ivory elephant, a shapeless piece of jade, a piece of amber with a insect frozen within, a Swiss army knife, pictures of loved ones . . . None of this junk, though, served as currency when it came to resupplying my store.
Uh-oh—I was in trouble.
And I'd never paid Lino the rent money for the year. Though I'd earned a fortune that season in profits. I'd consumed a fortune in drugs and given away another fortune's worth. Now, as I lost customers to the approaching monsoon, I felt the weight of the credit I'd given. I tacked up notices saying NO CREDIT. Alas, too late. I could only afford smaller and smaller quantities. Soon Rachid stopped his man from delivering to my door. Because I could afford only a few grams at a time, I sometimes had to traipse to Mapusa twice a day. Soon the Saloona didn't work anymore.
Lack of capital caused the major problems. I needed more cash on hand to purchase stock from Rachid's man in Mapusa. How could I get it? I had to recall the money owed me. But how? Some people had already left for the monsoon. Those who still came could barely afford what they were buying, and if I pressed them too hard, I might lose the few customers I had left.
Maria. That traitor! She owed twenty-six hundred rupees. If I could recover that, I'd be in bester condition.
I went to Stefano, her boyfriend and father of her child, to demand payment of Maria's bill. Poor Stefano. I was hardly the only one with whom Maria had this conflict. Half the beach had approached him with the same complaint.
So, no help there. My cash problem worsened. Paradise Pharmacy, my most reliable buyer, also lost customers to the monsoon. They stopped their weekly order. What to do now? I had no choice-I had to sell some of the baubles I was holding as security on debts. What did those people think I was, anyway?
Oh, god—look at this. I must look like a burglar, standing in the market place clutching eight watches. Ridiculous. But there was nothing else to do. I chose a spot where I could partially hide behind stalks of sugarcane. On one side of me sat an Indian woman with a stack of papaya; on the other an Indian woman with bananas.
'BA-NA-NA,' cried the one.
'PA-PA-YA,' yelled the other.
Well, okay. Here goes. I closed my eyes and took a breath.
'WATCHES! EUROPEAN WATCHES! COME CHECK THEM OUT!' I felt like a Class A retard. Must have looked like one too, hiding there in the sugarcane.
'GENUINE MITSUHISHI CASSETTE PLAYER!' Yippee, was this really me?
'BA-NA-NA!'
'AUTHENTIC TEXAS COWBOY BOOTS!' Had I really said that? Now I knew I was an asshole.
'BA-NA-NA!'
'BOOTS!'
One or two people stopped, gave me knowing looks, and browsed through my wares.
'You have maybe a Panasonic record player?' one asked.
'Sorry, no.'
'You can get?'
Did I look like an international electronics distributor, standing there in a fish market with eight watches on my arms? Or did he think I would steal one for him?
'Sorry.'
After being bargained down to nothing, I sold one watch and then went to the woman from Paradise Pharmacy for help. 'Try that store across the square,' she whispered. 'Ask for the manager.'
Obviously a fence, the manager had no doubt about how I'd acquired the collection of jewellery and assorted plunder. I felt exactly like the breaking-and-entering lowlife he imagined me to be. Of course he paid only the minimum. He evaluated the gold chains according to the weight of the gold; the same for the beautiful locket. I could have gotten more if I'd continued hawking them in the market, but I lacked the patience and the confidence. How embarrassing! I wanted to bury my face in a cowboy boot.
I kept the passports as long as I could, but eventually those too were sold, this time to Rachid.
'I will take all the passports you can get, darling. Two hundred dollars for an American or a Swiss passport, one hundred for other nationalities.' Apparently passports were more valuable than gold.
One day Marco came to my back window with news and a request. Maria lay in the hospital in a coma. Could I contribute to the find they were collecting to pay her hospital bill?
'Of course,' I answered. For weeks Maria had been a best friend to me. It didn’t matter if the friendship was partly a hustle; the relationship had existed. She was a fellow Goa Freak. She belonged to my Goa community. We had to help each other. 'What's wrong with her?' I asked.
'She collapsed unconscious last night.'
'What about dope? She shouldn't withdraw on top of whatever else is wrong with her. Does the hospital know about her drug habits?' Marco shook his head. 'Maybe we should put dope in her I.V. bottle. Just enough for her not to be sick. I tried it once; I think it'll work.'
'I'm meeting Stefano this evening at the hospital. Want to come?' he asked.
'Okay.”
Stefan (Maria's boyfriend), Marco, and I met later in Mapusa and discussed how to get dope into Maria's unconscious body. I gave Stefano half a gram to hold her a few days. I only saw Maria as a faraway bundle in a bed.
The three of us set up a schedule of shifts to sit with her. I had the morning, since it was the only time I could get away without losing a lot of customers. It would mean sacrificing much of my sleep time, though.
I arranged for a motorcycle driver to pick me up every morning at nine-thirty. Eeek, now I was more tired than ever. I needed even more coke.
Within day Maria was alert and mobile but scared and totally miserable. I continued my shift to keep her company and prevent her from leaving before she recovered. I stayed at her side until Stefano or Marco replaced me as sentry. She cried.
'Ah, Cleo. Thank you for coming. You're still my friend, no? You don't hate me like the others, do you? You know, I'm so sorry. I never meant anything bad. Please be my friend again.'
There seemed to be two Marias there. One warm, sensitive, and terrified, crying over not wanting her daughter to see her in the hospital. The other was crafty. Her eyes gleamed as she scanned me to determine where I'd hidden my coke. The transition as she changed from Maria to Coke Amuck Maria was dramatic and unmistakable. Her face underwent a metamorphosis—the tension of the muscles, the shape of the eyes, the curl of the lila. Her body would stiffen like a predatory animal. I never mistook which one I was dealing with. I couldn't communicate with Coke Amuck Maria. She didn't listen. Her answers came brief and vague as she concentrated on discovering the whereabouts of my stash. I kept the coke taped to my body, beneath my clothes. Coke Amuck Maria was so skilful at gaining access to it, though, that if I left the hospital with it intact, I felt a sense of accomplishment.
The way coke nuts got their paws on coke was almost magical.
But I also saw a real Maria there, a desperate and sad Maria who needed not to be hated. I brought her flasks of coconut milkshake and Five Star candy bars, and we played games. She was bored and miserable. One day I brought my projector and movies to cheer her up.
'Ah, Gigi,' she exclaimed as we watched Gigi and Marco's wedding. 'She was my good friend.' The scared look came into her eyes again.
One morning I arrived to find Maria gone. She had signed herself out. No, she hadn't paid the hospital bill. And no, the hospital would not give me back my projector and films until the bill was paid. Sorry.
The end of the season came and passed. My business trickled to nothing as the last stragglers fashioned
