Степан Мазур – Tai (*in english) (страница 5)

The novice bowed to the monk and spoke in Thai. The boy could barely make out a handful of familiar words, so he stopped listening.

On the long flight to Thailand, he’d read a magazine article telling that every Thai man had to spent some time—at least several months—at a monastery. Thai people believed this period of solitary reflection and withdrawal from mundane affairs was what made a man.

As he remembered that, it suddenly dawned upon him, What if it’s time for me to become a man? To serve my time. At a monastery, not in the military. At least they have tea and clean clothing here. It’s better than roam the streets in dirty rags and sleep on a bench with dogs.

He remembered there was no cap on the time one could live in a monastery. It was up to that person to decide. Not only a Thai man could become a novice, a samanera, but any foreigner as well; there were no ethnic restrictions, only a long-term visa requirement. Many Thai people viewed their monastery time as a rite of passage. Others did that to atone for their sins.

“But what are my sins? Have I done anything wrong?” Tai whispered to the Buddha—and remembered all the dishes he’d leave unwashed in the sink. The mess he’d make of his room. The homework undone. And the math test skipped. And those chocolate candies he’d gobbled down and then smeared some chocolate across baby Alyona’s lips to prove her guilty instead of himself.

The glow around the statue seemed to grow brighter for a moment, scaring Tai. He suddenly remembered Dad’s magazine with naked women; he’d stolen a glance at every single picture before putting it back.

“So… so I have sins to be atoned,” he sighed, realizing he hadn’t lived his short life properly.

Tai looked down at his bare feet, then up at Dalai Tisein. He was itching to confess all his sins to this man and then ask him about becoming a monk. The boy was yet to learn that Dalai Tisein was the abbot of this small temple—and one of its three remaining residents.

But it was beyond him to tell about the magazine. He heaved a sigh.

“I must go home,” Tai said, taking his eyes off the Buddha.

“Do you have any family left?”

“No.”

“Then where’s your home?”

“I… I don’t know. Nowhere?”

“Tai,” the monk mouthed. “You’re lost for this world.”

“Why? How?” the boy protested. He’d just been told he had more life than anyone.

“Don’t think about it. Just breathe.”

“But I… I don’t know what to do.”

“And what would you like to?”

“To put things right.” He would do his chores every time. Obey Mom and Dad, whatever they asked him to do. If only he could reunite with them.

“Our temple is a good place to start doing that.”

Dalai Tisein couldn’t tell whether this prematurely grayed boy would stay at the temple, but one thing he knew for sure: over the coming days and weeks, the adolescent would be developing his astral vision under Tisein’s guidance. No one would come here looking for him; not any time soon. Too many other things to sort out for both governments. Enough time for Tisein to heal the boy’s body and soul, and to nurture his mind.

How can I help someone who lost everything at once? Everything but the light in his heart. A resilient light holding up to the winds.

Any tourist or Thai person deciding to become a samanera at this temple would’ve been told to sleep in a dormitory with two other novices. But not Tai. Dalai Tisein gave the boy his own bed, in a separate bedroom in the main building, and put up a hammock in the corner for himself.

There were two reasons for that. The boy’s sunburned body needed soft bedding, but his soul was in an even greater need for heartwarming conversations. None of that could be provided by the novices; they spoke no other language but Thai, which the boy hardly knew at all.

“Everything we lose is given back to us. Just in a different way,” Dalai Tisein told Tai while rubbing an oil-and-herbal mixture into his skin.

“I lost all my family. I’m alone. And I’m going crazy,” Tai said. His back itched so badly he barely contained an urge to rub it against the old man’s fingers. Why are you barely touching my skin? Scratch it. SCRATCH IT!

“I’m seeing things,” he finished and clenched his teeth before he’d beg the monk to scratch him.

“You’re seeing more than other people because of your pain. It opened a hidden room inside you. Now you have a Gift of Loss.”

“A Gift of Loss?”

“A blow that accelerates your heartbeat, and your whole body, giving you strength. The strength you didn’t know you even had.”

“What do you know about Gift of Loss? Have you… have you lost your family, too?”

