Dave is from Manchester. He’s an alcoholic. Dave’s an alcoholic in love with a beggar. He said to me that he’s been offered sex for as little as three Rupee. He’s a Manchester City fan. He said that he’s been in Mumbai for six weeks; the bar manager at the Alps Tavern said he’s been living in the train station for 5 years. Dave says a lot of things.

Everyone in Colva knew Dave. The businessmen, the bar men, the beggars, the rug salesmen, even the dogs. The men at the Western Union knew Dave very well.

That’s how Joe and I met the skinny, chinless man I called desperate Dave. We were eating at the Alps when he invited himself to our table and said that he was desperate and needed help. He needed to get his money held up in the Western Union.

His eyes shifted nervously as he told us his sad story and his accent became chewier the deeper he took us down his well. To get his money he needed a name and an address so the money could be wired to someone beside himself.

“Why?” Was the question Joe, the two Aussies we had meet at the hostel, and myself asked. “This bloody beggar that I thought was my friend stole my passport.” He said.

Dave said that all Indians are liars and cheats.

The Aussies wanted no part in it, but Joe being Joe wanted to see where this was going to lead and agreed. I actually didn’t mind because Dave’s fear was honest enough and he appeared far too high strung to actually pull off a legitimate con. So I said to Joe, “Go for it.” But that my signature stays in my hand, so don’t ask me for nothing.

Dave got smashed quickly and we went outside for a cigarette and he knelt down nose-to-nose with a three year-old beggar girl and yelled in her face to fuck off and go home — home being a mat beside the curb on the opposite side of the road. She just laughed at him. Enraged, Dave picked her up and her two year-old brother and threw them over his shoulders and walked them across the street to where their mother was asleep in the dirt.

Supposedly Dave gets angry when he drinks. But I get angry when drunks exercise their insecurities. He was lucky to have read my stare right when he returned, and he apologized. He said when he gets his money he’ll get us drunk.

The next evening I accompanied Joe and desperate Dave to the Western Union and while they were dealing with that mess I saw that there were phones there and I wanted to call home but I knew it was too late there. Under the circumstances it wouldn’t have been the best idea anyway.

Anything with Dave is possible and sure enough the name on the money transfer didn’t match Joe’s name, as it was still in Dave’s, so Dave had to call his mother in Manchester to sort it out. Joe and I got a beer with Dave while we waited for the money to be re-wired, and found Dave when sober to be quite the pussy cat, of course—just a starved alley cat too afraid of life to live it; killing himself slowly to end it.

Dave got his money. We walked off into the haze of Mumbai’s night. Two hours later, when we were trying to make a night out of New Year’s Eve, we ran into Dave on the steps of the Alps, pissed drunk and probably broke again. He looked lost in thought, wondering when the next Joe Stockman would arrive off of the steel trains willing to help.

We counted off the new year at the Georgian gate on the harbor—exactly where we started our time in Mumbai—then headed back to the hostel and listened to the fireworks explode in our ears, the taxis honk continuous, and the cheers rattle off the brick façade of the Taj Mahal Hotel until morning. Then we left it all behind. Left Dave behind us for good.