Cambodia Noir (35 page)

I already know I won't do it. Not this time. June chose to disappear—so it's still possible she can choose to come back.

I'm starting to understand why I'm following her.

It's mid-morning by the time I slide into the old hangar on the lake. We used to fight here, me and Gus. Long, long ago. Up before dawn to grapple barefoot kids with arms like steel: straight out of the trees, hard and fast and hoping for a few minutes in the ring with the champ. A few minutes like as not to kill or cripple them—but it was what they wanted, and they fought for it like Trojans. I see it like it was then, and rub my dust-choked eyes.

A voice. “You should have stayed with us. Or did you get tired of having ninety-pound village boys kick the shit out of you?”

“I never get tired of having the shit kicked out of me.”

Gus stands in the shadows, arms crossed. “I see. What kept you?”

“I came the long way.”

“I think you're safe, for now.” He pulls a pack from his pocket, lights one, and glares at me for watching him. “The suits have got quite a talent for causing trouble. They're taking runs at everyone, trying to bully us into saying you did . . . well, anything, really.”

“If they're trying that hard, they got nothing.”

He takes another drag, nodding. “That's what I thought. The one I'd worry about is Number Two, but they can't find him.”

“I think you're gonna need a new crime writer.”

He sighs. “They haven't asked, so I don't think they know you were out of town.”

“Good. Then I've got a bit of time. What about the Khmers?”

“Don't know who they are. No sign of anyone after your girl, though.” Another drag. “I'm impressed you're still alive.”

“Statistics. Everybody spends more time alive than dead, till one day it's the other way round.”

He gives me a strange look. “What the hell is going on, Will?”

“It's nothing you'd believe.”

He snorts. “I'll believe a lot of things.”

“Not this. Only two things matter, anyway. I know how to find her.”

“And?”

“The stuff June was mixed up in, it started long before Cambodia. You couldn't have done anything. It's not your fault.”

“What makes you think I care?” He says it so badly, I almost smile.

“You still hope you're doing the right thing.”

“
Dios mío,
doesn't everyone?”

“No.” I meet his eyes.

He holds them a moment before looking away. “What happened up there?”

I say nothing.

“All right, fine. What's your plan?”

Goddamn Gus: he's still with me. “I go find her. Then I'm out. Kara promised me fifty grand if I bring June back alive. That's enough to get me well out of here.”

“Where'll you go?”

“Does it matter?”

He looks at me for a long time. “I suppose not. What about your girl, Channi?”

“I don't know.” I don't know. “I gotta see her.”

“Tell you what—you like the Green Dragon. Meet her there at three. I'll get you a room.”

“Gus . . . Thanks.”

“No pasa nada.”
He walks away.

Gabriel's apartment is a dump, but locked up tight. Cinder-block walls, security gates, bars on the windows. Unless you've got a wrecking ball, the only way in is through the front door.

So I knock. “I've come to settle up.”

“Show me the money.”

“Fine, you can come get it.” I turn to go.

The inner door opens, and Gabriel squints out through the bars. In daylight, you see every pock and scar on his cratered face. The hand cannon he's pointing at me looks like it fires tennis balls. “Hand it over.”

“No. We're gonna sit down and deal like civilized people.” I'm hoping he won't just shoot me. It's a pain in the ass to kill people on your own doorstep, no matter how many cops owe you favors. “Anyway, I'm dying for a joint.”

That gets a laugh. “There's the Will I know. Come in—slow. And keep, uh, hands where I can see 'em.” I do as instructed and he opens the gate, backing slowly into the filthy room. “What's in the bag?”

“Beer.” I show him. “Want one?”

He shakes his head, shuts the gate, then the door. The gun never leaves me.

I crack a beer. It's still warm. “About that joint.”

He laughs again, points at a table. “You roll.” He watches me do it with moist eyes and greedy, twitching fingers. “Will, Will, Will,” he coos. “You've been busy, at least if the shit I'm hearing is to be believed—which, well, my sources are all fuckheads, if I believed half what they tell me I'd'a just shot you, but nonetheless your name keeps coming up—”

“I deny everything.”

