"What are you doing? I told you before you're supposed to bargain with them!" Olivia turned away from Roland in exasperation.
"I know, I know, but we're on vacation and I don't need the stress over five bucks or a hundred baht or whatever." Roland half-smiled and tried to look like an easy-going beach bum, but came off more like a typical white dude tourist in Thailand.
"Whatever," she said dismissively. Olivia leaned her tall, curvy frame against an arrivals sign at the Phuket International Airport. She had been here before and thought it was 'alright'. Olivia would rather have gone to Indonesia or Singapore, but who was she to turn down a free trip, she thought. Roland even paid the fee to change his spare ticket to her name.
"Ok, he gave me a discount! Let's go, babe." Roland grabbed Olivia's heavy suitcase and deposited it in the taxi's trunk. "I still don't know why you need all this for just four days."
"I don't know how you expect to last ten days with that tiny one you brought." Olivia walked over, fanning herself in the humid night air. "I, on the other hand, am prepared for anything. If my boss is too incompetent to last more than three days without me, maybe I should just quit and stay the full ten days with you."
"Yeah, do it. Or ask for a raise, since you're so indispensable." Roland was so excited to be on his first vacation in three years, he didn't care too much either way. It was his first trip anywhere outside of The States, where he was born and raised, or Korea, where he and Olivia lived and worked.
Olivia was a Kiwi, and she had been around. In more ways than one. She, like Roland, was an English teacher in Korea. Due to the last-minute nature of the trip, she wasn't able to get off for the 10 days Roland booked at The White Orchid, a four star hotel on a secluded beach.
Roland, who had originally planned and booked this trip with his now ex-girlfriend, met Olivia through their mutual friend, Steph. A few weeks after his break-up with Jiah, Roland and Steph were chatting between sets at a live music bar in Seoul when Olivia appeared...
"So, it was just because you play music in bars? That seems so trivial." Steph leaned in over her gin and tonic.
"I get it, she's really involved at church and with her family...she had to lie about what I was doing all the time." Roland sipped his beer. "I can't believe she agreed to go on a trip with me in the first place. I guess I'll just go by myself."
"Yeah, why not?" She leaned in further, ginger curls almost in Roland's beer, "Or you could take meeee -" Steph batted her long eyelashes in mock flirtation.
"Funny. Your girlfriend, won't mind?" Roland leaned back with a smirk.
"As friends, as friends...pleeeaaaase!" Steph begged, multi-colored nails on interlocked fingers shook in front of her deep cleavage. Seeing Roland's frown, she stopped, finished her drink and klinked it down on the bar. "Kidding, Rollie. You'll have a blast on your own."
"Yeah, I guess." He ordered another pint before he had to get on stage. The cute-as-a-button bartender returned with his IPA, when a full-figured blonde in boot-heels that put her over 6 feet trotted up to Steph and gave her a hug.
"Gin and tonic please," she asked the departing bar tender, her New Zealand accent apparent.
"Roland, this is Olivia, Olivia, Roland...my work here is done." Steph got up and headed to the restrooms in back. "Save my seat, Liv!"
"OK." she called in reply. "Hi," she said turning to Roland, her face flushed from a few too many.
"Hi," Roland said back with an easy smile. He was an average looking guy, with tousled brown hair, and hazel eyes. At least he wasn't a shrimp, Olivia thought, checking him out. She wasn't particularly impressed with his rustic sense of style. His comfortable confidence was, however, a trait Olivia found extremely attractive.
They made small talk until Steph returned, then Roland excused himself to retrieve his Gibson ES-335 from behind the bar, and get on the stage. That adorable bartender made herself quite helpful, escorting Roland with his gear while ignoring several thirsty patrons.
"Soooo...where did you find Roland?" Olivia asked her friend with open intentions.
"Him, so not your type." Steph answered as she nibbled on a cocktail straw. "He used to play with Jules sometimes, and we became friends."
"Friends? You three ever...?" Olivia pried, eyebrows raised.
"Not my type either. He has a penis, you know. Not that he didn't try."
"And by the way, what's up with this 'he's so not your type' crap? What's that supposed to mean?" Olivia finally received her G&T and thanked the inattentive bar girl with a grimace.
"Uh...well, you're a whiter shade of pale and Roland has a bad case of yellow fever - maybe he caught it from me," Steph joked. "And you, you've got jungle fever just as bad and he looks like he's in Weezer."
"Aw, get fucked!" Olivia blushed as she laughed at the truth of Steph's words.
"Maybe I will, whatever that means." Steph motioned for another drink, to no avail. "I want to smack this bartender in the face."
Just then the sound system cut the canned music and the stage PA crackled to life. The bar owner, a lanky Canadian, stepped to the mic.
"Thanks for coming out tonight everybody. It's been a blast so far, right?" A smattering of applause rose from the decent sized crowd. "Ready for our last act of the night?" The clapping got a little louder, interspersed with hoots and howls. "Give it up for The Interlopers!"
Roland's guitar cut through the crowd noise, and the rest of the 5-piece group filled in, generating a twangy, distinctly American sound. They were pretty good, Olivia thought, although not what she would choose to listen to on her own. Anyhow, the band had Olivia bopping her head through the set. She even got up and danced once or twice.
When the set was over, Olivia and Steph tried to catch Roland as he left the stage, but the dance floor was too crowded. By the time they made it to the stage, he had disappeared.
"Oh well, you can try and snare him next time." Steph said, dragging Olivia back to the bar.
"Hey - I don't have to snare him. I just want to, I don't know...get to know him a bit."
"You just want to get in his pants. I heard he packs some meat too -" Steph said with complete non-chance.
"Oh my god! No! I can't believe you think that. He's interesting, different..." Olivia responded. She was intrigued, however, at the newly divulged detail. "He seems nice, and you have to know something to play guitar. I mean he can't be a complete dummy."
"Yes, nice, smart, that would be different." Steph continued to tease her friend as they waited for the bartender to take their order.
"Fuck you, ok." Olivia scanned the bar, but there was no sign of the smiley girl from earlier. Eventually an elaborately coiffed man with black-rimmed glasses appeared and took their order.
"Two G&Ts please," Olivia ordered with a seductive smile to the new bartender, who reciprocated with a wink. "Hey, what happened to the girl who was tending bar before? I wanted to leave her a tip," she lied.
"Oh - sorry. She go early tonight," he said with an apologetic pout, and placed the drinks in front of them in the bar.
"No worries. Thank you~" Olivia paid and swiveled back to Steph. "Ya think...?" she asked with narrowed eyes and pursed lips.
"Yep, but they probably just went somewhere else to eat something, have a couple more drinks. She looked like a tease, and he's a real sucker - don't you dare tell him I said that. If you ever see him again, that is."
Olivia made it a point to do just that. She saw that The Interlopers were playing that Friday in Itaewon, the foreigner neighborhood of Seoul where she usually spent her weekends. By the time the band arrived, Olivia had already installed herself in a prime seat at the bar, right beside the stage.
"Olivia, I didn't know you you'd be here," Roland said as he placed his guitar case and pedal board on the stage.
