A Tiger in Eden Read online

  It’s funny how the aul memory works. Sometimes that’s all I ‘member about a person is just one clear image, the rest all sort of blends together into more of a feeling than anything else. Maybe that’s all you need is those photographs in the mind. When you’re older, I suppose that’s all you have. I’ve got loads of them already but they’re not very nice most of them, I don’t like thinking about it. It’s all the bloody faces of Catholic lads I done over and worse. Don’t even get me started on our Mark, I’m trying to block that out completely, those are not good memories to have.

  Tanya stood up then and pulled her blouse off. She never wore a bra ‘cos she had quite small wee breasts but I’d seen her wearing a bikini for going swimming. She had nothing on underneath this time. As she pulled the blouse off over her head I could see her hairy armpits. I’d seen them a couple of times by that stage and at first I was a bit disgusted but now I was sort of curious, it was a bit of a weird thing to see on a woman. I know it’s natural and everything but I just wasn’t used to it. No way the girls back home would ever not shave their pits. The fisherman pants were off next and there she was in the nuddy right next to me. She had a big hairy triangle between her legs too. I was a bit shocked at the sight of it even though I suspected she was like that as I’d seen wee hairs sticking out the side of her bikini bottoms when we’d been swimming. Without a word she walked down to the water and ran into the sea. The arms went up above her head and she dived into the waves. She had a big tattoo on her lower back, one of them tribal ones. It made my aul Loyalist ones look like shite.

  There was something beautiful and free about our Tanya that I’d never seen in a woman before. It’s like she was living in her own world and wasn’t carrying around any aul hang-ups from the past. Everyone I knew was fucked up and I started to think maybe that was just home, maybe it didn’t have to be like that.

  I took the aul shorts off and ran into the sea as well. Tanya swam over, came up behind me and gave me a hug. I could feel her wee body pressing into the back of me. Her arms was round my chest and her chin was resting on my shoulder as the two of us watched the sun coming up over the ocean. There was still a wee bit of that phosphorescence stuff floating in the water, sure you could see it glowing whenever you kicked your feet or your hands.

  I’ll miss you, Tanya, I says, what am I going to do after you’re away?

  She plants a wee kiss on my neck. I could feel myself shaking but it was maybe just the cold water.

  You’ll have some other girl in your bed next week, she goes.

  I haven’t had you in my bed yet, I says.

  You never asked, she goes, biting me on the shoulder all playful.

  Is that all it would of took, me asking?

  Hmm, she goes.

  Right, I says, feeling like a right dumb cunt for not saying nothing before, well what are your plans for your last day?

  Oh you know me, she says, I’m not much of a one for making plans.

  Right, I goes, well can I make a wee suggestion?

  Just a wee one then, she laughs. I knew she liked me saying wee.

  I turned round in her arms then so I was facing her. She was a lot smaller than me and I could feel her fanny hair rubbing against my stomach under the water. Needless to say she was giving me the horn like nobody’s business.

  Come here and I’ll whisper it in your ear, I says.

  She turned her head so I could put my lips up close to her ear. The sea was turning a weird turquoise sort of colour.

  What do you say we don’t bother getting dressed the rest of the day?

  A naked day, she whispers back into my ear.

  Aye, we come back here tonight and swim in the same spot.

  I wanted to put the lips on her real bad but she let go of me then and says, come on, if we want to avoid putting our clothes on we better run back along the beach before anyone wakes up and sees us.

  That broke the wee romantic moment but it was a bit of fun getting back to shore and charging down the beach trying not to laugh and wondering if any early risers would see us. My aul knob was an early riser himself, sure I’d never run with a hard-on before but it went down soon enough. We went back to Tanya’s hut and by that time I was getting used to walking around with nothing on but as soon as we were inside I couldn’t stand it no more and I pulled her in to me and started snogging the face off of her.

  Go easy, she says, your stubble’s dead sharp, you’ll give me pash rash.

  What’s that, I says.

  She laughs then and goes, never mind, come to bed.

  Music to my ears, I says.

