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

heat sipping water, and as Phil leaned his frame against the tree, I noticed a row of rat-sized red ants diverting from their path down a slender tree branch to creep across his shirt. I thought about not letting on, but when I did he hopped about like someone with a Roman candle in his pants, making that peculiar shuddering noise you equate with extreme cold. It gave the guides a laugh, anyway.

Meanwhile Mick and I sat on limestone rocks, oozing yeasty, beery sweat and recovering our breath. The two guides stubbed out their cigarettes, hauling their packs, ready to go. Mick cursed under his breath and glugged more water.

I decided to take control. ‘No!’ I barked. It came out a bit Germanic, but it had the desired effect.

Coconut stood over me. ‘We go. Must reach number one village ‘fore nightfall. We go now.’

We were told it would take us two and a half days of solid trekking to reach the village where Claire Marchant had stolen Charlie’s passport. The plan was to spend nights in the hill tribe villages along the way. There was no other possibility than to trust the guides absolutely, but I felt the need to pretend to be in control of events. I heard myself falling into a ridiculous pidgin English. ‘One more cigarette-time. Then go chop-chop.’ I lit up another snout to show I wasn’t moving. Coconut shook his head in disgust. Bhun appeared indifferent.

Mick wore his infuriating broad smile. His snooker smile. ‘Where did you study guide talk?’ he wanted to know. ‘Was it in The Rover and Wizard?’

Even Phil, too young to remember these comics, found that amusing. Phil had this rarely demonstrated but irritating little laugh, halfway between a cough and a snigger. ‘Himsay me top-banana fella!’

I was shocked. ‘What’s this? A sense of humour, Phil? I think I prefer it when you’re a sack of misery.’

‘Lighten up!’ went Mick, and the bastard actually clapped Phil on the back.

When I was ready I scrambled to my feet, slung my pack on my back and looked like business. I jabbed a finger at Coconut. ‘You boss-man. We go now.’

Coconut glanced over at Bhun, his lip twisted into a scowl.

‘Did you see that?’ I said to Mick when we were underway again.

‘Yeah,’ Mick chirruped. ‘It was a look that said cunt.’

For the next part of the journey I had to endure Mick parodying my pidgin English. ‘Oh! Many many big tree! Big fella him come here no-go chop-chop. Him fallee downee. Him say bye-bye! Him wannee drinkee plenty water me say no.’ And stuff like that. For about two hours.

The two guides began talking across us, though Coconut, concerned about venomous snakes (he mentioned king cobras, and though we never saw one I did spot a luminous blue snake slipping quietly through the undergrowth), never took his eyes off the trail ahead. The vegetation altered and we were quickly enfolded in giant bamboo, banana stalks, royal palms and thorny liquorice. I knew the guides were discussing us, and it made me nervous. We’d placed ourselves in a dangerous position. They could easily slit our throats and take what money and documents we had with us. Up in the steaming jungle hills, no one would ever find us, or even care if they did.

Back at the hotel we’d debated whether to bring our cash and passports. I wanted to leave most of it in the hotel safe, but Mick had read in a guide book about the unreliability of hotel safes in Thailand. No, he decided, it was safest strapped to his belly, and I didn’t argue. Though our guides didn’t know it, Mick was carrying his life savings in dollar notes, plus my cash and traveller’s cheques. I didn’t have a clue how much Mick’s savings amounted too, but judging by the tiny amount we were paying our guides, it was probably more than they could earn in twenty lifetimes. As for Phil, you could more easily take a strip of skin from his back than peel a note from his wallet, and I had no idea what he was carrying.

Bhun, the quiet one, shouted something up the line that made Coconut cackle with laughter. Coconut looked back at Mick and I, and then at Bhun. Seeing our discomfort, he made to pacify us. ‘Sanuk,’ he said.

‘Sanuk,’ Bhun repeated, and they both laughed again. Their laughter ricocheted off the tall, thin trees about us.

‘Who are you calling a sanuk?’ Mick growled.

‘Only sanuk,’ Coconut said, moving off again. He withdrew his long blade from his belt and hacked at a creeper hanging in his way. ‘Fun.’

The vegetation became a thick, dry and scrubby tangle fighting for growth between spindly grey tree trunks of astonishing height, canopy upon canopy. The trees were festooned with parched, creeping vines, sometimes so defoliated that the vines looked like trailing masses of electrical cable. Unlike the trees at home, there were no low branches, and where the trees did sprout it was with large, papery leaves of greens, russets and reds. The dusty path ahead was sprinkled with huge, crinkly desiccated leaves. The ground breathed back at us, dry and hot.

I tell you this as if I was interested, when really my thoughts were on Charlie. When walking great distances the mind turns in on itself, and after a while fails to register the terrain ahead. I suppose this seems quite dangerous. Sometimes the path up or down the side of a steep ravine went perilously close to the edge: quite possible to miss a footing and to roll maybe two hundred feet through the brush before crashing into a tree. Perhaps the mind has a third eye which takes care of this while the brain is busy with other thoughts.

I was trying to find a dividing line.

There was a time when Charlie thought I was like a young God, and that I knew the answer to everything, and that I could protect her from any external threat, and