told off for not sleeping with a prostitute
For a while (1997?), I taught English in ******. It was a shit job, really. For the first time in my life, England had hope; I had a series of disappointing love affairs to obsessively brood over, three friends (two of whom are now dead) and a habit of drinking upwards of a bottle of cheap gin a day. My clockwise youth was disappearing down the plughole – a mixture of waste, dirt and dead skin – and all I had infront of me were blurry days, kidney pains and mournings of reluctant waking, the spray from the flush of the toilet like ocean spray on my nau-seas, ugly face.

One lonely evening, the bored moon sitting there, just fucking sitting there and shining on us with its fake smile, all around the city the soft sounds of love, boredom and domestic abuse fell like ash on skin. My friend Kev and I decided that sitting around in a hot flat sweating the afternoon’s gin out was not the way to be spending our lives. We were bright, young things. Men about town.

We decided a night on the town. We lived around the embassies, alas ******* being the administrative capital, there was not much “town” to do anything in.

So we stocked up on smokes, gin and brazil nuts and headed out. Now, at this point I should say we were drunken. We walked around the quiet streets, the tips of our cigarettes struggling to stay aflame in the mugginess of the night. There was gin and then there wasn’t. Locals had boasted to me that man had started his migration to Europe from here. It was easy to see why. There was fuck all else to do.

Even drunks get bored, so when we saw one single blurry neon light – we investigated. Turns out it was a police station. The virtual civil war that had gripped the country made the young policemen nervous and (in my opinion at least) rather over excitable. We were “invited” in by the apprehensive man with a gun. A rather terse conversation was enlivened by my friend remembering the name of the chief of Police to whom he taught English. The police Volted Their Face and became overly friendly. “A bar?” of course. So they bundled us into the armoured riot van and took us “downtown” (read: The Slums). I still remember the sound the long, stained wooden truncheons made as they swung against the side of the riot van. They sounded like the fingernails of someone you don't trust drumming on your teeth. We were deposited outside a brothel. The outside was full of fat men with thin wallets and thinner smiles. They saw us getting out the riot van. And they saw the police talk to the greasball owner. And then they saw the police give us a cheery wave and get back in the van, and leave.

“We don’t go to the toilet alone” said Kev. His adroitness indicated knowledge of behaviour in a wider range of social situations than me and I was confidenced. A sort of kevlar to protect my own piss weak, knock kneed, jellyfish bitter, stung-sore soul. If you like.

Now, I will never sleep with a prostitute. I, I just won’t. So when the brothel owner sent over two prostitutes (one with a black eye which choked me up so much I had to pretend inability to take the harsh smoke from the local cigarettes) and two large drinks, I was more than happy to drink the drink but there would be no way that I would sleep with the prostitute.

As Kev went off with the other girl, I told the girl this, who, with fear in her one good eye, went and told the owner.

Apparently, this was a grievous insult. So over waddled the owner. I was berated in a language I barely understood by a fat, balding lump of grease. He was so angry he sweated into his expensive suit, waving his arms around. Every time he lifted his arms, I could see a gun in a holster. I didn’t ask, but I doubted it was a replica.

I knew nothing of the culture. (“I am sorry”)
I knew nothing of manners. (“I am sorry”)
I was no English Gentleman, I was a ****. (“I am sorry”)
I had to stand there, shivering with fear.
I stared at my shoes.
I agreed with him.
I adopted submissive body language.
Every step I took backwards caused him to take two forward. I backed into a table, the edge digging into me just below my buttock.
The spittle from his voice showered my face. The last water to land there had been spray from the flush of the toilet as I'd vomited last night out this morning. I didn't dare rub it away. His teeth were crooked and the blackness between the rotten gaps was tainted red with anger.
I’d insulted his hospitality (“I am sorry”)
If I told the police that I’d refused a prostitute they’d close him down (I won’t I won’t).

And I took it all. In the end I sat on my own and waited for Kev. When Kev came down, the bastard put his arms around him and Kev said what a great fellow he was. The bastard told him he was welcome anytime. As we walked out, I ignored the stares of the men, and tried to keep Kev between me and the bastard in case his hair trigger temper went again. That bastard is doubtless still alive while Kev is dead. But I don’t care. In the end, we all fail. And that bastard will get his.
(sirolimus, Fri 21 Sep 2007, 16:39, Reply)