him. “Give them something.”
“What the fuck, I thought you had guys. The fucking African told me it was okay we didn’t have papers for these because you could get ’em right off the plane.” I look at him. His neck is fat. His face is red. I hold my face soft and still. “Do you even know what the fucking Christ I’m talking about?”
Answer to that one: no. Why Abu never told me about this? Why did Abu leave me here? But I can guess something. Maybe tomorrow is March 4. Maybe Vol is yelling about some business with Admiral Wattanayakorn. It’s the only thing I have to say.
“Of course I know. Dock N243. Of course I know.”
“Fucking black Africans. Christ, what black hole did he pull you out of?” Did I guess wrong? But he’s still yelling. “How much, I said! And don’t pad it.”
Okay, maybe I guess right. Dock N243, and from Vol I know some customs wants money. Too much money, and I’m supposed to give it to them. “Ten thousand baht,” I say. I’m supposed to get something coming off that plane.
“Fucking Christ shit,” he says. English swear words. He knows too many. “You better not fuck this up.”
Star Hotel is better than this Russian Vol hotel. Even in daytime, I see the bar girl working in here. No one’s happy. No one’s nice, I can see that. American movie on the video screen is spread thin; you cannot see the face, eyes, mouth move, too blurry.
“Please. It’s no problem. But you need to tell me flight. The time. How much will arrive.” I think I can use Saisamorn’s nephew’s car. Will it fit inside there?
“It’s Royal Jordan flight 617, arriving at 11:20. Dump your girlfriend in the terminal, tell her to call you when it arrives.” He makes the stomach noise with his mouth, starts counting thousand baht bills. They’re bigger than five hundred baht. They look powerful.
“Excuse. I do not have the mobile phone. Impossible for NokRobin to call.”
“They said you’re local skill. Worth my money. You’re a fucking monkey.” He chews on that plastic straw some more. It slices air, up and down. He’s too ugly. Of course he must pay for the lady, pay too much. No lady would ever pay for him.
“It’s okay. No problem without.”
“And leave it wide open? I’ll give you my fucking phone for the day.”
He gives me his phone. He gives me ten thousand baht, as much as I c
an think to ask, and he gives without bargaining. I don’t know anything about this airport, customs, dock, but I think I know more than him. He needs me to do it. “Okay. And how much money you give me for doing this business?”
Vol takes five hundred baht and smashes it on the table with his thick hand. “This is all your fucking money I have, and you’re not worth it. You don’t know shit.”
“My money? What you mean? No more baht? It’s okay. Dollars are for everyone.”
After some time of discussion, he says he’ll give me one hundred dollars. To me, yesterday, this is big money, enough, but I laugh and say I know the customs, I take big risk, why does he give nothing for this? Three hundred, I tell him. Russian Vol says fucking bullshit no. Fucking black African assholes give him someone with the banana up his ass, fuck that.
Jairong. He has hot heart. Ugly heart. I just smile.
When he wants me to, I hire the taxi driver to go to Star Hotel and get the Russian girlfriend, bring her back. Vol wants pizza food, so I take them to Pan Pan, one pizza restaurant I know. I don’t order food. I don’t want to eat now—my stomach feels tight, to me this food is no good. When they finish, I can leave them. Nine o’clock at night, and I want to see NokRobin, but first I say, “I do your business tomorrow for three hundred dollars. If not, no problem. I still can stay in Star Hotel. Owner of that place is my friend.”
Russian Vol spit on ground. He says one hundred now and two hundred then, when I bring that thing back. Okay, I say. From his pocket he gives me one hundred dollar bill. The most U.S. dollars I ever have of my own, and I see it’s nothing to him.