There Was an Eerie Silence

This time there was almost an eerie silence at the KC Bungalows. There were people on the island. One saw many at times, but for some unknown reason there weren’t but a few in the bungalows. The tourists stayed at the more expensive resorts down the beach a ways. Gone was the busy atmosphere of the area, with cleaning crews wandering around in the morning and a security guard or two walking at night and the cry of Thai kids and the cry of farang from their parents.
Last night there had been no one. A few people walking down the beach was about it. Hadn’t the Thai staff told him more than once that the bungalows were slated for extinction? A hotel was going to be built. Golem had watched the surveyors a year previously and come to that conclusion. It would hit at the end of the 2007 high season. Another new hotel on the beach; watching the waves at shore here a bit of history, no longer possible as Thailand figured out how to bring in more cash than it had ever done before. Koh Wai, just a short trip on the Island Hopper would now be an option, the thing about this option was that the beach was short and the sun blocked by the mountains as the huts were on the opposite side. The sun sets in unusual ways.
In a way it was fortunate. If the beach had been crowded someone might have seen him shoot Wicket on the previous night. As it was he had attracted attention and could not even ascertain if Wicket was, in fact, dead.
It was getting light now. The light of the lonely lampposts would soon click off along with the room electricity. There was only electricity in these bungalows from dusk to dawn. There was not a single luxury. Occasionally, the lights would go off for short intermissions at night and one would here hoots and howls from the dancing joint next to KC. If Golem was writing at these times he would reach for a knife and stand in apprehension at the door, looking from side to side. He knew the kinds of things that could happen when the lights went off. He had done a few of those things himself. Touristic areas in Thailand were safe, but when the lights went off and all was black, Golem could still see a guy who turned off those lights for a reason and he stood at the door with his knife in hand listening for a sound.