Melted: A MaxTul AU story

Twenty: Dinner With Friends

Author's Note: Remember that Eat Me is a real place in Bangkok. The picture above is the table I picked as the favorite table of Tul, Tor, and Prin. Food looks delicious but place is fancier than the types of places I go. It seemed perfect for Tul, Tor, and Prin though. You can find loads of pictures of the place if you look them up. But just like The Creamery, don't look if you're hungry.

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When Tul woke up the next morning, he felt well rested. He thought he'd have trouble sleeping knowing that Max, too, was sleeping at the other side of the apartment, but that hadn't been the case. He had felt completely relaxed and happy—the most relaxed and happy he'd ever been in this apartment.

He had enjoyed the dinner tremendously. Of course, Pongpat needed very little prodding to tell stories about a young Max and the Three Musketeers, as Pongpat called the threesome of Max, Itty, and Chalida. Max had initially been embarrassed but then began to feel more at ease the more he realized how happy telling these stories made his uncle.

Tul had enjoyed watching the banter back and forth: the arguments over details of stories and the clear affection the two had for each other. With others, Tul might have felt jealous that he had to witness such familial affection when he had felt nearly none growing up, but he didn't resent Max and Pongpat. He was happy to give them this time together.

He hadn't received many updates from Max about Pongpat's health, but he knew they had reserved a home dialysis machine. It would be delivered in a couple of weeks and would allow Pongpat to stop going to the hospital three times a week to do dialysis there. Tul couldn't imagine what was going on in Pongpat's head. If he were dying, would he be able to focus and work and tease Max like Pongpat was doing? In fact, Tul was feeling inspired by Pongpat. He didn't necessarily agree with the fact that the man didn't want to tell his wife and kids about his illness, but Tul understood.

However, he couldn't help but look at Pongpat and put his own challenges into context. To be blunt, as bad as his situation was with his family, he wasn't dying.  He was in excellent health,  and his future looked bright.  In many ways, Pongpat's situation reminded him what a privileged existence he lived.  If he were ill, he wouldn't have had to live in a tiny room just to pay his medical bills.  He had resented this apartment before, embarrassed at the luxury paid for with money he didn't earn. But it had allowed him to provide a harbor for Pongpat and by extension Max.  

How could he think to whine about his life in front of a man who didn't seem to be bitter--at least not in public--about dying?  Tul acknowledged that Pongpat may, for all he knew, curse the sky when alone, but outwardly, Pongpat kept going forward. Tul thought of his past and his alcoholism and felt a different kind of shame.  When he lost Primchanok and felt abandoned by his family, he felt like he was dying, so he turned to drink. He wondered how things would have been different if he had faced that pain the way Pongpat was facing his. For example, Tul thought the Pongpat was in an even better humor now than when Tul had first joined the team; it was as if Pongpat were determined to enjoy the time he had left. If Tul had been that brave, would he have met Max even earlier?

Thus, of course, Tul didn't resent the current happiness Max was having with his uncle because Tul was going to like (or try to like, Tul thought, remembering his embarrassing mistake about Khun Bagnet) anything that put such a smile on Max's face.

Tul had noticed that Max seemed tense when he first sat down to dinner table the night before. Tul guessed that Max was feeling awkward serving dinner in Tul's apartment. Tul remembered what Prin had said before about Max's guilt over their "apartment invasion," so he worked hard to make Max feel like he was welcomed—no, not just welcomed, Tul wanted Max to feel how much he liked having him there.