Pots’ Bar Goes to Pot

The Thai sun hammered down on Pattaya’s Soi Buakhao, baking the cracked pavement and giving the air a hazy, lethargic quality. The day’s heat was a physical presence, thick and suffocating. Gilly pushed through it, a man out of place and out of time, his stride purposeful where everyone else’s was languid.

He was a big man, a bit over six feet tall, and he carried his height and solid frame not with bulk, but with the dense, resilient health of a weathered oak. His skin was pale, a northern white that refused to tan, only reddening under the tropical sun's assault. His face was a record of a life that hadn’t been easy; its most notable feature was a nose that had been broken and badly set, giving him a permanently rugged, asymmetrical profile. It was not a face made for smiling. The muscles for it seemed atrophied from lack of use, leaving his default expression one of watchful, impassive assessment. He moved with a quiet, contained energy, a man who was far from out of shape, but whose physicality was kept on a tight leash, ready but not displayed.

His destination was a familiar one, though the sight of it now sent a fresh ripple of unease through him. “The Handsome Man Bar”. With one letter flickering sporadically as if on its last breath, the neon sign was dark. The windows were grimy, and the once-vibrant potted plants by the entrance were skeletal, their roots in dry earth.

A woman was sitting on a stool just inside the doorway, a silhouette against the gloom within. She offered a plastic, transactional grin to the passing world. ‘Hello, handsome man, come inside, please.’ The words were a recorded message, devoid of soul. Gilly stepped across the threshold, his eyes taking a moment to adjust from the blinding sun to the bar’s perpetual twilight. The smell hit him first—a cocktail of stale beer, cheap disinfectant, and underlying damp.

The woman’s smile vanished the second she recognised him. It didn’t just fade; it was wiped away, replaced by a chomping snarl of pure annoyance. ‘Oh, it’s you.’

Before Gilly could reply, a furtive movement caught his eye. A stooped figure, familiar in its nervous energy, ducked behind the counter. It was Pots. He was trying to use the bar as a shield, his body low as he scurried towards the back, a crab seeking its hole. He fumbled with the fire exit door, yanked it open, and disappeared into the bright slash of daylight beyond. The door swung shut behind him with a soft, final click, sealing the bar back into its gloom.

Gilly turned his gaze back to the woman. The day’s first and likely only customer looked her up and down, a flicker of recognition in his eyes from a visit in a more prosperous past. She was older than he remembered, the hard years etched around her eyes and mouth.

‘Yes, it is me,’ Gilly said, his voice low and steady. He nodded toward the back door. ‘Where is he going?’

‘Who knows? He is the boss. I don’t ask him what he is doing.’ She shifted her weight, the stool groaning in protest. ‘Was he expecting you?’

‘Get him.’

She sighed, making a theatrical sound of immense inconvenience. She fiddled with the frayed shoulder strap of her bikini top; the glitter peeling away from the cheap fabric, and stepped down from the tall stool. Her cut-off denim shorts were so brief they were more a suggestion than clothing. Without another word, she turned and marched through the empty pub towards the back door; her exit a performance of exaggerated indifference. She wiggled, a hollow echo of a once-provocative walk. Gilly’s eyes didn’t follow her; they were already scanning the room, taking in the dust on the empty tables, the sticky rings on the bar, the general air of a sinking ship.

Gilly didn’t wait. He slipped back out the front and into the alley that ran between the failing businesses, a narrow corridor of overflowing dumpsters and peeling posters. The fire escape, though rusted, was solid. He took the steps two at a time, his soft-soled shoes making little sound on the grated iron. He reached the top just as her hand closed on the doorknob of Pots’ makeshift office.

‘I said get him, not warn him.’

Her body froze. She turned slowly, the handle unturned, her face a mask of feigned innocence. ‘You’ll find him in there.’ She shrugged, a gesture that was all sharp bones and resignation, and nodded at the door. She then squeezed past him, her scent a mix of cheap perfume and sweat, and clattered back down the stairs to her post.

Gilly pushed the door open. The room was a testament to chaos and flight. Pots had pulled out drawers, and their contents spilt across the floor. A backpack lay open on a small, unmade bed, stuffed with a jumble of clothes. He was frantically trying to force a passport into a side pocket.

‘Are you going somewhere?’

