Page 52 of Semblance

“I’m tut-tut driver,” he repeated. “Mr. Shadow sent me to pick you up.”

“You’re kidding right? Do you know what time it is?”

He looked at his watched before replying. “Five fifteen.”

“That was a figurative question. Anyways, I’ll go after I get seven hours of sleep,” I replied. “Can you come back around noon?”

“Noooo,” he replied, his gentle voice full of concern. “Mr. Shadow made me promise to take you to Angkor Wat before 6:00 A.M. I can’t break promise to him. He very good to me. Give me and wife a job.”

“You’re married?” I was shocked. He looked as if he hit puberty two minutes ago. “How old are you?”

“Twenty-Seven.”

“Must be the Asian gene,” I surmised. “Look, I know you made a promise to Mr. Shadow but I made a promise to my pillow to spend some quality time with it. I hope you understand.”

The tut-tut driver shook his head. “Please, it’s very beautiful.”

“What, Mr. Shadow? Yeah, he’s definitely not hard on the eyes.”

“No, Angkor Wat is very beautiful. We go see now, yes?”

“I’m sure it is very beautiful, but we can go later in the afternoon, yes?”

“No.”

I let out a huge sigh. “You’re not going to let me sleep, are you?”

He nodded. “I let you sleep later. For now, we go to Angkor Wat. Shadow waiting for you there.”

“Fine,” I gave in. “But next time you see Mr. Shadow, you tell him that Aria said he was a dick for dragging her ass out of bed so early in the morning.”

“Okay,” he nodded.

“On second thought, don’t say that. Just wait for me while I get ready.”

“Temperature today will be very warm. Dress with more skin. I’ll wait for Ms. Aria at front of hotel,” he said before taking his leave.

I closed the door and stared at my bed, tempted to dive into its sweet embrace. However if I did fall asleep again, the tut-tut driver would only be pounding away at my door again ten minutes later.

For a moment, I considered scaling the window ledges from the outside and breaking into a different room so I could have an affair with another bed. It probably wasn’t worth the effort.

I sighed.

When I finished changing and wandered into the lobby, sauntering like a tired creature out of a zombie flick, the tut-tut guy was waiting for me by the entranceway, still smiling.

“Tut-tut ready,” he said as he gestured for me to follow him. I had to admit, I was curious to know what a tut-tut was.

“You wait here and I bring it over,” he said as I waited in the hotel veranda. It wasn’t long before he pulled up in a vehicle that looked like the combination of a rickshaw and a Vespa scooter.

“That’s a tut-tut?” I asked.

He nodded. “That’smytut-tut,” he said with a sense of pride. The vehicle clearly meant a lot to this guy, despite it looking like an unregulated death trap. “Please enjoy yourself.”

“I’ll try,” I mumbled as I sat in the vehicle.

Soon we were speeding away on the winding roads of the Cambodian streets, the darkness of the night melting away into a pale morning gray. I was amazed at all the beauty of Cambodia but saddened by the poverty as well. For every temple that we passed, I saw whole families sleeping on the streets.

It didn’t take long for my fears of sitting in the tut-tut to fade away. It was actually quite fun. In fact, there were quite a few of these tut-tuts on the road, which made me feel a bit better.

---