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Next year, all going well! He could have said ten-years, it would have been just as painful for Gow. A month wasn’t a long time to be with him but it was long enough to make him the best steady bar-fine she ever had. Most of her customers were around fifty; some a lot older. Like that old German guy that stayed for three months; she didn’t care much for him, but he was generous.

David was different. They had something special, or at least she thought they had. His announcement was sudden and delivered with a nonchalance she had not expected. He had told her several times that he really cared, jing-jing. Now, he didn’t even want to see her on his last day in Thailand.

He was young, only thirty-two. Maybe he wanted to try another lady before he left. That would have been okay with her if it meant him not leaving. She sat on the promenade wall and lit another cigarette. People filed past. She watched but she didn’t really see any of them. The only image she saw was David’s face in her mind’s eye. He dominated her thoughts as he always had since she first saw him.

She moved a little further along the wall to let a couple sit down. The man thanked her. His companion, who was a nurse, sat on his other side and said nothing. Gow had seen them before, on occasions. They always sat on the wall at noon and left at one PM. She had not sat next to them before, but on other days, she had noticed the man’s good looks as she’d walked passed them on her way to mall.

She never sat on the wall longer than ten minutes normally, not wanting to be associated with the girls on the street who spent most of the day looking for customers along Beach Road. Gow worked in a Walking Street bar. That was a respectable place to work, organized and safe, and she enjoyed the company of the other girls.

The man turned his head and smiled at her. “You look sad.”

“It’s nothing,” she said.

“Boy friend trouble?”

“Sort of.” Gow crunched her cigarette under her high-heeled shoe and lit another with her fifteen-baht lighter.

“I see a lot of that in my profession,” he said.

She sucked long and hard, and took her time to expel the smoke into the sea breeze. “What is your profession?”

“I’m a psychiatrist.”

“Good for you,” she said.

“My name is, Narong. What’s yours?”

“Gow.”

“My specialty is hypnosis. I can help you, if you want. We are from the Prachoen Mental Hospital. This is my assistant nurse, Chiap.”

Gow forced a smile at a nod from the nurse, who appeared disinterested in their conversation. She looked at Gow and Narong guardedly for a moment before turning her face in the other direction.

Gow was surprised by the offer of help from the man, thinking that the hospital would have enough patients without the staff having to tout for trade.

“I don’t have money for hospitals,” Gow said.

“No, you don’t understand,” the man said. “I can give you treatment here and now.”

“Now, for free?” Gow said.

Narong nodded.

“Okay, I’ll give it a try.”

She flicked her cigarette onto the sand and twisted round to face him. She told him how much David had meant to her and that he could have said goodbye in a nicer way. If only she could feel differently about parting with him, after all, seeing guys come and go was her profession.

Narong took her hands and asked her to look into his eyes. They were warm and kind eyes and it was easy for her to melt into his gaze. He took her hands and rested them on his knees. His fingers gripped her arms; hot hands on flesh cooled by the sea breeze. Her heart started to beat faster. He spoke to her softly. He told her the hurt would soon go away. All she needed was another love, a deeper love, someone to understand her and her feelings.

She smiled slightly, more from nerves than from amusement. He smoothed her forehead with his thumbs and the drone of his voice made her mind swirl. His hypnotic suggestion for her to relax didn’t work, and she was tenser than before she sat down. This was bewildering. The handsome young doctor, who could have his pick of all the nurses at the hospital, had made it obvious that he was interested in her, a bar girl from Walking Street; although a respectable bar girl. She knew she was pretty, her customers said so, but nurses were pretty too.

The attraction was mutual and that worried her. Is Narong going to be another David? Will he leave her and go away? Maybe not, if works at the hospital — there was the spark of hope she was looking for.

She stood up. She was hot and flustered. “I’ve got to go.”

Narong smiled and the nurse threw her a condescending glace before looking away.

Gow knew where Narong would be the next day and she needed the night to think about the situation. His therapy had worked, she was over David but she liked him. She may be about to go from the wok into the fire? The good side of the situation could be a life with a man in a well-paid job, and who was going to be around for a while. She had to make sure his feelings ran as deep as hers.

The next afternoon the fish ball soup was hot and she had already waited ten minutes at the stall behind a farang who couldn’t make up his mind. She asked him the time. It was twelve-fifty — she was late. She bolted her soup, snatched up her purse and hurried to the beach.

Her mouth was still stinging when she sat on the wall. Narong turned his head and gave her the same smile that sent her heart into palpitations. It was the moment of truth, but the decision was not hers. She put her hand on his. He took it and squeezed it onto his heart. She knew she had her answer.

The nurse stood up and looked at her watch. “Come on, Narong, we had better get back to the hospital. It’s time for your medication.”

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