Diamond Head (35 page)

“It doesn’t matter what I think,” Maku said. “I stand with your mother. You made your choice, Theresa, and you chose wrong. Now it’s out of your hands.”

“I can do it myself,” I begged, looking to each of my parents. “I’ll do it myself, I can do it; I know I can. Let me do it on my own, I can’t—I can’t marry him.”

“It’s not up for discussion, Theresa.”

I looked to my mom and could barely believe it was her speaking, her voice saying these words, her face, stern and decisive. My mom, who had given me everything, then sat calmly through my tantrums when I told her it wasn’t enough.
My mom
, who had entertained a thousand requests for designer clothes and tennis racquets and vacations around the world—who gave me full use of her car when I turned fifteen. I had crossed the line; it hit me suddenly. I had hurt her in a way that could not be undone.

“What did you tell Roy’s mom?” I demanded, trying to send my fears elsewhere. “She didn’t tell him, did she? Jesus, Mom—
did she tell him?
”

As humiliated as I felt, there was a desperate part of me that hoped she had told Roy. There was a part that hoped Roy was sitting in shame at that moment, in repentance, thinking about what a bastard he was, what a fucked-up thing he had done.

“I told her what happened, Theresa, and she’s dealing with it just as we are. The best she can. She’s a widow, did you know that? What am I saying, of course you didn’t. She lost her husband two years ago. Roy is her oldest. She has four more, all girls.”

“And I assume he knows,” she added. “We want the wedding before you begin to show.”

“This isn’t happening,” I breathed to myself. “This can’t be happening.”

“It’ll be a small ceremony. We’ll have it here, in the backyard. Nothing fancy.”

“Mom,
please
.”

“And we won’t say a thing about this, Theresa,” she said, eyes narrowed like a warning, a challenge to defy her again. “No one has to know about your condition.”

“Jesus, Mom,” I burst out. “My
condition
?”

“Your
condition
, your
situation
—I’m sorry, Theresa, I’ve never had a pregnant teenager before! How would you like me to say it?”

“Fine.”

“Fine
what
, Theresa?”

“It’s all fine with me!” I cried, standing from my chair, waving my arms furiously. I couldn’t stop; I couldn’t stop myself.

“Fine to marrying the bastard who stole my virginity while I was drunk—yes, that’s right! He just did it, and I had no idea what was going on and I hate myself for it and now I guess you both can hate me too.
Fine
to spending the rest of my life with a stranger.
Fine
to giving up a real boyfriend, a real husband, so that I can be with
Roy
, the man I hate most in this entire world, the filthiest person I have ever met, who I met on the stupidest night of my life, which I think about
constantly
.
And the worst part?
Do you want to hear the worst part? I can barely remember that night. I can barely remember the moment that is destroying my entire life. You don’t think I would take it back if I could? You don’t think that I’m sorry? That I don’t understand what I’ve done? I relive that night in my mind and I run from that car, I spend the rest of college alone, studying, being the woman we all want me to be, but I
can’t
—don’t you see that? I can’t do anything about it because I’m pregnant and I’m getting married and everything is just fucking
fine
.”

I stared at my parents, crying, panting, waiting for them to react. They would take it back, I told myself, they had to. They had to know how wrong this was, what a ridiculous, disgusting demand they were making.

But as hard as I stared, as hysterical as I looked, neither of them said a word. I know Maku wanted to, but he couldn’t. All my life, Maku gave me whatever I wanted, with the exception of what my mom did not. She was always his first priority, forever his final word.

“Maku,” I tried. “Please. What about red strings? What about my happiness—
my destined match
?” I pleaded frantically; the words came to
me suddenly. “He’s a knot, Maku; he’s a mistake. You’ll tie me to him for the rest of my life.”

Our eyes connected, just for a moment before he looked away. He turned to my mom and shook his head.

And then he stood up and walked from the room.

