On the List

Ryan was very open about being on the sex offenders register. He had told the story so often and in such tense environments that for the sake of everyone’s nerves he’d reduced the incident to a few sentences which sprang from his mouth like gunshots. “Met her on-line. Thought she was great. Looked over 18. She wasn’t. Parents found out. Sent to jail. On the list for life.” 

What he didn’t say was how horrible that first year had been after he got out. His hometown was so small that nearly every residence, including that of his parents, was too near a school. He rented a small trailer on the outskirts of town. When in town, parents would rush their children to the other side of the street if they saw him coming.

“So how’d you get a job here then?” asked a rather gruff fellow from Leeds who seemed a bit sceptical of Ryan’s story. They were in Thailand, a country notorious for being a magnet for pasty, sweaty paedos from the West. Though Thailand had been cracking down and weeding out potential sexual predators from the teacher pool, university positions were a little more lax.

Another of the lads chimed in, “Screwing a girl who looks like a woman—and who lied about being a woman—is definitely not the same as diddling a little boy.”

Lou, the only female at the table, had got a bad vibe off Ryan from the start. She thought he looked more like a serial killer than a paedophile, but suspected there was a nugget of badness in there somewhere.

“Don’t you think even if she were 18 that she’s still a bit young for you?  You’re what—28, 30?”

The men were silent a moment before bursting out laughing. Most of them had Thai wives or mistresses that were nearly half their age, albeit over 18.

Though Ryan didn’t say anything, he feared that Lou had a point. Ever since he could remember, he’d had a thing for girls who were likely in their last year of high school. And his favourite way to enjoy these girls was by laying down as they towered naked above him. Seeing the curves and flesh from that angle made him feel like he was floating on a river through a canyon. He remembered when he was about 9 years old and hiding under the wooden stairs that led to the basement. His babysitter had snuck her boyfriend in through the backdoor and as they stood on the stairs making out, his hand under her skirt, Ryan watched mesmerized through the gaps in the stairs as his caretaker’s buttocks moved in rhythm to his pounding heart.

In high school, Ryan wasn’t a bad-looking guy. Tall and gangly with glasses but with enough of a wave to his hair to seem mysterious. He was quiet and shy so was surprised to be asked to a dance by a girl who was as gorgeous as she was popular. They had made out heavily in every corner of the dance floor and later as they rolled around on the plush carpet of her parents’ basement floor, he asked her to stand above him naked. She laughed at first but he continued to ask, a whine creeping into his voice, until finally she asked him to leave and never spoke to him again.

The girl he’d met on-line had filmed herself for Ryan, camera at her feet, as she did various activities in the nude—dancing, working out, ironing. She’d never said it was weird or that Ryan was a freak and it was for this reason, he likely fell for her and blocked out the fact that in the videos, he could see it was a teenage girl’s room with its requisite posters and picture collages on the walls.

Ryan didn’t answer the question and Lou let it go. The other men who taught in the universities had no qualms discussing how the young women pushed the boundaries of the dress code by wearing the required knee-length black skirt but altering it so it fit their small bodies like a glove and finding white blouses so small, the buttons over their pert breasts were always seconds away from flying off. The men discussed asses, legs, and tits in the same jovial way they talked about football and rugby. But during these conversations, Ryan smiled and said nothing. He claimed to not really notice and insisted that he preferred curvy blondes, a type that was lacking in Thailand.

It was true that he really wasn’t interested in having a Thai girlfriend. It seemed like too much work, especially given his low salary. But he found he couldn’t stop looking at them. Though they were in their early 20’s, they looked much younger and they all seemed to have perfectly shaped bodies with small waists, shapely legs, and breasts that seemed would rest perfectly in the palm of his hand. Their skin reminded him of lattes and their long, black hair was impossibly soft and silken. Some of them flirted with him mercilessly, touching his arm and standing too close when asking a question.

Lou was the one who broke the news to the ex-pat group.

“I told you guys he was a creep, but you didn’t believe me!! I knew something like this would happen!”

She then began to tell them the whole sordid story of a hidden camera in his shoe and the footage gained in weekly speaking tests. He’d been caught when he left his phone in a classroom and a teacher saw an image after turning on the phone. He’d surrendered the phone and left the country immediately.

The men were mostly shocked that they’d been unable to detect such a deep flaw in a man’s character. But life went on and as they raised their classes in a toast of farewell, Lou said by way of closing the subject, “Once a perv, always a perv.”