Tiare in Bloom (18 page)

“Be careful of the dogs!” Materena calls out to Pito as he steps out of the house.

But it isn’t the dogs that Materena should be worried about, it is the women! For Pito is about to find out that a man with
a baby in his arms is Prince Charming as far as women are concerned, even if he isn’t, well . . . very appealing to the eye.

But being Prince Charming isn’t the reason why Pito is taking his granddaughter along on his new journey to be fit, the reason
is much simpler. He just feels like taking this baby out of the house a bit, to give her some fresh air, change her ideas
and everything. And there’s also the desire to appear normal.

The way Pito sees the situation, a man walking around on his own attracts suspicion. People will say, “What is that man doing
walking on his own around here, eh?” People will think that he’s plotting to steal their TVs, worse, harm their children.
A baby, so Pito believes, will camouflage him, and make him walk past unnoticed. But first, a quick
Iaorana
to Mori sitting under the mango tree at the petrol station as usual.

“
Eh, Iaorana.
” Mori stands up. “And how’s the queen today?” he asks, kissing Tiare’s feet. The queen giggles. She loves her great-uncle
Mori.

“So?” Pito says. “What’s the latest news on the coconut radio?” Although Pito already knows the news on the coconut radio,
since Mori has told him the news yesterday and the day before, it doesn’t hurt to be told again how wonderful you are.

“They say you’re wonderful.”

“
Ah bon?
” Pito feigns surprise.

“
Ah oui,
” Mori confirms. “You’re wonderful, you’re a champion, you’re number one.”

“Hmm.” Pito stands up proud and tall. “So they’re not backstabbing anymore, eh?”

“
Non,
Cousin, women adore you.” The women in question, of course, are the in-laws who have never thought highly of Pito until recently
when he became Mr. Mama, looking after his granddaughter while Materena is at work.

When the news that Materena had nominated Pito to be in charge of Tiare got on the coconut radio, the relatives were deeply
concerned. What is our cousin doing? they asked. Trusting a man who can’t be trusted when there are so many women in the family
available to help.

But now it is a known fact that Pito can change diapers, make bottles, massage the baby’s belly to ease gas pains — he can
do the whole lot, and without any supervision. And plus, he’s taking his holidays next month to help Materena with the baby!
Talk about a miracle!
Bon ben,
since the news is still the same, Pito better go and start his exercise program. Off he goes, walking fast steps and feeling
a bit healthier already.

“Pito!” Mama Teta and her gang of six respectable-looking
memes,
all wearing missionary dresses (also known as mama
ruau,
old-woman dress), running shoes, and pandanus hats, spot Pito and hurry over.

“
Eh mea ma!
” Pito calls out, thinking, Great, they’re going to talk to me for days, and then I’m never going to do my exercise. Simultaneously
and with astonishing speed, the women fish out their handkerchiefs from inside their bras to wipe their faces. Nobody wants
to kiss sweaty people.

Pito greets the venerated Mama Teta with two kisses on her cheeks. He also kisses her companions because, speaking from experience,
memes
like to be kissed. You kiss one, you kiss the whole lot or they get sad. So,
bisous-bisous
multiplied by seven.

“Where are you off to?” Pito asks.

But nobody cares about Pito anymore, he’s already an old story. The baby in his arms is much more interesting.

“
Aue!
She’s so tiny, she’s so beautiful, she looks like a doll, can I hold her for a little while?”

But the baby hides her head in her grandfather’s shirt.

“She’s hiding, the little
coquine,
come on,
mistinguette,
give your old Mama Teta a little smile.” After a bit more persuasion, Mama Teta finally gets her much-sought-after smile.
“
He-he!
” she brags, “she gave me a smile, it’s because she knows I’m her blood, I’m family.”

The other
memes
push Mama Teta out of the way, they want to be blessed with a baby’s smile too. They coo and coo, whisper tender words, beg
with their hands joined in prayers, tickle the baby’s feet, and very soon there are about thirty relatives trying to get close
to baby Tiare. Cars driving past slow down, and heads, the drivers’ included, turn to the crowd to see what’s going on. Is
it a politician mixing with the people to get some votes? A celebrity who had hoped to pass incognito?
Eh non,
it’s just a man with a baby in his arms, keep driving.

