An Angel with a Gun Read online

  There was a sweetness in the air. It smelled fresh and felt cool. I liked it, it was comfortable.

  “Sa-teven. Sa-teven. Are you awake, tee rak?”

  I opened my eyes reluctantly. I was enjoying my sleep. I sat up as soon as I saw Pin. I wasn’t scared or even shocked. I was just so happy to see her again. She looked even more beautiful than I had remembered her. She wasn’t pregnant anymore. She smiled at me and I felt the smile wrap itself around my heart and soul. I was on a bed, but it wasn’t the same bed that I had fallen asleep on and Angel wasn’t there. Pin sat serenely at the end of the fluffy white bed.

  “Where is Angel?”

  “She is asleep. I have come to see you.”

  “You look even more beautiful than I had remembered Pin.”

  “Thank you, tee rak.”

  “And you aren’t pregnant anymore.”

  “My baby was born again to a lovely couple in China. A little boy. They love him very much.”

  “I missed you Pin.”

  “I missed you too.”

  “You didn’t say goodbye to me or anything.”

  “I couldn’t. I had very little time.”

  “I went to prison for your murder and you just left me there.”

  “I know tee rak, but I didn’t leave you there. I was with you every day.”

  “Well, why didn’t you let me see you or why didn’t you talk to me? I was very frightened in there.”

  “I couldn’t tee rak. I had no more strength, but I stayed with you and tried to guide you. I tried to push the right people towards you and help you make the right choices.”

  “Did I do alright?”

  “You did the very best that you could and my murderer was captured, just because of you. I’m sorry that you had to go to prison.”

  “Did you make me become a monk?”

  “No, tee rak. I can’t make you do anything. Everything you do on earth is your choice. I can only try and help you, but everything is your own choice.”

  “Have you always watched over me Pin?”

  “Whenever you needed me.”

  “So you are like my guardian angel?”

  “I’m one of them. You’d be surprised at how many you have. Some of them are not spirits like me. Some of them are alive and walking the earth at the same time as you. Some you know and some you’ll never meet. They are people who do things to make your life better, happier, safer.”

  “I’m somebody’s guardian angel?”

  “Yes. You have the most gentle and pure heart Sa-teven. You have been a guardian angel to so many people, even before you became a monk.”

  “So, I have done some good for somebody?”

  “You have changed so many lives. So many people have a good life because of you.”

  “Really? I didn’t know that. I always thought that I had always messed everything up in my life. I have always been a failure. I’ve never done anything special. I’m just too stupid to be anything important.”

  “You are important and you have always done the most special thing that a person can ever do. You give love to people and you make their lives better.”

  “Oh! I think I know what you mean. I have to tell you Pin that all those miracles weren’t really miracles. They were just accidents that my friend Porn explained away to the rest of the villagers as miracles.”

  “Porn is a good lady with a good heart, but they were miracles. Only you could have done these things.”

  I couldn’t stop myself from smiling. I had a wonderful glow inside of me. It was an amazing feeling. I felt ecstatic and blissful. I can’t explain it really, but it’s like the feeling you get when you help somebody, only it felt stronger and lasted longer.

  “So, I’m not a bad person really? I haven’t just wasted my life?”

  “You are the most beautiful person I have ever met.”

  “No. I’m not handsome.”

  “Oh, sorry. I mean in the sense of a beautiful heart. You don’t have to be handsome to be a beautiful person.”

  “Why have you come to see me Pin?”

  “Because you are in big trouble. You face great danger.”

  “You know about the gangsters?”

  “Yes. I know.”

  “I think it’s going to be alright. I’m going to give them their drugs back and they will let me take Pom and that will be the end of it.”

  “Sa-teven, they are going to kill you and Pom and everybody else who is with you.”

  “They want to kill Angel too?”

  “Yes. They are going to kill you all.”

  “So, how can you help me?”

  “Everything you do is your choice just as it always is, but I can help you. You will need more people and you will need some weapons. You cannot fight these people unless you fight the same way that they do.”

  “So what do I do?”

  I think it was at that point that I sort of drifted back off to sleep because I couldn’t remember what else Pin had said. It was just so typical of me. Why didn’t I write it down or tape record it or something? Pin had said that I was a good person and that I had helped people, but she didn’t say that I wasn’t stupid. I awoke and Angel and I were still wrapped around each other. I was back in the normal bed. I looked around, but there was no sign of Pin. I decided not to tell Angel about my friend the ghost visiting me during the night. Thai people can get very scared about these things. I actually felt much better because of Pin’s visit. I don’t really know why, but I suddenly had a good feeling about everything. A sort of quiet confidence filled my body. I was still feeling a bit anxious about the situation, but I wasn’t feeling scared. As I lay there I tried to remember more from what Pin had said, but nothing else would come. I kissed Angel and left her sleeping while I went and showered. I was feeling really good about myself. I made two coffees from the selection of tea and coffee making stuff on the long dressing table. I put Angel’s coffee on the bedside cabinet and woke her up with a kiss. She awoke gently. She opened her eyes and smiled.

