Thump

            It is pointless to ask for directions to Soi Cowboy because the street stands out from all other Bangkok alleys with its glaring neon lights and thumping bass sounds.  During the day the traffic of pink and yellow tuk tuks, motorcycles, and Toyotas rival the music with beeps.  At night the street becomes more imposing and one senses that touching this bright city would feel cool and sharp as metal. 

            Soi Cowboy roars with drunken cries for sex.  Bar trucks line the perpendicular road, Sukhumvit, so that pedestrians can drink wine coolers and Mai Tais until they shake off the shame of approaching Soi Cowboy's scintillating entryway.  Truthfully, no one in Bangkok judges the visitors of Soi Cowboy.  Bangkok streets are rife with male, female, and gender ambiguous prostitutes.  The night markets sell vibrators and tiger print handcuffs alongside backpacks with elephant motifs, Buddha's image printed on lamps and tee shirts, tie dyed sarongs, and fake designer jewelry and electronics.

            Every night is a holiday on Soi Cowboy.  Hilary is celebrating her twenty-first birthday even though her birthdate is next month.  She has agreed to let three of her male coworkers get her drunk with a can of warm beer and a Singapore Sling and take her to her first strip club.  She wears her tightest tank top and rims her eyes with more eyeliner because when she puts on makeup they tell her it looks like her eyes can pierce their souls.  Tonight they say nothing except, "Let's go."

            Entering Soi Cowboy tastes salty, like the sticky neck of a Skytrain metro commuter or the crystal garnish for sliced guava, pineapple, and purple yam sold on the sidewalk for twenty baht.  The go-go bars on Soi Cowboy all have different themes: Texas ranch, followed by English royalty, followed by Middle Eastern desert, followed by dollhouse kitsch, followed by another Texas ranch.  The strippers wear costumes with blue glitter and tassels, patches of polyester and high heeled boots, bending down to serve customers seated at the outdoor patios their Singha beers and vodka shots.  The women take hourly shifts holding signs written in English, advertising show highlights and bar specials.  They stand by the door with their legs spread slightly, frozen.

            The neon overwhelms the street; the pedestrians’ skin glow indigo.  Vendors sell papery popcorn and mango sticky rice from their bicycles.  Children with scabby arms wave postcards and cigarettes at tourists, pleading for baht.  A man sits in the middle of the street, his outstretched legs amputated at the knee and a puppy sleeping on his thigh.  But no one looks at the street, instead focusing on the establishments that line the road.

            They pass the first few establishments and quickly settle on a cowboy themed club named KISS.  A woman in a low-cut white dress ushers the group to the end of a gleaming metal bench, one of two that flank either side of a catwalk.  The men order Long Island Iced Teas.  Hilary shakes her head no.  The manager pushes a drink menu at her.  Sitting on the edge of the bench, next to the man who had taken her virginity the previous night, Hilary grasps the menu with both hands and studies it until the manager walks away.  She bobs to the music before realizing dancing makes her one of them, the strippers.

            She peeks over the menu.  Six women writhe their bodies to the techno pulse, staring vacantly at their reflections in the mirrored walls.  They wear silver stilettos, red and white striped ribbons placed over their pussies, blue tassels stuck to their nipples, and white cowboy hats.  Their skin is gauzy-pale, powder collecting in the crevices behind their knees and elbows.  Some cover their black iris with blue or green colored contact lenses.  From their facial features, it is clear they are all Thai, even though only one has straight black hair.  Another has curly red hair, another straight platinum hair in loose pigtails, another cropped blond, curly light brown, and straight dark brown.  Maybe their hair has been dyed, maybe they are wearing wigs.  It is difficult to distinguish the parts of their bodies that are authentic.

            Since the women seem robotic, unfeeling, not even dancing in rhythm to the thump of the bass line, Hilary can look at them without guilt.  They can look at themselves, too, touching their cowboy hat rims as they gaze at their reflections in the mirrored walls.  Perhaps they are just as incredulous as she is, all of them wondering how they ended up here, in this club with excessive glint, glitter, flirt, and grit.  All of them wondering how long the women’s arms, pubic area, and calves will stay smooth before they have to clench their teeth and wax hair off again.  Wondering how long they will sway until the manager signals the next act with her left hand tapping her right shoulder.

            Attributes blur, rendering the women indistinguishable.  Their torsos have no lines, wrinkles, defined musculature, or protruding bones.  The weight of the tassels pulls on their small tits like feeding fish.  No fat wiggles along with their swaying bodies.  The ribbons tied at their hips never slip.  Except for occasional ankle tremors, the women stand powerfully.

