Sex, Drugs & No Idea

29: Wonderful Madness

Things were really starting to fizz in the old brain-box when they got back to the beach after visiting Mushy Mountain for the second time. Charlie started to think that perhaps he'd been a bit greedy and impatient with the hallucinogens. The lights were brighter, the shades more intense and the colours seemed to cut the night like hanging tracers. Neon pinks and electric reds and poisonous greens and galactic yellows carving out drinks specials above bars, and behind the colours there was the steady thumping of heavy bass coming thick and deep out of the sand itself, rising into his chest like sentient tendrils. All around were the people like insects, flitting about amongst the colour and noise and through the thick, vibrating air, and Charlie's ears seemed to be able to dissect each pounding rhythm so that he was able to switch between the competing songs in his head. Fires were still blazing. Sweat was started to run down Charlie's spine.

A belch in Charlie's ear alerted him to the presence of his Australian colleague.

"Where've you two been then?" Hugo said, putting his arms around Kamilla and Charlie.

"Mushy Mountain," I said.

"Again?"

I blew out a breath. "Yup."

He gave me a knowing look. "Could be making a bit of a tit out of yourself?"

"Oh, yes. On the verge certainly."

"Shall we get out of here?" Kamilla asked me, leaning around Hugo's broad frame. "There's a taxi over there and they are almost full."

A taxi on the island of Koh Phangan was really just a pick-up truck in which the driver squished as many drunken tourists into the covered tray as he could. It was an excellent and ingenious system and, unlike our own boring Western bureaucratic systems, enabled any man with a pick-up to indulge his entrepreneurial spirit––and make healthy profits, if he concentrated solely on accepting skinny passengers who were so drunk that they'd agree to whatever exorbitant price he set.

"Yeah. Sure. Good idea," Charlie said. That familiar sensation was stealing over him; a precursor to an almost total lack of control.

"You guys, ah, want me to, ah, come with?" Hugo asked with a nod of his head and a wink.

"You know that feeling," Charlie said slowly, "when someone punches you hard in the middle of your face?"

Hugo laughed, but did his best to look heartbroken. "Have fun, kids," he said.

"It won't be the same without you, mate," Charlie replied.

"Yeah, it'll be worse."

"Some would consider it an improvement that can't be measured on any scale that humans have so far come up with," Charlie replied.

They were the first to get into the taxi, meaning that Charlie was wedged up between the cab and Kamilla. As they sat there, a mess of Irish people fell into the back with them. They were loud, absolutely plastered and quite overwhelming. One of the lads started bellowing and spraying spit in Charlie and Kamilla's direction, trying to communicate in some basic fashion. He seemed to be having a splendid time.

"Are you alright?" Kamilla asked.

"Hm?" Charlie realised that he had pulled his feet up, and had almost adopted the foetal position, retracting himself into the corner of the tray. He unclenched his body.

"You're ok?"

"Yeah," Charlie muttered. "These loons are all just a bit intense, you know. In this tight space." He pulled out a cigarette and fumbled and flicked at his lighter until Kamilla grabbed it and lit the end of his smoke for him. He took a shaky drag and smiled a wide smile that was genuine, but perhaps a little manic. The drugs were definitely starting to stir.