The wedding was scheduled for the middle of June, giving us a month to prepare our home and our minds for what would come. My parents met with Roy’s mother, Mrs. Lo, but I had yet to speak with Roy. He didn’t call and I didn’t want him to. The less I heard from him, the less I thought about him, the easier it was to pretend that the wedding wasn’t happening. That perhaps my parents and Mrs. Lo had called it off, realizing the absurdity of forcing us together for the rest of our lives.

But with or without Roy, the wedding was being planned. During the first week, a case of white napkins arrived at our house, then a crate of champagne glasses and fifty folding chairs, stacked one on top of another on the lanai. During the second week, little red envelopes cluttered our mailbox, RSVPs from our fifty guests. I refused to check the mail. I knew if I did, those little cards would be thrown in the marina, eaten by the bottom-feeders, never to be found.

I was to wear my mom’s wedding dress, the gold cheongsam she wore to her banquet. She never offered her ceremony dress, the white dress, and I didn’t ask. White was for virgins, not teenage brides, pregnant and lying at a shotgun wedding. She didn’t have to say it; I understood perfectly. Almost every day, my mom asked me to try on the cheongsam. It wouldn’t fit, she said, we had to alter it before the wedding. But I refused that as well. I would wear the dress as it was, made for someone else. I had no interest in looking beautiful, not for Roy or for anyone else participating in the charade.

During the third week, my mom stopped asking. She stopped showing me forks and pictures of cakes, stopped insisting that I speak to Roy. At first, it was a relief, a small victory. She had finally
realized that I would never be interested in the details of the wedding, that I couldn’t give a shit if my shoes matched my dress,
her dress
. There was a distance that crept up on us, something quietly unsettling that I tried not to acknowledge. But then, slowly, its breadth reached past the wedding; my mom’s remoteness, emotionally and physically, began to appear everywhere. There were no groceries, no clean laundry, no greetings or goodbyes—not even for Maku. That was the first alarm. When my mom was mad at me, she would withhold these favors for a day, maybe two, but never from Maku. Even during difficult times, for as long as I can remember, my mom was a wife, dutiful and considerate. If she didn’t cook, there would be leftovers warming in the oven. If she was gone, there would be a note. But during the fourth week, as the wedding loomed just days ahead, I knew something had changed, something was wrong.

For three days, whenever Maku was away, my mom spent hours, literally hours locked in their bedroom. She would sneak in and out, locking her door for half an hour at a time, only to emerge and continue about her day until she disappeared again an hour later. For three days, Maku went to run errands, to jog, to grade exams at school, and my mom would disappear, lock herself in their room. Normally, I would have asked. It was a simple question,
what are you doing in there?
But in the last few weeks, everything about my mom and I had become complicated, difficult and strained. I no longer spoke to her voluntarily. When I responded, it was a yes or no. Casual questions, conversation, they had been eliminated from our relationship. I spent all my time in my room—but she didn’t. My mom was not one to stay in her room; happy or sad, she was always busy, always doing something, and that locked bedroom door began to worry me.

Perhaps even stranger, when Maku was home, my mom would be gone. She’d go shopping for new clothes. She’d come back with her hair cut and dyed jet-black, something she had never done before. At first I thought it was for the wedding. She wanted to look nice
for our guests—but what was she doing in her room? Why was she avoiding Maku?

I couldn’t help myself; with the wedding so close, I had to know. Did Maku not want the wedding? Were they fighting because he tried to call it off? The next day, I waited for her exit into the bedroom, and immediately, I left through the front door. I walked around the side of the house, to the back window of her room. The curtains were pulled closed but there was a gap in the left corner where the fabric had been pulled too far. I squatted and closed one eye, focused the other.

I saw my mom at her vanity, her profile. She was closing the drawer where she kept her jewelry, locking it behind her. She walked to her bed and I noticed a piece of paper in her left hand, folded in three. She held it so gently, like it might melt if touched in too many places. She sat on her bed and unfolded it, raised it to her face.

She stared at the paper for twenty minutes.