            Hilary’s friends stare in rapture, their beers dangling loosely from their limp grasps around the bottles’ necks.  The one who took her virginity chortles softly.  Alcohol has hardened all of the men, turning them solipsistic.  She covers the echo of their laughter with her own, feigning male indifference.  They point at the strippers with their beer bottles, sloshing liquid onto their wrists. 

            Nothing surprises her here.  She yearns for surprises like the magnificent scale of the Grand Palace and the reclining Great Buddha: dazzling sights she had dreamed of since she was young.  She had also dreamed of losing her virginity to a charming teenager in a sunlit bedroom with soft down comforters, but that disintegrated after she turned twenty.  After she turned twenty, she became realistic.  Realistic and impatient.  Impatient and impulsive.

            One of her friends leans forward and yells past the one who took her virginity, “Which one is the hottest?”

            She points at the one with straight black hair.  That stripper has enough self-worth not to hide her ethnicity behind wigs and makeup.  Asians may not have origins in a Texas ranch, but her honesty taunts.  Hilary explains none of this, though.  Her feminine nature merely senses superlative attractiveness, according to them.  She does not think but just does, according to them.

Hilary’s friend follows her finger and agrees with a vague “yeah.”

            Leaning against the bar, the manager signals the next act with her left hand tapping her right shoulder.  The women march off the catwalk and through a doorframe covered in gold tinsel, which flutters as the women parade through it, not bothering to partition the metallic strands.  Seconds later, six other women file out with only a white, plastic band as thick as their pussies.  These women pout aggressively, knowing they push the limits of concealment.  Hilary’s spandex tank top and makeup seem much less daring now.  She tries to look like she doesn’t care, clenching her jaw.  The men seem convinced, but she cannot convince herself.

            The women from the previous act have reentered the space, dispersing themselves among the audience.  The two blondes begin repeating "hi" to Hilary’s friends and giggling coquettishly.  One squeezes herself between Hilary and the one who took her virginity.  Their arms touch.  She does not look at Hilary.  Hilary stares at the stripper’s belly button.  She moves her arm, bending the menu.  Hilary peruses the drink choices again as the manager approaches their group.  Hilary orders a margarita to keep busy.

            The group is all in Thailand together but not just for Hilary’s unbirthday, since she goes back to college in September before they can truly celebrate.  One needed surgery after drunkenly slamming a door on his hand so hard that he sliced off half his pointer finger, one renewed his Marine Corps shooting license, and the one who took her virginity joined Hilary in taking advantage of a cheap flight from Cambodia, where the whole group works at the United States Consulate General Office.  Back in Cambodia, everyone is home by midnight because that is when the night spirits roam.  In Cambodia, no one talks about sex.  In Cambodia, Hilary’s body makes her ashamed.

            "Do you want to go to Midnite now?  I saw a sign for a ping pong show starting soon," her friend farthest down the bench asks, looking at his fake Rolex watch.  He wears one of the strippers' cowboy hats.  The techno music's thump fills the lag in the men's decision-making capabilities.  Hilary thinks she knows what a ping pong show is, but does not clarify.  How does a woman shoot a plastic ball out of a place where there should never be a plastic ball?  She shakes her head: finally, she has found the line.

            "I'm going to head to bed," Hilary announces after they leave the club.  The group stands huddled on Soi Cowboy, the sounds more muted now.  The one who took her virginity already walks forward before she has finished her sentence.  The other two nod, wish her a good night, and follow him.  The next day, after ordering more room service burgers, scrambled eggs, and chicken wings than they can afford, they will regret not walking her home.

            Hilary retraces her steps back to Sukhumvit.  No one looks at her and she is grateful.  Not even the prostitutes in bright colors and fishnet stockings, languishing on the sidewalk curb, turn their head as she passes.  Lingering at a table laden with jewelry, she purchases a leather belt, too tired to haggle the price down from 120 baht.  Her pants have become much looser over the last few weeks.  Cambodia does not sell size 6 jeans or size 6 anything, so she wears them even though they slip sometimes, revealing the waistband of her panties.  Soon maybe she will be able to purchase the smaller Cambodian clothes and fit in, literally, with the populace.

            She walks back to their hotel and sits on her uncomfortably firm mattress.  The cream colored sheets have been changed.  She will never have to see last night's sheet again.  Hilary unbuckles her sandals.  The back of her tank top clings damply to her skin.  The night before she slept naked.  Tonight she will sleep with all her clothes on.  After ordering room service burgers, scrambled eggs, and chicken wings, the men will knock on her door.  She will not answer.  She will wake up early and read by the pool.  They will find her eventually.  One will sigh, "I thought you had disappeared."

            She wishes she had.