I Am What I Am

My apparel is sticking to my body as the sweat envelops me. Its late evening in the nightclub area of Bangkok as I say bye to the last of my work colleagues who had joined me for some drinks in the Silom area pub which I often go after work.

I have decided to walk back to my apartment which is barely ten minutes away.

Maybe the events of the last few hours will become less scary to me once I have ceased the alcohol intake.

I go to the pub washroom and look in the mirror. My good-looking physique is overshadowed by signs of despair on my face which literally seems to have caused my skin color to turn white as if I had seen a ghost.

I leave the washroom and the waiter called Nong, who I have known for some while, asks me:

"Hey. Are you Ok??"

I reply:

"Well not really maybe too much booze...and that stranger in the pub was bothering me a lot..."

The waiter paused and asked:

"Sorry what u mean by stranger?" His English was not proficient enough to understand the word stranger, so I rephrased:

"The guy who kept walking up and down inside the pub and staring at me...

the one wearing a baseball cap, face mask and dark glasses..."

Nong looked more puzzled and said:

"Oh, so sorry I do not see. Busy tonight so many customers..."

He then changed the subject:

"So how your girlfriend...she did not come tonight?"

"No, she is away on business.... anyway, she is my friend not my girlfriend...and in any event I am going home now, so see you next time" with that I slipped a nice tip into Nong's hand and exited the main entrance of the pub.

Luckily the street lighting was powerful there and the same brightness all the way back home as it was a main road all the way. As I departed the pub, I looked around carefully, left and right: thankfully no sign of this stranger.

As I started my trip home I reflected on the events in the last few hours. The pub gathering had been fine to begin with. Four work acquaintances and normally my friend Sally would usually also come. I felt strange that Nong had automatically classified Sally as my girlfriend. In my mind that was not right. And better not to express or show my true feelings about her even now living in a much more nonjudgmental society I felt still governed by other people's rules on morality.

Anyway:

-Just then after no more than a few paces from the pub I saw the stranger again. Barely 10 feet away, standing motionless next to a lamppost.

I am chilled inside. As the figure in front of me is a mystery and gives me a feeling of deep foreboding.

The face covered and hidden and with lengthy grimly ominous clothes. And despite the dark glasses I feel powerful eyes drilling into me as if I soul is being examined.

I froze though my thoughts are racing. Should I -despite my fright -approach this dark and creepy looking stranger and then have a confrontation?......

No.! ...No! ...I resolve to myself.... I need to keep calm and just maybe ignore what was happening. I watchfully never lost sight of the stranger and crossed over the road as I increase my walking speed.

Why is this happening to me? What have I done to deserve being stalked in this menacing and dangerous way?

The sweat is no better and I am shaking.... maybe the alcohol...but more likely the wicked looking character who now seems to be after me...

I take out my cell phone and wonder whether to phone my sister Gill back in London?

I often would phone her for advice she is being a sympathetic ear, and one of the only ones of my close relatives to have understanding about me and how I had chosen to lead my life.

No, I can and should sort this myself. Especially when I have tried so many times to sort out my feelings in relationships which my parents had condemned and which had caused me to flee to work in Thailand to escape the disapproval of most of my family and others who rejected me simply because of who I am and what I desired.

Then as I get nearer my home the stranger is actually approaching me. Now we are literally just a few paces apart as I stop near the side of the front of my house. Maybe my parents have engineered this stranger to get at me because of the life I have chosen to lead? What is this? What is being done to me?

Am I going to be assaulted? Will there be a fight? Is my life to end now? My feelings were growing more and more fierce as it seems my existence would still be governed by a society that often looked critically at minority lifestyles.

Then suddenly I am now face to face with the stranger and the dark glasses are removed and our eyes meet in an intense stare.

I look into those the bewitching eyes in front of me. Without dropping my gaze, the stranger removes the cap and face mask. Long black silky hair drops around the head, and I see red lips and feminine features.

No longer a dangerous stranger: now a gentle soul having enticing eyes, with prominent breasts and a curvy shape waiting to be enmeshed together with me; I see myself identical in almost all respects except I am butch, and she is femme. My whole body including my own breasts and my insides are rich with lesbian desire. I move forward and give a gentle kiss on the stranger's lips. With that she disappears into my being.

I can feel she is part of me now and I suppose she always was...and whether the alcohol gave me a delusion or something mysterious caused these events, the apparition has finally provided me the power to accept and embrace who I am; the next time I see Sally, I will call her my girlfriend and give her one big kiss.