“Even putting my boys in the hospital?”

“Okay, I did that. Consider it the hidden cost of using cheap muscle.”

“I shoulda known better.” He sighs. “But these days you gotta be careful who you keep close. Loyal's better than smart, if you know what I mean. The whole damn country's like something crawled out of a Cronenberg movie, even the hospitals don't have drugs unless you're sick—what kind of a fuckin' world is that?—and anyhow—”

I finish rolling the joint and light it, and the room gets fuzzy. Pull the memory card from my bag and pass it to him, with the drugs.

“A token. Here's what you paid for. Sorry it's not as useful as you wanted, but the job is done.”

His face stays hard as he tokes. “Well, a gesture, okay, sure, but thing is, it's timing, see, all timing: Had I had this weeks ago, I could have made use of the intelligence on it—”

“And ended up like Charlie: in fucking pieces. This is out of our league, trust me.”

“I don't, actually.” He passes the joint back, looking me up and down. “And a man has to have policies. Y'know, you can't just—fuck, these kids do anything they goddamn like, you talk about standards, they can't fucking spell the word—which is why you beat the shit out of them and now we're here, so, policy”—he hefts the gun—“I can't go paying for late work.”

“Put that down,” I snap. “We can reach an agreement.”

He doesn't put the gun down, but it wavers a bit.

“I'll pass up the money I'm owed because there's something I want more. Information. I want to know everything there is to know about Pisit Samnang. Associates, hideouts—who he's been seeing. I know he's in your orbit.”

His eyes narrow. “It doesn't sound like I get much out of this deal.”

“Gabriel,” I say, echoing his croon. “Gabriel, Gabriel: you're not seeing the big picture. I have. Everything you wanted to know in the first place—just ask. All you have to do is tell me about Sam. And you don't have to worry about him coming back at you, either.”

Now he's interested. “Dead? Your work?”

“No more freebies.” His eyes flicker. “You get information, so do I. Everyone wins. Like old times.” I hold out the joint.

“No deal.” He reaches for it. “Times have changed. And I'm the one with the gun.”

So I take the gun away from him.

He groans, cradling his arm. The roach smolders on the dirty carpet.

“Probably not broken,” I say, as I crack the cylinder. He groans again. “You know, I hate guns. I hate having them pointed at me. Hate pointing them.” I'm taking the bullets out one by one, tossing them into the piles of garbage that hold up the walls of heaven.

“Not everybody can kill people with their bare hands.”

“I don't kill people,” I say.

“Lots of 'em die when you're around.”

I finish and look at him. “And I'll be happy to break every bone in your body and leave you lying here.” Let that sink in. His eyes burning: fever and fury. “You should have taken my deal.”

“You think you can play everything your way,” he snarls. “It doesn't work like that. You get me my money or you spend a long time looking over your shoulder, that's how it goes, way of the fucking world—”

“We'll see.” I cross the room to the drawer where he keeps his gear: it's well stocked. The red feeling is on me, and my eyes linger on the little white bags. Just one hit—

I start cooking up. Gabriel's eyes brighten, then he looks scared.

“How much should I use?” I ask. “Been a while. Hate to get the dose wrong.”

“What do you wanna know?”

“Just one thing, really. Sam had a contact come into town, end of September. Some Hong Kong big shot. I know you keep tabs on the players. I want a name.”

“Look, Sam sells everything to everybody, okay? I mean, he connects every dot, and, yeah, true, he's in deep with the Hong Kong crew, but there's a billion of those little fuckers—”

Stalling. I kneel next to him. “Think I can find a vein in your eye?”

“Fuck, fuck, man—you are one sick son of a—all right, look—there's—there was one big shot here, about a month ago, yeah, Chun Song, so, maybe, who knows, he could be your guy—”

“Who is he?”

“He's definitely a big spender, mostly in the sex business. He runs half of Wan Chai, or that's what they say, anyway. Mostly he comes here for girls, the really young ones, you know—and what I hear we're not talking vanilla, that's for sure. I know one guy had a story 'bout how he went to one of Song's places, fucked this girl, cut her up and—”

“I get the picture. How do I find him?”