Pots jumped and spun around as if someone had shot him. His face, already pale, went ashen. ‘Oh, hello, Gilly, I didn’t expect you.’
‘No, so it seems. I have been known to surprise people.’ Gilly stepped fully into the room, his colossal frame making the cramped space feel even smaller. ‘Is that why you are packing your passport? Or, do you need to prove you are over twenty-one to drink in “our” bar?’ A cold smirk touched Gilly’s lips. ‘Give me the bag, Pots. We’ll have a beer together, and you can tell me a story. A true one, for a change.’

He stood aside, a clear but unspoken command. Pots ducked his head in a gesture of submission and slid past, abandoning the backpack. Gilly’s eyes swept the squalor of the room—the empty whiskey bottle by the bed, the single plate crusted with old food. ‘No girlfriend, I see?’ he remarked, the question hanging in the stale air.

They descended the fire escape; the metal shuddered under their weight. At ground level, the alley was suddenly alive with tension. An already drunk foreigner, his face florid, was squaring up to a Thai girl, his words slurred and aggressive. ‘You owe me!’ she screamed back, her voice shrill with fury. She lashed out with a sharp kick, connecting squarely with his groin.
‘Is that the best you’ve got?’ he gasped, doubling over but not yet defeated.

He didn’t see the Thai bouncer move. The man, who had been leaning against the wall with the casual lethality of a resting predator, uncoiled. He grabbed the drunk by the throat, landed a piston-like punch deep into his stomach, and unceremoniously tossed the man onto the concrete. The girl spat at his bleeding, contorted face.

It was then that the sound came—a rising snarl that grew from a rumble to a deafening roar. The very air seemed to vibrate.

‘Get back,’ Gilly barked, his instincts screaming. He shoved Pots hard against the rough brick wall, shielding him with his own body.

A pack of heavy motorbikes, Japanese choppers with thousands of cubic centimetres of engineered fury, screeched to a halt, blocking the mouth of the alley. The riders were a vision of calculated menace, clad in leather jackets worn open to reveal the menacing stocks of sawn-off shotguns. They scanned the scene with cold, assessing eyes, nodding to each other as they identified their target.

There was no warning shout, no demand. The world exploded. The deafening blast of shotgun cartridges tore into the front of The Handsome Man, shredding the wooden façade into splinters. Glass from the windows disintegrated into a thousand glittering shards. Gilly watched, his body pressed flat against the wall, as the pellets ripped across the interior. The storm caught the bar girl, who had just resumed her perch on the stool. The blast threw her backwards, and her body slid to the floor, a ruin of flesh and bone, erasing her bored annoyance. A rain of broken bottles from the shattered shelves fell onto her jerking form.
Another rider hurled a Molotov cocktail. It traced a graceful, deadly arc through the broken window and onto the spirits shelf behind the bar. A hungry rush of flames followed the whomp of ignition as the homemade alcohol in the genuine, now-shattered bottles caught fire. The bar, which on its rare good days served harsh liquor to uncaring customers, was now serving a funeral pyre.

Gilly grabbed Pots by the collar, hauling him away from the inferno. ‘Come on. Let’s get out of here!’

Pots stood rooted, his eyes wide with horror, fixated on the flames consuming his life’s failure. Gilly tugged harder, the fabric of Pots’ shirt straining. ‘Move!’

They stumbled onto the main soi, now a chaotic tableau of screaming street vendors, the frantic clanging of arriving fire engines, and a growing crowd of gawking spectators. They ducked and weaved through the throng, two ghosts fleeing a disaster. Gilly spotted a nearby pub, a slightly more upscale place, and dragged Pots inside. The cool, dark interior was a shock to the system. They slumped into a secluded booth, their chests heaving.
‘Calm it,’ Gilly said, his voice a low command. He signalled a wary waitress for two beers.

Pots was shaking his head with his hands. He rubbed at his eyes, but the tears weren’t from smoke. ‘They killed her. She was the only girl working for me; the rest quit. Christ, I hated her, her constant complaining, her petty thefts, but I’ll miss her.’ He let the tears wet his grimy cheeks, a complex grief for a complicated life.

‘What?’ Gilly’s voice was sharp, cutting through the self-pity. ‘You had how many? Twelve to fifteen girls were working in the bar when I was last here? What happened to them?’

Pots looked at the stained wood of the table, as if the answers were written there, steadying his head. ‘First it was COVID,’ he uttered, his voice throaty and broken. ‘And then… the tourists never really came back. Not the kind with money to burn. It just… caused all this.’

‘Are you going to tell me the truth?’ Gilly’s stare was a physical weight.

‘I always do.’

