And yes, he who had an affinity for dogs left to reproduce in Bangkok streets and obviously elsewhere in Southeast Asia so gratuitously, an affinity for them that perished with the overseers' knowledge and without the least compunction, would wish to see them in drooling rapture rather than in grueling rupture. Both scenes, then and now, reminded him that instinctual cravings were such a compulsion in man and dog that for it, this frenzy, this euphoric escape, they would risk death. Such was the insanity of it all—all this programming to replicate beings with no purpose beyond replication itself, unless it were the animation of inanimate elements that they neither saw nor wanted to see, as they each, in separate moments, lowered their umbrellas to jump onto a rock when the rain was a mere sprinkle and continued their destined walk, this movement toward open body bags, coffins, and urns that waited patiently for them in their myopic and only half-believed sense immortality.
"Nice, isn't it?—one of the best sites that we in Laos pride ourselves on, and show to all our rich travelers—dogs doing it."
"Well, its rife in life. I couldn't expect anything better—here or elsewhere."
"Good, then its impossible to disappoint you. There's not much here, I must admit. La Prabang is better. Maybe I'll take you to a few temples and stupas in Vientiane—La Prabang even—before you return to Bangkok."
"It's okay, I don't mind. Seeing sites—it's not what I'm after."
"What are you after if you don't mind telling me? Why did you want to come Vientiene, anyway?"
"That's Complicated," he said ineffably for how could the wish to escape inordinate grief be expressed? He merely stood there not from bravery but from the confusion of a mute animal, numbly feeling this hot iron branding of the forehead, this incommunicable set of feelings, and these memories fading to abstractions with every new day, but there at this distance beckoning him nonetheless. The number he was, the more he could function, not that bereft of agenda, he needed to do anything apart from engaging in a departure that he hoped would bring him peace of mind.
The Laotian kissed him on the cheek taking in the sides of the lips and transferring his molecules therein.
"My new brother," he said ironically. "He keeps wanting to sweep up a pile of dirt that blew away long ago. Forget your past. You are a guest in my home and I usher new beginnings for you."
He tried to thank him but the words would not come out. How could he thank someone for this betrayal of his intention. Although an invitation to the possibility of fraternity, family, and a consistency of human presence which for sanity he was deemed to need, his body yearned not for true intimacy but true illusion. He wanted him as his lover, the lever for the fuel of his testosterone, dopamine, adrenalin, and serotonin which would be extinguished at ejaculation like the falling of a bottle rocket. Thus he stayed silent.