“It’s not the first tsunami hitting Thailand,” the abbot said, his voice suddenly painful as if the visions of the past were coming up to torment him. “But this one was the strongest I ever heard of. I hope our people will learn from it.”

“Why? Why did we have to face it? Why did I have?” Tai said, his eyes welling with tears.

The monk gave no answer. As he finished applying the ointment, Tai sat up—and saw the sea taking Dalai Tisein’s family in his sad eyes.

This old man had survived the same grief as himself. He really wanted to help. He could be trusted.

“No pain, no gain,” Dalai Tisein said. “But when you’re not ready, an impact like that can break you. And send you to the next lesson earlier than your soul was planning.”

“Why?”

“What happened to you… happens when you have a special destiny to live up to.”

Tai didn’t get it, but asked no more questions. He couldn’t come up with any. His head felt empty, his body pleasantly heavy. The itching sensation was gone. His eyes were closing with an overcoming urge to sleep. He was down on his belly, sprawling over the bed, fresh and smelling of aloe vera (the monks used it to disinfect the bedding).

Dalai Tisein dipped the bandages into the healing potion and applied them to Tai’s sunburned back, neck, and shoulders. Then he pulled a blanket over Tai’s body. “It’s a heavy load. But if you can pull it, you get great strength.”

“Strength,” Tai said sleepily, his ribs feeling the hard wooden planks forming the abbot’s bed. The wood was soaked in oil to repel insects, the scent mixing with that of aloe. His ribs were only separated from the planks by a thin layer of strange material feeling like rough felt. But Tai was too exhausted to care.

He dropped off to sleep.

…and saw giant waves in his dream.

Chapter 5 – First Practice

A calm voice reached him, soft, and measured like a whispering surf. “Тai. Tai.”

Had the ocean not been that brutal less than twenty-hours ago, Tai would’ve loved it. But its calm was deceptive, hiding violence underneath. With his serenity supplanted by anxiety, he had to wake.

His eyes wouldn’t open. Feeling his neck badly stiff, he raised his head slightly. He’d slept the whole night in the same pose, face down and pressed into the thing that used to deserve the name of a proper pillow some years ago. Now it was only a finger-thick.

Thai people would not use the tourist-craved silicone-filled pillows themselves, knowing just too well how bad those were for your neck. After being used for a month, such a pillow would become too hard, constricting your veins and causing headache.

“Tai,” the old monk said. “You’ve slept a day and a night. Get up. You need exercise and food.”

“Yeah. I will.”

But his eyes just closed again. It was not until Dalai Tisein began to rip the stuck, crusted bandages off his back that Tai woke up for real.

“Hey! It hurts!”

Tai turned his head to look at the monk who now had a regular orange robe on, not the mourning-black one. He looks like a tangerine. A good one, not old and wrinkled. You can’t tell if it is soft or hard unless you touch it. Looks are deceiving.

Looks?

Tai looked around—and took joy in seeing no animals next to the monk. His lay brothers also had none. The animal spirits were probably scared off by prayers, incenses, or by the bell that Tai made a mental note of ringing every time he passed by.

Dalai Tisein removed the last bandages. Tai clenched his teeth to contain a scream.

“If you feel pain, you’re alive,” the monk said, putting fresh bandages over Tai’s burns. Then he helped the boy put his tee on. After being laundered by the lay brother, it smelled of aloe vera, like the bedsheets. The aloe vera plants were abundant in the location. Having a knife or a pair of scissors, you could easily collect a full basket of leaves. When boiled with water, they killed all harmful bacteria and bad smells.

The lay brother brought in a tray with two soup bowls. The smell told Tai it was tom yum, the traditional Thai hot and sour soup with prawn he’d come to love in this country. He immediately felt starving and, taking the spoon, began to eat. “Tom yum, yeah? Mmmmm. Love it.”

“Tom yum nabe. With coconut milk,” Dalai Tisein said, taking his spoon, too. He sipped his soup unhurriedly, smiling at Tai’s good appetite. “Gatun’s a good cook. But most of the time we just eat boiled rice.”

“Why?”

“We got few gifts this year. And no tourists will come here for the rest of it. We’re in for hard times. But we’ll put our faith in Buddha and brave them.”