Smoking Poppy by Graham Joyce (the read aloud family .txt) 📕

Mick and I did. I hadn’t noticed Phil dirty his hands with money since we’d arrived. I couldn’t figure what denominations I’d got in front of me and I accidentally handed the barman a monster note. Mick snatched it back and paid the tab himself. ‘Give me your money,’ he bellowed.

‘Why?’

‘Because you’re in a state.’ This was his favourite phrase. He was always telling me I was in a state. ‘Look at you: nearly gave that chap a ten-quid tip. No wonder the little fucker was smiling. You can’t think straight. Your mind is in another place. Give me your fucking money. I’m in the chair.’

‘Don’t be ridiculous.’

‘Hand it over! Mick’s in the chair. And you, Phil.’

I don’t know why but I felt very strange. The travel and the bombardment of strange and exotic smells had upset my stomach. I was tired from the journey and I almost had double vision. I couldn’t keep my mind off my encounter with Charlie tomorrow. I was afraid I might burst into tears the moment I saw her. I was living on the edge of an emotional volcano, and every time I thought about her this fluid started collecting at the back of my eyes. Home suddenly seemed to me a desperately long way away.

I handed Mick my money. Wallet, cash, credit cards, everything. ‘Phil?’ he said.

Phil’s fingers strayed to his pocket. Then he thought better of it. ‘I really don’t think that’s going to be necessary.’

‘Good,’ Mick said, stuffing them all in the bulging money pouch fastened around his considerable waist. ‘You pay your expenses, I’ll take care of ours.’ He’d got Phil’s measure, anyway. ‘Now let’s go and eat a pot-bellied pig. Follow me, boys, and keep close. Mick’s in the chair.’

11

I woke very early the next day, on account of the jet-lag. Phil had a room on his own, and the twin I shared with Mick had now cultivated a vegetable odour. I felt distinctly queasy. I wasn’t sure if it was the prospect of seeing Charlie later that morning; the food I’d eaten the night before; or the lunar aspect of Mick’s blubbery bottom peeping at me from the single sheet beneath which he slept. No jet-lag for this boy. I deliberately made a commotion in the shower, but Mick merely snorted and grunted in his sleep, so I dressed quickly and left him to it.

It was five-thirty a.m. and none of the hotel staff were about. I slipped out into the garden to have a smoke. I expected it to be cool at that time of the morning, but it was already sultry and the temperature seemed to be cranking up at the rate of one degree per minute. There was a haze made golden by the diffuse sunlight. The Mae Nam Ping river at the bottom of the hotel garden ran swift and strong, the colour of green tea. It would be another six hours before I could see my lovely Charlie, and the cigarette wedged between my fingers trembled at the thought.

A stone path wound between dribbling fountains, and the hotel garden was quite beautiful. There was a spirit house on a pole, white, as if made from wedding cake, carefully tended with flowers, figurines and offerings. A night-light flickered inside the spirit house. At the foot of the garden a sumptuous pagoda with a huge smiling Buddha overlooked the river. Burned out incense sticks clustered at the Buddha’s feet. The seats in the pagoda were carved from teak, upholstered in leather, and a sign invited me in but warned me to remove my shoes. This I did, and for good measure I put out my cigarette, but then I saw an ashtray placed on the low table, so I lit another one, sat down, and watched the river flow.

I’d been torturing myself about Charlie, trying to identify what exactly had gone wrong between us. I’d explored the usual psychological angles, whether it was a power thing, in that I hadn’t wanted her to grow up; or whether it was a sexual thing in that fathers don’t want their daughters to mature. I’d been through all that stuff, and though I knew better than to dismiss any of it, it just didn’t ring true.

From the earliest times, Charlie used to love to hug me. She would run to the door when I came home from work, leaping into my arms. She would cuddle up to me when she was poorly, or tired, or sad or plain happy. Sometimes several times a day. Spontaneous, fondling displays of innocent affection, and among the greatest pleasures to be found in this fleeting life.

Then it suddenly foreclosed, when Charlie was about eleven. Funnily enough, Phil was happy to take a hug until much later, which, in a boy, surprised me. I thought he might shrink from it earlier. But he too in his time felt the need to retreat from these overt displays of affection. There was no particular incident prompting the withdrawal. It was just a sign that they were growing up, becoming independent, feeling the need to cut loose. Naturally I felt a pang at this. But you accept it. You wouldn’t want it any other way.

I was startled by the presence of a figure at the entrance to the pagoda. She made me jump. It was a cleaning lady brandishing a sweeping brush. These Thai ladies move softly as a beam of light, sometimes seeming more spirit than flesh. She smiled and waid me deeply, before leaving me alone. I think she noticed that my eyes were damp.

Oddly enough I never saw that same lady again.

Some time later Mick came down, looking for his breakfast. He was red-eyed and his hair stuck up like the comb on a good rooster. His ghastly army-surplus khaki shorts reached midway down his meaty calves, and he’d decided to give the hotel staff the benefit of viewing his gorgeous pink and bristly chest. ‘Coffee,’ he croaked.

‘Put a shirt