Chapter Ten
T hailand is good for me.
Well, not good , but you know…
Bangkok is bustling with action from sunup to sundown, and I’m almost certain their main cultural export is sadness.
It’s not a bad thing. I think the people who live here being overly familiar with the clandestine, the perverse and the deceitful, makes it one of the few truly genuine places in the world.
Granted, I haven’t been to many places, but in terms of cities, I like the ones that wear their grit and grime on the outside , for all to see.
London’s not like that. On the outside, it pretends to be prim and proper. But there’s a festering underbelly, just like everywhere else. The hypocrisy makes my eye twitch.
That’s not to say I blame London for all of my problems growing up, but I certainly associate it with many of my youthful hardships. I do miss things about it from time to time… Like how lively the city gets in summer. A good Yorkshire pudding.
Especially being here, in Bangkok, a place so inherently different—it’s liable to make your head spin if you visit here from somewhere like America or England.
Despite missing some of the comforts of the States, Thailand is the perfect place for me to continue living the hedonistic lifestyle to which I’ve grown accustomed.
I can get by pickpocketing, as if I’m twelve years old again— back to my roots!
—there’s heroin on every street corner, and strange, filthy sex is a staple.
In short, I’m living my best destructive-boy life down here, and I couldn’t ask for more in terms of a breakaway from the path of straight and narrow I was attempting to follow in Atlanta.
I miss Alice. Of course I do. I think about her every day.
But the more I sink into the perversions and debauchery of my current lifestyle, the more I realize we weren’t meant to be together. She was just another mask for me to wear… A beautiful one, yes. But my biggest mistake was not listening to my gut.
I always knew she was too good for me— I was right. And she paid the ultimate price from getting mixed up with someone as wholly tragic as yours truly.
Am I certain that Andres wouldn’t have killed her one way or another if I’d never come along?
No. But the course laid out by the universe is a mysterious and melancholy one.
Something about me slithering into Alice’s life disrupted her cosmic flow.
Who knows, it could even be a twin thing…
My malediction muddied the waters between Alice and Andres.
As soon as I started fucking around with them, they both wound up dead.
I’m fine swallowing all the blame. It might even be my purpose .
Some more evil to balance out the world’s good… Yummy.
Anyway, none of that matters anymore. Because I’ve been living in Thailand for about three weeks, and every day, I move further and further from the person I was trying like hell to be, and back to who I am .
I’m dozing on the cot I call my bed, in this shabby hostel of sorts where I’ve been crashing. Sweat lines my bare flesh, from the heat of summer and the amorous activities between myself and a lovely young lady named Moon .
At least I think that’s her name… I’ve been sky-high since the moment I touched down at Suvarnabhumi, so I wouldn’t be the best person to ask for confirmation of anything right about now.
I’m not positive where she even came from.
She sort of just appeared out in the hall the other day, and we decided to get high together.
Naturally, one thing led to another, and the next thing I knew, we’d been fucking for almost a full day, in more positions than my drug-fueled libido could even stand.
And now, I’m sticky and sore, melting into the bed with humidity and hours of sex lingering in the air.
Coming in and out of consciousness, I register her saying something I don’t understand in Thai, slinking out of bed and leaving. I’m almost certain she robbed me, but honestly, it’s to be expected. Plus, the way she made me come was more than worth a few baht and the last hit of panda .
Footsteps that sound clunkier than hers approach my bed, but I’m too fucked up to be concerned or even look . I simply flop over onto my stomach and wait for whatever is about to happen to me.
Unfortunately, it’s something I don’t expect. Which is saying a lot.
“You Trevel Fenwick?” someone asks. A man. Older, with what sounds like some sort of Eastern European accent.
“My name is Tippy McMasters.” I chuckle into my pillow. “Now please, either make a deposit or leave me to rot in peace.”
The room is quiet for a moment, and I think maybe I was hallucinating the voice. Until I feel a large, meaty hand on my face.
The stranger grabs my chin, hard, yanking it in his direction. I grunt out of displeasure, blinking back grogginess to peek up at him.
“Uh… hi,” I grumble while he looks over my face, assessing me. He’s not ugly, so I add a sighed, “ Daddy .” His eyes sharpen, and his hand drifts down to my throat. “Ooh, kinky ,” I snicker, then lick my lip. “I should warn you, you’re getting, like, sloppy fifths at this point.”
