The Half-Child (15 page)

Mayuree picked up her comb and started running it through her hair, but it caught on a knot bringing tears to her eyes. She put the comb back down on the edge of the sink and looked inside the bathroom cabinet behind the mirror. Her gaze fell on the orange tube of sleeping pills Wen took on occasion to counteract the amphetamines. It was half-full. Enough to put her to sleep for good.

She moved the orange tube to one side, found a strip of paracetamol and closed the cupboard. She washed down the painkillers with a glass of water and splashed more water on her hair. Then she smeared her comb with conditioner and went to work straightening out the kinks and untangling the knots, until her hair felt smooth and sleek again.

Mayuree used haemorrhoid cream to shrink the bags under her eyes—a trick Wen had taught her—and massaged whitening cream into her skin. She rubbed lotion all over her body, working it into her elbows, knees and ankles, and finished with a spray of cologne.

Her clothes from the night before were scattered on the floor of the main room that served as bedroom, lounge and eating area. Mayuree bundled these with the rest of the washing into a plastic bag to drop off at the Chinese laundry next door. She pulled on a pair of clean jeans and a blue top, a colour supposedly lucky for those born on a Friday. Then she grabbed her handbag and laundry and headed down the stairs.

She needed to meet with her boss, explore the possibility of working additional shifts to pay off some of the debt in kind. Perhaps she could convince him to increase the frequency of her pole dances. They were good for tips.

Before that, she needed to visit Kob and apologise to him for this latest setback in their plans. It didn't matter that he wouldn't understand. Mayuree needed to see him, to hold him. To know she could still feel love enough to outweigh the hatred and bitterness in her heart. To remind herself how he made it all worthwhile.

She pressed the bell beside the blue gate. Chaowalit ambled into view, registered her standing there, and disappeared again.

‘Older brother?' Mayuree called. ‘Anyone? Please let me in.'

She checked her watch, waited a full minute, pressed the bell again.

This time it was Frank who appeared in the yard of the compound.

‘Khun Frank,' Mayuree called. ‘It's me, Kob's mother.

Can you let me in? I need to see my son.'

Frank walked over to the gate and opened it, but not enough for her to enter.

‘Little sister, I was about to call you. It's about your son.'

A stab of fear ran through Mayuree's body. ‘What about my son?'

‘Don't panic,' Frank said, ‘but we've transferred him to the clinic for tests.'

‘Tests? What kind of tests?'

‘Medical tests. We're worried about his health. Doctor Somsri thinks there are signs he might have a rare congenital disorder.'

‘I don't understand,' Mayuree said, trying to look past him. ‘Where's my son? I need to see my son!'

Frank cleared his throat. ‘It's better if Kob is kept in isolation, rather than being exposed to potential infection in his state.'

Mayuree grabbed a fistful of Frank's shirt and threw herself against his chest. ‘Please,' she begged, ‘please let me see my boy.'

Frank raised his arms in the air and stepped back. The momentum brought them both inside the gate.

‘I need to see my son,' Mayuree screamed, pounding her fists on his shirtfront.

Frank took her firmly by the shoulders and held her at arm's length. ‘Let me check with the clinic staff.'

He turned and took a few steps towards the main building, punching numbers into a mobile phone as he walked. His spoke too softly for Mayuree to hear, but turned back and nodded.

‘You can see him for a few minutes,' he said. ‘But don't wake him.'

Mayuree pressed her palms together and raised them to her forehead in a
wai
. ‘Thank you so much.'

Kob was in a low-sided perspex cot. He was lying on his stomach with his hands raised either side of his face, wearing nothing but a nappy and a cotton vest. There was colour in his cheeks and his skin was warm to the touch.

‘Oh, my poor little boy,' Mayuree murmured.

She stroked the skin of his upper arm. She leaned over, put her face close to the back of his neck and inhaled.

Through the antiseptic aroma of the clinic she smelled the unique scent that was Kob.

‘I'm so sorry, my darling. I want to take you home but I…'

She hung her head. How could she keep doing this to Kob, promising him a life together only to let him down?

