Snapshots of Thailand

By Stephanie Phillips

As her career in the high pressure field of fashion photography is coming together, the narrator's personal life is coming unraveled.  Desperate for an escape from her personal problems, she yields to a Thai travel commercial that also offers tranquility in a tropical paradise and an escape from a cold wet winter that has gone on far too long.  She discovers that it takes more than a change of venue to find tranquility.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Stephanie Phillips
• Release date: Nov 23, 2018
• ISBN: 9781386477891

Book preview

Snapshots of Thailand

Stephanie Phillips

Published by Stephanie Phillips, 2018.

This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.

SNAPSHOTS OF THAILAND

First edition. November 23, 2018.

Copyright © 2018 Stephanie Phillips.

Written by Stephanie Phillips.

Table of Contents

Title Page

Copyright Page

Snapshots of Thailand

Snapshots of Thailand

The day I decided to leave Seattle, the morning clouds were cement- colored and bloated with rain and arctic gusts twisting and tossing the garbage lying in the street. I huddled in the warm lobby of my brownstone apartment, smoking a cigarette and waiting for my friend Nicole's car to pull up. Ironically, my mind was miles away from budget airfares and tourist visas. I'd just been dumped......

On Valentine's Day, I had arrived home bearing a giant white teddy bear, a box of hazelnut truffles and a bouquet of heart-shaped helium balloons for my live-in boyfriend, James, only to find his side of the closet empty and a note lying on the bed that used to be ours. He wanted to simplify his life, move in new directions. There was no new address, no number I could call. He hoped I would understand.

I tore the note to bits, gave the teddy bear to one of the neighbor brats down the hall and ate the truffles myself, but I couldn't bear to get rid of the balloons. They were in the kitchen, beginning to wrinkle like old grapes in brightly colored skins.  Letting go of them would require abandoning my waning hope that James would come back.

Through the dirt-streaked glass of the front door, I saw Nicole's car lurch into the parking lot and I dashed out to meet her, eager for the distraction from my thoughts. As soon as I slid into the passenger's seat, Nicole reached across and gave me a big hug. Suddenly I was so grateful, for Nicole, for her car, cheerfully cluttered with her three-year old son Joel's picture books and action figures and reeking of fast food and strawberry air freshener, for all things that stay the same, so grateful that I started bawling.

I'm sorry, I sniffled, rummaging through my pockets for a Kleenex. You come all the way out here to cheer me up and here I am, acting like a total spastic.

Don't you worry about me, sweetie, Nicole said, gripping my hand. "You just do your best to put him out of your mind and we'll have a fantastic time. I guarantee it."

And so we careened out of the parking lot and in the general direction of Summerhill Mall, where we planned to spend the day shopping. I reflected that at least I could indulge in these girlfriend dates now without feeling guilty. My spending habits had been one of the things James and I had fought about. He always wanted to know why I needed another tube of lipstick, another pair of shoes. Bloody environmentalists.

Nicole