Mr. Peanut (20 page)

Neither did they give you a true sense of how sheer the climb was down to Hideaway Beach in Princeville, the rusted railings wobbly on cement stairs steep as attic steps—“They should call it Fall Away,” David said—built literally
off
the edge of a cliff, as if the house to which they’d been attached had fallen into the ocean, since chunks of the last step had eroded and you had to jump
down
to the path, this adding to the comedy and terror. They didn’t render the slipperiness of the switchback trail you traversed, where your hands were burned by the rope lines you used to half rappel down at the risk of tumbling two hundred feet and bouncing off solid rock webbed by palms. They didn’t communicate the conviction that for all Kauai’s beauty there was always a concomitant anxiety about your safety: rip tides could take you; tiger sharks could ambush you from below; the nothingness of the Pacific stretched out and could carry you away.

No picture conveyed the power of the current at Ha’ena Beach, water too dangerous to swim in, where sign after yellow sign warned of lethal drop-off and shore break, the stickman figure crushed by stickwaves and washed out to sea. (“No wonder you never see stickmen,” David said to Alice, “those idiots are all dead.”)
DANGEROUS MARINE LIFE!
the signs read.
DO NOT APPROACH THE MONK SEALS! NEVER TURN YOUR BACK ON THE OCEAN!
David’s pictures didn’t communicate the invisible speed of the shallow river mouth they tried to cross that afternoon in order to reach the reef beyond, how it knocked their feet out from under them while they held hands and slid toward the giant surf—it was like being swallowed—and were finally beached in the shallowest stretch of stream, the last safe patch between tributary and ocean, as if the water itself had been trying to snatch their lives away. (Only after, calmed down, could they laugh about it.) Pictures didn’t render how miraculous it was to watch three Hawaiian boys, none older than twelve, ride these same monstrous waves on boogie boards, the total control with which they banked away from the jetty, the
trust
to come so close to crushing onto rocks, immune, it seemed, to both current and tide. “It’s like they’re playing on explosions,” Alice had said. Nor could photos seize the splendor of the rainbow that suddenly
appeared, arcing from the water to sand, the light appearing as near as ceiling and as wide as highway, or how it retreated from her grasp as she tried to walk after it.

The pictures didn’t hint at how peaceful the half-mile descent down to Secret Beach was on a root-tangled and rock-littered path enclosed by a canopy of trees and brush that formed a bower so dense that it insulated you completely from the sight and sound of the ocean. They caught only glimmers of how impossibly gorgeous the young couple who climbed toward them there really were. The man was tall and sandy-haired; unshaven and sharp-featured, he carried a surfboard and stepped from rock to root as surefooted as a mountain goat. His Hawaiian wife, as if to confirm she was some sort of island princess, wore a lily in her hair. Their barefoot son followed close behind, a long-haired boy wearing a Rip Curl surfer’s shirt. Seeing Alice stop to watch
him
was like seeing an arrow pierce your beloved’s heart or a possible future passing you by.

He never took a picture of the urn but knew where it was at all times. Alice kept it on a small table by the door to the lanai. She placed an orchid in a small pitcher next to it, its petals so blue they seemed lit from within.

The pictures
did
reveal the weight she’d gained during the two weeks they were there, over fifteen pounds that puffed her cheeks, fattened her arms and legs, and if you stacked and then flipped them in sequence, the change looked like a nickelodeon before-and-after. After every enormous meal, she would sit back, exhale, and rub her belly.

Out of hundreds of photos, only one was of the two of them together. That picture was taken during their hike along the Na Pali, near the end of their time on Kauai. The trail began at Ke’e Beach, the very end of the highway that otherwise encircled the island but for this sixteen-mile stretch of towering, eroding coastline. The trail ran hundreds of feet up into the cliffs. After consulting maps and guides Harold had given him, he told Alice they had three choices. They could hike two miles in to Hanakapi’ai Beach and turn around. They could press on for two more miles and try for the Hanakoa Valley, an all-day round trip. Or if she was interested in a really extreme challenge they could go another five miles to Kalalau Beach, a strip of sand so remote and protected that boat landings were illegal. They’d have to camp there overnight, which required permits, and would need to be fully outfitted. Stage by stage, he warned, the trail became more difficult and dangerous; in fact, some parts were so narrow that even the lightest rainfall made them impassable.

