Chapter 1: The Throatfucking of Johnny
The incense hit him first, that thick, sweet smoke that clung to the back of the throat. It couldn’t mask the other smells—stale perfume, the ghost of last night’s pad kra pao, the sharp, clean scent of the leather straps hanging from a hook on the wall. Johnny’s knees ached against the rough, ornate rug, a Persian knockoff fraying at the edges. The plush purple sofa loomed beside him, a monument to uncomfortable opulence.
Neon from a naga serpent lamp cast everything in a pulsating pink glow.
“Eyes up here, baby.”
Gigi’s voice was a low hum, a vibration he felt in his teeth. He dragged his gaze up past the sequined hem of her robe, past the elegant, powerful line of her thighs, to her face. She was smiling, but it wasn’t warm. It was a thing of knowing, of ownership. Her fingers, strong and tipped in crimson, threaded through his blond hair, not yet pulling, just possessive.
“You came back,” she said, stating a fact. Her English was almost perfect, softened at the edges by a Thai melody.
Johnny swallowed. His mouth was dry. “I did.”
“Why?”
He didn’t have a good answer. Because the girls at the hostel seem like children. Because the freedom here is a trap that fits me perfectly. Because when you call me ‘good boy,’ my brain goes quiet. He said none of it.
Gigi’s smile widened. She didn’t need him to answer. She opened her robe.
The sheer size of her, erect and pressing against the silky fabric of her lingerie, still sent a jolt through him. A part of him, the Kansas church pew part, recoiled in a silent scream. The rest of him, the part that had been drifting since his plane landed, leaned in. The conflict was a physical ache in his chest.
Her hands moved to his head, firm, directing. “You look so pretty like this,” she murmured, her thumb tracing his lower lip. “All that American sunshine on his knees for me. Now open.”
The command brooked no delay. He obeyed.
The pressure was immense, a stretching fullness that threatened to choke him immediately. He gagged, his eyes watering. The neon naga blurred into a smear of pink light.
“Shhh,” Gigi soothed, her voice dropping to a whisper as her hips began a slow, insistent roll. “Breathe through your nose. You remember. Take it. Be my good boy.”
Tears tracked hot lines down his cheeks. His hands, which had been limp at his sides, came up to clutch uselessly at her hips. The silk was cool under his sweating palms. His throat worked, struggling to accommodate her. The world narrowed to this: the salt-sweet taste of her skin, the oppressive heat of the room, the pounding of his own heart competing with the distant thump of bass from a club down the soi.
Bliss and shame swirled together, inseparable. The shame was familiar, an old, tight coat. The bliss was terrifying, a bottomless pit. He was drowning in her, and a secret, screaming part of him never wanted to come up for air.
“Good,” she moaned, her control wavering for a second, a crack in her dominion. Her grip in his hair tightened, a sharp, beautiful pain. “Just like that. Just take it.”
His vision sparkled at the edges. Memories flickered, disconnected and useless: his father’s hand on his shoulder at graduation, flat and heavy; the endless, flat gold of a wheat field; the first time he saw a kathoey on Walking Street, a vision of impossible confidence that had stolen the air from his lungs.
Gigi’s movements became sharper, more rhythmic. The ornate mirror on the wall caught them in its gilded frame—a pale, kneeling form, slack with submission, and her, a dark goddess of plenty, using him. He saw himself. A stranger.
With a final, deep push and a guttural cry that was half Thai, half pure animal, she finished. He choked, swallowed convulsively, the act as much one of surrender as of physiology.
For a long moment, there was only the sound of their ragged breathing. The incense smoke curled between them like a spirit.
Slowly, gently, she withdrew. Her hands, now tender, cradled his face. She looked down at him, her own breath still coming fast. She wiped his tears and spit from his chin with the edge of her robe.
“There,” she whispered, her dominance softening into something that felt dangerously like care. “My good boy.”
She sank onto the purple sofa, pulling him up and into her lap as if he were a child. His head lolled against her substantial chest. He was boneless, spent, his mind a scrambled, quiet blank.
She stroked his hair, humming a tune he didn’t know. “You think too much, Johnny from America,” she said, her chin resting on his head. “You come here to lose yourself, but you cling to your ghost so tight. You need to let it go.”
“What if I don’t know who’s left if I do?” The words were out, muffled against her skin, before he could stop them. It was the most honest thing he’d said in months.
Gigi’s chest rose and fell in a sigh. “Then you are empty. And empty can be filled with better things.” She shifted, reaching for a pack of cigarettes on the cluttered side table. “You want to stay tonight?”
He did. Desperately. The thought of going back to the sterile hostel, to the boys talking about cheap beer and easier girls, made him feel hollow.
“I can’t,” he said. The ghost was still there, shaking its head in disappointment.
“Okay.” She lit her cigarette, the flare of the match highlighting the sharp, beautiful planes of her face. She didn’t seem offended. She’d seen this before. “You want a beer before you go?”
He nodded, sitting up. He avoided the mirror now.
She padded to the fridge, a tiny thing buzzing in the corner, and came back with two cold bottles of Chang. She handed him one, her eyes appraising him. “You are a sweet boy, Johnny. Confused. But sweet.” She took a long drag. “This world… it eats sweet boys. You have to decide if you want to be eaten, or if you want to grow some teeth.”
He drank the beer, the bitter taste a grounding anchor. He felt exposed, a shell cracked open. The throbbing in his knees, the soreness in his throat, were proof of what he’d done. Who he’d been, for twenty minutes on a worn-out rug.
An hour later, he stepped out into the Bangkok night. The humid air was a slap after the cloistered incense of Gigi’s apartment. The soi was still alive with noise: motorbikes sputtering, laughter spilling from bars, the sizzle of a street food cart.
He walked towards the main road, his body already beginning to forget the specifics of sensation, leaving only the emotional residue behind. A group of young backpackers, loud and sunburnt, stumbled past him. One of them, a guy with a beard and a fisherman’s hat, clapped him on the shoulder. “Hey man, good night? Find some trouble?” He winked, a parody of camaraderie.
Johnny forced a grin, the expression feeling like a poorly fitted mask. “Something like that,” he said, his voice rough.
He merged into the river of people, another anonymous farang in the neon stream. But as he walked, the question Gigi had planted echoed in the new, hollow spaces inside him, growing louder with every step.
Eaten, or teeth?
For the first time, he had no answer at all.