  And that’s the way it was, all day. We must of done it six or seven times, I didn’t think that was even possible. You hear stories that women who don’t shave stink but it’s not true, the smell of her was gorgeous, so it was, I was licking the sweat right off of her.

  In between times when we were lying on the bed recovering she would pick up the guitar and sing me a wee song. I never heard the like of it. Some of them were hers and some of them were more famous ones but her own versions of them. She played this dead slow version of ‘Girls Just Wanna Have Fun’ that was brilliant, I nearly bawled, so I did. But the best was a song called ‘Summertime’. Tanya says it was from some aul opera by Gershwin but her favourite version was by Ella Fitzgerald. I never heard of either of them but the way Tanya sung it naked sitting up on her knees with her head all bowed to one side, I could’ve died right there and then in that hut and my worthless fucking aul life would of been complete enough.

  I still think about her sometimes. She pops into my head when I’m not expecting it and all of a sudden I’m back on that beach watching the sun come up or lying on her mattress in the hut, watching a wee bead of sweat running down her arm. Wherever I am fades away into the background and I feel an aul pang of regret as she leans down to me and goes, Hush little baby, don’t you cry. I hope she’s all right. Knowing our Tanya, she’s probably sitting on some beach down in the Australia right now, singing her songs to some other fella, the two of them warm and happy and free.

  3

  Phi Phi was party central at the best of times and I threw myself into bed with loads of women and got into a few fights and that. I lost myself there for a while I don’t mind telling you, I was more than a wee bit fucked up to be honest. I remember having this German girl with dreadlocks shacked up with me for a week. She wasn’t that nice-looking and her English wasn’t the best but I didn’t care, I just wanted to fuck the aul hole off of her and forget who I was sort of thing.

  The funny thing was the son of the family who owned the huts I was staying in was watching the whole time through the slats, but I was none the wiser. He was a right crack-up, the wee bastard, sure I liked him. I used to muck around with him on the beach, carry him on my shoulders and that and show him how to do choke-holds. I told him off when I heard he’d been watching me shagging all the women though. Sure I was out of it on Chang and Red Bull half the time and I don’t think I was setting a very good example for the wee cunt, performance wise.

  I done a bit of training with the barman Som and his pal. They’d both been in the army, sure they still have national service in Thailand, I couldn’t believe it. Loads of countries still have it, I was amazed by that, sure they done away with it in the UK after the war. I met all these French and Swiss and Israelis who come through the Thailand and they’d all been in the army, some of them had to fight and that. Fucking mad, so it is.

  Anyway, the Thai lads were dead fit, not an ounce of fat on the cunts, sure that’s why all the backpacker girls went mad for them. Aul Som served drinks at the bar down on the beach, he was stoned out of his mind half the time but he told me one night he fucked about two hundred women a year.

  Bollocks, I says, even I don’t get through that many and sure I’ve got fuck-all else to do.

  Serious, he goes, the western men all come to Thailand to pay for sex and the women come here to get it for free.

  Fuck sake
, I goes, that’s sexual discrimination, so it is, sure you must spend a fortune on rubbers.

  He looks at me all funny then and says, I don’t understand, Billy.

  Rubbers, I goes, flunkies, johnnies, you know?

  Oh, he says, not really, only about half the women want me to, the rest don’t say anything.

  Are you fucking serious, I goes, sure what about the AIDS and the HIV, are you not worried about getting it?

  He just shrugs like the possibility of it was so remote it wasn’t worth thinking about. Jesus, I was thinking, he could have it already and be giving it to half the backpackers in the country, I better mind.

  Him and his mate were good at the aul kickboxing. They showed me a couple of muaythai moves that were fucking deadly, so they were. You can paralyse someone easy if you hit them right on a certain spot on the spine. I was pretty good at the aul scrapping anyway from my younger days on the Shankill estate but I never learned nothing like this. After a couple of months training with those lads I was about ready to jump in the ring and knock the fuck out of some big cunt. The only problem is that knowing how to kill someone with your bare hands doesn’t usually mix very well with the booze and feeling sorry for yourself. I was ready to snap, so I was. Lucky for me you can get away with just about anything in Thailand. It’s not like the peelers are going to turn up in an aul jam sandwich and have you up in front of the magistrate for assault and battery. You can assault and batter people all you like, sure no one says nothing.

