probably buy you dinner. Or we would if we really cared, which we don't. But, see, the point is that you've only got two choices. Go back home-' She stops and turns her head a bit to the right with her eyes on Kwan. 'Is there some reason you can't go home?'
Kwan hesitates. 'Yes.'
'Then you're stuck at the ocean, aren't you? And the only thing to do is dive in.'
Kwan says, 'You're not diving in.'
Oom laughs, and the mama-san joins in with that odd chirping sound. 'I've been in so long my fingers are wrinkled,' Oom says. 'I've gone all the way to the bottom and brought back pearls. I'm so wet I'm half fish. It's just now I'm not doing it. Because I've told someone I won't. Because he pays me not to.'
'Lots of girls are getting paid,' the mama-san says. 'They do their jobs.'
'They're not in love. I am. And he loves me, and if you say one thing about that, I'll walk out of here right now, and tomorrow I'll be bringing customers into the Kit-Kat.'
'All right, all right.'
'This is not a stupid girl,' Oom says, nodding toward Kwan. 'And look at her. She's the most beautiful girl to come in here since I did. She's valuable. You don't want to lose her. You should explain the situation to her instead of pounding her over the head.'
'Whose side are you on?' Kwan asks.
'You're thinking about this all wrong,' Oom says. 'There aren't any sides in here, despite the cliques Fon and those other idiots form. Now you're my friend, now you're not. I liked you yesterday, but I hate you today. There are really only two sides: us and the customers. It's us against the customers. They come in and sit down and pretend they're interesting and different in some way from every other man in the room, and we pretend they are, too, and we take their money. As much of it as we can get. And we should be helping each other, not competing. That's why I come back here between sets, that's why I don't sit with customers or let them buy me drinks. I want them to pick a girl. I'm not going with them, so they should choose somebody else. I just get out of the way.'
'That's a new excuse,' the mama-san says.
'Explain it to her.' Oom stands up. 'Or don't, it's up to you. But you,' she says to Kwan, 'you have to get into the water or go home. And this could be a good deal for you.' She moves to the door that leads back to the bar.
The mama-san says to Oom, 'Don't tell me you're actually going out there to smile at someone, maybe sell a couple of drinks.'
'No,' Oom says. 'I have to pee.' To Kwan she says, 'Just stop wringing your hands.' And then she's gone.
Kwan tries again. 'Nana told me I could decide whether to go with-'
'And you can,' the mama-san says. She puts both hands out, palms up. 'After this.' She shifts impatiently in her chair. 'Sit down,' she says.
'I like it up here,' Kwan says.
'All right, be a bitch, give me a stiff neck. Oom's right. I should tell you what's going on. After you help us this time, after Captain Yodsuwan, you can decide every time, yes or no, go or no go. But this time you've got to do it.'
Kwan says, 'I don't have to do anything.'
'Listen.' The mama-san lets her head drop forward and twists her neck left and right. She says, 'Please sit down. This is giving me a headache.'
Kwan turns around the chair Oom vacated and sits.
'This is about the bar. If you go with Captain Yodsuwan, it will be a favor to the people who own the bar. They can be good friends to you. The captain can be an even better friend. He can look out for you. If you get into trouble, he can protect you. It's important to have someone like that in Bangkok. Every other girl in this bar would go with him in a minute. But naturally, since I have such terrible karma, he wants you.'
'Why do the owners care?'
The mama-san slaps both knees and clenches her fists, which have come to rest on top of her thighs. She draws several deep breaths and wills her hands to relax. 'Why do I have to explain this to an ignorant village girl?' She shakes her head to take the sting out. 'Don't be offended. We're all ignorant village girls. The village is just farther away for some of us than it is for others. All right, to make it simple: There are three men who want this bar. They own a lot of bars already, and they've got power and money, and they want the Candy Cane.'
'And?'
'And they can take it, unless someone with enormous face is on our side. Captain Yodsuwan isn't exactly that, but he can help for now. He can tell his men to start making trouble in the other bars. They have girls dancing naked upstairs. That's illegal. They have some girls who aren't eighteen. That's illegal. Some of them have short- time rooms in back. You know what a short-time room is?'
'I know what a short-time is.'
She shakes her head wearily. 'Well, having a room for them is illegal, too. He can cause enough problems that the men who are trying to take the Candy Cane will take another bar instead. But he wants money, of course, and the choice of any of our girls. And since you had to go to the beauty parlor today, he's chosen you.'
Kwan slumps forward and rests her face in her hands. With her eyes closed, with the pressure of her fingers on her face, she can almost pretend that she has a choice. Then, suddenly, one presents itself. She sits up and says to the mama-san, 'I can go to a different bar.'
'Kwan.' The mama-san uses her name for the first time. 'Just do it for us. Don't force me to-'
'Well?' The gruff voice is not asking a question. It's making a demand. Kwan looks around to see Captain Yodsuwan standing in the doorway. His tiny eyes study her as though he's trying to see through her skin, and he's sweating so heavily that Kwan wouldn't be surprised to see steam rise off him.
'We're just talking about it,' the mama-san says.
'What is there to talk about? She's a whore, whether she's done it yet or not.'
Kwan feels the words like a slap. She knows that her face must be as white as paper.
'There's no problem,' the mama-san says with a smile. The stiff spine is gone; she's leaning forward, tilting her face up to him submissively. 'It's her first time, that's all. I'm just telling her a few things, trying to make sure you both have a good time.'
'You're a farm girl, right?' The captain's hard little eyes skitter up and down her body. 'Nothing you haven't seen before.'
'She's… shy,' the mama-san says, with an edge of desperation in her voice.
'Five minutes,' the captain says. 'And then you can keep her and the deal will be off.' He goes back into the bar.
Kwan gets up. She says, 'Never.'
The mama-san says again, 'Don't force me.'
'Me? Force you?'
'I didn't want to have to say this, but you're not giving me any choice. I know who your father was selling you to. If you don't do this, if you don't go with Captain Yodsuwan tonight, I'll have two of the waiters hold you here until those people come and get you.' She lets her eyes drop to the floor and then looks out through the door, at the crowded bar. 'If I call, they'll be here in ten minutes.'
Kwan feels like she couldn't move if someone lit her on fire. She's staring at the mama-san, but the face she sees is Nana's.
The mama-san says, 'Well?'
Kwan can barely hear her own voice. 'I'll go.' ON THE WAY out of the bar, fighting for breath as she edges through the crowd of customers with Captain Yodsuwan's fat, wet hand on the back of her neck, Kwan hears a long shriek, high enough to leave a scratch on the ceiling, and she sees Oom charge out of the women's bathroom. Oom vaults onto the stage and runs its full length, girls jumping out of her way at every step, until she reaches the far end of the stage, near the door, and she leaps off it, sailing over the women serving at the bar, clears the bar itself-two customers diving sideways off their stools-and lands in the arms of one of the tallest, best-looking men Kwan has ever seen. Oom throws her arms around his neck, both legs bent at the knees so he's supporting her full weight, and she kisses his neck and cheeks over and over again as he slowly turns in a circle, his eyes wide open, looking past Oom. Looking at Kwan.
