Love Songs from a Shallow Grave

scarf. His hair was slick and angled across his forehead in the style of Adolf Hitler. But his face was boyish, not yet ready for a moustache. In his hand was a large grey card with the names Dr Siri Paiboun and Comrade Civilai Songsawat written in pencil, camouflaged, grey on grey. In the wrong light it might have been illegible but the cabin lights reflected silver off the carbon letters.
    Siri and Civilai raised their hands and the young man nodded. They collected their baggage from the overhead container and followed him down the steps and across the runway. The old fellows attempted one or two questions along the way, in Lao, then French, then Vietnamese. Then the odd phrase in Burmese, English, Chinese, and Mauritian Creole (Civilai had learned to say ‘I would like to meet your sister’ from a very personable Mauritian he’d met at a conference in Havana.) Their guide responded to none of these.
    Their own limousine was parked beside a wire fence. They sat, the three of them, in the rear seat, the scent of the leather hinting that the cow had not long been slaughtered. Siri and Civilai exchanged a glance and chuckled. The limousine, lit only by the distant lights of the aeroplane, was missing a driver.
    “I’ve read about this,” Civilai whispered. “They’re remote controlled. This fellow pushes a button and it heads off all by itself.”
    But then a skinny man with a cigarette hanging from his bottom lip, wearing his black pyjamas and scarf with less panache than their guide, walked out of the darkness adjusting his crotch. He stopped, looked at the shadows in the back seat, and took one last puff of his cigarette before flicking it over his shoulder He climbed in the driver’s seat, slammed his door and started up the car. He glared into the rear-view mirror with eyebrows hacked from old door mats.
    “If they ever come to visit us I’m not sure we’ll be able to match a reception like this,” Siri whispered.
    “I can’t begin to imagine all the planning and expense that went into it,” Civilai agreed.
    The new limousine started silently and the gear lever danced from first to second without effort. When they reached and passed the fortified guard post, the guide also slipped into gear. His Lao was fluent but accented. Somewhere from the border up towards the Kong Falls. The product of a mixed marriage, they guessed, although something about him suggested one of his parents was a machine.
    “Welcome to Democratic Kampuchea,” he began. There had been no eye contact and even now he stared straight ahead at the driver’s bald patch.
    “And we’re very happy to – ” Civilai began.
    “Our two countries have a great and mutually respectful history,” the guide continued. “As the two honoured guests know, we are the first two Marxist states to have shaken off the shackles of Therevada Buddhism, leaving our peoples free to think without superstition and religious propaganda.”
    “What’s your name, son?” Siri asked.
    There was a confused moment like a tape sticking in an old recorder, but it was fleeting. The boy continued.
    “We are happy to receive such honoured representatives from the People’s Democratic Republic of Laos. I am your guide, Chan Chenda and I will be accompanying you during your visit here. While you are – ”
    “I think I detect an accent in there,” Givilai said. “Don’t you, Siri?”
    “I picked it straight off,” Siri agreed. “I’d wager one of your parents is Lao. Am I right?”
    “My family…I am proud to serve Angkar,” the guide said, flustered. He glanced briefly at the two guests then looked away, embarrassed.
    “I bet you are,” Siri said, not really knowing what Angkar was. “Such a lovely place. Travelled around much, have you?”
    “Thank you,” said the guide. It was the type of ‘thank you’ heard at the cinema when somebody’s trying to hush up a chattering couple. Siri and Civilai recognised it at once and they shut up.
    “Here in Democratic Kampuchea,” the guide continued, “we have drawn upon human resources to develop the ambitious aims of our great country. Through direct consultation with our Khmer brothers and sisters, we have reached an exciting period in the development of cooperatives. As laid out in our four-year…”
    The boy droned on like an automaton, leaving the guests with no entertainment but the occasional brown light of a wax lamp glowing from a passing hut. It was too dark to read so Siri left