Free Miss Bangkok: Memoirs of a Thai Prostitute by Bua Boonmee

that I was not a virgin , but the mother of a young child.
    Months passed by while Hiroshi and I followed this same routine of late-night drinking, flirting, and cavorting. Then one night he arrived at the bar with a Japanese woman.
    ‘Bua, this is my wife,’ he said by way of introduction.
    My breath caught and I couldn’t bring myself to say anything.
    ‘ Mai pen rai , Bua. It’s all right, she knows all about you.’
    My first thought was that this woman was jealous and had come to the bar to confront me. But her expression was blank. She was polite to me and remained impassive, even when Hiroshi introduced me as his aijin . I was a little embarrassed by his crudeness, but she nodded in approval and bowed to me politely. I returned the gesture.
    ‘ Kombanwa watashi wa Bua desu ,’ I said, formally introducing myself in Japanese.
    She smiled, which unnerved me slightly, all the time maintaining a courteous expression.
    I accompanied Hiroshi and his wife to a table where I waited on them for the evening. If she despised me, she did an excellent job of concealing it, and she maintained her composure for the duration of the night.
    When they finally decided to leave, she approached me and bowed once again. I returned the courtesy. It was then that I realised she did not feel threatened by me. She had probably known of my existence for some time, although I must confess that I hadn’t known of hers—I had deliberately not asked Hiroshi about that aspect of his life.
    Hiroshi returned to Jasmine’s alone the following night. He sat in his usual seat and ordered a drink. I sat down beside him and he could tell straight away that I was angry.
    ‘Sit with me, girl. There are some things that you do not understand,’ he said.
    ‘I am Japanese. My wife knows that I have a Thai girlfriend. I am a man. My wife and I lead separate lives.’
    He went on to explain that his wife lived in Japan with the children, while he lived in Thailand. He hadn’t been back to Japan in a long time, and she only rarely came to Thailand. I had witnessed first-hand his wife’s strange acceptance of the situation the previous night, so I knew that he was not lying.
    ‘That is the end of the matter. We will speak no more of my wife,’ he said, as he stroked my thigh.
    Though I enjoyed Hiroshi’s attention, as time passed, it became a little too routine. He would visit me at the bar every night, arriving between 7pm and 8pm, and leaving at 1am. I occasionally met other men, but Hiroshi ensured that developing a relationship with any of them was out of the question. His patronage secured me a luxurious lifestyle; I regularly dined at five-star restaurants and spent his money on extravagant shopping sprees. The other girls at Jasmine’s found his behaviour almost incomprehensible. He was spending all this money on me, and yet I still refused to become his mistress.
    I, however, knew what attracted him. The truth was that he was not really in love with me, but simply saw my coy ‘innocence’ as a challenge. Though I never responded to his advances, he did everything in his power to make me feel special and loved. He declared his undying love for me on a daily basis, and begged me to put him out of his misery and become his mistress. He asked me when I would give in to his demands, but I refused to answer.
    His influence on my life extended beyond the bar where I worked. In time, I introduced Hiroshi to mae , to whom he began sending money every month. He even sent her souvenirs from countries that he visited on his business trips. Though he was older than mae and she must have been suspicious of our relationship, she never asked any questions.
    All of my friends in the bar envied my arrangement with Hiroshi. They regarded his patronage as essentially money for nothing.
    I wasn’t Hiroshi’s first Thai girlfriend. He had supported several girls and their families before me, though all of these relationships had ended when he discovered they