How could she keep leaving him in the care of strangers, day after day, struggling to stay awake during what little time they spent together? Maybe Khun Frank was right. Maybe she should give him up.

Mayuree gazed again at her sleeping boy. His fingers were splayed, making his chubby hands look like little brown starfish. She remembered him at the beach on the weekend running handfuls of sand through those fingers, giggling as though it tickled. His mouth was open, lips squashed into a pout, soft pink tongue resting behind six tiny teeth. She lifted one of the black curls on his head. It recoiled like a spring.

She knew his body more intimately than that of any lover, and she loved him more than anything. She could never relinquish him.

She leaned forward so her lips were close to his ear.

‘Trust me, my beautiful boy,' she whispered. ‘Please be good, get well, and it won't be long before I can take you away from all this and we can be together all the time.'

She ran her hand from the top of his head to the soles of his feet and gave his cheek one final sniff-kiss. ‘See you soon, my lovely.'

Mayuree stepped back into the foyer of the clinic where Khun Frank was waiting.

‘I won't lie to you,' he said. ‘Kob is a sick little boy.'

‘I don't understand. He seemed fine on Sunday.'

‘We're testing him for a few conditions, one of which can lie dormant then manifest suddenly with grave consequences.'

Mayuree hugged herself. She knew what she had to do.

‘Thank you for letting me see my boy,' she said. ‘Please, look after him.'

She walked out the gate and down the
soi
to the main road, where she hailed a
songthaew;
the loose change in her bag would pay the fare. She checked her wallet. The cop had left it untouched. She had close to five hundred baht. Enough for what she needed.

Pattaya Bay came into view as the
songthaew
turned on to the beach road. Mayuree would stay on until it turned inland again and reached Wat Chaimongkon on South Pattaya Road. There she would buy garlands of marigolds and jasmine, a bunch of lotus buds, and a platter of fruit to offer the monks. She would light nine incense sticks and leave them standing upright in the earth of a bronze pot, counting on the smoke to carry her petition to the Lord Buddha.

‘Make Kob well,' she prayed. ‘Keep him safe.'

She would ask nothing for herself.

18

‘T
hat was close,' Somsri said.

‘Actually, I think it was a blessing the mother showed up like that,' Frank said. ‘Now she knows her child is sick.'

‘Perhaps.' Somsri ran his tongue over his teeth. ‘Chaowalit did well.'

‘Yes, it was quick thinking on his part to call me. It bought us the time we needed. Speaking of timing, how long will the child stay under?'

‘A few hours yet. The dose I gave him should last long enough to get through the formalities.'

‘And the rise in body temperature?'

‘We put a lamp over the cot for a few minutes. Just long enough to heat him up a little.'

‘Simple but effective.'

The doctor nodded.

‘And all the paperwork's in order?'

Somsri nodded again.

‘Good, good,' Frank said. ‘I'm going to head over to the orphanage and make sure all the volunteers leave on time.

You've teed up the meeting with your contact from the Board?'

‘Yes, though it will cost more to have him come outside business hours.'

Frank held up one hand. ‘Not my jurisdiction,' he said, still smarting from their recent phone conversation. ‘It's up to you to handle that.'

He took leave of the doctor and made his way out of the compound. He was content with proceedings, though he felt sullied by the mother's performance. What did that shameless whore think she was doing, throwing herself at him like that? She almost knocked him off his feet. Frank tried to recall if she'd made contact with his skin. The possibility made him shudder.

More than ever, Frank was convinced God had sent him to Pattaya to restore order to chaos. Some women with children were not fit to be mothers. Others fit to be mothers were denied children. It was Frank's duty to right these wrongs.

Jayne was not the maternal type. When her contemporaries married and started having children, one after the other, it seemed they'd all succumbed to an epidemic to which Jayne alone seemed immune. She fled the country and became an expatriate largely because her aspirations when it came to marriage, mortgages and children were so at odds with those of her family and peers. That they were also at odds with the vast majority of Thai people—who always asked how many children she had and looked crestfallen to learn she had none—was beside the point. As a foreigner, she was allowed to be different. What made her a misfit at home added to her exoticism in Thailand.

