Three drinks in and I'm already buddy-buddy with the Frenchman. I get the feeling we've known each other forever. Vive la France! The French are good guys. The best! The cream of Europe.
That gets us talking, and I quickly find out why Jean-Louis is mad at women. It's simple: his girlfriend dumped him this morning.
"Reckless woman!" I yell. "You don't dump a pilot. You just can't do that. Unless you're--like you said, Jean-Louis--a whore."
"Cursed woman!" Jean-Louis growls.
"Dime-a-dozen woman," I confirm, hiccuping.
"You don't leave me, you whore! I leave you! You don't deserve me! Actually, that's exactly how it was. Now that I think about it, I'm the one who left her. But I was generous, and I let her believe it was the other way around."
"If you were generous, that means you loved her."
"Oh, I loved her like crazy," he admits. "That's why I let her go."
"That's right!"
"If you truly love a woman," the Frenchman explains to me, "you fuck her quick and then you run as hard as your legs can carry you."
I stare at him, stunned.
"Seriously?"
"Parole d'honneur!"
"Didn't know that one. And why, exactly? Why should you run?"
"How old are you, mon ami?"
"I'm still young. Forty-four."
"I'm thirty-two, but I've got way more experience. Let me teach you... hic... how women operate."
"Yeah, seriously! Teach me!"
My pilot starts acting all high and mighty. Now he's some big expert on women.
"First of all," he says, raising one finger, "you don't trap a woman in a relationship. If you're a true gentleman, you fuck her, pull your pants up, and leave without looking back."
"That sounds kind of weird. Explain it to me. Why like that?"
"Well, so you... leave them be free. Nobody can be happy if they're someone's slave. Love in handcuffs? Merde! That can't be!"
"Yeah, that's kinda true," I admit. "When you're right, you're right!"
We sit there and listen to the sea. Jean-Louis suddenly loses the urge to talk. I feel the lounge chair rocking sweetly under me. I close my eyes. I'm this close to falling asleep.
The waves keep coming, one after another. We don't say a word. Each of us chews over his own problems in silence.
I don't know what time it is anymore, but who gives a shit? Even the wind has stopped. You only hear the clink of glasses now and then. I feel like I'm wasted, but Jean-Louis seems to come alive with every glass he drinks.
"God, I loved that whore so much!" he bursts out, ugly-crying.
His shoulders shake and the glass trembles in his hand. It's not pretty.
There goes my sleep. Again.
"Jean-Louis, don't cry!" I try to calm him down. "Come on, fuck that! Can't you see you're spilling your drink on the sand? That's a waste."
"Damn it! Je m'en fous! Look, I'm not crying anymore, but I'm pissed! You invest everything you have... you put your heart in it... and it all goes to shit because that's what she wants. Merde! But who the hell is she to say it's over?"
"Exactly! Who is she?"
"She's a... nobody! A cow! Some basic-ass bitch with a pussy wider than the Andaman Sea. Yeah, a dumb cow! Can you imagine what I was able to love! And what didn't I give her? Why wasn't she satisfied? A... hic... damn fussy bitch! And she was wide as a damn bucket, for fuck's sake! When I was in her, it was like I was fucking a paper bag."
"That's not really such an important thing. I mean, if you love a woman."
"It was damn important to me!" he yells. "And I'm not some guy with a small dick. Wanna see?"
"No, thanks."
"Look here!"
"Keep it in your pants, please! Zip up, man, what the hell! What's Anurat gonna think if he sees that?"
"Not small, right?"
I get pissed when I see what he's showing me. I start yelling at him, "Put it back right now, you perverted Frenchman! I don't want somebody to see us and draw the wrong conclusion. Hmm, you're right, it's definitely not small."
If there's one thing that can piss me off even more in this world, it's seeing a man with a dick longer than mine. I snort like a bull that's seen the red cloth. This Frenchman was driving me insane, casually whipping out a whole damn baseball bat. It's a slap in the face.
What an idiot! Where did I throw that empty bottle? Where is it? I'll crack him in the head with it, cursed Frenchman. I swear! First chance he looks the other way, I'll shut him up for good.
"You turned green with jealousy," he giggles.
"Like hell!" I growl.
God, why do hammers like that even exist on this earth? What are those even for? What does this lunatic do with The Woman Killer? What, does he turn women inside out?
If I were a chick, I'd run from here screaming with my hands up. But I'm not, so I'm going to change the subject.
"Where are we taking off from tomorrow?" I ask so I don't keep thinking about how much I want to smash the Frenchman's mouth in.
