The One Day You Were My Husband (56)

His body had changed completely in the space of a week. He was wearing a vest; his shoulders were sharp, his skin the dangerous shade of brown that follows sunburn but precedes peeling. Purple-red marks were beginning to scab on his left arm. He coughed like the man who lived next door to us when I was growing up. That man had died of lung cancer when I was nine.

The phone line was poor, and I only caught every few words. He didn’t know what his illness had been, only that he’d felt at the time like he was “going to die.” He had received “various things” intravenously and was taking what he believed to be antibiotics now. He told me his parents had managed to visit him twice, that they were staying near Siam Square—wherever that was.

In spite of his low energy, he straightened up when I told him my mother was here too.

“Seriously?”

“She was on a plane within twenty-four hours of your arrest.”

Johan was speechless for a moment.

“Most mothers would tell their daughter to get themselves on the first plane home and never talk to me again,” he said eventually. “I am touched. But I’m not sure what even your mum could achieve in this situation.”

“She’s throwing everything she’s got at this. But Johan, we need to know what’s happening.”

He rested his chin on both hands, eyes closed.

“Johan. Please. Mum has a friend here who can help—Prawat. He has contacts in the prison. But we need to know what we’re dealing with.” I paused. “And I need to know what I’m dealing with, too. Please tell me. Everything.”

Johan’s eyes opened. “He has contacts here? Inside the prison?”

“Yes.”

“Who is he?”

“I told you—he’s an ex of my mother’s. Look, Johan—that’s immaterial. I have to know what’s happening.” I leaned forward on the cheerful blue plastic counter my phone handset was attached to. I needed water.

His reply was lost a few times, first to the phone, then to a hacking cough. As I waited, the fan above my head stuttered to a halt and the heavy air closed in like a weighted blanket. We were sheltered by concrete, but the heat was deadly and the stench of drains overpowering.

Johan’s cough sounded dry. I asked him if he’d had any wheezing or rattling, if he’d coughed up any blood? He didn’t reply.

“I did do it, Carrie,” was what he was trying to say. I heard it the sixth, maybe seventh time. By then he was slumped forward on the phone counter. “I did do it. I’m…I’m sorry.”

I waited for him to take this back, but he didn’t.

“I’m sorry,” he repeated.

I wiped the sweat from my face with a piece of loo roll taken from the hotel.

“Did someone tell you to say this?” I asked after his next round of coughs. This was my one source of hope: the possibility that he might have been coerced or set up. I’d read it was common.

He stared at me for a long time. His eyes, from where I was, seemed bloodshot, but perhaps he’d been crying, too. His lips were stained white by painful-looking cracks. He looked severely dehydrated.

Sweat was beginning to gather behind my knees, in my elbows. To my left, a Thai woman with her sandals off was smiling, laughing, with the man opposite her, as if they were having a drink in a pub. This was no longer a world I knew.

Then: “I did it,” Johan said firmly. “And Carrie, you need to stop this Prawat, whoever he is. It could put me in real danger, having someone poking around.”

He cleared his throat, setting off another bout of coughing, then wiped his face with his bruised arm. He looked dreadful.

“Do you get it, Carrie? I’m answerable to people much more dangerous than the prison guards or the prosecutor. I’m glad your mum’s here to support you, but she mustn’t try to interfere with what’s happening to me.”

And then visiting time was over, and the guards were shouting at us, and someone was already taking his arm.





Twenty-two.





Dear Carrie,

It has come to the Trust’s attention that you are in Thailand following the arrest of your traveling companion on drug trafficking charges. We need to ensure it is appropriate for you to continue to practice within this hospital. Please can you make yourself available for a video conference tomorrow at midday British Summer Time / 6 p.m. Indochina Time. The videoconference link is below.

It is a requirement that you attend.

Regards

Sima Barak

Legal and Compliance

Imperial College Healthcare Trust



“The important thing to note is that you two are not actually married,” Mum said, as we entered the Klong Prem complex three days later. On the manicured lawn in front of the prison’s smart white edifice, a man in a heavy boiler suit and wide-brimmed hat strimmed verges under the violent sun. “I’ll get a lawyer friend to look into this, but don’t think you can be disqualified by association with someone you don’t have any legal ties to.”

“But I’m wearing his ring, Mum, and I live with him. I can’t pretend he’s just some bloke I met in a bar. And besides, I surely can’t be disqualified for something I knew nothing about.”

“Carrie!” Mum was getting angry. “Your career is on the line! You were never married to Johan—do you understand? It is critical that you stick to this. It is the truth, apart from anything else.”