19.
After the conversation with her parents, added to the fact that she’ll be leaving in a week to go back to Australia for at least a week, Thalia is eager to absorb everything Thai while she can.
She got her hair braided on the beach, which isn’t “Thai” exactly but is a thing she’s been wanting to do with her trip.
We go to a different beach every afternoon because there are more than two dozen different beaches on Phuket alone and she wants to experience as many as she can.
I keep reminding her that we have time, that she’ll have a year to sit on every beach she wants to.
“I know, but when you’re not in vacation mode, you just let opportunities slip. Besides, I’ll be a student.”
“Two hours, twice a week, I don’t think the demand on your time will be that intense.”
Still, she’s been practicing Thai every day, messaging Meena whenever she can and watching YouTube videos. We’ll even practice together, which is helpful because it reminds me that my own Thai is full of holes and there are so many words I don’t know.
After days of grinding, by my standards at least, I finally have a draft of Gimme Goblin Girls 16 that I’m reasonably satisfied with.
The response when I publish is predictable.
I check back a day later to find that I have an average of 3 stars on Amazon; one reader rated it five stars and another gave it a one star rating complete with a review.
DNF tbh Jason should never have taken back Asmargerda without some SERIOUS groveling. Don’t recommend this series btw group shower scene was descent.
Well, what are you gonna do? Can’t please everyone. Maybe it’s time to start a new series, something less fantasy-oriented and more real world. If Michael Dalton can do it, why not me?
Having published a book, I decide to give myself a day of relaxation before jumping into the next one. I spend the day hanging out with Thalia, who tries her best to cook us Pad Thai.
The noodles are the main casualty. She soaks them too long and they go soft and clumpy, sticking together in the wok in a way that no amount of stirring really fixes.
The tamarind paste goes in fine, and the egg scrambles okay, but without enough heat the whole thing steams instead of fries and comes out slightly wet which means they don’t absorb the tamarind sauce and palm oil.
The peanuts are good at least. It’s hard to mess up peanuts.
But she didn’t realize the kit came with a little packet of peanuts so she also got a bag of boiled peanuts which we later discovered are terrible. For me, it’s roasted or nothing.
I could get better Thai food anywhere else in town, but I decide to keep that to myself.
She wants to be helpful and earn her keep.
There’s no more pretending that she doesn’t live with me and that this isn’t a permanent thing between us.
Somewhere along the way, we both decided that this relationship is something we want to be in and so there’s no reason to fight it.
No reason to talk about our status either.
We’ve just worked the whole thing out between us.
After floating around the pool a little while, I decide it’s time we go up the hill to Grandma Jazz.
It’s a little cannabis cafe perched on the side of the hill on the road that connects Kamala with Patong.
Hats on a hat rack by the door. Tiles on the walls with different patterns on each one.
It looks like the inside of the most interesting grandmother’s house you’ve ever been in, which is more or less the point.
The view of the valley from the veranda is absolutely incredible.
There’s a balcony on the upper level and a larger one downstairs.
Jazz plays at the exact right volume. It’s present enough to set the mood, low enough that you can hear yourself think.
On Saturday nights they do live sessions with a saxophone or a piano player. It’s not to be missed.
You come in and take a fedora off the hat rack and choose your strain. AC will roll up a joint for you right there. Thalia takes in the place as we walk in.
“Sut yord!” she says.
AC greets me with a fist bump. He’s British, been here long enough that the Thai sun has worked on him a little, a permanent slight tan that makes him look permanently content.
We give each of the small glass jars that line the counter a sniff before making our selection.
The jars are labeled in Joy’s handwriting, each with a little description.
I go with White Widow and Thalia chooses Runtz Mintz.
Joy comes up with a tray of glasses from downstairs.
She’s wearing a flowing dress with a halter top and her curly dye-blonde hair is done up in a bandana.
She has that ease about her that people develop when they’ve found exactly the thing they’re supposed to be doing.
“Sawadee ka Mike,” she says. “Coffee?”
“Sure,” I say.
I introduce Thalia and we make small talk while AC rolls the joints with the unhurried concentration of a craftsman.
He smooths the paper, sprinkles in the finely-ground flower, and tamps down the end then burns away the extra paper with a lighter.
The whole process is done in about forty-five seconds.
Then Joy brings down a couple of iced coffees and we all sit together on the veranda downstairs.
The coffees come in high ball glasses with single round ice cubes, the kind of detail that tells you someone thought carefully about everything.
These two are more like hosts than mere proprietors, which is what keeps me coming back here.
We settle in, start smoking while wearing fedoras.
Soon we’re laughing and chatting just like family.
I tell Joy and AC that Meena recommended the place.
It’s amazing that this was her first experience smoking weed and I had no idea until she told me.
They didn’t even realize we knew each other.
Of course, they knew that I was studying Thai, but Meena is also a common name in Thailand.
It means “March,” incidentally. We talk about her grandmother and the trip we took up north to visit.
“That’s so sad, right?” Joy says. “Grandma getting old already.”
“You know grandmas get free cake at Grandma Jazz,” AC says.
“Have you ever had any grandmas come looking to take you up on that offer?”
“When they do, we’ll be ready to serve them.”
“So, how’d you come up with the name Grandma Jazz anyway?” Thalia asks.
“We owe everything to our grandmas,” AC says, in a tone both gentle and serious. “Without them having done their thing, none of us would be here.”
“I love that,” Thalia says.
“Plus when you rented the space it was already full of old lady furniture, right?”
AC shrugs.
“Both can be true at the same time.”
“You still studying Thai, Mike?” Joy asks.
“Nid noi,” I say. Little bit.
“You’re good already,” Joy says.