Her time in the orphanage was doing little to change her mind. The toddlers were amusing, the way they walked like zombies and struggled to speak Thai and English—or German in little Gai/Rolfe's case. But all you could do with a baby was put food in one end and clean up the shit that came out the other.

‘Everyone is special', proclaimed the poster on the wall, the slogan emblazoned over a photograph of a penguin colony. ‘We are all God's children', advised another that featured an image of a warthog.

They reminded Jayne to keep her uncharitable thoughts to herself and she read them over and over throughout the day when she felt herself at risk of slipping out of character.

She read them again in the late afternoon as she and Dianne paced the playroom, each with an infant over one shoulder, waiting for them to burp. Jayne was carrying the baby with the mohawk, whose name was Ant. Dianne carried the tiny newborn Nok.

‘She was abandoned at the hospital a couple of days ago, poor thing,' Dianne told Jayne. ‘They say her mother was probably that teenage prostitute whose body was found on the weekend.'

‘I know the one you mean, I read about it in the local paper. Poor girl.'

‘Oh, she'll be okay,' Dianne said. ‘In fact, she's probably much better off. She'll be cared for here for a while and then get adopted overseas into a well-off family.'

I was talking about the mother
, Jayne wanted to say, but the penguins and warthogs told her to bite her tongue. She patted Ant on the back a little faster than necessary.

‘It's the thing I love about this work,' Dianne continued, cradling Nok's head in her hand. ‘It feels good to be part of an organisation devoted to improving children's lives. New Life—the name says it all.'

‘Doesn't it,' Jayne said, adding self-consciously, ‘Praise the Lord.'

She glanced at the warthog, wondering if she was laying it on a bit thick. He raised an eyebrow but Dianne beamed.

‘You know, you're amazing Jayne. Everyone is talking about how you've taken on all the dirty work around here with no complaints. It takes a special person to do that.'

Jayne flushed in spite of herself.

‘Frank must think very highly of you.'

‘I've hardly seen him.'

‘Ah, but as he'll tell you himself, Frank has very good instincts when it comes to people.'

Jayne felt something warm and wet hit her shoulder.

‘And he must think you're really special to have trusted this work to you.'

The warm, wet stuff started to trickle down Jayne's back.

‘So what are your plans for this evening?' Dianne said.

‘There's this new place opened in town that serves fondue.

A few of us thought we might try it out.'

She was saved from answering by the appearance of Frank Harding.

‘Just dropped by to see how you're all getting on,' he said. ‘How're you going, Jayne?'

‘Fine,' she said, backing away towards the bathroom.

‘Busy.'

He chuckled as if she were joking. ‘Dianne keeping you on your toes is she?' He smiled at the volunteer.

‘Actually, she's pretty low-maintenance, whereas these babies…I'm sorry, you'll have to excuse me. I need to get cleaned up.'

Frank held up his hand. ‘It's good to hear you're settling in.'

‘Absolutely,' she said. ‘Loving it.'

Baby spew was sliding down Jayne's back, headed for the waistband of her jeans. How had Ant managed to vomit
under
her T-shirt?

‘You shouldn't overdo it, especially in the first few weeks.'

‘Right,' Jayne nodded.

‘Don't feel obliged to stay late.'

‘Okay then.'

There was an awkward moment when both of them waited for the other to speak.

‘Well then—' Frank said.

‘I'll be—' Jayne said at the same time.

‘Go on,' Frank said.

‘I really need to get cleaned up.'

He glanced at his watch. ‘Yes, of course, don't let me keep you.'

It was too late to salvage her jeans. Ant had fallen asleep and Jayne handed her over to one of the Thai staff on her way to the bathroom. She mopped up the vomit as best she could. But the smell clung to her as she headed back to the hotel causing her fellow
songthaew
passengers to screw up their noses and give her a wide berth. They probably thought she'd been drinking.