The address Hannah had given me was in an area of Jakarta I had never heard of. So I simply got in a Bluebird taxi and gave the driver the hotel-branded piece of notepaper I'd scrawled it on.
The driver looked at the paper and then looked back at me, his face screwed up in confusion. "You want... here?"
OK, so, apparently Hannah lived in an area of Jakarta not frequented by foreigners. No biggie. I just nodded to the driver as if I knew what I was doing.
Despite Hannah telling me it was not far away, I was in the cab a good 45 minutes. The driver got us to an area of the city with narrow streets lined with small, indecorous cement structures.
"We close," he told me earnestly, but instead of driving with purpose, he began combing the tiny side streets with his window wound down, asking random people if they knew the address. Eventually, he was able to find it using this technique.
He stopped outside one of the tiny houses and pointed proudly. I thanked him, paid well and stepped out onto the street. It occurred to me that once we was gone, I had no way to get home, or even to know where I was, but it was too late to turn back now!
As the driver rolled away, I surveyed what I presumed was Hannah's house. All I could see from the road was a small cement patio and a door with dirty plastic streamers on it. A small string of Christmas lights hung around the door-frame.
The door was slightly ajar, but I knocked anyway. A girl who I had never seen before answered. I had a moment where I thought perhaps I had the wrong house, but there was enough recognition in the girl's face to indicate she had been expecting me. She waved me soundlessly into the front room.
I didn't really look at the girl, as I was not expecting anyone else to be in the apartment, and was preoccupied recalculating my chances of getting what I was hoping out of this expedition.
The front room led out to a bedroom, both narrow and small. Once I progressed through the small hallway, I glimpsed Hannah lying in her bed, which filled the room with only a few dozen centimetres to spare either side. Already I could see she was very pale and was clutching her hip with both hands.
She looked happy to see me, though. I sat by the bed and we chatted, while her presumed roommate went and sat in some other room behind this one.
"I feel so sick," Hannah said. "My stomach." She invited me to look. There was a red area to the left of her flat belly. She guided my hand to her pain, pressing me gently against it. I felt tension somewhere under the skin.
It was also good to be touching Hannah's smooth skin again, and I couldn't help a part of my mind wandering back to that first night we had spent together.
I said I thought it might be some kind of infection, and she agreed that one of her friends had said the same thing.
At that point her roommate came out of the back room and sat in the bed with Hannah. I said, "Aren't you going to introduce me?"
"Oh that's my friend Selvia, but she doesn't speak much English and she's shy."
I smiled at Selvia. "Don’t worry, I'm shy too." I leaned over and shook her hand.
In doing so, I got a real look at her for the first time. She had lovely curly hair and dimples, and behind her dark eyes I could see a kind of light-hearted warmth. I liked her immediately.
"It’s nice of you to look after your friend," I said. She just smiled shyly.
I asked Hannah why she hadn't been to hospital yet. She just shrugged. I explained that while I didn't want to scare her, I had looked up her symptoms on the internet, and there was a real possibility her paid was caused by some kind of infection in her "ladies' parts". Dr Google had said that, left untreated, it could render her unable to have children.
She said, "Got no money for hospital."
"What about your new boyfriend? How come he's not taking care of you?" I asked.
"He said just wait and see if it gets better."
I immediately heard an orchestral theme song in my head and sprung into action. In my best macho, superhero voice, I said, "Fuck that! You can't risk your health -- I'll take you to hospital!"
I asked her friend Selvia if she knew where the nearest hospital was. She said she did.
"Well let's get a cab and go there, then."
Both girls looked at me puzzled. "Now?"
"Yes, right now. Let's go!"
Of course, my main motivation was to help out my friend Hannah -- of COURSE it was -- but it also crossed my mind that if I could rescue her from certain infertility, she may see how much better of an option I was than her useless new boyfriend, and that that realization might just lead to me being permitted to ejaculate on her stomach again, just like old times.
So we hopped in a taxi and headed to the hospital, Hannah in the front seat, clutching her side, and myself and Selvia in the back. I made some slightly awkward conversation with Selvia, but it was clear she didn't speak much English because Hannah kept answering for her. I thought that was nice of her because she was obviously in a lot of pain and it was hard for her to speak.
The hospital wasn't far away, I paid the taxi driver and we headed inside. Hannah was feeling weak, so Selvia and I carried her in, one of us on each side. I sat them both down in the waiting room, went to reception and demanded to see a doctor.
We waited over an hour, but finally a doctor saw us and tests were scheduled. The doctor said that it was lucky we were in this particular hospital because they had the only machine for this particular test in all of Jakarta.
Sounded legit to me. What a wise decision I had made to come here! We waited for another stretch then Hannah was finally admitted for the tests.