I must have looked at my watch fourteen times, wondering how she was still reading, still staring at that single sheet of paper. I looked back at the vanity and searched for clues, examining her pots of makeup, her hairbrush, her perfumes. They were a mess, I realized suddenly, bottles of lotion pushed into a pile, tubes of lipstick scattered across the mirrored surface, the vase of birds of paradise suspended precariously off the edge. My mom was adamant about organization, about keeping everything in its proper place, and I had never seen her belongings in such disarray. I looked back at her and she was so still, I wondered if she was breathing, wondered if she had made that mess herself, still startled by the sight.

She stood up suddenly. Without warning, her legs straightened below her. I watched my mom fold the paper and walk to her vanity, unlock the drawer, and replace the letter. She locked the drawer and left the room, the small key safely in her pocket.

Squatting at the window, my knees cramping below me, my mind buzzing with possibilities, the only thing I knew for certain was that
I needed to read that paper. It was the only hope I saw; in that paper, I thought that maybe, just maybe there was evidence that my wedding had been canceled, that it was all a plan to terrify me, to set me straight.

So I began to watch the paper as if it were a bomb, ready to interfere at any moment. The plan was simpler than I imagined; my mom’s neurosis gave me an easy opportunity. That evening, she moved the paper. I watched her put it in her purse and I grabbed it out as her bag sat on the counter. She was going out—
just out
, she told me, not even looking in my direction. But the phone had rung; she went to answer it. I walked swiftly to the adjoining room and slid the paper between the cushions of the couch, to the left of the armrest where I knew there was a gap. I went immediately to my room. From my door, I listened for her to hang up. I walked to my window and saw her get into her car, her purse on her right shoulder, watched her drive away.

I ran back to the couch and pulled the paper from the cushions. It was a letter, I realized as I unfolded it, handwritten in short, square writing. The corner read July 2—a week before. My eyes raced across the words, so many words. I devoured them standing up.

Dear Amy,

I know this letter may come as a surprise, and I’m ashamed to be contacting you like this after so many years. I suppose this is my attempt at an apology, about twenty years late, but I couldn’t find a way to do it any sooner. I found your address in the Punahou directory. I’m not following you, I promise. I just need to get this out. I need to tell you this now, before I lose my nerve, so that I might finally have a chance at moving on.

I was in Palermo when I found out you were engaged to Bohai Leong. My brother wrote me a letter. He included the newspaper article and he was so angry. Amy, I went crazy when I read that letter. I had just found you and already, you were gone
again—had committed your life to another man. I was furious with myself. I shouldn’t have left when everything was so uncertain. I should have written more, should have given you a better ring. I started drinking every day. I stopped showing up for my assignments. I even thought about ending it all. 1500 volts to the head. An end to the misery.

But then, selfishly, I decided to hurt you. But it wasn’t that easy, Amy, and that’s what you must understand. I loved you more than anything and I just wanted you to know what a huge mistake you had made.

Every letter I exchanged with my brother made it worse, pushed me further and deeper into my head. He knew how I felt about you. Since we were kids, he knew exactly how I felt about you and in a way, I think Paul felt betrayed as well. The year had already been so shitty for my family and Paul was in a bad place, a really dark place, and I just—I followed him into that hole.

I knew it was the money you were after. I don’t blame you—you made the choice you had to, but to come home and see you driving a Mercedes and living in Diamond Head with some other man . . . I couldn’t handle it. I couldn’t bear the thought. So I did something stupid, something loathsome that ended in catastrophe. On the day of your wedding, Paul was there. It was too simple. Black shirt, black pants, and no one knew the difference between him and the rest of the restaurant staff. He said the party was rowdy and it was easy enough; a couple drops of thallium in a teacup, just enough to make him sick, to make you question your future, to shake your confidence.

But he put too much in, Amy. It all went wrong. He swore it wasn’t our fault—said that it must have been something else but the newspapers confirmed it. They said it was poison, a murder, and I have never felt more disgusting in my life—not at war, not ever. Amy, please know that I have never hated myself more than when I realized what we had done.

I was positive we would be caught—I almost hoped we would be. We waited, week after week, for that knock on the door. But it never came. The investigation began and then it ended. I was dumbfounded, skeptical of our luck, but then I found out what happened to you.