But it is not just a man with a baby in his arms. It is, according to the crowd of women present, a man going through the
next stage of his life, the stage of enlightenment and maturity.

“Ah,” sighs one of Mama Teta’s companions, “I’ve seen this lots of times in my life. When men are young they make babies as
if they were free, but they don’t care, they want to
stay
free. Then they get old and you see them walking around with a baby in their arms, and they’re even changing diapers . .
. Ah,
maitai,
it’s good.”

“True,” another of Mama Teta’s companions agrees. “I think men should only become fathers when they’re mature in the head.
There are too many irresponsible young fathers around, they understand nothing, not even themselves.”

“It should be the law that our men can’t become fathers until they’re at least thirty years old.”

“Eh, forty is better.”

On and on and Pito is getting
fiu
of all of this, not counting that the way a few of his in-laws are staring at him is making him quite uncomfortable. Here,
Loma for instance, she’s staring at Pito like she wants to jump on him. Lily too . . . Lily, who’s never given Pito a second
glance before because he’s married to her cousin and he’s not her type, but this morning for some reason she’s openly admiring
Pito like he’s a hero, a fireman with a medal for bravery or something. She gazes at the baby in his arms with longing and
smiles at Pito.

Pito smiles back, turns his head to one of Mama Teta’s companions, the eldest one, she must be close to being eighty years
old, and she’s also looking at Pito like she wants to jump on him.

With brief excuses, Pito escapes his fans, walking as fast as he can past the Chinese store, the fibro shacks, and making
a right turn towards the international airport.
Voilà,
at last, nobody knows him here. Pito’s plan is to walk around the carpark ten times, twenty times if Tiare doesn’t whine,
thirty if he’s up to it. Okay, then, let’s go for the first lap with fast steps to make the heart beat faster. Go, go, go
—
allons-y!

“Oh, the beautiful baby!” a pretty young woman exclaims, getting out of her car. “How old is he?”

“Four months,” Pito replies, looking straight ahead. He’s not going to bother rectifying that woman’s mistake about the baby’s
gender. He’s seen many women get all upset when people misjudge their baby’s sex — It’s a girl! or It’s a boy! — but who cares
about things like that? Pito tells himself. It’s not the end of the world if people think your baby is a boy when it’s a girl,
and vice versa. They are only strangers. They don’t count.

And now, let’s have a little tour at the airport, let’s count the tourists, eh? There are three young women, tanned with sun-bleached
hair, slouched on the benches with surfboards and backpacks at their feet. They give Pito the biggest, friendliest smile,
as if they know him well. He gives them a friendly smile too. Further away, two thirty-something black women dressed in jeans,
white tops, and high-heel shoes openly admire Pito and the baby in his arms. They are so beautiful that Pito’s eyes pop out
of his head. They ask, in sign language, if they could touch the baby. “Absolutely!” Pito replies in sign language. “Touch
the baby for as long as you want.”

The black women go ahead, caressing the baby’s arm very softly, talking to the baby in their language, smiling at the baby
smiling at them, breathing their mint-scented breath all over Pito, making his head spin with their heavy perfume.

Pito is in paradise. These women, top models for sure, would never in a million years have given Pito a second glance without
this baby in his arms. Actually, they wouldn’t have given him a
first
glance. Ah, if only Pito had known this earlier, he would have taken his children for lots of walks when they were babies.
He would have been more popular, instead of pretty-boy Ati getting all the attention.

But the beautiful black women have to go now and, adopting a sad face, they blow the beautiful baby a kiss, and another. The
grandfather too gets a kiss blown his way, and he’s still smiling minutes later, long after the angels have gone.

When he comes out of his reverie, he’s in front of the airport café, and who does he see sitting right out the back? Ati —
on his own.

That’s strange, Pito tells himself. Ati usually has company, and plus, he’s looking quite gloomy today. It’s a change from
smiling-with-all-his-teeth Ati. Smiling-with-all-his-teeth (because he has the apartment in town, the flashy car, the speedboat,
the women, the whole lot) Ati has occasionally gotten on Pito’s nerves. It’s nice to see Ati looking a bit normal. But still,
Pito hopes his best friend isn’t going through a depression.

“
Copain?
” Pito gently taps Ati on the shoulder, counting the empty coffee cups on the table. Eight.