  It was some English lads who copped it the worst from me. Honest to God, I don’t know why we Prods bother aligning ourselves with England so much. The fucking Union Jack’s hanging everywhere like we’re dead patriotic or something. I know it’s ‘cos we want to remain part of the UK and tell everyone we’re British and not Irish, but seriously once you meet a bunch of English lads on holidays it’d fucking put you off, so it would. Sure they’re the worst, most annoying cunts out. They’ve got an aul chip on their shoulder or something, like just because they used to rule the world everyone’s supposed to bow down to them and I don’t like that, so I don’t.

  Sure have you ever been to England? What an aul shitehole. And yet they swan around like they’re the best thing since sliced bread. It does my fucking head in. Every couple of days a bunch of them would come through Phi Phi and piss everyone off with all their shouting about En-ger-land and how they’re going to win the next World Cup. They’re fucking deluded, so they are. They can’t handle the truth, like yer man Jack Nicholson says in that film.

  So I was knocking about with this English girl, sure the women are far superior to the men over there, they’re loads funnier and usually won’t start a fight over nothing like they have to prove themselves and they’re fucking good-looking too. She had lovely pale skin only she got sunburnt easy so she had to watch it. She was one of those frail English-rose types but she was all right, she was only on the island for five days and she calmed me down a bit with her quiet voice and sarcastic sense of humour.

  Her name was Claire and she got me off the beach and onto one of those wee mopeds, driving round the island for a look. She sat behind me holding on with her delicate arms. She brought out the protective side of me, so she did. The roads were fucked on the island, all hilly and full of potholes, it was quite dangerous riding the motorbike if you didn’t know what you were doing. Loads of the backpackers had taken a spill or burned themselves on the exhaust. We only crashed the once into the bushes and it was more funny than anything else.

  We were relaxing by the bar one night, sure she got pished after a couple of drinks and would want to go back to the hut for a ride. I took it easy on her though, I didn’t give her a good aul reaming like I did with some of them, sure I needed to calm down anyway, I was a bit pent up with tension or something. Turns out what I needed was just to knock the fuck out of someone and here comes the perfect candidates.

  Som was obsessed with yon Chili Peppers album, Blood Sugar Sex Magik, I think he fancied himself as looking a bit like the lead singer. Loads of the Thai lads grew their hair long after they come out of the army. Anyway Som was playing it as usual and ‘Under the Bridge’ came on. Now there was a few English lads further down the bar, I had my eye on them ‘cos they were a bit annoying and I was trying to have a wee laugh and a joke with Claire who’d sort of fallen for me. Course they’re pished and start singing the lyrics dead loud, there was a bit of an edge to them like they were pissed off or something, typical fucking English lads in a group spoiling for a fight over nothing like I said before.

  After the song was over one of the lads with an aul pinched face leans over the bar and starts shouting at Som to put on some Take That. Som just shakes his head no and the English lad starts abusing him, as do his mates. Put it on, you black cunt, they’re saying. Som was outnumbered and he looks over at me ‘cos he knows I hate that boy-band shite. I says, excuse me a wee minute Claire, I’ve just got a bit of business to attend to, you stay here out of the way love, I’ll not be long.

  Claire had the good sense just to nod and say, be careful, she knew what was coming and had seen me doing the muaythai on the beach so she knew I was going to burst them.

  Youse are not putting that on, I goes to the English lad, that’s music for wee girls. And that’s a friend of mine youse are calling a black cunt, by the way.

  The eyes lit up on the three of them but I could see straightaway the two at the back were shitting themselves at the muscles on me and all the Loyalist tattoos. The aul NO SURRENDER across the chest works wonders sometimes, so it does.

  You got a problem, mate? the one with the pinched face goes.