“You say that and then any time I try to say something in Thai, you can’t understand me.”
Joy takes a hit and blows it out, waving the smoke away.
“Say something.”
I ask her in Thai what she wants me to say. She looks at me with a blank expression, having no idea what I’m trying to express, which rather elegantly proves my point.
Below us is a grassy field that stays green even during the dry season without being tended. There are breadfruit trees that grow wild at the edge of it. I think the people in the neighborhood must harvest them but I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone pick them.
“When we went up to visit Meena, we smoked weed by this waterfall,” Thalia says. “We kissed. It was so magical.”
“It has that power to bring people together, doesn’t it?” AC says. “Barriers break down. You realize they were never there at all except in your mind.”
“I wanted to kiss Meena too,” Thalia says. “Thai women are just so cute. Including you, Joy. You’re gorgeous.”
Joy says thank you with a smile.
“Michael’s too shy to admit it, but he made Meena his girlfriend while we were there.”
“I’m not shy,” I say. “I just didn’t have a good reason to bring it up. But it’s not a secret or anything. Actually, it’s a pretty new development so there’s not really—“
“You two girlfriends, Mike?” Joy asks, laughing.
“I guess so.”
“So, you two have an open arrangement?” AC asks.
“No, I wouldn’t say that,” I say. “Thalia encouraged me to pursue my interest in her and made me realize that trying to keep things platonic with Meena would have been a mistake. I’m glad she did.”
“Well, that’s very generous of you, Thalia,” AC says. “You must be very open-minded.”
“He’s just a lot of man,” Thalia says. “Enough to share.”
She cackles, clearly very stoned. Then, as sometimes happens, something shifts. No one says anything, which feels like just a natural break in the conversation. But I can see how in her stoned state, she can start to get self-conscious.
“Oh god,” Thalia says. “I should just be quiet, shouldn’t I?”
“It’s fine,” I assure her. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”
“I’m being a little too honest,” she says, refusing the joint that is offered to her. “I should stop now before I say something I’ll really regret.”
“There’s no judgements here,” AC says. “Feel free to express yourselves, live the way you want to. This is Thailand after all. You can be free here.”
“That’s what the word Thai means, right Joy?” I ask.
She tilts her head.
“I’m not sure,” she says. “Maybe?”
“I don’t want to go home,” Thalia says. “I mean, I do but I don’t want to not be here. Does that make any sense? It sounded stupid.”
“It makes perfect sense,” AC assures her. “I think it’s how we all feel about this place. We moved here from Bangkok a few years ago to open up the shop.”
“We should do something special,” I say. “Before you leave. Take a trip, something memorable.”
“No, let’s do it when I come back,” Thalia says. “I want to celebrate my return so that I won’t feel sad before I leave. And that way Meena can join us too.”
“Will her grandma be okay without her?” Joy asks.
“Maybe Meena can bring her along. We can park her in one of the chairs upstairs. I don’t know about weed, but I know she likes coffee!”
Everyone chuckles at that.
“She’d be well taken care of,” AC says.
“Yeah,” Joy adds. “But we’re only allowed to operate a cannabis dispensary, not a grandma shelter.”
“Seriously though, do you think Meena could meet us here in Phuket?” Thalia asks.
“Before we left, I told her that I’d buy her a ticket to come visit,” I say. “The sooner, the better. But we’ve got to ask her first.”
“Let’s do that, then,” Thalia says. “There must be some awesome resorts all over the island, right? We could do a staycation.”
“I love it.”
I have a sip of coffee, which helps my system self-regulate and keep this indica-dominant strain from making me sleepy.
The light down here on the lower veranda is turning to gold.
I can hear the group upstairs getting louder and it filters down pleasantly, evidence of other people having a good time in the same building.
AC checks the security cameras on his iPad and sees that a group of customers has just walked in upstairs, so he and Joy excuse themselves to go serve them.
We stay downstairs on the veranda, playing chess.
The game takes a while. At one point she takes close to five minutes to make a move.
I don’t want to say anything, convinced that she’s deep in strategizing. Finally, she looks up from the board.
“Are you going to move?”
“It’s your turn, darling.”
“Oh, right,” she says, and then moves her rook diagonally three spaces.
I don’t say anything about the rook. It’s a very stoned move. Let her figure it out.
The sunset, when it comes, is no less spectacular for the fact that the mountains face east. The thin strips of cloud turn orange and pink before fading to nothing.
When we come inside, we find a large contingent of Middle Eastern men in luxury casualwear talking animatedly around two of the tables.
Upstairs, someone is picking at the piano keys in a way that’s just aimless enough to be charming.
Joy and AC have taken their spots behind the counter, doing what they do, which is make everything feel easy and right.
The shop will be closing in about an hour, so we close out and say goodbye.
“I’ll definitely come back!” Thalia calls as she stands at the door.
“When you do, can you bring back our hat?” AC asks with a smile.
“Oh, sorry!” Thalia says, taking the fedora off her head and hurrying over to put it back on the rack. She gives Joy a quick hug on the way out.
I generally make a point of not driving when I’m stoned. Some people say that weed doesn’t affect their driving, but I typically prefer caution. Since we’re less than five minutes from home I don’t think it’s much of a risk. We’re wearing helmets at least, which is more than the locals do.
We go for a swim when we get back. No swimsuits.
We just strip down and jump in. The pool is the temperature it always is at this hour, warm from the day but with a current of cool near the bottom where the sun didn’t reach.
We come together and hold each other just the way we did that first afternoon we made love.
“I love you,” she tells me. “I’m never going to stop wanting this.”
“I know,” I tell her. “I love you too.”
We stay in the pool until we can see stars.