Ko Samui, Part 1

In Koh Samui, I play her an Argentinean tango. With the crashing of the ocean beneath our bungalow rising above the sharp chords, my fingers fly over the taut guitar strings. I watch her tilt her head back, her mouth slightly ajar and eyes closed, strands of hair matted to the sides of her face. Nadia has burn scars on her arm -- gashes where her skin has crumpled and puckered up into saggy folds after the angry blisters above her elbow scabbed over. It happened a couple weeks ago when she launched herself over a rolled up sheet doused in kerosene and set on fire to serve as a flaming jump rope. She caught her foot and fell on her side, singeing her arm and catching fire to her hair. She picked herself up quickly, rubbing the ends of her flaming hair hard between her hands to put out the fire before resuming her frenzied leaping. I lean over now and flick the scar gently with my tongue, tasting a hint of salt. “Love, you’re a fucking goddess,” I tell her, the words suspended in the air like the last notes of song.

            Nadia opens her eyes and sees me. Taking a long hit from the joint, she passes it to me, exhaling, looking up at the patchy clouds dampening the halo cast by a nearly full moon.  She has the skin of a snake charmer, olive gold and supple, marred only by the recent burn and a large, disarming upside down ‘V’ shaped tattoo of Alex from “A Clockwork Orange.” Alex wields a dagger in his fist and clutches an eyeball, right there on her thigh. When she flexes her quad, his face contorts so that one eye pops forward and he looks ready to spring out at you. Once I asked her about the tattoo and she said, “Evil is a sign of our freedom and we all have this urge
 to destroy just buried within us, waiting to come out.” The way she said it was haunting -- like it was the most natural thing to think of evil as you would a caged bird, beating its wings frantically on the inside of your chest, willing you to open the door so it can fly away.

            The beach and the ocean as far as we can see -- to where the water hits the sky and smudges into a seamless black sheet -- are ours. Nadia picks up an empty Coke can next to my feet, stubs out the joint, and stands up suddenly, arching her back and extending her arms above her head in a graceful stretch. She pitches the Coke can and we see it clink against the jutting rock face of either Hin Ta or Hin Rai. As Levi, the beefy German at “Yo’ Mama’s Beach Bar” once told us, these rocks are sacred. Island lore claims that an old Thai man and his wife were transformed into rocks after being tossed from their boat into the stormy sea, their quest to bring back a friend’s daughter to marry their son foiled by the fickle weather. The rocks, huddled together and bent over protectively, seem weary from the constant watch they keep. They are a testament to the parents’ hopes for their son’s happiness -- a sign of true intentions.

            “Fuck,” Nadia swears under her breath, “I think I just blasted that can at the old lady's head.”

            I shrug, though part of me feels a gnawing sense of dread that hurling a can at an old lady who’s watchful guidance represents love, could indeed bring bad things.
            “Let’s go get some more beer and stuff,” I suggest, as if our beating a hasty departure from the scene of the crime will save us. As I stand up, I realize that I am dizzy, and my headache amplifies the sound of the wind lashing through the palm trees above our bungalow, rustling like rain.

            I drive, revving the motorcycle with Nadia’s arms cinched tightly around my bare waist. The wind along the beach is strong and even though I’m not going fast, sand whips up from under the wheel and stings my face. Whatever the pot was laced with causes the ground to swell towards us, pulsing to form bulges that I swerve to avoid. Light from the lanterns hung in front of the bungalows cast long shadows on the beach. We drive, and the lights smear into a glowing trail, knit together by our passage.