The Fourth Watcher

21

After returning her nod, he silently shares the elevator with Mrs. Pongsiri, the apartment house’s central gossip conduit, whose opinion of Poke has improved with Arthit’s frequent visits. Uniforms, Rafferty supposes, inspire confidence. Given the hours Mrs. Pongsiri keeps-going to work at 6:00 p.m. and returning home around 3:00 in the morning-her occupation is a topic of continuing speculation among the residents. She looks tired tonight, her figure sheathed in a too-tight cocktail dress that is so saturated with stale cigarette smoke that the elevator smells like an ashtray by the time they reach the eighth floor. Once the doors open, they exchange minimal smiles and go in their separate directions. As she walks away, Rafferty sees she has already unzipped the top four inches of her gown.

The digital clock on his desk blinks a green hello when he finishes double-locking the door and turns to face the living room. The clock reads 2:17 a.m., so Mrs. Pongsiri has come home early. Rafferty has managed only a couple of hours’ sleep in the past two days, and he feels it all the way down to the cellular level.

He smells smoke, and it isn’t Mrs. Pongsiri. Then he sees the light beneath the bedroom door.

Rose is sitting up in bed, wrapped in the mandatory towel, a cigarette between her fingers. From the pile of butts in the ashtray, she’s been at it for quite a while.

“I was worried about you,” she says in Thai.

“Everything’s under control,” he replies, also in Thai. He kicks off his shoes and climbs up beside her. “I gather Peachy actually went home.”

“Not happily. I think she’s very lonely since her husband left her.”

“It’s worse than that. Arthit told me tonight that he killed himself over the debts she ran up.”

Rose’s fingertips fly to her mouth. “Ohhh, Peachy. How terrible for her.”

“Another reason for us to be grateful for what we’ve got.” He spreads his arms and stretches. He feels like he’s been shut up in a small box for days. “Every day we’re together is a blessing. You, Miaow, and me. And there’s no promise that it’ll go on forever, so we need to be thankful one day at a time. There was probably a time when things were fine between Peachy and her husband, and they took it for granted. And then things weren’t fine anymore.” He strokes her arm, the skin he loves. “I’m never going to take you for granted.” Then, at what he hoped would be the romantic high spot, he yawns.

“Poor baby, you’re tired.”

He shakes his head, half expecting to feel his brain slosh around inside. “This has been the longest day of my life.”

“I’m so sorry about all that.”

“It’s not you. Oh, I mean, sure, it’s partly the thing with the bag of money. But I think I can put that on hold for a little while.”

She runs a finger down the side of his face, and his right side erupts in goose bumps. “If you say so, I’m sure you can. What’s the rest of it?”

“Give me a minute. Let me figure out what order to tell it in.” He closes his eyes for a moment, lets some of the day’s images pass before his eyes, and the next thing he knows, there’s a tug on his arm.

“You were snoring,” Rose says.

“Not a chance.”

“Like a helicopter.” She leans over and kisses him on the cheek. “Go to sleep. You can tell me in the morning.”

“No. You need to know what’s going on.” He focuses on what he needs to say for a moment, making sure he has the Thai words at his command. “Okay, okay, let’s start with the relatively easy stuff.” And he tells her about his talk with Arthit, about how happy Arthit was to hear that Rose had accepted Rafferty’s proposal.

“I finally accepted it,” Rose says. “Before one of us died of old age.” She slides a hand over his shoulder and says, “You’re so tight you’re practically in a spasm. Turn around so I can work on your neck.”

“It’s carrying this head around,” he says. “Just too many ideas inside.”

“Not to mention all that bone.” Her fingers probe, stretch, and isolate his muscles.

“And then,” Rafferty says, and hesitates. “I had a little surprise today. My father is in Bangkok.”

Her hands stop moving. He feels their warmth against his skin, and he starts to drift off again. “Is this a joke?” she asks.