"You know Phuket?"
"Not at all."
"Then why explain? Trust me. With me, you're safe."
"Still, where does your plane take off from? Because I haven't heard of any airport nearby."
"We're not going by plane. We're going by seaplane."
"Aha, your little toy takes off from the water. That means it's small."
"Small as it is, it can carry thirty people without any problem."
"Ah..."
"What do you mean, 'Ah'?"
"Nothing," I mumble. "Nothing at all. I just thought it was a bigger plane."
Jean-Louis looks at me from under his brows, his eyes swimming in whisky, then suddenly starts laughing.
"God, you're stupid! Ha, ha! You thought you were going to pilot a regular flight with 500 passengers? Ha, ha!"
"No. I swear I didn't think that. Not even close!"
I drink the dregs in my glass out of spite. The bottle's been empty for a long time. That shithead Anurat took off. What a slave!
It's probably already 3 a.m. Okay. So much for sleep. I threw ten dollars away on those sleeping pills for nothing, and Jean-Louis keeps laughing like a moron, and he's driving me insane.
"Stop it already!" I shout, pissed beyond words. "What's so funny? Stop it!"
"I can't!" he laughs with tears in his eyes. "Just the idea of seeing you at the controls of a plane with 500 passengers has me dying laughing."
"Oh, go to hell! What's the difference between 20 seats and 500 seats? A plane's a plane! Haven't you heard that size doesn't matter?"
"Yeah, yeah... sure it doesn't!" he says, wiping the tears off his cheeks. "That's the slogan of men with small dicks."
I feel all the blood rush to my head.
"Fuck off!" I howl. "Get the hell out of here or I'll knock your teeth out, you filthy frog!"
"Ha, ha! You offended? Hi, hi, hi! So you really do have a tiny cock!"
"I'm serious! Get lost or I'll hit you!"
I clench my fists and lock my eyes on him. Jean-Louis stops laughing and starts looking at me the way kids at school used to look at me when they wanted to beat me to a pulp.
"I am Jean-Louis!" he says, shoving his chin up aggressively. "You hear me, idiot with an ant's dick? Nobody tells me when to leave, when to laugh, and when not to laugh. You Europeans--white as cheese--you come here to Phuket acting like big shots, but you're pygmies next to Jean-Louis!" he roars, fired up. "You all come to Asia with your master airs, with your microscopic organs and your swollen wallets, and you think you're hot shit, but you're just a bunch of little shits!"
"Lower your voice, buddy. I'm not deaf! I'm good with both my wallet and what's in my pants."
"Prove it," he hisses with a mocking look, "and if it's longer than mine, I'll get on all fours and suck you right here, on the spot!"
I flinch and look at him with pity. What an ox! I start laughing.
"I knew it," I say, hiccuping. "A cat will always eat mice. I knew it."
"What did you know, worm?" he yells.
"That all Frenchmen are a bunch of faggot cocksuckers!"
"You called me a cocksucker?" the beast asks, and he jumps off the lounge chair fast.
"I called you a cocksucker!" I double down, with that prickly drunk tone. "So what if I called you that? What are you staring like that for, like an ox? I'm not scared of you! Here, I'll call you that again: Cocksucker! French dick-sucker!"
"You're dead!" the beast decides, cold as ice, and he locks a dirty stare on me. "We'll see who ends up sucking dick. We'll see right now. Get up, you mutt! Up, worm! You're going to feel Jean-Louis's fist on the top of your skull!"
"Eh, shit!" I stammer. "It's a... hic... free country! I'll get up from here when I feel like it."
I don't know how, but the alcohol fumes suddenly clear, and my vision sharpens. Looks like I really screwed up. I look up at the Frenchman from below. No, this isn't looking too good.
In fact, I'm trying to get up right now, but my legs won't do a damn thing and that's that. Those damn sleeping pills! I'm paralyzed! I'm basically a jellyfish washed up on the beach.
I can already see tomorrow's newspaper headlines.
I'm young. I don't want to die. I'm going to try to negotiate.
"Come on, Jean-Louis, buddy, let it go. It was a joke. Frenchmen are good people. Look, I officially declare the French a civilized people. OK? Is that good? Come on, man, I was joking! Can't you take a joke?"
The French brute stares at me with eyes injected with blood and whisky. He's way too drunk and out of control to hear anything anymore.
I see him lift his lounge chair like it's a feather and snap it to pieces in his big hands, then he waves a sharp piece in his hand and goes:
"Get your ass ready! I'm going to shove this thing somewhere!"