‘Yeah, like the “we’re doing great” email you sent me last month. Cut the crap, Pots. What is really going on? This,’ he gestured vaguely toward the still-audible chaos outside, ‘this isn’t about a lack of tourists.’

The beers arrived, condensation already beading on the cold bottles. The server, a woman well past her sell-by date, took one look at their grim, tense faces and decided flirtation was a currency neither possessed. She left without a word.

Gilly studied his “friend”. Pots now looked down at the gap between his legs, where the worn, stained cloth of his trousers peered back, a testament to his decline.

Outside, the brown-shirted police were beginning their slow, methodical work, interviewing witnesses. Several locals, shopkeepers, and street vendors turned their eyes toward Pots through the window, their gazes a mix of curiosity and accusation.
‘Time to leave,’ Gilly said abruptly. He threw a few notes on the table, grabbed Pots’ arm, and manoeuvred him out of a back exit into another labyrinthine alley. He whistled sharply and clearly, and two motorbike taxis materialised from the heat haze.

They weaved through the traffic; the wind offered no relief, only a fiery blast in their faces. They arrived at Gilly’s hotel, a mid-range place that offered anonymity and clean sheets. Gilly dismounted and paid his driver. As he turned, he saw Pots tap his own driver on the arm, point down the soi, and urgently order him in Thai to keep going.

‘Oh, no you don’t,’ Gilly muttered. He pulled a 500-baht note from his pocket and flapped it in the face of his own driver, pointing at the retreating bike. The driver’s eyes lit up. The chase was short and decisive. A minute later, both bikes were back outside the hotel, the drivers 500 baht richer and Pots looking utterly defeated.

‘Good try, Pots. Now, get inside.’

In the sterile quiet of the hotel room, Pots slumped into the low bedside chair, looking small and broken. Gilly stretched out on the bed, the springs groaning, his posture deceptively relaxed. ‘Come on. Tell me. The complete story.’

‘I already told you,’ Pots whined. ‘All the bars struggled. The only customers left are the sad old regulars who live here. Beer in a girlie bar is too expensive for them now, so they drink outside the nearest 7-Eleven; it’s much cheaper. The view isn’t as good,’ he attempted a weak, pathetic smirk, ‘and sitting on concrete isn’t as comfortable as our beer-soaked cushions, but needs must. The staff couldn’t live on what I could pay. Some quit, some went back to their villages up north, and some started selling themselves online. Whatever they did, I went skint. Totally skint.’

‘You paid the rent and the girls’ wages with the cash I sent?’ Gilly’s voice was dangerously calm.

‘Yeah…’ Pots couldn’t meet his eyes. ‘Sorry about that, but I had to eat, you know? A man’s got to live.’

‘Why did you not tell me the full truth?’ Gilly’s stare was unblinking, a predator’s gaze. ‘Or is there something else, something bigger, you are not telling me?’

Pots opened his mouth, the words sticking in his throat. ‘I fell in…’

A knock at the door, sharp and official, cut him off. Gilly was on his feet in an instant. He moved to the door and looked through the peephole. A maid in a standard-issue hotel uniform stood there, a cleaning trolley laden with miniature soaps and folded towels beside her. She glanced up, her eyes meeting his through the tiny lens as he opened the door a crack.

‘Hello, I’ve got all I need, and the room is tidy, thanks. Try tomorrow.’ He turned back into the room, his mind still on Pots’ unfinished confession. ‘You fell in what?’ he asked, his back to the door.

It was a mistake. The maid ducked and sprinted, head in hands, up the corridor. Two men emerged from an alcove, shoving the heavy cleaning trolley aside; it tipped with a crash, scattering soaps and toilet rolls. They stepped across the mess and blocked the doorway. One was immaculate in a navy blazer and crisp slacks, a smile on his face that didn’t touch his cold eyes. The other, broader, glowered at Gilly from under a heavy brow, one hand tapping the weapon holstered inside his open leather coat.
Mr Immaculate strode into the room as if he owned it. ‘Hello, Mr Pots, you are well, I trust?’

Pots’ eyes darted around the room like a trapped animal’s, hunting for an escape that didn’t exist.

The man shoved Gilly back into the centre of the room with a casual, powerful push. Leather Jacket followed, pulling out his pistol and levelling it at Gilly’s chest.

‘Now, now, no need for violence,’ Mr Immaculate said, his tone conversational. ‘I merely wish to talk to your friend.’

‘Who are you? What do you want?’ Gilly demanded, his hands slowly rising.

