Oliver Benjamin
been shot. Those brave, beloved heroes had no idea what they were
getting themselves into. Gasping for air and shrinking in horror, I
found myself inching back up to the top of the hill in a panic.
The leader emerged from under Siddhartha’s lifeless hulk,
bleeding profusely and looking entirely different. He was missing his
trademark sunglasses, and, much to my surprise, most of his
mustache. Apparently, his eagle orbs, no longer obstructed by dark
plastic, managed to see me and called out: “You there! Freeeeeeze!”
I didn’t know what to do—all I knew was that I didn’t want to
end up like poor Sid, so I fled. It was probably one of the stupidest
things I could have done, because the next thing I knew, shots rang
out around me, striking the tender tropical plants and in some cases
splitting them in two. They were warning shots of course, but I ran
anyway. I managed to climb over a ledge that obscured me from their
view and continued to run down to the safer and more populated side
of the island.
There was a great deal of commotion going on down at the beach, as
the FBI’s presence had become much more apparent, if not
completely obvious. Everywhere people were running to dispose of
any illegal substances they had stashed in their bungalows. You could
hear the non-stop flushing of toilets all the way down the beach. I ran
into Belly and a frustrated-looking Hugo, who became livid when I
told him that the FBI were there to capture Tree, not to make any
drug arrests.
“What? God damn it!” he cried, “I just threw four ounces of
premium hash into the fucking ocean!”
Belly looked suddenly worried and said, “Whoa, Hugo, and with
all the acid and ecstasy everyone’s been dumping,” She paused to
think, “we might be fucking up the entire marine food chain!”
“Fuck the fucking food chain. I’m out a fuckload of money!”
Amid the turmoil, Dee Tok was sitting in his empty bar staring
sadly into a cup of ginger tea, and tapping out the rhythm of some
long-forgotten Thai lullaby. His face bore the passivity of someone
suffering an unconscionable injustice, but is finally freed from the
burden of waiting for it to happen.
After much prodding, Dee emerged from his self-imposed
silence and agreed to share with me the story of Tree, the story few
ever got the chance to hear.
127
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