The Viewing

Nathan was halfway through a video of his new Phuket apartment when the agent asked whether he wanted to see the bathroom. He lowered the phone, smiled and said he was still taking everything in.

So far he had taken in the pool, the balcony and himself in the balcony door.

He had arrived four days earlier with two suitcases and a strong desire to stop answering questions about what came next. Back home, people called his situation a career break. His caption called it a new chapter.

The apartment in Bang Tao supported the caption beautifully. Pale furniture. Big windows. A pool visible without leaning. Nothing in the room suggested a man calculating how long his savings would last.

The agent, Mali, explained the lease. Nathan nodded at the right moments while quietly dividing the deposit by the amount he usually spent on groceries.

He asked whether the apartment had fast internet.

“Yes.”

“Good. I work remotely.”

His laptop currently contained three unfinished applications and a document called PLAN FINAL, which was neither.

Mali showed him the desk. He sat down and tested the angle for a video call. Then he moved to the balcony and asked if she could take a quick photograph.

She had held enough phones during viewings to understand that “quick” referred to the time available for photography, not the importance of the result.

Nathan put one hand on the railing. In the first picture, the swimming pool was too small. In the second, his shirt pulled across his stomach. In the third, everything looked settled.

He sent it to a friend with a message saying he was looking at places.

The friend replied, “Mate. You’ve done it.”

Nathan looked at the lease again.

There were two other viewings. One had a smaller balcony and a larger stain behind the curtains. The other was a plain studio above a shop, farther from the beach, with a table that could serve as a desk if he stopped putting things on it.

At the studio, Mali asked whether he wanted a photograph.

He said no.

The room had none of the visual evidence he had hoped to acquire. It did, however, leave enough money for him to live there without turning every lunch into a calculation. The air-conditioning worked. The shower had pressure. The building’s ordinary noises stopped being irritating when he considered the alternative: paying to look relaxed while worrying about rent.

He asked to see the lease.

That evening he moved in. One suitcase fitted under the bed. The other became a temporary table beside it. He opened PLAN FINAL, deleted the heading and started filling in one of the applications.

His friend called.

“How’s the new place?”

Nathan looked around the studio, then at the photograph from the balcony. He could have said the paperwork was taking time. He could have said he was staying somewhere else for a few days.

Instead, he turned the camera around.

His friend saw the suitcases, the small table and a packet of instant coffee.

“Pool?”

“No.”

There was a pause.

“Looks like my first flat.”

Nathan laughed. For the first time that week, he stopped checking how the room looked behind him.

He moved the suitcase off the chair and sat down to work.