Selvia and I sat in the waiting room. I asked her how she knew Hannah and we made general idle chit chat. Of course my mind was completely on Hannah's well-being, but I did notice that Selvia had lovely sparkling eyes and a dark, flawless skin. She couldn't possibly have weighed more than 35kgs.
It occurred to me that it was relatively fickle to be thinking about all that now, of all times... But wow! That wonderful curly black hair!
After a while, Hannah limped back to the waiting room. She was given a hospital bed and told she would need to stay overnight. Selvia and I went and sat by her bed for a while, then Hannah asked if I would take her to the toilet.
I said, "Er... maybe it's best if Selvia does that?" Hannah insisted we should both come.
So we helped her hobble over to the toilet with her IV drip in hand, and watched as Hannah took a piss and wiped herself. It was a weird moment, really, I still have no idea why she wanted me in there with her.
We had been intimate many times, but somehow this seemed way more intimate than I had ever signed up for. I probably would have been happier leaving my previous fond memory her vagina intact, rather than create an awkward new one. I still looked though, as if somehow I intuitively recognised that would be the last time I'd see it.
Once she was back in bed, a doctor came and explained that Hannah had diverticulitis, but surgery would not be necessary. They were going to give her antibiotics and keep an eye on her, and because we caught it early, the infection would most likely resolve itself.
He showed us the fancy scans they had done with their special machine and pointed at the dark patch which was apparently the infection.
All the time, I was thinking, "fucking hell, I've just watched her take a piss, now your showing me photos of her organs, I've seen just about as much of Hannah as I need to."
And somehow, it totally demystified her for me. In that moment, all that garbage I'd built up in my head while working in Singapore -- all that angst and hope and attachment -- just dissipated like low-handing clouds rolling in over a large lake.
Hannah said she was tired and wanted to sleep. I gave her a clumsy kiss on the cheek and Selvia did the same, then we left and closed the curtain behind us. The doctor was lurking there checking a chart or something, so we told him we would be leaving.
The doctor said that was fine, but we would have to pay the bill in advance before leaving, to ensure they were able to give Hannah the care she needed. Without waiting for an answer, he rushed off to arrange the invoice, leaving Selvia and standing together in the large hospital dorm.
We faced each other under the eerie greenish light of the hospital curtains that flanked us on either side, two strangers thrown into this weird situation. Our eyes met and we held our gaze in comfortable silence. Selvia gave a little sparkly smile, showing her dimples.
I decided that, since she didn't know much English, I'd attempt a mime. I held my side like I had an infection and whispered, "Oooh, Selvia, can you take me to the toilet please. I'm gonna need lots of help, I can't do it by myself."
She laughed like she was seeing her first Jim Carrey movie and then said, loudly first, then muting herself as she realised she might be overheard, "Yeah! She's such a hypochondriac!"
I said, "Wow, you know the word hypochondriac. Your English must be ok."
She said, "Yeah, I'm just shy... and Hannah likes the sound of her own voice so I let her talk."
I was stunned to silence for a second, then snorted surprised, unrestrained laughter, and Selvia joined in.
We talked a while longer; her English was great! She said I must be very kind to help Hannah like this, and I said, "Yeah I'm awesome". She asked if we were together and I replied, "No, I thought maybe once, but now we're just friends."
The bill came and it had so many zeros I couldn't work out what the amount was. Selvia took the bill and read it for me. She said "Oh my God!"
I said, "What, how much is it?"
"Nine million Rupiah!" she said.
I was pretty used to Indonesian Rupiah by then, but it took me a while to convert it. When I did, my breath caught in my throat. "That's nearly a thousand US dollars!" I said.
I checked the bill, and the charges were itemised -- 3 nights in a private room, saline drips, meals, antibiotics, doctors’ visits, etc. It seemed way higher than I had been expecting for a hospital stay in Jakarta, but I didn't want Selvia to think I was cheap, so I went to the ATM and pulled out the required amount and paid the bill.
I put Selvia in a cab and sent her back to Hannah's place, then went back to my hotel. I sat alone on the big hotel bed, wondering how this day had ended up with me being alone -- then reminding myself I'd been an idiot to think it would go any other way.
When I closed my eyes to sleep, it was Selvia's face I saw, not Hannah's.
This post is the second of an (at least) 8 part series. The next part will be posted soon.
I believe story is the key to human knowledge -- the native unit of storage that is understood by our brains.
So I share this personal story, despite the fact that it makes me vulnerable, because I believe someone out there might learn something from it in a way I can't even predict or understand.
If you get something from it, please leave me a comment and a like. Or, even better, share your own story and give me a link to read it.