My short story, Monk For A Month, will appear in Chelsea
Station Issue 3 this summer. It's the first time my work will be published in a
literary journal. I'm pretty thrilled about it.
Blurb:
Two men, Reece and Doug, are almost done with the “Monk for a
Month” program at the temple in Chang Mai, where they have been living like
Buddhist monks. But on the same night that Reece finds out that Doug is having
an affair with another Thai monk, there is a murder lose in the town. Tony sees
the killer hiding in the temple and goes about trying to help him escape the
police. In the process, a love affair begins.
Excerpt:
I sat at the bar sporting my saffron robes and shaved head,
sipping a Singha beer and listening to the bartender who was clearly agitated.
I couldn’t tell whether the man was upset over the recent murders, or the fact
that it was raining hard, or if he simply didn’t like serving liquor to a monk,
even a Caucasian one.
“His name Somchai,” the barkeep said. He spoke English, but
with the usual Thai singsong-clip that I had come to love. “And yes, he kill
American expatriate named Warren. Tony Warren.”
I had seen a dead body once before, and it took a moment to
get my nerves settled. I had never learned the invaluable art of staying
detached in the face of tragedy, of not identifying with the victim. I had no
way to shield myself from the reality of how brutal humans can be to each
other, what brutal lengths they will go, and the pain they are capable of
inflicting on each other.
Across the street, four soldiers trudged along in the rain.
“When did Somchai kill the American?” I asked, my voice
scarcely a whisper.
The barkeep didn’t know exactly, sometime at the beginning
of the afternoon that had now come to an end. At the same time that he killed
Warren, Somchai had also killed Warren’s Thai girlfriend. Both victims had been
found two hours earlier at the apartment belonging to Warren.
The barroom was already dark, due to the lateness of the
hour and another power outage. Candles flickered on the bar and at each table;
their yellow light mingled with the blueness of the dying day.
The shower stopped as suddenly as it had started, as it
often does in Thailand.
“How old was she? The girlfriend I mean.” I asked.
“Very young. Nineteen.” Regret passed over the barkeep’s
face. “A real beauty.”
“I would like another Singha,” I said, “but I don’t have any
more money. Can I buy on credit?”
The bartender’s look of regret turned to disgust. As he
walked away, a customer two stools over ordered beers for me and himself, and
also shots of cheap Thai whiskey.
The barkeep busied himself with our drinks while the man who
ordered moved to the stool next to me. He introduced himself as Ty Poe, and did
not shake my hand, as it is consider disrespectful to touch a monk. Poe was
courteous, offering the customary wai
gesture of respect. He was somewhere in his forties, and had a smoking-induced
cough. The polluted streets of Chiang Mai didn’t help his lungs any more than
his chain-smoking, I thought. I gave him my name, Reece Jackson, and told him I
was from America, San Francisco in fact.
“I overheard you talking about the murders,” Poe said.
“I wonder why they haven’t caught him yet. Chiang Mai is so
small a town.”
“They have him trapped within the walls of the old city, but
you should know how it is,” Poe grunted. “We’re talking about an American
expatriate and his whore who got themselves killed by a homeless gay kid. I
mean, there are limited resources available to the police department. The
police force, as a rule, is not well trained. Officers have to buy their own
uniforms, their own guns. They are poorly paid. Not much would be happening now
except that this dead girl happens to be the daughter of an army Major. The
army is doing what they can but they do not know the town as well as Somchai.”
Poe was right, I thought. What could anyone reasonably
expect of this situation? The unvarnished fact was that in this country, any
given police station’s cases were ranked according to priority. And priority in
Thailand had to do with money, wealth, and status. Those on the low end of the
spectrum were unlikely to receive much attention. And for a homeless gay boy
with no family who happened to murder a bit of riff-raff, then it was probably
the victim’s fault. Why bother figuring out all the sordid details?
I felt thankful that I lived in a country where every death
warranted respect, every victim merited justice, no matter how far down the
social and economic ladder that victim might fall. At least I like to believe
that bit of hype.
The barkeep placed the beers and shots before us. I lifted
my shot in a toast to Poe and knocked my head back, taking the drink in one hot
swallow. Poe stared at me in obvious surprise.
“I’ve never seen a monk drink like that,” Poe said.
“I’m not really a monk. My partner and I paid good money to
enroll in the Monk-For-A-Month program here at Wat Phra Singh. He’s on some
damned spiritual quest that I, frankly, don’t understand. Me, I’m just a
system’s engineer along for the ride.”
“So you’re not alone,” Poe asked, exhaling a stream of
smoke.
“Technically, no. But it often feels like I am.”
The bar stood only a few doors down from Tha Phae Square,
which spread before one of the four main gates of the old city, where two of
the town’s chief avenues collided. The square was bordered by the city wall,
built of ancient stone and brick, and butted against by the city moat on the
north and south sides. The top of the
wall was wide and strong enough to walk on, and just then a horde of children
scampered along the wet stones, heedless of the danger of falling. Among them
ran Jude, my adopted son, also sporting a shaved head and wearing the robes of
a monk.
The children looked down on the tourists who gathered in the
square, clutching their umbrellas in case the rains returned.
It must be between six and seven in the evening, I thought.
Another shower started and people in the square ran for
cover.
Jude hopped down the wall steps and dashed across the road like
a fleeing deer. He entered the bar and huddled against me, giving Poe a
cautious glance. Jude was a handsome seven-year-old who had a round face that
gave way to a large jaw and a brilliant set of teeth. He had an impishness and
good humor in his eyes, and was strong for so young a boy. But what I admired
most about him was his gentle and trusting disposition. Unlike most boys, he
was incapable of hurting anything. His only flaw was that he was fathered by
two gay men, which made him an outcast back home, someone to be pitied, stared
at, whispered about, and occasionally laughed at by his peers.
Strokes of lightning lit the sky, coming so close together
that they seemed like one, and the thunder was continuous. It was a noise that
burst like metal fireworks, but which would immediately rise again, its modulations
that grew less and less defined as the shower let up until there was only the
sound of rain striking paving stones.
“This rain will last all night,” Poe said, lighting another
cigarette from the butt of his previous one.
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