Sisterchicks Do the Hula (13 page)

“Do you happen to know when it was built?” Turning to Laurie I added, “Doesn’t it look like the house across the street from the Ladybug?”

“It does,” Laurie said.

“In the mid-1800s,” the driver said. “It arrived from Boston board by board, shipped around Cape Horn. One of the missionary families who lived here taught a school for the
keiki
of the
alíi.
”

“A school for whom?” Laurie asked, combining our cash to pay him.

“The children of the Hawaiian royalty. My wife’s great, great aunt was Lili’uokalani.” He paused, waiting for us to be impressed, but of course, we were beggars when it came to Hawaiian history.

I asked for a little more.

“Lili’uokalani was the last reigning monarch of Hawai’i. The teacher who lived in this house taught Lili’uokalani to play the piano when she was only three years old. The teacher’s name was Juliette Cooke, as in Castle and Cooke.”

Again, we were sadly uninformed.

“Lili’uokalani wrote hundreds of songs. Have you ever heard of ‘Aloha Oe’?” He started to sing for us in a mellow voice.

“Yes,” Laurie and I said in unison.

“She was my wife’s great, great aunt,” he stated again
proudly. Nodding to the frame house he added, “I don’t know what they tell you on the tour in there, but not all the missionaries who came here were haoles.”

As we emerged from the cab, I noticed that the sun had found a tiny crevice in the overhead lake of clouds and had let down a thin golden line, fishing around for admirers. I swished across the wet pavement, ready to bite on the shimmering hook.

Zip
. With a snap, the golden line was retracted, and we were left with wet feet.

“What was that word the driver used?” Laurie asked.

“Haole?”

“Yes. Where did we hear that before?”

I refreshed her memory on how the one-eyed hotel
mauka
mama had called me that and then the bandana girl on the catamaran explained that it wasn’t a compliment.

“Right, but didn’t the guy on the catamaran say it meant ‘no breath’?” Laurie asked.

“That’s right. He did. So what does that mean? Not all the missionaries who came here had ‘no breath.’ ” I shrugged.

We followed the pavement around to the covered portico in front of the Mission Houses Museum gift shop. A bearded gentleman standing behind a counter under the green roof greeted us with “Aloha” and asked if we were there for the tour.

“Actually, we’re going to the tea parlor,” Laurie said.

“You’re almost there.” He motioned to his right. “The Winterbourne Tea Parlor is around the corner of the gift shop. You can’t miss it.”

For some reason I assumed the tea parlor would be inside the white house, the same way it was set up at the Ladybug Tea and Cakes that I ran at home with my neighbor Sharla. “You don’t serve tea in the frame house?” I asked.

“No. We offer tours, though, up until four o’clock this afternoon.”

A tour sounded like the perfect rainy day activity to me, but I wasn’t sure if Laurie would feel the same. I knew she was set on finding a new pair of sandals before the day was over.

Our luncheon at the Winterbourne Tea Parlor was scrumptious and relaxing. Laurie and I sat at a small table beneath a quilt hung on the wall as art. The sign below the quilt said it was the Hawaiian breadfruit pattern. I liked the English china sugar bowl on the table. The old Hawaiian elements seemed to have found a way to blend with the European encroachments upon this island in a peaceful manner inside this quiet haven.

As I popped the last bite of scone smothered in guava jelly into my mouth, I overheard two of the other guests talking about the tour they had just taken of the Mission Houses.

“This is a wonderful place,” I said to the young woman who slipped the check on the corner of our table and asked if she could bring us anything else.

Laurie slapped her credit card on the check before I could reach for my purse. Then, as if to explain my appreciation for all things tea-ish, Laurie added, “My friend here owns a teahouse in New England.”

“You do? Where is it?”

“Connecticut.”

“Really? I’m going to Connecticut this spring for my brother’s college graduation. Maybe I can come by for a visit to your shop.”

“You should,” Laurie said. “It’s in Hartford. You’ll love it. They fixed up an old house, and all the visitors love to stop by there after the tours.”

Laurie had left out some helpful details so I explained further. “The Ladybug is in an area called Nook Farm. The Mark Twain house and Harriet Beecher Stowe house are right there, open for tours, and that’s how my neighbor got the idea that we should start a teahouse. Visitors take the tours, and then they want to sit and eat and talk about it.”

“That sounds similar to what it’s like here at the Winterbourne,” the waitress said. “Do you happen to have a business card?”

“No, I didn’t bring any with me. But I can write down the information, if you want.”

“Yes, please. I’ll get you some paper and one of our cards.”

She returned with another woman, who shook my hand and introduced herself as the tutu of the Winterbourne Parlor. I remembered from the pigtailed twins I saw at baggage claim that a tutu was a grandma or an elderly person.

“May I ask you a question?” the tutu said. “Do you order your loose leaf tea from the mainland, or do you have to use an international source? I ask because we’ve been having some
problems with our distributor lately.”

“We work with an excellent company on the West Coast. Have you heard of the Carnelian Rose Tea Company?”

She shook her head.

“I don’t have their information with me, but they have managed to get us any kind of tea we want. Ask for Jennifer. She’s wonderful.”

“Good. I’ll look up their website and contact Jennifer,” the tutu said. “We are having difficulty ordering the Madame Butterfly tea, and we need it for a big event next month.”

“I know Jennifer carries Madame Butterfly.” Turning to Laurie I explained. “It’s a green jasmine tea. Very smooth. Each of the leaves is rolled up by hand, and when they get agonized in the boiling water, they unfurl like butterfly wings.”

