Mon Unexpected Travel Buddies

Port Vila, Vanuatu Mornings are warm in Vanuatu. The temperature at night varies according to the season, but tonight was unusually cold for Monisha. It had been four years since her divorce from her abusive husband. She wasn't particularly lonely because she missed him, but she was feeling cold at the thought of what had been and what could still be. After all, they had two handsome children when they were together, which convinced her it'd be unlike him to not find himself back into their lives sooner or later. And knowing the kind of man he is, she's concerned he'll indubitably carry out threading them into his fingers like puppets—just like what he had started to do after their youngest son was born. As her anxiety builds up, her blood pulls away from her extremities, making her palms and soles clammy. She put on a cardigan over her short-sleeved summer dress. She was all about comfort, but prior to the trip her mother had insisted she pack more lightweight clothing to avoid carrying bulky luggage. In truth, her mother simply wanted her to look attractive and stylish. Or, depending on the situation, sultry. As she was bosomy and had generous hips, her mother wanted to accentuate Monisha’s curves by picking out close-fitting dresses and, whether she liked it or not, even a skimpy two-piece bikini. "I think whiskey will be warmer than the heater in this room," Monisha expressed to her mother over the phone. "I'm going out for a drink, Ma." "Sure, baby. Go out and have some fun. Try not to think too much, okay? The kids are alright—I take better care of them than you do, don't you think so?" her mother, Fatima, teased. "Grand-mère, don't say that! She might not come home anymore!" "You're so going to make her cry!" "This isn’t any joking matter!" You could hear faint yelling of young boys in the background. These voices were of her children, the people who mattered the most to her now. “I love you, boys.” Monisha's often been on the phone with her mother since her arrival in Port Vila. Though on a holiday, she can't help but worry about her children because they can be a handful. Nonetheless, her parents encourage her to find time for herself and take a break from her motherly duties, which is why they finance her trip overseas at least once a year for the past three years. She does feel gratitude towards them for their efforts, but she just plainly doesn't know what to do on her own. She hasn't lived on her own, more so for herself, in the past fifteen years. At 38, all she knew was how to be a mother, and sadly, an ex-wife. Her idea of fun was something like sitting on a bench watching her kids play soccer. Somehow, it was all about the children now. She often thinks: Tch. How does a person have fun when they're alone? To think holidays are meant to be fun. "What's not fun about being alone? Rather, why can't it be fun?" asked an inquisitive young, brown-eyed, black-haired, and slightly tanned fair-skinned, gorgeous looking man with a radiant smile. Apparently, Monisha had been speaking her thoughts out loud again, which she often does when the alcohol starts kicking in. It takes two whiskey tumblers for her to start feeling the buzz, but never too many for her to pass out drunk. She never notices the people around her when she's deep in her thoughts, especially when she's drinking. But she couldn't help but notice him because he looked as if he was glowing. It could've been his white button-up shirt, or it could've been the uplighting of the bar top. She couldn't quite wrap her mind around it at that moment, but she smiled back at him anyway, though she was certain she wasn't beaming as he was. "Is this your first time going on a solo trip?" he asked, to which she gestured in disagreement. “This is my third time going overseas on my own," she calmly explained at first. "I just don't think I can get used to being alone, you know? I go to different places, but it’s the same sh—I-I’m sorry, I shouldn’t be swearing. But I just feel strongly against spending time alone because I can’t make sense of it. Sure, it’s relaxing and all, but like, look, how is this any fun sitting and drinking on my own while everyone else is enjoying the music, and dancing, and chatting, and laughing at each other’s jokes?” she rattled on as wave after wave the alcohol hit her. “Oh?” he paused. “I think it’s fun because no one knows who I am, so I can be whoever I want to be. Or just be completely me—without anyone realizing I’m acting my usual self.” “I don’t even know myself,” she muttered. Her chin in a cupped hand, she looked vacantly at the glass she was shaking lightly with the other hand. “You’re talking to me like I’m a wall.” “It’s not me, it’s the alcohol,” she said, still with a blank expression on her face. “What about the alcohol?” “The alcohol is making me talk to you. I don’t normally talk to strangers. I probably wouldn’t have said a word to you if I wasn’t drinking right now, to be honest." Monisha was spacing out again. When she wasn’t swirling her glass, she was running a finger delicately through its rim. Honesty? She wasn’t even being honest to herself or to anyone back home. All she did was say she was fine, when in fact she was mentally and emotionally exhausted dealing with her anxieties and the emptiness she couldn’t admit. She would be engulfed in guilt whenever she acknowledged there was a void even her children couldn’t fill. She was done healing from the divorce, but she wasn’t rebuilding a life for herself either. She made her children a priority and purposely overlooked herself; she was in a rut. “Funny that I talk about honesty; I’m not normally an honest person either.” “Funny, too, that that's the most honest thing I’ve heard in a really long time.” The man reached out to the bartender for an unopened bottle of Glenmorangie Signet. He knew she had been drinking whiskey, he was absolutely clueless why she was drinking. But he was drawn to her the way she was so absorbed in her reverie that she couldn't be bothered to pay any attention to him since he turned up at the bar counter half an hour ago. And she was finally talking. He wanted her to chat with him some more, and he knew exactly what he needed to do to keep her talking. He set the bottle down between him and the woman-that-looked-like-her-soul-just-returned-from-astral-traveling as he politely inquired for her name. “Monisha," she responded. He poised himself for a self-introduction, "Monisha, is it? My English name is Payton. It's a pleasure meeting you, and I'm keen to have a drink or two with you. What do you think?"