Anywhere but Paradise (6 page)

I brought extra chicken for Tinkerbell, too, but all I see is an empty cage next door. Maybe it’s her checkup time.

I wiggle closer to Howdy and reach for him again.
Whop
. Howdy’s paw hits my fingers. “Ouch,” I cry, and rub my hand.

“No fighting, you two,” says Daddy.

“Not funny,” I say.

“Just give him a little more breathing room.”

So I do. I scoot back, but my eyes never leave him. “Everything is going to be okay, Howdy. I promise.”

“Time to pick up your mother from the beauty parlor,” says Daddy way too soon.

“That cat’s got some pounds on him,” says the officer as we step out of Howdy’s cage. “He’ll probably lose a few. Most do. At least the ones that make it.”

“What do you mean?” I ask.

I look into Tinkerbell’s pen. That’s when I notice. No bowl of water. No bowl of food. No pan of litter. No small white card on the cage.

“Y’all were supposed to take care of her,” I cry.

I squeeze my eyes shut, as if that will block out the truth. Tinkerbell was leaving four weeks before Howdy.

“We did our best,” says the officer.

I open my eyes and pull away from the cage.

Poor Tink. I am sure she died of a broken heart.

“Oh, Howdy,” I say. “You’ve got to be strong.”

I trudge out of the building after Daddy, my insides tight and twisty. The waterfront just across the way mirrors the dark gray sky.

On the drive back over the Pali Highway, I close my eyes and count.

Less than a day until I see Howdy again.

Then it’ll be one hundred and ten more days until he is released. Unless of course I can break him out sooner.

Thirty-four more days of school.

Forty more hours until I have to see
her
.

And I don’t know how many more days until Howdy and I leave this awful island and head home to Gladiola, Texas. Truth be told, anywhere sounds better today. Anywhere but paradise.

Night-Blooming Cereus

BEFORE BED,
Daddy sticks his head into my room. “I’ve kept forgetting to show y’all something in the yard,” he says. “Your mama just said she’ll take a rain check, but I’m hoping you’ll come out back.”

The TV blares from the front room. That’s Mama. She doesn’t like to miss her favorites.

“Sure, Daddy.”

We find the flashlight in the kitchen drawer. I scamper down the back steps and tiptoe onto the cool grass. No stepping on any bufos, brownish warty toads, for me. No petting them, either. Daddy had said it’s best not to tangle with them. Though they’re mostly harmless to us, these critters are poisonous. Cats tend to ignore them, but sometimes dogs can’t resist. I’m not taking any chances.

Daddy strides ahead, tall, confident. I hop gingerly across the lawn, between plumeria trees with their
skinny branches and long narrow leaves. I take in deep breaths of their sweet-smelling clusters and make my way to the monkeypod tree in the back corner where Daddy stands.

“This is one of the reasons I chose this house to rent,” he says, giving its enormous trunk a pat. “That and of course the Halanis. This tree is probably older than me.”

Starlight twinkles through its big branches and umbrella-shaped top.

“Shine the light up the trunk until you see something,” says Daddy.

“Like what?”

“Go on. You’ll know it when you see it.”

I move the light up, up, up. And stop. Scraggly legs of a plant cling to the trunk. It doesn’t look like it belongs. Instead, it looks like something I might come across in a pasture outside Gladiola. The leaves are flat, spiny, bumpy, green, and a little wider than a ruler. Like a cactus, though not like one I’ve ever seen.

“It’s a night-blooming cereus,” Daddy says.

“I don’t see any flowers.”

“It’ll bloom when it’s ready, kitten, and only in the dark.”

I kind of like that. It will bloom in secret, as if it doesn’t want anyone to notice. As if it doesn’t want the attention of the bright light. Only people who look carefully will see.

I shine the beam back on the plant.

Not even a bud.

Sunday at the Beach

MAMA PREPS FOR SUNDAY
dinner in our tiny kitchen. “Thanks, but no thanks,” she said when I offered assistance. “This space is best for one.” Daddy’s out front, trimming hedges and visiting with Mr. Halani. We won’t eat until one o’clock.

