Catching the Sun

Rory did not take his eyes from the gibbon by the sink.

‘Gibbons eat some insects and small animals such as tree lizards, ants, beetles, butterflies, crickets, stick insects, maggots, Asian leaf mantis,’ my son said. ‘Things that gibbons don’t eat include Cheesy-Wheezy Puff-Puffs.’

Travis wiped his mouth on the back of his arm and picked up a bread knife. With one bound and then another he was across the kitchen and in our faces. His teeth were bared. The knife was in his hand and the knife was at Jesse’s throat.

Then Rory reached out and placed his hand lightly on the gibbon’s arm.

The gibbon froze.

He stared with shock at the small dimpled hand of the child resting on the brown fur of his left arm, just below the elbow. For a long time, neither of them moved. Then the gibbon pulled away, totally subdued, moving very slowly and very gently as if afraid a sudden movement would disturb my son. None of us moved. But the gibbon hopped across back to the sink where he paused to examine the nails of his fingers.

‘Where the bloody hell did you learn to do that?’ Jesse asked my son.

Rory did not bother to reply but I already knew the answer. He had read it in a book.

‘I keep thinking we’re going to be struck down,’ Jesse said, looking at me.

‘What?’ I said, wrapping my son in my arms.

‘I keep thinking that some lightning bolt is going to strike us,’ Jesse said. ‘To punish us for the way we live here. For the lies we tell. For the rules we break. For the things we do.’

‘Shut up, Jesse,’ I told him, annoyed. ‘This is crazy talk.’

‘I know I’m stupid,’ Jesse said, looking at Rory now. ‘I know I did a bad thing bringing him here. A stupid thing. But he was drinking beer till he puked in the bar and he didn’t like the flashing lights and they had filed down his teeth and they were giving him stuff to make him stay awake until closing time. And he doesn’t like being made to wear a hat.’ Jesse hung his head. ‘And I thought it would be a bit of company.’

‘No,’ my son said, and he placed a hand on Jesse’s arm, as he had on the arm of the gibbon. ‘You think you did a bad thing.’ He smiled up at us and for a second it was as if he was the grown-up. ‘But don’t worry,’ Rory said. ‘I think you found him just in time.’

6

Up in the ring, Jesse was in trouble.

He was limping, and his mouth was twisted with pain, a thin stripe of blood on his lower lip.

He towered over the small Thai youth in front of him but every time Jesse stepped forward, the Thai kicked him with his shin. Always the same kick. The gleaming thin brown shin lashed out hard and high on Jesse’s plump milky thigh, and the pain in my friend’s face registered as clearly as if he had been given an electric shock.

Farren leaned into me and shouted something in my ear, but I didn’t get a word of it. Near midnight the noise in a Muay Thai stadium is deafening. There’s a live band, tucked up somewhere high in the rafters, so hidden that they could be some kind of mad radio, and as the night goes on they build in intensity, their pipes, drums and cymbals – you notice the clash-clash-clash of the cymbals most of all – sounding like a commentator who has lost control, echoing and encouraging and urging on the violence in the ring. I had never heard such a racket. Farren had to put his arm around my shoulder and pull me closer to make himself heard.

‘Look at that,’ he shouted. ‘There’s the reason why the Thais were never colonized – right there. There’s the reason why, out of all the nations of Asia, only the Thais were never ruled by the white man from the big bad West. Because they have a mean streak.’

Directly above us, Jesse reeled on the ropes, the sweat flying from his body. The Thai kid seemed to be moving in for the kill. I found that I was shouting Jesse’s name. It did no good.

On the other side of Farren, I saw the Russian jump up and laugh. I had driven him from the Amanpuri resort in Surin all the way south to the stadium in Chalong, his big meaty arms wrapped around my waist all the way. The Amanpuri was the most exclusive hotel on the island but, unlike a lot of clients I was sent to pick up, the Russian didn’t complain about being picked up by bike.

Farren often did business at night. Phuket had two seasons – wet and dry – but the heat was always with us, and in the day it could kill you. So business was often conducted in the cooler, darker hours, when it was easier to work, and think, and sell, and dream.