Laurie smiled at my passionate description and then looked at the two women standing by our table. “I’m a diehard coffee drinker, but she’s always trying to convert me. Give me a nice, dark Arabica Italian roast in a double brevé latte or a doppio cappuccino any morning, and I’m good to go all day.”

The three of us looked at Laurie as if she were speaking a foreign language.

“Although,” she added quickly, “I do enjoy the Ladybug signature blend tea. Jennifer created that one for the grand opening of the Ladybug Tea and Cakes, didn’t she, Hope?”

“Yes, she did.”

Laurie seemed to be trying hard to prove that she could hold her own in the world of tea talk. “I love the Ladybug
blend, which has a yummy vanilla, sugar-cookie taste. That’s a good one as well as the chocolate mint tea, which is stronger. More full bodied.”

“Chocolate mint tea?” The tutu looked at the young waitress, who gave an approving nod. “Now that would do very well around here with some of our regular customers.”

“They must be sisterchicks then,” Laurie said. “Because my Realtor, Penny Lane, told me that no sisterchick can pass up really good chocolate.”

I gave her a little kick under the table and a look that said,
You can stop now. We’ll let you stay in the good graces of the tea circle. Just stop talking now. Please
.

When the ladies walked away from the table, Laurie leaned over and whispered, “Why did you kick me?”

“Oh, did I kick you?” I replied with an innocent smirk. “So sorry.”

“Was I embarrassing you?”

“You? Never.” My grin widened. “You make me smile, you little brevé, full-bodied, Arabica sisterchick, you.”

Laurie responded with a comical grin that showed all her front teeth and none of her lips.

I laughed. “I haven’t seen that silly grin on you for a long time.”

“Stick around. I think I have a few more of those bubbling up to the surface.”

“Always good to know that we bring out the best in each other, isn’t it?”

“Nothing but the best. Besides, it drives Gabe crazy when I make that face. I have to get all of them out of my system this week before I go home.”

The waitress returned with the credit card and held it for a moment. “Is this your real name?”

I watched Laurie shrink an inch and fold her shoulders in toward her chest. “Yes,” she answered in a thin voice. “I’m Laurinda Giordani.”

“Wow, really. That is so amazing,” the young woman said.

All my protective-instinct feathers started to ruffle. If this woman was about to ask for Laurie to get her Gabe’s autograph or ask him to donate a free painting to their tea parlor, I was ready to squawk nice and loud.

“I have a cousin named Laurinda,” she said. “I’ve never met another Laurinda. I think it’s a beautiful name.”

Laurie paused a moment before realizing that the Giordani part of her name wasn’t factoring into this conversation. “Thank you,” she said, nodding gracefully.

The two of us exchanged knowing glances as we got up to leave. The incognito princess had managed to visit an art gallery and dine on scones and guava jelly without being detected. Two for two. I wondered if we could complete this day with a perfect score.

N
ext item of business—shopping for shoes.” Laurie was heading toward the street and looking for the nearest cab to hail. The clouds above were sifting out a fine mist that made me feel like an overly attended- to house fern.

“What about the Mission Houses tour?” I asked.

“Did you really want to go on the tour?”

I was about to say, “Not unless you do,” but then I realized that wouldn’t be the truth. I really wanted to go on the tour. I wanted to see the inside of the house. I was curious if they had the actual piano on display that the missionary teacher had used to instruct three-year-old Lili’uokalani.

“Yes.” I stopped under a sheltering tree. “I would really like to go on the tour.”

“Oh, okay.” Laurie turned around and headed back toward the information desk. I watched her feet trekking through the
puddles in her strappy sandals and knew that those prissy little darlings were not going to be happy much longer.

“Wait,” I said, remaining under the tree. “Let’s talk about this.”

I had been trained over the years by my male shopping companions that the objective of going to the mall was to seek the needed item, snag it, bag it, and bring it home for dinner. That’s why I started to shop by catalog.

Laurie, however, had spent the past two decades turning mall meandering into an art form with her daughters. It was better that she take on the shops by herself and I take on the tour with only Emilee Rose to think about.

Laurie had joined me under the tree.

“We don’t both have to go on the tour,” I said. “Why don’t you go shopping and meet me back here in a couple of hours? If I finish the tour and you’re not back yet, I’ll poke around in the gift shop or have another cup of tea.”

“Are you sure?”

“Fly. Be free. Find some new sandals. I don’t think it would be fair to my pudgy sausage feet if I subjected them to viewing all the sleek little numbers available in Honolulu and then told my feet they couldn’t take any of the shoes home with them.”

“You’re sure you don’t mind doing it this way?”

“Positive.”

“Okay. I’ll be back in a couple of hours. Keep your cell phone on.”

I bought my ticket and had just enough time for a visit to
the little girls’ room before the next tour.

“If you can imagine,” the tour guide said, starting us off in the primitive kitchen. “Juliette and her husband raised their own seven children while providing room, board, and private schooling for, at one point, as many as sixteen royal children. The Royal School wasn’t started on this property, but Juliette lived in this house for more than forty years.”

I realized he was talking about the teacher that the cab driver had mentioned.

“Listen to what Juliette wrote in a letter home to the good people of Sunderland, Massachusetts, in 1842.”

I smiled. I knew where Sunderland was. We had even driven through there once on our way home from a wedding in Amherst.

My heart went out to this missionary woman. She seemed like a kindred spirit. All Juliette was trying to do was serve a nice little tea. I knew what that was like.
I guess it doesn’t matter how you’re expressing yourself creatively. There’s always someone who will criticize your attempt
.