So I am fixing to work on my tan. I won’t stick out so much with one.

I scamper to the ocean side of Hanu Road and race walk down the grassy shoulder. My beach bag bumps against my hip. I pass driveways and a bunch of side streets until I find the street to the park.

Tall ironwood trees with long, weepy needles and teeny tiny pinecones line the road. The breeze kicks up and I see the shimmering blue water in the distance. I take in the salty air and quicken my pace. Big white puffy clouds decorate the bluest of blue sky.

I’ll stay until dinnertime. Then, after we eat, we’ll drive over to see Howdy.

I sprint across the beach park grass and step into the soft, sugary sand. Here, the beach is long and broad. Sparkles of light dance off the clear blue-green water. Ribbons of turquoise, emerald, teal, and navy color its surface. Halfway to the horizon, a line of waves breaks on the reef. To the far left and right, small islands host untold numbers of birds. I cross the sand to the warm water’s edge and let the lacy ocean shush over my feet.

The beach park is filling up, but not too much. I settle in between a family and a couple with cameras taking photos of each other on their beach towels. I inspect my two-piece suit. I made it right before we moved. It’s orange with white polka dots and ruffles, just like one I saw in a magazine.

I slather on the baby oil and hope for the best. I’ll use the system Cindy’s older sister swears by. She should know. She sunned every day over spring break and came back to school the tannest girl at Gladiola High. Her foolproof method? Apply oil and turn from one side to the other every thirty minutes. Like roasting chicken on a skewer. Done.

I prop myself up on my beach towel and pop a piece of spearmint green deliciousness in the shape of a leaf into my mouth. Candy is an important part of sunning.

I gaze at the ocean. If I squint hard enough, I
can imagine this wide-open space is the land around Gladiola. This time of year, pastures of green overflow with happy shades of blue, orange, yellow, pink, and white wildflowers. And all you see is land and sky for forever.

A fly wants to become my best friend.

“Shoo,” I tell it, and it wings away on the gentle breeze.

Slather and turn.

Thirty minutes. The family next to me is at the water’s edge, with buckets and shovels. The girl about my age helps the younger ones fill their pails with sand. The couple next to me reads. My bag of candy is now empty. I open a pack of my favorite gum, and my mouth juices around a stick of its chewy sweetness.

I wonder if Cindy has found the key chain we won with the ticket we shared at the fall carnival at school. We put keys to both of our houses on it. She took it home first. I forgot about it until I opened my bedside drawer a few weeks later and there it was. I didn’t say a word. I hid the key chain under her bed days later. She never said a thing. Next thing I knew, it was behind a pillow on my window seat. Back and forth it went. Before I left, I tucked it in a boot deep inside her closet.

Slather.

Turn.

One hour.

I pull out a postcard from my beach bag to send to Grams and Grandpa. A colorful fish on the front eyes me. “Hum-you-hum …?” The letters of its name blur together. Twelve letters in the Hawaiian alphabet. And this little fish with twenty-one in its name is swimming circles around me.

Slather.

Turn.

Ouch.

I pop up and rush to the edge of the ocean where foam swirls around my feet. I tiptoe forward until I’m knee-deep and splash water over my arms and shoulders. Cooling, cooling off.

“You’re red,” hollers the older girl being buried up to her neck by her family.

“But I’ve been here less than two hours.”

“That’s probably long enough,” says her mom as she adds a shovel of sand on top of her daughter’s stomach.

“Are you sure?”

“Positive.”

This I know: It’s going to take a lot longer than this to become a new me.

Fire

DADDY WORKS
for the agriculture department. He studies invasive species and knows a heap about sugarcane production.

They burn the fields. On purpose. To make an easier and more productive harvest. Somehow it doesn’t ruin the stalks. Then they collect the cane.

We took the extra-long way back to the house after the hula show last weekend and passed by a burning field.

Yellow and red flames reached for the sky. Gray smoke billowed up and up. The wind carried it across the blue, hiding long sections. The smell was thick, heavy.

I am like sugarcane. I am on fire.