Raid on Soi 5: a Short Story Read online

Soi 5: a Short Story

  by Paul Salvette

  Copyright 2011 Paul Salvette

  Raid on Soi 5

  I’ve got a good feeling about tonight. The small baggies of coke tied up with rubber bands jingle in my pocket as I work my way down the street. Vendors are hawking their crappy wares for the tourists, but they pay no attention to me. Since I’m one of their own, they know I don’t have any money. I chuck my menthol into the gutter and walk toward the mouth of Soi 5.

  The usual gaggle of working girls are hanging out on the sidewalk, tits and ass hanging out for all of Bangkok to see. Two motorcycle taxi drivers are sitting on the ground playing checkers with bottle caps. They look up at me and grunt in disgust. It’s not my fault they have to bust their ass for crummy pay in this rotten city.

  The old woman that’s always here with the fruit stall is cutting up a sour mango for a fat, middle-aged tourist. His hairy fingers are rifling through his fanny pack looking for small bills. She spots me and says, “Here comes the drug dealer. Always bringing trouble to my business. What does your mother think of what you do for a living?” The man turns around and stares at me, pissed that I interrupted this little transaction, but completely clueless of what she just said.

  “Shut up,” I say as I chuck my empty Red Bull bottle into the plastic trashcan by her feet. That bitch is always on my ass about something.

  A pair of legs in heels and black fishnets steps out from the 7-Eleven and recognizes me. It’s my cousin Lek, who usually spends her time upcountry. She must be working the go-go bars again, because she probably lost all her money playing cards.

  “Oh, it’s you. You shouldn’t be here, ya know. The Nigerians are all over Soi 5 today. Be careful.” She slaps the butt of the gross man waiting on the fruit and puts her arm around him. Changing to her bargirl English she says, “We go now, honey.”

  I hang a left into the soi, and I can barely walk past the throngs of slow-moving gawkers. They stare up in wonder at the blazing neon hovering above the street, beckoning them to join the carnival of flesh. The girls in short skirts inside the bars are either playing pool or hustling in new customers. Bald white heads reflect the light from the multi-colored chaos engulfing the thin road. These old bastards are going to need some coke to get their dicks hard tonight, and I’m going to be the guy to sell it to ‘em.

  On most nights, the Nigerians control this soi, and they are a fucking mean bunch. They only allow me to deal by the shitty dive bar all the way at the end about a hundred meters. The business down there is always lousy, just low-life expats instead of tourists flush with cash. They usually ask for a discount in broken Thai.

  A group of three Nigerians are standing and chatting out in front of the stairs to Sexzilla. My English isn’t bad, but I can’t understand a word they’re saying. I walk up to the one I recognize and say, “Hey, Eddie. How you man?”

  “You can’t be here tonight. The boss doesn’t want any Thais dealing on this soi. Sorry.”

  I spot some sex tourist with puke all over his shirt curled up in the stairwell. “What wrong him?”

  “Man, just get out of here,” Eddie says, not even looking at me. His eyes are scanning the crowd for potential customers.

  I walk back to the soi’s entrance to wait for the signal. Some homeless kid starts tugging on my cargo shorts, and I tell him to scram in Thai. The little urchin must be Cambodian, because he’s not getting the hint. I give him a kick, and he goes running down the filthy sidewalk barefoot.

  The cop who tipped me off last night while we were drinking whiskey is making his way through the crowd. He’s the one who told me that the Nigerian mob boss was not being “cooperative” with the boys in brown, and a raid was going down tonight. He sees me and gives me a nod. A black paddy wagon comes screaming down the road with its lights flashing and pulls into the soi. It practically nails some tourist perusing a stall with bootleg kiddie porn DVDs.

  Five seconds later, about ten Nigerians start trying to run past the cops out of the soi and onto the main road. The police are armed with clubs, and they start whacking skulls like it was fun. A group of black guys sitting at one of the outside bars, obviously not dealers, get tackled in the commotion. The police are manhandling anyone who is African and chucking them onto the steel benches in the back of the paddy wagon.

  Eddie ducks past one of the cops at the entrance of the soi and sprints down the main street. That nasty fruit woman who always bitches at me lets out a scream as he plows face first into her stall. Watermelons and mangoes spill out onto the sidewalk and roll into the road. A cop grabs him by the scruff of the neck as blood runs down his face.

  The white-skinned tourists are standing around and snapping photos like a bunch of slack-jawed idiots. The paddy wagon backs out onto the main road and speeds off toward the station.

  These fellas are going to be in jail or deported unless their boss gets some cash to the police real quick. Until then, I’ve got this soi all to myself. I got real lucky tonight.

  About the Author

  Paul Salvette is an author who lives in Bangkok, Thailand, with his wife, Lisa, and newborn daughter, Monica. He grew up in the United States and served in the Navy from 2002 to 2009, with some time in Iraq. His day job involves working at a Thai foundation that focuses on poverty eradication, philanthropy, and education. He hopes to stay in Thailand until he is deported or dies of natural causes, whichever comes first.