“I wish it were. He’s here, and he’s brought along my half-Chinese half sister and a Southern Chinese guy who seems to be a hired gun.”

“A sister, too? But this is wonderful for you,” she says. “It’s your chance.”

“For what?”

“To make it up with him.” She makes a tsk-tsk noise, a reaction that Rafferty has learned is a lot less mild than it sounds. “We’re talking about your father, Poke. He’s here, in Bangkok. With your sister. He came looking for you.”

“Yeah? That makes us even or something?”

She lifts a hand and slaps his back. “This is one of the things that’s wrong with you.”

“One of them? And, by the way, ow.”

“One of many. You’re in your head too much. You’re so busy making a judgment that you close yourself off to understanding anything. You talk about being ‘even’ with your father, like you’re making some sort of business deal, like you don’t have any feelings about it. For years it’s been like your father was dead, and now he’s here. You can make things right again. You have a second chance. Do you know what I’d give for a second chance with my own father? Do you know what I’d give to be able to talk to him for five minutes? Two minutes ago you were talking about how it’s a blessing for us to be together. Every day is a blessing, you said. Well, here’s your father, back from the dead. And you don’t think that’s a blessing?”

“Actually, no,” he says, still in Thai. “I was just fine. From one day to the next, I never gave him a thought. I haven’t seen him since I was sixteen, remember? It’s not like he’s earned a lifetime of love and loyalty.”

“Your parents don’t need to earn your love,” Rose says. “They gave you life. That’s enough. What did Miaow do to earn your love? You make love sound like money.”

“At least you get change from money if you give too much of it.”

She rolls over so her back is to him and lights a cigarette. “You don’t even mean what you’re saying. You’re just stubborn. You’ve gotten used to the idea that your father is no good, and it’s too much work to learn that it might not be true. You’ve been living in your side of the story since you were sixteen. Now you don’t want to hear his side.”

“I already heard it. That’s what I’m trying to tell you. Whether I like it or not, he’s barged back into my life, without an invitation-”

Rose raises an arm and lets it drop. “Oh, Poke.”

“-and he’s toting a bag of threats.”

Rose turns her head enough to give him her profile. “Against who?”

“The whole hemisphere, is what it sounded like.” He hesitates, then takes the plunge. “I asked Arnold to find out what he could.”

“This is impossible,” Rose says. “Your father comes all the way to Bangkok, bringing your sister, and instead of welcoming them, instead of bringing them home so I could meet them, you. . you assign Arnold to him. Do you know what I think?”

“I already do. I’m stubborn, I don’t know anything about love-”

“I think you’re afraid of what it might mean to you. Here you are, with this opportunity. So what do you do? You go looking for facts. More facts. Like facts can tell you how to feel or what you should do. He’s your father, but you don’t want to know what that might really mean.”

“Well, how do I know what he’s up to? What’s his agenda? He’s not exactly aces in the trust department. Anyway,” he adds in English, “it takes one to know one.”

“What does that mean?” Her voice is several degrees chillier.

“It’s just the way he is. He may be my father, but he’s more like Arnold than he is like me.”

He turns to her, puts a hand on her arm. “I’m just being careful. This,” he says, “this room, you, me, Miaow-nothing can threaten this. I can’t let anything threaten this. Not my father, not Elson, not anything.”

“We’ll talk tomorrow. For now go to sleep.” She puts out her cigarette and lies down again with her back to him. Then she says, “This is silly,” and turns and puts both arms around him. He feels her breath on his cheek.

He is asleep in seconds.

He is back in the Lancaster house, in the living room, which has developed windows that look out on a Southeast Asian landscape, all palms and heat shimmer, when the phone rings.

He sits up, says “Shit” in his wake-up frog voice, and flips the phone open.

“Who’d call at this hour?” Rose asks.

Before Rafferty can say a word, he hears his father’s voice.

“Get out of there,” Frank Rafferty says. “All of you, get out of there this minute.”