As part of The Wheeler Centre’s Hot Desk Fellowship program, Vivian Nguyen worked on Cocaine Bust, a chamber piece play that unfolds over a night of celebration when a convicted drug trafficker is released from prison. The play is set in an abandoned car wash in Braybrook where four Asian men reunite, only to secretly come with scores to settle.
QUI: Fuck, yes. I am a free man, shawty wanna be a what? A what? A free man, I am a free mother effing man. No, don’t mess it up, bro don’t mess this up! Let’s go driving down that road, baby, Ballarat Road edging on 80 on a 70 road- What? Be careful? Mother fucker, I’m gonna be speeding, feeling the rush of it, because I’m the fucking- What? I didn’t hear you? I’m a what?
A mother fucking free man.
[He grabs a deck of cards.]
What are you talking about?! Don’t get too big for my boots? Shiiiiitt. Ay, ay you think that’s a threat? That’s a threat to Qui Tran? Shiiiiiiiit, nah bro, I can never be too big for a place like this.
In this place?
I’m King.
WOOOOOOO! Look at this! The great abandoned carpark. Smells the same. Nah, Braybrook hasn’t changed since… since those long-drawn days. Kid days, I had my first blowjob here. Yeah… A damn blowie. Mother fucking bad-ass. Them youth days listening to hardstyle, fucking hardstyle, rap, trance- Hard thumping base. Saving our dollars, our hard earnt dollars working late night shifts at Maccas on weekends serving through those grave yard hours to cars, in and out, standing with an ATM in hand thinking…. I’ll be in those hot cars one day. Supra, 370Z, Impreza’s, Beamers, Mer-fucking-cedes. Once in a blue moon there’s a Bulgari and you’re like… Fuck. Nah, I absolutely can’t. No way! That’s too far my imagination, so I stick to the others… Thinking about the mod-up, amped, thumping, revving down the street, vroom vroom cars.
We’re daydreaming when we’re serving, us boys, but the drivers askin’ ‘Soft serve sir?’, ‘Apple pie?’, ‘Sundae with chocolate syrup’- ‘Cheeseburger?’, ‘Dollar menu shit!’, ‘Quarter pounder fillet-o-fucking-fish?’ Then we’re waiting for the burgers to roll down the mini-metal slides but my mind’s running wild! Irritated. Impatient… A little more time, wait a little bit boy and then we’re gonna win big one day, that’s right- Sitting in those seats, day dreaming of a girl, fucking her, loving her, being with the boys, my boys, drifting in those cars, being… A man. A man.
[He starts shuffling cards.]
I’m reminiscing, what’s wrong with that! I’m raising memories, they’re flooding my mind in a place like this. Braybrook, baby, you haven’t changed. Tonight’s the night Qui Tran is a free man, a free man. Four years later and I’m still here...
We did it boys, we did it. Let a man dream, I can dream, shh, shh! Let me smell the fresh air cause this calls for a celebration, a shuffle for a game of 13. The game of 13, you know that? Course you don’t. But we boys do, we play a round or two. Then another til one of us gets sick of losing. Strategy, combos, repetition, how much can you keep going? Push it forward? Press hard? How much do I hold back? Someone’s playing too hard too fast, but you’re gonna end up a loser if you don’t risk it and test the water. Left stranded with the goods in your hands! The trick is to stretch it out baby, play the long game.
13, y’all, we callin’ it ‘Struggling Upstream’. Why are we struggling? You know the streets, you know who is who. It’s all about that. Cause the more you play, the more you’re in the game. Stay sharp! Ready! Yeah, we watched our dad’s play it, uncles all around a table counting ‘3, 2, 1’ screaming and clanking their VBs round while a pig’s swirling behind ‘em on top of hot coal with a pole stabbed right through it. Generations of struggle, passed down. Intergenerational shit. No one gets out in a place like this… Unless you’re gifted. But these boys will be so down. A good addition to the night.
The brothers, the boys, are coming tonight, we be celebrating tonight! Big boys celebrating a big win! I’m out brothers! I’m back, I’m good, I’ve learnt, I’ve done my years!
[Beat. He gets the stack of plastic chairs and starts organising it into a round for the night ahead.]
Weakest cards a 3. Self-explanatory. We play it when we’re waiting. Waiting for the phone to buzz, the text to ding, tellin’ us when to leave, when to strike, when to hit. Soldiers, little soldiers on stand-by. Round after round, but this shit be way back. Wayyyyyy back before, before, oh shit… Oh shit.
Richie lost his virginity… Right here. It just hit me, he told me a couple metres that way towards the Kebab shop in his mum’s RAV 4. Shit! Can’t believe… I remember that? Dude, we’ve been sneaking out since we’re 17, illegally driving his mum’s RAV 4. He told me that the windows be steaming that night! Told me his girl was sleeping! But you coppers came round knockin’ on the window at 3am, asking… ‘Sir, what you’re doing here? In Braybrook, in an abandoned car park at… 3am?’ You know what he said?
Yo. He said, he said, ‘we were sleeping sir’. Sleeping?! Be sleeping?! This cunt’s hitting Sarah up like she was a god sent Angel! Would you believe it? Course not, cause when you’re a young boy all we were thinking in those days was fucking anything and everything.
Right, side tracked. The rules are this: 3, 4, 5, all the way to 10, then we get to the suits- What? What happens to 2? Y’all, listen first before jumping in! Shit! Listen. It’s 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10. Then Jack, Queen, King, Ace… Then 2. Yes. 2’s the biggest suit. I didn’t make it up. Why would I do that for? Can’t fuck with the game, rules are rules. That’s the rules of the game! It doesn’t make sense? Well… A bit too bad then. That’s what we deem to be the rules, our rules, I ain’t changing it. Tell that to my fucking ancestors.
[He continues shuffling, then he starts distributing the cards.]
I’mma make sure there’s…
Perfect. 52 Cards. Definitely the boys will be down for this. Deck for me, Richie, a deck for John and a deck for… Yeah, Thomas.
[Pause.]
Thomas, Thomas, Thomas, golden boy golden egg golden child Thomas. Fuck, wonder what that cunt’s been up to. Smart guy, whizz kid guy, going to places kinda guy. Type a guy who said he doesn’t study, yet the grades skyrocket, like a breeze. Effortless. I know that cunt’s lying. No such thing as a genius without working for it. But, if we gonna play that game, we gonna play that game. Go along with it. However! You can’t be too smart when you’re working the streets, working it like you know who is what and who is who. You get ahead by being a loyal brother! And guess what?
Tonight’s the night Qui Tran’s a free man!