  Jesus, I was thinking, how come they always say that? It’s right annoying, so it is. You worked that out all by yourself did you, I says, sure you must be the brains of the operation.

  Fooking Paddies, all think you’re fooking hilarious, he goes.

  Aye, I says, sure that’s why all your women go for us rather than ugly cunts like youse. Look at the wee puckered mouth on ye, sure I’ve seen better-looking rusty sheriff’s badges.

  You better shut it, you fooking Paddy cunt, he goes and stands up trying to look menacing or something.

  I’d had enough of playing around, sure he’d no banter on him at all. There was only one thing for it so I grabbed him by the throat and lifted him up and bashed his head on the wooden beam of the low roof. He tried kicking me in the chest but he was only wearing sandals, it was pathetic so it was. One of them flew off and landed in the sink behind the bar. Som lifted it out with two fingers like it was a dead rat and threw it to the other two who were standing back all shocked.

  Take it easy, mate, one of them shouts, thinking about coming forward.

  Shut your gobs, I goes, or youse’ll be next. I slammed the one with the pinched face down on the bar, sure his face was even more pinched after that. He was trying to scratch me with his long fingers so I grabbed his bollocks with my other hand and crushed them real hard. My name’s not Paddy, I goes. I let him go then just to see if he’d drop it at that or if he was a fighter and all credit to him he come at me real furious like. I let him punch me a couple of times but he’d more spirit than experience ‘cos he kept trying to hit me exactly the same way over and over.

  Come on, Dave, get stuck into him, one of his mates goes and I actually laughed.

  Aye, come on, Dave, I says, you’re such a big man, why don’t you try and hit me like one. I fucking hate cunts called Dave, I don’t know why, I just never met one I liked. It’s funny how you get hung up on wee things like that. Anyway I could see Claire holding her hands over her mouth looking a bit upset, I wondered what was wrong with her, then I realised I was just standing there letting this piss-weak English cunt punch me in the head and I wasn’t doing nothing. Sure I could hardly feel it anyway, I was just killing time hoping maybe his pals would join in so’s I could get a proper fight but they were too feared.

  Come on, Billy, Claire squeals and by the sound of her voi
ce I realised she was worried about me, she thought I was taking a beating. That pushed me over the edge then and I snapped out of it. I laid into the three of them big time, sure they didn’t stand a chance. I put the back of my hand across Dave’s face, swatting him like a fly sort of thing, he never saw it coming and fell back against the bar. Som darted in to lift a glass out of the way not so’s Dave wouldn’t hurt himself just so’s it wouldn’t get broke, it was quite comical watching him in the background, he’d seen it a thousand times before I suppose like all barmen.

  I stepped up to the other two then and for a laugh grabbed their heads to bash them together. I thought that would be dead funny except it was a bit cocky of me and the one on the left wriggled free and spun round to jump on my back. Even though he was a bit of a fat fuck he moved fast so he did and the weight of him on me was something fierce, he must of been shovelling the aul green curry in like nobody’s business. Anyway he started clawing at my eyes from behind, fuck he near blinded me I was so preoccupied trying to shuck him off of me that his pal had a free go to start laying into me from the front. When your blood’s up sure you can’t feel nothing, he could of been stabbing me with an aul broken bottle for all I knew. I put one big paw on his chest and shoved him away dead hard, he staggered back and fell over one of the stools and cracked his head on the way down, probably a concussion I was thinking, good that’ll learn ye.

  Yer man Dave came charging back then and I windmilled round, he kicked me one in the thigh sort of karate-style, I think he was aiming for my balls. Good job he missed, that would only of pissed me off even more. Fuck that I was thinking, I’ll show ye some proper moves. I squatted down a bit and tensed the aul leg muscles then threw the fat fucker on my back right over my shoulder, it was amazing actually I’d not thrown someone like that for ages, never a fella as big anyway. You should of seen the shock on his face as he went over, if I hadn’t of been so busy I’d of laughed. He sort of half landed on Dave, not like in the movies, a bit messy like these things always are in real life.