Rush (6 page)

Establishing shot: Ha Tien, a long white beach, palm trees, dark ocean.

Grey day in Vietnam, and this stretch of coastline is abandoned. Phoebe is wearing a white string bikini and she is sprawled out on a towel on the sand despite the obvious lack of sun. She's reading a paperback novel and I'm watching her from behind my sunglasses. I'm not sure if she's aware of my eyes on her, but if she knows it she doesn't seem to care.

It's just the two of us here. This is the kind of beach without waves rolling in on the white shore. To get here we drove past several black-pepper tree plantations being tended by small silhouettes wearing wide hats. There are small ripples on the dark water that sweep in with the wind like an invisible hand has brushed the surface. There are no sounds apart from the gentle lapping of water and the occasional gull cawing, or Phoebe turning a page in her book.

As always, I am smoking a cigarette. I've converted Phoebe to the Asian brand now and together we smoke like a chimney on an eighteenth-century factory. I ash into the white sand.

Phoebe isn't smoking this afternoon. She is wearing her glasses about halfway down her nose and it looks peculiar in a cute sort of way, and I almost feel like smiling.
We are sitting apart on separate towels. I am not wearing a shirt and I haven't bothered with the sunscreen, because there is no sun and I already have cancer anyway so what does a malignant exterior growth matter? Phoebe asks me to lather her up and I observe the small freckles on her shoulders as I do so. After a while she reaches out and stays my hand. She says, ‘Hayes, stop it. You're hurting me, stop it.'

I tell her that I had no idea, but that's a lie.

I leave her alone on the beach to be raped by the natives and I go for a swim, not because I need to cool off and not because I feel like it. The water is lukewarm around my ankles and I stand there for a while looking off at the dead horizon, a flat dark line against the pale grey sky. The ocean here slopes away into the depths swiftly, and I push out into the darker waters and begin to swim.

I swim slowly until my shoulders begin to ache and the water around me seems pure black, but when I cup it in my hands it reveals its clarity. I tread water for a long while and wonder how many sharks there are out here and how long it will be before they tear my legs off.

I imagine what it's like to have a shark brush up against you in the water, to feel the coarseness of its skin as it passes.

The shore is a long way off.

The skeleton of a shark is composed entirely of cartilage. Its body will not float when it dies.

Gills flap open and closed, a series of slits. Eyes, cold, black pits.

Its teeth, if it shows them, will be stained and chipped, looming row upon row.

The upper lobe of the tail is the most powerful. The tail won't stop moving, thrusting its mass forward, otherwise it will sink and die.

Beneath me, at the level of my feet, the water is much colder than the surface. I feel the change in temperature as I pedal. When my feet rise they are massaged by warmth. As they descend, the cool envelops them.

Distant thunder rumbles in the black cloud on the horizon. I might have been floating out here for a very long time, I can't be sure, but suddenly the air feels just as cold as the water around my feet and it seems like time to return to the shore. It takes a longer time to swim in than it does to swim out. There is relief in my arms as my feet touch sand.

I walk dripping from the ocean with a thunderstorm to my back.

Phoebe lies on her stomach and she looks up from her book as I approach. She says, ‘You were a long way off.'

I look back out at the black ocean and I see the fin of a shark cutting its way across the bleak surface five hundred yards out from the shore.

I turn my back on the ocean. ‘I suppose so.'

Phoebe had a great time maxing out Hayes' credit cards. A slew of bills came and I dumped them immediately into the trash at Hayes' apartment. She didn't seem to notice. She came home from shopping one afternoon and said, ‘They rejected one of your credit cards today.'

I raised an eyebrow. She said, ‘Hayes, are you listening?'

I said, ‘Uh-huh. Just use one of the other ones.'

Phoebe smiled. ‘That's exactly what I did. Would you like me to show you what I bought? Just let me go into the other room and I'll change into it.'

It was late afternoon and the room was lit only by the setting sun. I had been sitting alone in the shadows when she'd walked in. Phoebe turned a light on in the bedroom. I heard the rustle of fabric, the sharp intake of breath as she snorted cocaine. More rustling fabric, another snort. Then she appeared in the doorway and said, ‘Ta-da!'

She wiped at her nose. She wasn't wearing her glasses anymore. The light came through the doorway behind her and she was a dark outline in her black panties and bra and stockings. The pale skin of her arms and belly and upper thighs seemed to glow.

I lit a cigarette and said, ‘Suits you.'

She took a bow and said, ‘Thank you, thank you.'

‘Do a twirl or something,' I said, indicating with a finger.

She twirled like a ballerina. Her panties were riding up her buttocks.

I said, ‘Wonderful.'

She smiled and went back into the bedroom. Then she appeared in the doorway again holding a straight finger under her nose. She said, ‘I'm bleeding.'

A trickle of blood ran over her finger and onto her pouting lip. She pinched her nostrils and more blood spilled out. She asked, ‘Why am I bleeding?'

I sat my cigarette in the ashtray and let it burn. I stood and said, ‘You've ruptured something.'

Phoebe gave a look of confusion.

I said, ‘Pinch here.'

I said, ‘Tilt your head back, like this.'