“
Eh copain!
” Ati exclaims, smiling, but by the time Pito is sitting with his granddaughter on his lap, Ati’s face is long again.

“You’re fine?” Pito asks.

“I have nothing.” There, Ati has spoken.

“You have nothing?”

“Nothing,
copain;
no wife, no family, no nothing.” Ati goes on about how he used to look at men with children and think, I’m glad I’m not him.
But these days he thinks, I wish I was him. Here, what about his sister’s husband with his tribe of eight children? One day,
only last year, Ati’s brother-in-law came home from work while Ati was visiting his sister, and the eight children ran out
to their father and jumped on him, and Ati thought, I’m so glad I’m not him. Imagine being attacked like that every day. But
yesterday, Ati’s heart was full of envy for his brother-in-law. He thought, Imagine being greeted that way every day. When
Ati walks into his empty apartment, all he gets is a look of reproach from his dying plants.

“Look at what you’ve got, Pito,” Ati says with his sad voice. “A beautiful wife, three fantastic kids, and now this little
princess. Look at me, I’m going to be a lonely old man who scares children.”

“Ati, you’ve been drinking too much coffee.”

No response from Ati.

Pito has never seen Ati like this, but he will be the first to admit that Ati is reaping what he sowed. Pito can’t count on
his fingers the women his best friend has brought to tears. Hundreds? There were quite a few nice women willing to devote
their whole life to Ati, but
non,
Ati had to see if the next catch was better. And pretty-boy Ati is not getting any younger, though sometimes he believes
he is, chasing younger and younger women. Some of them a bit
too
young — green, far from being ripe — because, as Ati has said, “A man is only as old as the women he’s sleeping with.”

“I tell you,
copain,
” Ati declares with seriousness. “The next woman I meet is going to be my wife.”

“
Ah oui?
”

“
Oui,
this is my promise to you.”

“You don’t have to promise me anything, it’s your life.”

“The next woman I meet,” Ati repeats, “is going to be Madame Ramatui.”

“What about one of Materena’s cousins?” Pito says for a laugh. “That way we’re going to be in-laws.”

“Who do you have in mind?” Ati sounds interested.

“Loma?” Pito is still joking.

“Loma! Are you crazy?”

Pito cackles and thinks about Rita. If she weren’t with Coco, Pito would recommend (and highly) that Ati tries his luck with
her. Pito has always liked Rita. She has her feet on the ground, she’s a very nice person, and lately very pretty too. Rita
has lost even more weight in her quest of falling pregnant, something like sixty pounds! Coco must be dreading the day Rita
finally falls pregnant and starts eating for two again.

“Well, what about Lily?” Pito remembers that there was a time Ati liked Lily but was too intimidated to approach her. Ati
claimed at the time that Lily was out of his league, and plus, she only liked men in uniforms with medals. Ati was still tempted
to try his luck, with a bit of encouragement from Pito, but then he heard that Lily was a heartbreaker. And that was it, since
Ati is also a heartbreaker. You can’t have two heartbreakers breaking each other’s hearts.

Well, maybe Lily has changed, just as Ati has.

“Lily . . .” Ati looks up, pondering. “
Oui,
I could try my luck with her . . . but she doesn’t look like a woman who wants a family.”

“See if you can get into her pants first,” Pito says, shrugging, “then ask her nicely.”

“Can you organize something, then?” Ati asks, interested. This is Ati saying,
Oui,
I will try my hardest to get into Lily’s pants and then I will ask her very nicely to give me children.

Pito nods. He doesn’t mind playing Cupid. “We’ll eat at the house next week, I’ll get Materena to invite Lily . . . leave
it to me.”

L
ooking after a baby during your holidays can’t really be called a holiday, but it doesn’t mean that Pito is not enjoying the
first day of his well-deserved break from work, even if it involves changing diapers and making bottles.

It’s nice for a change to be the person who counts the most. Now, Pito isn’t saying that Tiare ignores her grandmother and
he’s not comparing at all, there’s no comparison to be made, but let’s just say that Pito has the magic touch with Tiare at
the moment. Whenever Tiare is in her bizarre mood, crying for no reason and fidgeting, Materena automatically passes the baby
to Pito. Luckily, so far, anyway, Tiare only does her theatrics when her grandfather is around. Time will tell how long Pito’s
magic touch will last.