‘A mean streak,’ Farren repeated. ‘A lovely people who are capable of extreme cruelty if you push the wrong button. Just like the Brits.’

It wasn’t a criticism.

‘Come on, Jesse!’ Farren laughed. ‘Murder the little bastard!’

Leaning against the ropes on the far side of the ring, Jesse gamely motioned for his opponent to come forward, and he did, the Thai kicking him high on the thigh again, and then again, and then again. Three kicks that blurred into one kick and seemed to shrivel something in my lower stomach.

Farren turned away and clinked beer cans with the Russian, who seemed to be having a rare old time. We were in the VIP section. There were only a dozen seats in there, but if you were in the VIP section they put a rope around your little area, and gave you a plastic bag that contained two cans of Tiger beer. I took a nervous swig of the can I was holding.

Jesse lunged forward, hunched down and fists flying, one last desperate try at getting past the kicks that were crippling him. But the Thai lifted one knee and it met Jesse flush on the chin and he dropped into the arms of the referee who hugged him like a loving parent and waved it all off. I felt a sickened relief that it was all over.

The little Thai did a series of perfect, joyous backflips, and his bare feet cracked against the well-worn canvas of the Muay Thai ring like pistol shots.

Pirin, Farren’s Thai, was in the corner and he looked at me now and nodded, but the band had stopped playing and there was a brief moment for talking normally.

‘All good with you and the family, Tom?’ Farren said, and something must have passed across my face because he leaned in and poked his finger against my chest. ‘We’re going to get you that car,’ he said, and I could smell the Tiger beer on his breath. ‘That old bike is not good enough for you.’

This was the chance I had been waiting for.

‘I like the bike,’ I said. ‘I can fix it up.’ I hesitated for just a second. I had been thinking about this for a while. ‘But it’s my visa,’ I said. ‘It’s a tourist visa. I appreciate everything you’ve done for me – I really do – but I want to be legal.’

I shook my head, not knowing what else to say. That was it really. I wanted to work. I was happy to work. But I wanted to be legitimate. And Tess wanted it for me too.

‘But everyone comes in on a tourist visa,’ Farren said. He clapped me on the back and it was a good feeling. ‘We’ll sort out the paperwork later,’ he told me. ‘We’re not going to let the little men stop us with their bloody paperwork, are we?’

‘No,’ I said, smiling back at him, and enormously relieved even though nothing had changed. ‘No. We’re not.’

I climbed into the ring where Pirin was nursing Jesse. ‘Always the same in moo-ay tai,’ Pirin said, and it sounded strange to hear the national sport of Thailand pronounced with a Thai accent. ‘Kick loses to punch. Punch loses to knee. Knee loses to elbow. Elbow loses to kick.’ We helped Jesse to his feet. He could just about stand, although his pale blue eyes scared me. They didn’t seem to be looking at anything. ‘And Jesse loses to everyone!’ Pirin laughed, and slapped him on the back.

Jesse looked at us. ‘What happened?’ he said.

‘Cha-na nork,’ said Pirin. ‘Knockout. But you fought bravely. There’s no shame. Be proud of your heart.’

‘No,’ Jesse said. ‘I mean, what happened to me? I used to be quite good at all this.’ He looked at me, bleary with sadness as much as anything else. ‘I really did. Quite good, I was.’

‘I know,’ I said. ‘I saw your fights. You showed me the DVD, remember?’

‘You saw my DVD?’

We gently helped him between the ropes and into a chair in the little VIP section. There was a backstage area by the toilets where the fighters prepared and got patched up and exchanged equipment – a surprising amount of sharing went on – but Jesse did not look ready for the long walk to the toilets.

Farren was making his pitch to the Russian.

‘A foreign buyer in Thailand needs to bring in one hundred per cent of the purchase price in foreign currency,’ he said. ‘We can help you with your FETF – that’s the Foreign Exchange Transaction Form you need for the Land Department. Then Wild Palm helps you to set up a Thai company that legally owns the land. A Thai company that you control. You are allowed to own up to forty-nine per cent of the shares.’

Then there was what they called the money pause.

Farren was silent, staring at the Russian, giving him the chance to ask the obvious question – But how do I control a company if I own less than half of it?

The Russian did not ask the question.

They never did.