“So many children.” Niran’s eyes narrowed. “Those lost little ones, they are our family now.”
Tommy stayed by Austin as they walked to Niran’s van. Annalee walked with her parents. There would be no hand-holding for them today. As they set out, Annalee studied the architecture. This was her first time to Thailand, and the pastel buildings and Chinese accents surprised her. This developed city wasn’t the sleepy place she had expected.
Niran pointed out highlights as they made their way to Patong. “Everyone lost someone in the tsunami. It doesn’t matter how many years go by, we remember.” He slowed the van and pointed to a park just ahead. A battered boat sat on a cement platform. “That police vessel saved eighteen adults from the waters that day.” He nodded. “There are many tributes.”
As they drove into Patong, the building fronts changed. The signs and displays looked seedier. Cheaper. Same with the hotels. Niran pointed again. “Hotel rooms here are a mere fraction of what they cost at the beaches of Karon and Kata.” He set his jaw. “Many rent by the hour.”
They parked in a big lot at the beginning of a long stretch of road where outdoor market vendors lined the sidewalks. They stepped out of the vehicle. Niran gathered them close, as if the passersby might hear them. “This is Bangla Road.” He stared down the roadway. “Here we rescue children every week.”
A bad chill ran down Annalee’s arms.
“What are we going to do?” Austin was only sixteen, but he had a heart for their parents’ ministry. He always had.
“We will walk.” Niran pointed toward the busier parts of the street. “Make eye contact with the children and you will see. They know who I am. If they are afraid, they will look away.”
“These children are property,” Annalee’s father added. “They are owned by dangerous people, men in most cases.”
Niran nodded. “You will take my lead.”
Annalee looked at Tommy and for a few seconds their eyes held. The reality of this was clearly more than either of them could believe. She walked between her parents and Tommy stayed by Austin.
Their pace was slower than Annalee expected.
Not four buildings down Bangla Road, she spotted a pair of young teens walking toward them. The girls wore skimpy short skirts, bikini tops and high heels. Nothing like the typical beach attire worn by most women on the street.
Annalee felt her heart skip a beat… something was wrong with these girls. The situation was obvious, like Niran had told them. Annalee’s dad stopped and she and her mother did the same thing. But Niran hurried on. That’s when Annalee saw the men.
One trailed the girls. The other leaned on a nearby tree with a cell phone. Before Niran could say something, two white men in bold Hawaiian print shirts walked up to the girls. The guys looked like tourists.
The distance between them was too great for Annalee and her family to hear what was being said. But in seconds the man with the cell phone was at the girls’ sides. The two white tourists passed what looked like a handful of cash to the man with the phone.
And just like that, the girls took a hard turn toward a hotel, the tourists close beside them. A few doors down they disappeared through the doorway of a building. In English, the sign read, MASSAGE PARLOR.
Annalee felt sick to her stomach. Did that really just happen? The man with the cell phone met up with the guy who had been trailing the girls, and again money seemed to be exchanged.
Niran looked heartsick, but he kept walking. The others caught up to him. They had missed the chance to help the two girls. Annalee had a feeling there would be more.
Bangla Road bustled with an ethnically diverse mass of tourists. Most of them seemed to be looking for a kind of fun that was illegal in other countries. Niran had told them the nights were worse. The things that could be bought and sold would hurt their hearts. He kept the details to himself. He didn’t have to say anything. Here in the Phuket sunshine, the sex slave industry was in plain sight.
Five more buildings and Annalee spotted a thin girl in the crowd ahead. She was walking toward them, and like the two others, this one wore high heels and heavy makeup. But as they got closer, Annalee gasped and covered her mouth. The child couldn’t have been more than ten years old. Dirt streaked her see-through shorts and top, and her hair was teased to twice its normal size.
Suddenly a Thai man, maybe fifty years old, came alongside her and shoved her. Hard.
The girl fell to the ground and scrambled to her feet. Blood trickled from one knee and terror screamed from her eyes, but she didn’t cry out. The man grabbed her little chin and forced her to look into his face. He barked something at her, then he dropped back into the crowd behind her.
“They are beaten if they don’t make eye contact with potential clients.” Niran spoke softly as they walked.
They were close enough now to see the girl was crying. She seemed desperate to avoid the eyes of passersby. Too terrified, too hurting to look up. Even if it meant a beating, apparently.
Annalee caught a determination in Niran’s eyes. He took a few running steps through the crowd and put his hand on the girl’s shoulder. Annalee and her family were just a couple feet behind, but they stopped. This was Niran’s territory.
Whatever Niran said, the child nodded. Tears trickled down her cheeks. And like that the angry Thai man was there at the girl’s side. He shouted something at Niran and then Niran whipped out his wallet. The police had given him a badge, a way of identifying himself as an informant.
Anything could happen at this point, Niran had told them. But a trafficker would rather lose a child slave than lose his freedom. And Thailand’s government was very hard on convicted sex traffickers.
It only took a few seconds for the Thai man to understand what was about to happen. Niran already had his cell phone out. Like a seasoned athlete, the perpetrator turned and ran for his life. He was halfway down the block when Niran stooped and talked again to the little girl.
She was still crying, her black eyeliner running down her face. Niran turned to Annalee’s parents. “We need to get her to safety. The child told me she’s been that man’s slave for three weeks. He said he’d kill her if she got away.”
Before they took the girl back to the van, Niran directed her to the nearest bench. When she was seated, the child’s feet didn’t even reach the ground. Annalee looked around. No one seemed to notice the scene playing out here. Tourists, too busy bartering for a better priced T-shirt to see a child sex slave being rescued. Too busy to notice other trafficked children mixed in with the summer crowd.
Annalee and the group formed a shelter around Niran as he worked. He said something to the girl and she ran her hands over her cheeks and nodded. Niran removed the heels from her young feet and slipped them into his backpack. From inside one of the pockets he pulled out a pair of sandals and gave them to her.
Her hands shook as she slid them on.
And in that single act, the child no longer looked like a sex slave. She was a girl in need of safety and shelter and family. With the change of shoes, the child looked like she might be Niran’s daughter. Niran motioned to Annalee. “Hold her hand, please.”
Annalee took the child’s hand and at the same time, the girl looked up. Her eyes welled with fresh tears and then she did something Annalee hadn’t expected.