There was blood on my fingers as I helped her into the bathroom.

She said, ‘I feel dizzy.'

I asked her if she had a headache. She said, ‘I don't think so.'

I said, ‘Put your head in the basin here, rinse your face.'

She complied and I went to the shower, opened the frosted glass door and turned on the water. The room filled slowly with steam. I went to Phoebe and placed a hand on her shoulder. Her face was wet and pink. I eased her toward the shower. She clung to me as if I were a life preserver. I could feel her body shaking. ‘Take a shower,' I said.

I helped her out of her underwear and into the shower stall. She stood shivering under the blast of hot water, and I closed the door and left her alone. I went back to the ashtray to finish my cigarette. I paced restlessly back and forth. Outside, the sun was half an orb sinking behind the
smokestacks of factories and old buildings. Half the city were turning their lights on as the sound of homecoming traffic increased. I stubbed the life from my cigarette and returned to the bathroom.

I stood outside the shower door and listened to the running water. I called out, ‘You okay in there?'

There was no answer.

I opened the door and Phoebe was curled into the foetal position in the corner of the shower, blood running from her mouth and swirling with the water down the drain. I said, ‘Fuck,' and closed the door.

I went to the bedroom and started packing my things. I threw some of my clothes—some of Hayes' clothes—into a bag. I lit another cigarette and cursed repeatedly. I punched a wall.

Rubbing my knuckles I returned to the bathroom, which had completely filled with steam. I rolled up my sleeves. I opened the shower door. Phoebe was conscious again. She was sitting with her head in her hands, sobbing under the flow of water. I could hear each whimper, a low and barely audible sound. I pinched my cigarette out of my mouth and said again, ‘Are you okay in there?'

She didn't look at me, shook her head.

‘This is a fucking disaster,' I said.

Still, she didn't look at me.

I said, ‘Come on out of there.'

She looked at me now with pathetic eyes. Her hair was plastered to her skull. She wiped at her nose. She said, ‘I'm sorry.'

I offered her my hand, felt the warmth of water splash against me. She took it. I hauled her from the shower and she collapsed against me for support.

We stood there awkwardly. I tried to push her away. Her wet body clung tight to me.

She reached up and plucked the cigarette from my hand, put it to her own mouth. I felt her lungs draw in, her body briefly ease away from me. When she was done, she placed the cigarette carefully back between my fingers. She breathed smoke against me.

She tried to kiss me, angling up, lips reaching my own at a skewed angle. Her eyes were closed. She tasted like smoke and the blood that had run from her nose down her throat. Her face was wet and she held the back of my neck. I wondered if she could feel the pulse of my tumour as it sent vibrations down my spine.

I pushed her away. ‘No,' I said.

I pried her away from me. She said, ‘Am I ugly to you?'

I stared at her. Her eyes were bloodshot. I stubbed my cigarette out in the sink. I said, ‘Right now, you are.'

She said, ‘I'm sorry.'

I shrugged and went back to packing my bag.

She came to the doorway wrapped in a towel. Her head was bowed in shame. She told me that I shouldn't go. Please, don't go. This won't happen again. Promise.

I kept on packing my things.

She came to me and let the towel fall away. To me she was small and frail, afraid. She begged me not to go. She took my hand and placed it on her body. She said, ‘Please.'

I stared her cold and hard in the eye. There was nothing but fear and shame in her. Strands of wet hair hung over her red-rimmed eyes. I brushed them aside with the back of my hand.

She said, ‘Please.' I felt the warmth of her body where she held my hand low on her thigh.

I bit my lip and pulled away. Lit a cigarette. Stood there with my arms crossed.

Tears were welling in her eyes. Her lips were trembling. She sat heavily on the bed with a sigh, and attempted to control herself. But the tears came. She began to sob.

I stood over her.

I offered her my cigarette. She warily accepted. She crossed one arm over her breasts. She exhaled smoke. She asked me, ‘Will you stay?'

I leaned in close to her and I said, ‘Don't fuck up again.'

She told me that she wouldn't. I smiled and took the cigarette, blew smoke over her. She reached out to touch the side of my face with her hand. I dropped the cigarette to the carpet. Stepped on it with my shoe. I took Phoebe by both her wrists, held them apart from her.

Her lips tasted now like tears.

I told myself that I wouldn't hesitate if I needed to get rid of her.

I forced her back against the sheets. There was still fear in her eyes. I released one of her wrists and loosened my pants, guided myself in with one hand. I didn't look her in the eye.

When I woke later, half clothed on the bed, Phoebe was no longer beside me. The light to the bathroom was on, and I listened:
scrape scrape, tap tap, sniff, snooort
. I gave a sigh, rolled over, went back to sleep.

 

Hayes had been dead for a week and I was sitting alone at the bar in the Rex Hotel with nothing to do. One of the
suited
thuong gia
approached me with an envelope. I presumed they recognised me from my attendance at the roulette with Hayes. Inside the envelope was a single piece of paper, with an address in English written on it.

This is how I wound up back at the roulette. I attended simply as a spectator, not a competitor. The spectator role has never been unfamiliar to me. For most of my life I have existed not as an active participant, but as an observer.

