Sun & Moon

Chapter 20 - Bianca

The dim glow of streetlights guides me down the empty road I've been wandering since arriving by cargo plane. My wallet is already half empty from bribing my way through the various airport channels till I made it out into this sleepy Bhutanese town. Even though I was able to make a fake passport in Silver Bow and gather all the necessary counterfeit documents, I still wanted to make sure that I would be untraceable. The only person who has a hint of my whereabouts is Valentina out of the sheer desperate attempt I made to ask her to run away with me.

How pathetic was that?

I shiver in my heavy windproof jacket with fur trim as a gust of cold and dry air blows hard behind my back, the crunch of fresh snow under my shoes breaking through the silence of the night air. I bought everything that I needed for my journey at the sports shop back home: a hiking bag, hiking boots, warm clothes and a few ropes and things so it looked like I was going for a trek.

I search for a hotel, an inn or a restaurant but everything seems to be closed right now. I could really use the warmth when another gust of wind hits me in a short burst.

I reach an empty square, all white from snow, with a lone clocktower. I notice a group of youngsters gathered around a small bonfire at the far end of it as the clock strikes 12 and gongs, reverberating through the town. For the most part, the group minds their own business, smoking cigarettes and drinking what one drinks at midnight with friends, till I hear someone shout "hotel?" and I turn to look. One of them is waving me down.

I pause in my steps and sniff the air. Humans. Well, if anyone of them tries something with me, it will be their loss. Hopefully, they would have sense enough to run away rather than record a white wolf snapping at them and post it on the internet like everybody seems to do these days.

I walk over to the group, some of whom greet me with hellos and nice-to-meet-yous and drunkenly laugh among themselves. The one who waved me down seems about the only person who can speak sensible English.

"You looking for hotel?" he asks, maybe a boy of 17, with a bright red woolly cap, holding a lit cigarette that doesn't smell like tobacco behind his back.

I nod.

"Okay. 75 dollars, one night," he says.

"I'll give you 50 dollars," I haggle, keeping in mind what funds I have left.

"70 dollars."

"60."

"65."

The price is a little steep, but I am growing desperate for some shelter right about now.

This better be a great hotel, kid.

"Show me," I tell him.

He takes one last puff of his 'cigarette' and hands it to a friend as he gestures for me to follow. The boy takes me down an alleyway that's barely lit up, though my sharp senses can make out the sound of a cheering audience and the distinct intonations of a sports commentator echoing in the distance. He takes several complicated turns until we reach a small building with a half-closed garage door. The boy opens up the garage door for me to go through it.

The walls are colored a weird pale green. In one corner of the room are stacked stools and tables huddled together next to a set of dark stairs leading upstairs. I begin to wonder if this is, at all, a hotel. A middle-aged man, who slightly resembles the boy, turns away from the football match he's watching on the TV to size me up and pointedly asks him some questions in their language. He shouts out "Ma!" and in comes a short elderly woman dressed in heavy layers. She, too, questions the boy, whose name, I find, is Sangay. He explains himself further then, all at once, everybody's countenance changes. He probably mentioned the 65 dollars.