An ugly light fills the angel's eyes. “Easy. Everyone in Hong Kong knows where he is. Why don't you go looking?” He cackles. “He'll do my work for me.”

“Then it's a happy ending for everyone. Now shoot.” Hold out the needle and the hose. “It'll ease the pain. And I don't want your scum following me.” He smiles again as he takes the gear, tying his arm with the ease of long practice. Looks at me as he finds the vein. Those blasted teeth—blood in the dropper.

“See you round.” He grins. “Just look over your shoulder.”

A new set of clothes, a hasty shower in a cheap hotel, a string of moto rides I barely remember. I keep seeing Gabriel's face: going slack as he took the shot, eyes rolling up, snot running from his nose. He has the tolerance of a goddamn gorilla, so I put in a lot. Maybe too much. I didn't check, just grabbed the cash from his kitchen—must be ten, fifteen thousand US, neat bundles stashed in a pot in a huge pile of decaying dishes—and split.

Now I'm at the lake again, lost in its maze. The Green Dragon is hidden in the depths and I don't know how I get there, but I walk into the room and there she is, looking out at the water with the sun on her hair.

Channi.

Her feet are bare, shoes next to her chair. Away from her bar she doesn't quite know how to hold herself. She has no map, no good reason for being here: a good girl wouldn't be here at all.

Two mugs on the table, dripping frost. One beer, one Coke. No sign of Gus or Mama T. Channi turns to watch me as I cross the room.

“I have a story for you,” I say. She takes my hand, sits me down. I've planned this, but now I don't know where to start. I want to tell her everything. Kabul, Battambang . . . June. There are no words. I want to say something to comfort her, but I've turned to stone.

“Tell me later.” She puts a hand to my cheek. Sad eyes. We sit like that for a long time. Maybe she says some stuff. Maybe I do, too. I'm not sure. Clouds fill my head.

“I have to finish something,” I tell her. “I have to go away.”

She looks up and she's smiling, her face still colored with hope—but her eyes are shining. “I wait for you.”

“I want you to come with me.”

“Why I don't wait for you here?”

“Channi. I'm going to—to help someone. The girl I told you about. But the things I've done—I can't—” No, not that way. “Come with me.”

She takes her hand away, tears shining on her face. They only make her more beautiful. She speaks her own language because it's all she can remember. “Your friend told me you would go. I didn't believe him.”

“I'm not leaving you. Come.”

She reaches up and I think she's going to hit me, but she just holds on to my face, so I have to look in her eyes. “This is my home.”

“Channi—” I try to gather her in my arms, but she twists away, angry. The chair clatters on the deck. She stamps a foot on the boards. “Channi, if I stay, we will never be safe. The people who will come after me—” I can't go on, not against the look on her face. Have to try. “They might—they could try to hurt you. You need to leave. I'm sorry, I didn't mean it to happen, but you're not safe—”

“Safe?” Her voice is hard in a way I've never heard. “Safe? I've never been safe. I've been
here
. I was born in a Khmer Rouge camp. I grew up in the war. Now we have peace, and someone dies every day. But it is always my home.” She's screaming at me now, and there's something feral about her, something hurt and ferocious: “I know it's not real to you, I know. It's all a dream, Cambodia's a dream, and you'll go away and you'll wake up. But it's real to me.” Sobbing now, and gasping through the sobs—I try to go to her, she steps back, away.

And I am torn apart. I can't move. She picks up her shoes.

“I'm not a dream. I am real. So go, if you want. You get your girl and get your money and go.”

“Wait—” Reach for her—

She hits my hand away with the shoes. I grab her then, grab her and kiss her, hard, for all the times I won't get to kiss her. For a second she's with me, and strange flowers grow from the bleached wood of the deck and bloom around us. Then she's pulling away again, running through the room, leaving me alone with the sun and the lake and the two full glasses, and the water runs down their frosty sides and pools on the table.