  “Good morning Angel. Did you sleep OK?”

  “Yes I did. I had a lovely dream, but I can’t remember it. I remember it made me feel happy though.”

  “I had a dream too. After your coffee we need to get Som and go for breakfast. We’re going to sort everything out today.”

  “Really tee rak? Do you think you can do?”

  “Yes, I do.”

  We checked out of the hotel and found a little roadside place with red plastic chairs and stainless steel tables placed out on the narrow pavement. It forced the pedestrians to walk on the road, but the food was good and it was cheap. We had pork and rice soup and a bottle of coke each.

  “Angel, do you know where we can get some weapons?”

  Angel just shrugged her shoulders and looked at Som, who was having some trouble getting her breasts to sit evenly on her chest.

  “Som! Do you know where we can get some weapons and we are going to need some more people.”

  “Yes. I know ladyboys. We have weapons and can fight good too.”

  “Good. Because they might have to fight today.”

  “They not do for free. They want money.”

  “We’ll sort that out. But for starters, they can take any money from some of the bad people we are going to meet today.”

  Som smiled. At first I thought that it was because I had said something good, but then I realized that she had managed to shovel her breasts into the bra cups with her huge hands and they were now sitting perfectly level. Som looked up at me and this time she did smile because she liked what I had said.

  “We are going to surprise the bad guys. You need to get all your friends together and I’ll ring the gangsters. We’ll meet them this afternoon.”r />
  “Tee rak, you are different today. You are strong today. I never see you like this before. What happened?”

  “I just think that we can sort everything out today with a little help from some very special friends. I’ll tell you all about it after it’s all over, but I think we’ll be OK.”

  “Yes. I believe you.” Angel squeezed my leg.

  “Give me the phone please Angel.”

  She handed me the mobile and I rang the only number on it. It rang three times before the man with the heavy East European accent answered it. He waited for me to speak and I waited for him to speak. He spoke first and I felt like I had won a small victory.

  “I want my drugs back today or we kill the girl. I am tired of playing your stupid game.”

  “We will come to your warehouse at 2:00pm this afternoon. Make sure the girl is there with you and that she is unharmed. I want to see her before I give you your drugs. We also want a million baht in cash. This is a small amount for the amount of drugs we are holding for you and I think it’s a fair payment for the amount of trouble you have put us to. Have the cash and the girl ready at two o’clock.”

  I closed the phone before he could say anything else or argue with me. I turned the phone off in case he tried to ring back. I had decided that on that particular day he was going to have to play my game.

  Angel and Som both started giving me a round of applause.

  “Som, you need to get your friends together. Tell them all to meet at your house at midday. If anyone has motorbikes then they should bring those too.”

  Som nodded. I still couldn’t quite remember everything that Pin had told me when she visited me the previous night, but I knew that she was with me and I strongly believed that everything would be OK.

  We sat on the floor in Som’s house as her ladyboy friends started to arrive before midday. Ladyboys can look very glamorous and sexy, but they are a tough lot. They turned up on motorbikes in high heels and short dresses. They carried guns and knives tucked inside stocking tops, knickers and bras. One girl even brought a Russian hand grenade along. They all had red lipstick, dark eye shadow and long false eye lashes. The smell of sweet perfume was heavy in the air. These girls were ready to fight. There was no doubt about that. Including Angel, Som and myself there were sixteen of us. I didn’t know how many bad guys we would be up against, but I was feeling confident. I gave everyone the brief outline of my plan about the warehouse. Nobody questioned it, they all just nodded.

  “But first I want to visit a café that they own. It’s on a small Soi on the south side of the river about twenty minutes away from the warehouse. I don’t know how many Albanian gangsters will be in there, but I think it’s a good idea if we take them out of the game before it kicks off.”

  Angel looked at me and her delicate mouth dropped open.

  “How you know all this, tee rak?”

  “How do I know what?”

  “How do you know they are Albanian Gangsters and how do you know that they have café twenty minutes from the warehouse?”

  “I can’t really explain right now Angel, but you just have to trust me. I know that I am right.”

  “Do you know where the café is and how to get there?”

  “Yes, I think so.”

  “You see it before?”

  “No, not exactly. Just trust me Angel. I know I’m right.”

  “I trust you.”

  I addressed the girls again;

  “Can I just say one more thing? These people are very bad people. They kill people. They will kill you if they can. We have to hit them hard and fast before they know what they are up against. Today we are at war, but we are at war for the right reasons. So don’t be afraid to use lethal force, because that is the level of force that they will be using against you. Today we are going to save someone’s life.”

  “OK. But we are also going to steal their money and drugs right?”