‘Ask your friend; he knows me well.’ The man’s smile was razor-cut.

Gilly’s eyes fired silent, furious darts at Pots, who had found a sudden, intense interest in the carpet’s pattern.

‘Let me get to the point, as you are clearly a busy man,’ the man continued, his gaze shifting back to Gilly. ‘I assume Pots here owes you a not-insignificant amount of money?’ He didn’t wait for a nod. ‘He owes me more—much more than just money. We will leave with him now. Each day while he is my guest, he will lose a digit—a finger, a toe, perhaps both. I haven’t decided on the order.’ He paused, letting the image sink in, his grin widening. ‘Then, we may kill him, or perhaps just leave him on a street somewhere. I’ll decide nearer the time.’ He signalled to Pots. ‘It is time to go. Say bye-bye.’

Gilly’s hands were up, his mind racing through scenarios and finding none. The man with the pistol twitched the barrel, a silent warning. Leather Jacket moved in, grabbed a trembling Pots by the arm, and began backing out, dragging him into the corridor, forcing Gilly to stand still.

‘But I don’t know what you want!’ Gilly shouted after them, his voice tight with frustration.

The only answer was the slam of the door. Gilly ran to the window, but it offered a panoramic view of the beach and the serene, indifferent sea—the wrong direction. He cursed, sprinted out of his room and across the corridor to a window overlooking the car park. He was just in time to see Pots being shoved into the back of a black limousine. Mr Immaculate turned, looked up directly at Gilly’s window, and gave a cheerful, mocking wave before ducking inside. The car pulled away smoothly and disappeared into the traffic.

‘Now what do I do?’

He paced the room, the silence oppressive. He grabbed his phone and searched for news of the fire. Google yielded nothing yet. A local news site had a hastily uploaded report with little detail: “A bike gang attacked a foreign-run bar. Killing a member of staff.” It was less than he already knew.

Gilly rubbed his jaw, the stubble rough against his palm. Today was not the day for him to start smiling. He took the lift down to reception, his body thrumming with pent-up energy. The manager, a plump man in a too-tight suit, spotted him immediately and scurried over, his hands pressed together in a tense wai.

‘Please, Khun Gil, come to my office.’ His voice was a nervous whisper.

‘Sure,’ Gilly said, his tone flat. ‘What can I do for you?’
Once inside the cramped office, the manager closed the door. ‘One of my maids was terrified by your guests.’ He wrung his hands.
‘And?’ Gilly prompted, his patience wearing thin.

‘Please understand, this is a classy establishment,’ the manager implored. ‘And those people… they are not welcome in my hotel.’
‘Your hotel?’ Gilly raised an eyebrow. ‘Congratulations on owning such a fine “establishment”. Do you own it? Or are you just a well-paid dogsbody?’

The manager flushed. ‘I mean… the hotel’s policy. They are not welcome. If you insist on inviting them in, you will have to find somewhere else to stay. Okay?’

‘I apologise for upsetting the lady,’ Gilly said, though the apology was hollow. ‘Why is she so scared of them?’

‘They are Mae Kaet Noi followers,’ the manager said, the name dropping like a stone.

‘And what is that?’

‘Mae Kaet Noi is a village near Chiang Mai. It is… not a good place. The bikers took one character from there as their logo.’
‘You mean the wolf’s head on their jackets?’

‘Yes,’ the manager whispered, his eyes widening. ‘So you know them?’

‘We’ve only just met,’ Gilly replied grimly. ‘Please make out my bill. I’m checking out now.’

He walked back to the main reception desk. The young woman there was fluttering nervously, pretending to sort paperwork. She gave a slight, discreet cough. ‘Sir,’ she said, her voice timid. ‘Someone delivered this for you a little earlier. I was about to take it to your room.’ She passed him a small, unassuming cardboard cube. The lid had Adrian Gil’s full name handwritten on it in black marker. Next to it, crudely scrawled, was the symbol of a wolf’s head.

Gilly’s blood ran cold. He took the box. It was light, and nothing rattled. He peeled back the sticky tape with deliberate slowness, his movements controlled despite the dread coiling in his gut. He opened the top flaps and looked inside.

‘Oh, my God.’

The colour drained from his face. He dropped the box as if it had burned him. It hit the polished floor with a soft thud. From its confines, a small, pale object bounced out and rolled in a tiny, grotesque circle before coming to a stop against his shoe.

It was Pots’ little toe.