He explained this with an indifference that bordered on contempt. Exhausted, finished, he was over the nights of endless crying, not because
she didn’t deserve all her grief but because she always dared him to comfort her, and he was over the anger she leveled at him when he did. He was tired of going into another bedroom to sleep, of her not looking at him and not letting him touch her, of her not saying whatever it was she needed to say. He wanted to go home, and if she’d come along, he wanted that too. So when she brightened and said she’d like to go all the way to Kalalau Beach, eleven miles in and at least a two-day trip, he was taken completely by surprise—if for no other reason than on such an expedition they’d be obliged to communicate. They would have to rely on each other.

When he called this plan in, Harold advised him not to do it. Only highly experienced hikers could make it, and several people died on the trail every year. The outing to Hanakapi’ai was feasible, he said, the hike itself difficult enough that they’d have a sense of accomplishment. But otherwise, he couldn’t responsibly approve.

They were also supposed to leave in three days. By now it was late morning, and they were scheduled to get outfitted for a hike that Alice was set on. “I’ve always wanted to do something like that,” she’d told him.

David found her on the lanai after she returned from a swim. Her back was to him, and he was standing in the kitchen now, watching her through the veranda’s glass door, noticing the fat handles around her waistline, the thickness at her calves, extra weight he felt whenever he held her hand to help her up the path from the beach to their condo. He slid the door open and stood beside her along the railing. “I want to talk about this trip,” he said.

He made his case, having had further discussions with a local. When he concluded it was too risky, she said, “Since when do you care if it’s dangerous?”

“What are you talking about?”

“You know what I mean.”

“No, I don’t.”

She crossed her arms.

“What is it, Alice?” he said. “Just come out and say it.”

“It’s nothing.”

David buried the heels of his hands into his eyes. “I can’t take this anymore,” he said. “I just—”

“Just
what?”

He had no idea. “What do you want to do?” he asked resignedly.

“I want to go,” she said. “This is the Everest of hikes, right? I want to do it. I need to do
something.”

“No,
please.”

“Take me or I’ll go alone.”

He heard her but wasn’t listening, at least not as Harold had advised. Instead he imagined the narrow trail hundreds of feet up, the two of them weighed down by full packs, the rain coming suddenly—before Alice, her feet slipping out from under her, would suddenly be gone.

He’d take her, of course, if only to see her quit.

“Fine, then,” he said.

Harold expedited the permits and they were fully outfitted by the end of the day. Before they left, however, David told her they should pack for home, and he made the arrangements.

They hired a cab to Ke’e Beach, where park rules stated that you weren’t supposed to leave a car overnight. They rode together in silence as they drove west, around the northernmost point of the island, winding up switchbacks from which they glimpsed the ocean through the trees, the cliff faces dimpled with branches you’d be clutching for dear life headed down. They crossed single-lane bridges over inlets whose currents ran with visible force down the mountains and out to sea, where locals sat outside lean-to shacks with hand-painted signs advertising
MAPS
or
GUIDED TOURS
, rows of surfboards and kayaks lined up behind them.

“What do you mean,” David finally said, “that I don’t care if it’s dangerous?”

Alice, sitting shoreside, was peering out the window at every sharp turn and looking down. “Are you really going to bring this up again?” she said.

“Yes,” he said, “I am.”

“Then you’re going to be talking to yourself all day.”

He closed his eyes, shook his head. If he could get her alone somewhere, somewhere completely private, he’d kill her. He would break a rock over her head and split her skull open so that he could see, just for a second, what the fuck was in her mind.