  “Well, yes. We will be doing that as well.”

  “OK. No problem.”

  Now that I had fully motivated them I was happy that they were all well and truly up for the fight. We all swapped mobile phone numbers and we were off. I sent half of the girls with Som to make a reconnaissance of the area around the warehouse next to the Chao Phraya River. They also took the car full of drugs with them. I took Angel and the rest of the girls to find the Albanian café. We went on four motorbikes - two up on each bike. Angel and myself led the way on the first motorbike. We went along the old streets on the south side of the river. They were narrow and dirty. The roads were old and greasy with a mixture of motor oil, cooking fat and decaying food that resisted draining away into the river because of the lack of rain. The area was run down and quiet. It wasn’t on the tourists’ maps and that suited the type of people who wanted to run businesses from the area.

  We turned into a narrow Soi or street that ran away from the river. It was mostly deserted except for a small café that advertised Albanian food and coffee. It was half way along the Soi on the left hand side. We stopped short of the café and walked the last twenty yards. The girls pulled their guns from out of their underwear and held them behind their backs. There were several tables inside, but only the two at the very back of the café were occupied by six men who were smoking cigarettes that smelled very cheap. They all stopped talking when we walked in. A younger Albanian woman stood behind the counter to our left. She had no expression or emotion on her face. It was a hard, cold face that just watched us from behind the counter offering sweet coffee, corn bread and stew for sale.

  All the men were rough looking. They were sort of battle hardened by gang warfare in Eastern Europe and here in Thailand. They were all heavily tattooed, but not with nice tattoos. These were gang tattoos - stars, numbers, daggers, skulls and the black two-headed Albanian eagle.

  Sometimes you don’t need to introduce yourself and this was one of those times. I don’t know if these gangsters knew exactly who we were, but they realized as we stood there that we were going to be a big problem and that we were the enemy. They realized too late and, as they tried to stand up and grab the guns that were tucked into their trousers, the girls had already cocked and pointed their weapons. The noise deafened me. I don’t know if it was just because it was indoors, but the sound actually shook my body as the bullets whistled past me and hammered into their targets. A table went over and chairs splintered and smashed. Coffee cups shattered and I saw a heavy glass ash tray splinter into a thousand glass shards that then shot backwards and stuck into the wall behind the gangsters, who were spinning and convulsing in the hail of bullets that was dissecting limbs from their blood spewing bodies and making them toss guns in the air or drop them on the floor. It was quick, but it was brutal. The Albanian lady behind the bar pulled up a sawn off shotgun from behind the counter and pumped it. As she lowered it again in our direction Angel spun around and fired her revolver. The bullet smashed through the woman’s skull and splattered her brains on the handwritten price list on the wall behind her. She slumped back against the wall and slid down it, already dead. The shooting stopped, but my body was still shaking. I wasn’t scared. It was just the noise. You cannot imagine how loud a shooting gun is, let alone a few of them when they are being fired so close to you. The noise is debilitating. Thank God it stopped. I could smell smoke and a chemical smell. I’m not sure if it was sulphur or cordite, but it smelt of burning chemicals and it made an acid taste in my throat. The girls had already started going through the pockets of the dead gangsters. They took mobile phones, wallets and cash. They took the gold rings from their fingers and the gold chains from their necks. One girl used her gun to smash out the gold teeth from out of one dead man’s mouth. I could see that she was not a fully trained dental nurse and, if she was, it wouldn’t be a practice that I would want to go to. The cash till was emptied, but there wasn’t a lot in it
. The sim cards were tossed next to the bodies. One of the girls, who was named Wan (Sweet), found a plastic container of petrol in the kitchen. She turned on the gas bottle of one of the cookers and poured the petrol over the dead Albanian gangsters. She lit a table cloth and tossed it towards the bodies as we walked out of the café. The Bangkok air smelled a lot fresher than it did before we had walked into the café. We got on the bikes and drove off. There were a few Thai faces watching us from the shadows of doorways and windows, but not many. We waved to them as we drove off and they waved back. They wouldn’t be saying anything to the police. I felt Angel hugging me as we drove along. She squeezed me tightly between her legs and wrapped her arms around me. We went to meet up with Som and the rest of the girls.

  We met up in a waterside café on the opposite side of the river from the warehouse road. Som and the girls had identified three suspicious cars with two men in each car that were parked up around the entrance to the cul de sac where the warehouse was located. When we told her about the Albanian café and the men with the tattoos she confirmed that the men in the cars had the same tattoos. They were watching for me and a bald girl to make our approach, but they hadn’t paid any attention to any ladyboys who happened to walk past or go by on a motorbike.

  So now we knew that there were at least six bad guys waiting in some cars, but we didn’t know how many were inside the warehouse and we didn’t know exactly where they were holding Pom.

  Angel looked right into my eyes;