  Learn more about Paul at https://paulsalvette.com or follow him on Twitter @PaulSalvette.

  About America Goes On

  A young veteran of the Iraq war drives across America while struggling to find his place in the country he just defended. Confronted with complacent attitudes and narrow minds, he realizes his fellow citizens don’t even understand America is at war, let alone respect his sacrifice. The only people he can relate to are his fellow Marines from his second tour of duty in Iraq, along with a mysterious girl who is waiting for him on the East Coast. Travel with this veteran through the barren desert of California all the way to New York City as he learns about modern America, as well as himself.

  America Goes On is a 16,000-word (~65-page) novella about the 21st century reality of war in America.

  Excerpt from America Goes On

  The freeway descends from the Rockies into the Denver skyline and the Great Plains beyond. I’m stuck in rush hour and something is off. If Colorado is in the Wild West, it sure doesn’t feel like it. I’ve passed several ski resorts and seen too many damn rich people on vacation with their K2 skis on Thule roof racks, Botox injections, Dior sunglasses, and L.L. Bean jackets. This is not my scene.

  Billboard after billboard advertises car insurance, iCrap, and cell phone plans. We’re engaged in a brutal fight in Iraq and Afghanistan, but everything here’s a grand diversion set up to keep people boxed in as dedicated consumers.

  I’m on my way to visit Mark Thomas, who’s going to school up in Boulder. He was one of my guys, and a damn smart dude. He knew politics inside and out. He was in the Marines because he came from a messed up family and needed the money for college. It’s good to see he’s using the GI Bill to do what he really wants. He served his time, and I’m glad he’s getting something back for it.

  During chow he’d talk about why we shouldn’t be in Iraq. He went on and on about how there are no WMDs, that we have no business being involved in the Middle East, and that the war effort is one big joke. I usually ignored that hippie shit, but Mark made some interesting points from time to time. To avoid getting the shit beaten out of him, he never mentioned his opinions to anyone else. During Mark’s diatribes, I’d usually give acknowledging grunts and nods, but whenever he veered into the ridiculous, I’d look to
the side as a subtle way of showing my disagreement. Even though he didn’t believe in what the White House and Pentagon were doing, he was still a good Marine.

  Mark told me to meet him in the middle of his “guerilla activism” at this park on campus. I had no idea what the hell he was talking about, nor what I should expect.

  Pulling off the freeway into Boulder, I see lots of people walking dogs outside fancy houses and coffee shops. It reminds me of when we used to go up to Ann Arbor to party in high school. But this town has broader lawns, smaller dogs, and nicer cars. I’m used to seeing college kids with couches on their porch and beer bottles tossed on the sidewalk, but this place, shit, it’s too nice. I pull into an overpriced parking structure and set out to look for Mark.

  I hear drums banging away in the distance, so I figure that must be the source of this “guerilla activism.” On the walk over, I pass all sorts of multicolored flyers stapled to telephone poles that announce the protest tonight against the war. The flyers proclaim nonsense like “1,000,000 Dead in Iraq and Counting” (that’s ridiculous), “No Blood for Oil!” (we never put any Iraqi oil into our vehicles), and “Fuck the War” (whatever). I walk by kids who wear University of Colorado sweatshirts and carry massive backpacks with “Obama for Change in ‘08” buttons dangling from the zippers and shuffle around in blown-out flip-flops.

  Kids talking among themselves trickle into the park as the massive crowd mills around a large stage. A few mustached university cops stand by in riot gear, but they’re just chatting about the Avalanche game rather than looking to start a brawl. The police certainly aren’t interested in the spectacle before my eyes, so I wonder if it’s just another day on the job for them.

  In front of the stage, a mish-mash of old hippies and college kids hold a variety of protest signs, mostly about Iraq, but some read “Free Mumia,” “Smash the Police State,” or random blurbs beyond comprehension. Many among the younger crowd wear shirts silk-screened with that Che guy’s mug. Many among the older crowd don sun hats and pastel-colored spandex pants that highlight the disgusting fatness around their midsections.

  About Raid on Soi 5

  Beneath Thailand’s veneer of smiling people and luxury hotels lies a dark underworld. Drugs, prostitution, and robbery await the throngs of hapless tourists who visit the country on holiday. Sukhumvit Road is a pleasant location in Bangkok to visit by day, but at night the filthy underbelly floats to the surface, engulfing those who dare to venture into its sleazy alleyways.

  Raid on Soi 5 is a 1,000-word short story thriller about the corruption and treachery of those who deal drugs to tourists on one of Bangkok’s most notorious streets.

  Table of Contents

  Title

  Raid on Soi 5

  About the Author

  About America Goes On

  Excerpt from America Goes On

  About Raid on Soi 5