The man scoffs, then hauls me to my feet, literally by the throat. If I could feel anything, I’m sure that would have hurt.
“Get dressed,” he grunts. “You’re coming with me.”
“Hey, I told you I’d pay the rest later,” I slur, yanking out of his hold. “We made a deal , remember?” I cock an eyebrow, because while I don’t recognize him, it’s safe to assume he could be here on behalf of the shady people I’ve been associating with since I got here.
But he just continues to offer me a bored glare. “I’m not here for money, and I don’t care what you’ve gotten yourself into. Like I said, you’re coming with me.”
Alright, now I’m confused.
The situation has sobered me up just enough to take in the stranger standing before me.
A big, sort of burly white guy, likely in his mid-to-late forties with light blond hair shaved close to his scalp.
He’s wearing all black, including black leather gloves, glancing at his phone screen in between watching me, rather closely.
Yawning, I rub my eyes. “Yea, I’m not going anywhere. Sorry, mate. Who even are you?”
The man sighs, clearly irritated by my fluttering around naked, defying him and asking questions as opposed to just doing what he says. He tucks his phone away, then reaches behind his back to pull out a pistol, aiming it at my head.
An uneasy laugh puffs from my lips. “Fuckin’ hell… Really? ”
“No games, Trevel,” he snaps in a deep, commanding brogue.
“The only reason you’re not bound and gagged right now is because you coming along willingly makes the flight much easier.
But if you’d rather opt to do this the hard way, just know…
My only instruction was to bring you in alive .
They never specified in what condition.”
Even more unease awakens inside me, sending a chill up my spine. I peek left at Leo, who shrugs from where he’s seated at the rickety kitchen table, flicking away a cockroach.
The utter seriousness of this man, who is clearly not from around here… The gun aimed at my face… His words. It’s all turning my stomach.
Flight?
Bring me in…?
They??
I feel myself pale in an instant, nausea from weeks of heavy drug use and not much food or water mixing fast with my nerves. Turning, I hunch over and throw up on the floor next to him.
“Jesus Christ…” the man mutters, frowning.
Pulling in a breath, I straighten, dizzy with my head spinning. “That’s better. Now, where were we? Oh, right… Who are you?? And what do you want with me?”
“I’m the man who was sent here to fetch you.” He speaks evenly, no emotion in his tone or visible on his face. “Now, hurry up and get dressed. Trust me, you don’t want me to do it.”
I gape for a moment before glancing at the floor. “You’re, um… s-standing on my shirt.”
The man blinks at me, losing a bit of his disgust and hostility as he peeks down at his feet. Noticing that he is, in fact, standing on my shirt, he moves, allowing me to bend and pick it up, along with the rest of my clothes.
I dress quickly, feeling like I must be having some sort of mental episode.
I don’t understand anything that’s happening.
All I know is that while I don’t necessarily care whether I live or die, if my only two options are to go with this stranger or have my brains blown out, I suppose I’ll take the former.
It’s like one of those Choose Your Own Adventure books. Go with him and I get to keep reading. Don’t go… and the story’s over.
Once my clothes are on, I stand still and stare at him, awaiting his next command. I think he’s surprised, and maybe a bit impressed by my compliance, because he asks, “Would you like to freshen up before we go?”
“Oof,” I huff, grinning. “Look that bad, do I?”
He’s not amused. “Go use the restroom, Trevel. Unless you’d rather do it at the airport.”
There it is again… Airport.
Who is this bloke? Where is he taking me??
Shaking it off when I sense the stranger’s impatience, I mumble, “The loo is out there,” nodding toward the door. “It’s a communal… situation.”
Sighing again, his jaw sets visibly. He grabs me by the arm and drags me out of the room, then gives me a little shove. “Move. And don’t try anything. I will not hesitate to shoot you in the balls.”
I cast him a horrified look while scampering toward the bathroom. “A wee bit extreme, don’t you think?”
“Not really, no,” he grunts, following me inside.
I do my best at cleaning up while this scary ogre of a person is hawk-eyeing me, dunking my head in the sink, gargling mouthwash and using a random toothbrush someone left by the sink.
“My name is Sven, by the way,” he says, and I pause.
Blinking at him in the mirror, I spit, then smile. “Trevel Fenwick. Charmed, I’m sure.”
He cocks a brow, but says nothing.