Ke’e Beach was jammed with hikers, beachgoers, and snorkelers. The entrance was shrouded in darkness, embowered by mountain foliage on their left that jailed off a clear view of the ocean to their right. Cars were parked everywhere in the makeshift lot crisscrossed by ancient roots that pythoned across everything, pitching the vehicles at crazy angles and making them appear abandoned, dented from all the wear and tear and splashed as they were with mud. Furious, David got out of the cab and walked on to the trailhead, leaving Alice to pay the driver and talk to herself while she tried to catch up. He read the advisories and, looking at the maps, felt a rush of adrenaline ahead of his fear. The trail was like a skyscraper staircase straight up, composed of what looked to be a frozen river of rocks.
He turned to look for Alice, who’d already stopped to adjust the straps on her pack and retie her boots, underestimating, he thought, what lay ahead, and when she put her arm through a shoulder loop and lifted the pack she staggered backward slightly from its weight, rolling her eyes in annoyance and cursing under her breath, as if she were here against her will. It made David sick with disgust, with husbandly portent: there was fighting and venom to come. Pack finally secured, she snapped her belt strap and caught his eye; he pointed up and began to walk.

He pressed ahead during the initial ascent, anger and anxiety making him rush, and he put a solid twenty-five yards between them. He didn’t even want to speak to her.
He
didn’t care if it were dangerous?
She
was the one making him take her. Livid, he pushed himself harder. When he did glance back, the distance between them had increased, but she wasn’t even looking to see where he was. He knew she knew what he was doing. It was a challenge, a game of chicken. He was daring her to either storm off or keep up, the latter forcing her to realize the futility of completing
her
expedition. The harder he pushed, the sooner she’d fail—the sooner, that is, they’d be safe.

But keep up she did. He finally had to slow down himself, due not only to the difficulty of the climb but also to the overwhelming beauty of the Na Pali. During the ascent the trail was rocky, pocked with boulders he had to climb over, slide down, or hug around, the path interrupted by streams, staggered by roots that tripped him and threw his pack toward his head and sent him falling forward, only the steepness of the incline catching him, saving him from injury, a thing to remember coming down. Along the steepest section there was nothing to see but the trail in front of you. The foliage was so dense it blocked both sun and breeze and acted as a blanket that trapped the humidity. But at the top there was a clearing and the wind hit him full force, cooling him down, the sun drying the sweat from his shirt. To his right was Ke’e Beach below, the bathers the size of commas; ahead, the fluted cliffs of the coast jutted out one after the other like the toes of a giant reptile, their faces so thick with vegetation they looked covered in fur. From this vista he could see for several miles. A white tracery of surf was etched along the line where the rocks plunged into the water.

The sight calmed him, as the ascent had cleared his mind. He knew what he wanted: to get his wife back. He needed her. He now wanted them to leave. It was time for this to end. David looked down the trail and Alice was laboring toward him. She had caught up, and perhaps she too had detected the clearing where he stood waiting. When she stopped, he would apologize. He was sure the spectacle of this place would soften her heart too.

“Look at this,” he said when she came up to him.

“Fuck
you,” she said, and walked on, disappearing around a turn.

David blinked, half laughed, then hurried after her.

He got to where he was right behind her. He would’ve liked to walk next to her, but the trail was too narrow: cliffs to the left, sheer drop-off to the right. With her pack on, he could only see her legs, and, when she gestured, her hands and arms. So he talked to the back of the pack. “Fuck
me?”
he said. “What did I do?”

“Don’t even talk,” she said.

“We haven’t talked since we got here.”

“You haven’t wanted to.”

“That’s
all
I’ve wanted to.”

“You don’t
say
anything,” she said. “You just repeat everything
I
say.”

“I’m waiting for
you
to speak.”

“Please.”

“I’m waiting for you to look at me for once.”

“Oh, of course it’s me.”

“Here we go.”

“It’s
always
me.” She half turned, speed walking. She’d pinched her thumbs to her index fingers. “I am a
leper
to you.”

“Oh, for Christ’s sake.”

“A
lep-per.”

“Can you cut the drama? Pull yourself out of it for a change? So I don’t have to be the one who has to wait and then apologize.”

“You and your fucking apologies. You think they undo everything. Like a goddamn reset button. But there are things you can’t undo.”