Tom Callaghan - A Summer Revenge

The taxi pulled up outside a low-rise building, nondescript-looking apart from the purple neon sign above the entrance that said VISTA HOTEL. A few Indian or Pakistani men shuffled around in the car park at the side of the building, smoking and joking with their friends in a low-key way. A line of taxis was parked ahead of us, obviously waiting for the bar to close, the customers to select the evening’s companion and head home.

I got out as Kulayev paid the driver, looked around. There was the same electric tension in the air as on Ibrahimova Street in the Soviet days, when it was called Pravda, and the working girls sat in cars with their mama-sans , their bosses, waiting for custom. Men desperate for sex, women desperate for money, hoping that the client they ended up with wouldn’t cheat them, wasn’t violent, wasn’t crazy and would come quickly.

We walked into the hotel lobby and headed toward the stairs. A burly black security guard with biceps the size of watermelons saw Kulayev, waved us through. The music went from merely very loud to ear-splitting as we went up two flights of stairs and through a wooden door. The room was very dark, and at first I could only see the lights of the illuminated beer pumps on the bar in the far corner. Then, as my eyes adjusted to the light, I started to make out shapes which gradually resolved themselves into men and women.

“Water?” Kulayev shouted, trying to be heard over the strangled disco beat. I nodded, and he pushed his way through the crowd toward the bar. I took the opportunity of his absence to take stock.

The room stank of cheap tobacco and cheaper perfume, lust and failed ambitions, despite the very best efforts of the extractor fans rattling overhead. The noise was deafening, a song I didn’t recognize played past the level of distortion. But clearly the patrons knew it, judging by their energetic moves on the dance floor. Everyone hopped from foot to foot, as if the floor was electrified. The walls were wood-paneled and featured shelves like those outside mosques. But instead of shoes, these were filled with handbags. The male customers all seemed to be in their forties or fifties, with the usual beer bellies and bald heads, most of them clutching glasses of beer. Drooping jowls, piggy eyes, jeans twenty years too tight and too young for them, last season’s trainers or shoes with heels that gave them an extra inch of height.

And dancing around them, smiling, flirting, holding cigarettes up to be lit, desperate for eye contact, a smile, anything that held the promise of five hundred dirhams to send home to feed their children, the women. Almost exclusively Asian, mainly Chinese or Vietnamese, with the occasional African or Slavic face standing out in the crowd, there must have been twice as many women as men crammed into the room. All dressed to show off their best assets, all teeth and cleavage, mascara heavy as black paint, lipsticked and lipglossed, miniskirted and booted.

Kulayev appeared, clutching a Corona and a bottle of water which he handed to me. I unscrewed the cap and drank. It was lukewarm and tasted of tin.

“What do you think?” Kulayev shouted.

“Great,” I lied and gave a smile that must have looked as false as those all around me. I’d been a police officer for a long time. I’d worked Vice for a couple of years, hitting the brothels and the freelancers, but I’d never seen so many working girls in such a small room. It didn’t make the job of finding Natasha Sulonbekova look any easier.

A slightly overweight woman in a low-cut black wraparound dress came over and kissed Kulayev on the cheek very enthusiastically, wrapping her arms around his waist and nuzzling his neck. Up close, I could see that she was in her mid-thirties, with acne scars painted over with thick makeup. One of her front teeth was slightly crooked, smeared with traces of lipstick. Her breasts looked as improbably large as those of the woman I was looking for; maybe they shared the same implant surgeon.

A nearby table came free as a very drunk shaven-headed Lebanese-looking man lurched toward the door, swearing in Arabic, two tiny Chinese girls in tow. We sat down, and I sipped my water as Kulayev patted the woman’s thigh.

“Akyl, this is my very dear friend Lin, from Ho Chi Minh City.”

I smiled, nodded, slightly taken aback when Lin offered me a formal handshake. I took her hand in mine, noticing the roughness of her skin, the way her lipstick made a narrow mouth look generous, the coal-black eyes framed with mascara that gave nothing away. Her perfume was very strong, as if the top had come off the bottle. She flicked her shoulder-length black hair away from her face, then placed her hand on my thigh.

“You have a cigarette?”

Her voice was low, her Vietnamese accent strong, but I could recognize the sensuality—real or fake—promised in her voice. I offered her one of mine, but she looked at the pack and shuddered. Obviously Classic was not a brand she favored.

“You buy me Marlboro Light?”

I nodded and waved to a waitress. When the cigarettes came, I gave the waitress twenty dirhams. Again, I didn’t expect any change, and I wasn’t disappointed. Lin pushed the pack toward me. The false talons at the ends of her fingers were reserved for better things than opening cigarettes. I stripped the cellophane, tapped the bottom of the pack. Too hard. Half of the contents spilled out onto the table, quickly soaking up puddles of beer.

Lin and Kulayev both laughed at my clumsiness, which was exactly what I’d wanted. I’d revealed myself to be an out-of-touch, out-of-town boy, what we call a myrki in Kyrgyzstan. I’ve often found that playing simple can be the smartest thing you do. It lowers people’s guard, elevates their opinion of themselves. And you learn more than by appearing smart.

I lit one of the surviving cigarettes for her. She held my hand to steady the flame, inhaled, jetted twin gusts of smoke.

“Akyl’s looking for a girl.”

I tapped Kulayev’s shin with the side of my shoe, warning him not to say too much. Lin looked at me, appraising clothes, haircut, the potential thickness of my wallet. I wasn’t sure if I passed muster or simply that the hour was getting late.

“Handsome man like this, he’s no need to look; women will find him,” she said, patted me on the cheek, returned her hand to my thigh. This time she gripped it tighter, so that I could feel her fingernails pressing into my skin.

“I’m from Kyrgyzstan, Lin, just in Dubai for a few days. I wondered if there were any Kyrgyz ladies I could spend some time with?”

I looked round for Kulayev, but he had got up and was already whispering in the ear of a girl wearing a blue dress and a bored expression, his arm around her back, fingers assessing the curve of her breast. As I watched, she transferred her gum from one side of her mouth to the other and carried on chewing. Who says romance is dead?

“You buy me a drink.”

It wasn’t a question, but delivered in a regal tone that told me how lucky I was to be sitting with her. So I simply nodded.

“Bullfrog.”

I had no idea what a Bullfrog was, but I ordered one. The tall cocktail that arrived was a radioactive blue, lethal-looking and obviously strong. I was surprised that it came with a straw, but when I looked around, all the women seemed to be drinking through straws, even those with glasses of beer. Maybe it was so they wouldn’t smudge their lipstick; maybe it was practice for later on.

“You have a wife, children back home?”

“No.”

The grip on my thigh moved up an inch.

“Girlfriend?”

Her hand was now perilously close, so I simply shook my head.

“You like me?”

I cleared my throat, gave a passable smile. She smiled back, and I saw that her lipstick had spread to both front teeth. It made her look as if she’d recently killed something. Perhaps she had.