Besides, I had no weapon to take to the game with me. In a foreign country you'll find it difficult to get your hands on a lot of things, weapons included.

I studied the faces of the men who had gathered in the roulette hall, watching their every subtle movement. When a gun went off, I would not watch the man pulling the trigger, but instead I would focus on a member of the crowd and wait to see if they flinched at the suddenness of the explosion. Every man had his own reaction. I saw men flinch, I saw men wince in imaginary pain, I saw some open their eyes wide with terror, I saw others stare blankly as if no emotion registered with them at all.

There were a lot of Westerners gathered here and I noticed that most of them did their best to keep to themselves. More Westerners competed than Vietnamese. The Vietnamese were keen watchers and gamblers. They would often cheer at the end of a match, like fans at a football game. But I couldn't shake the feeling that they were cheering the stupidity of the Western men.

I moved among the crowd unnoticed. It was necessary to have a drink at all times. I doubt whether I might have been able to handle a place like that in full sobriety. With a drink and a cigarette I could sit off to one side in the
smoke and shadows and the rest of the room seemed like a hallucination, viewed through a piss-yellow filter.

To see a man blow his brains out isn't as shocking as it might sound to some. We've just about all seen it before on the television. I was a child during the Vietnam War and I remember the images on my television screen and on newspaper covers. Soldiers leaping from helicopters under fire. Little peasant girls wandering naked and bloody down devastated streets. Jimi Hendrix, ‘Machine Gun' playing over it all.

It's hard to come to terms with the fact that the war actually happened, when all you've ever known it to be was images on a screen and words on a page.

Two matches down for the night and another two to go. In a way, it didn't surprise me that eight men were willing to risk their lives in a game like this. There was money involved, of course. There's always money. It has a habit of making the world go round.

For me, it wasn't about the money. I'd caught a glimpse of something my first time round that I wanted to see again. It was my desire to be filled with that sensation again: watching a man die, feeling the thrill rush through your body.

I went outside for some fresh air. There was an entry fee at the door but you could get a stamp so you didn't have to pay on re-entry, just like a nightclub. The stamp didn't say anything legible, though, so when bodies were discovered with the stamp on their arm it made no real sense to the authorities.

The burly men standing by the double doors gave a nod and let me out into the cool night. It had rained earlier in the evening and I could still catch the wet scent in the air.

The warehouse was in a narrow street lined with uncollected trash. There had been a homeless boy here when I had arrived, scavenging for food. With the warehouse doors closed behind me it was hard to hear anything of what went on inside. The building was not soundproofed, but around us there were nothing but other empty warehouses or factories, so there was nobody to listen to the gunblasts except for the destitute.

When it came, the blast sounded like it might only have been a rock thrown into a stack of garbage cans in a nearby alley.

I lit a cigarette. The double doors opened behind me and I could hear the hiss of the crowd, and a thin man with long matted hair emerged from the haze. The doors were shut behind him and we were left alone in the moonlight. The man was nothing more than a silhouette when he approached me and asked for a cigarette. His accent was thick Australian.

‘Fuckin' madhouse in there,' he said. He was young, maybe no more than twenty. I watched him as he struck a match and lifted it to the cigarette that I had surrendered. His face contorted in horror as he drew on the cigarette, and he spat and said, ‘Jesus, what the fuck is this?'

‘It's an Asian brand,' I explained, feeling a slight stab of shame at that confession. I'd noticed that nobody smoked the Asian brand but Hayes. I couldn't figure out why he'd lied, why he'd converted me from Western cigarettes.

The Aussie laughed and turned away. ‘You crazy cunt, nobody smokes that shit. Gonna take me ages to wash that fuckin' taste out of my mouth.' He followed the wall of the warehouse to a nearby downpipe where water dripped from the guttering. He stood beneath it with his
mouth open, head tilted back, swallowing what water he could, moisture spilling over his forehead and into his knotted hair.

I didn't see what he'd done with the cigarette. It seemed a perfectly good waste, to me.

The Aussie and I never exchanged names. In places like that, you're better off nameless.

He'd been doing the Asia backpacking thing. It was what all of the young hip travel magazines told him he should do. He told me that he'd stumbled onto the roulette by accident. Another traveller introduced him to it, said it was an easy way to make some money. A week later that traveller lost his visa and shipped out. The Aussie stayed. He told me there was an attraction to the roulette that was more than the money he could win. ‘It's the thrill of it,' he said. ‘That knowledge of five chances at safety and one at death. The risk, it gets my blood pumping. When I play a game, I feel like I can do anything.'

He told me that he wrote poetry and showed me a notebook that he carried around in his tote bag. I read the first poem, which consisted of two lines:

 

A girl rings at two in the morning and she says,
I might be pregnant.

I laugh and tell her that she's going to need a
coathanger, the malleable metal kind.

 

I told him that I was impressed. I said, ‘It's very pro-choice.'

He flipped through his book looking for another snippet that he could share with me, his hair hanging in his face and the tip of his tongue sticking out between his lips.

The next one read:

 

A young man tells me that he's been sentenced to two months imprisonment.