4 Kaua'i Me a River (5 page)

CHAPTER
5

When I awoke Tuesday morning,
Hatch was already in the kitchen. I tip-toed toward the bathroom to make myself
presentable, but he stepped in front of me before I got there.  

“Two sugars, extra creamer,” he
said handing me a cup of coffee.

“
Mahalo
,” I said. I could
only imagine what I looked like after the three
mai tais
I’d sucked down
at dinner the night before, but Hatch seemed to take my disheveled appearance
in stride.

We sat on the sofa and sipped
our coffee. The coffee table was littered with stacks of tourist information
Hatch had picked up from a display in the lobby. He picked up a handful of brochures
and fanned them out in front of me.

“How about a helicopter ride?”
he said. “You ever been up in a chopper?”

I didn’t want to let on I’d gone
on my first helicopter ride six months earlier with Ono Kingston, a friend of
mine who’d made it clear he’d like to take our relationship to the next level. 
 

“I bet this island’s gorgeous
from the air,” I said, avoiding the question.

“Yeah. This is the perfect place
for helicopters,” Hatch said. “Lots of inaccessible cliffs and tons of great waterfalls.
You don’t think you’ll get airsick or anything, right?”

I screwed up my face. “Airsick?
Are you serious?” Hatch knew I’d worked as a federal air marshal after college.
In air marshal training they’d thrown everything they had at us to make us get
sick, disoriented or scared. I passed without a whimper. No way I’d give them
the satisfaction. I still say they pushed the female recruits twice as hard as
the guys.

“Great,” he said. “Which company
do you want to go with?” He plucked out three brochures.

I put down my coffee mug. “Let’s
take this one, Safari Helicopters,” I said. “They say they have the smoothest
ride. I’ll be fine, but I don’t want you tossing your plate lunch if we hit a
downdraft.”

An hour later we pulled up at the
helicopter tour office. The tour began with an entertaining FAA briefing about
wearing the life preserver, how to enter and exit the aircraft and what to
expect on the ride. I think ‘entertaining’ was the operative word, since it
seemed they’d learned if you want people to pay attention to the safety
information you need to present it in an amusing way.

“Okay guys and gals,” said the
briefing guy. “The ride you’re about to go on is all about color. We got green
in the valleys and our beautiful blue sky and ocean. We even got pink, red and
brown up in Waimea Canyon. But in the unlikely event of a water landing, do you
know what your favorite color will be?” He reached down and picked up a bright yellow
pouch the size of a hardback book. “That’s right, people—sunshine yellow!” He
demonstrated how to don the vest over your head and clip on the waist belt.
“Now for those who are worried about packing on a few inches on vacation, take
heart. You’ll be wearing this baby around your waist for the entire flight
today. When the ride’s over and you take it off you’re gonna feel so skinny
you’ll feel like ordering
both
the mac salad and rice with your lunch.”  

The briefing went on like that
for about ten minutes. Then we trooped out to the van and the guy drove us to a
helipad at the edge of the Lihue airport tarmac. I looked up and hoped the
helicopter pilot was as mindful of the planes swooping by overhead as I was.

The briefing guy gave us each a
number so we could be seated according to weight. Back at the tour office a potential
female passenger who my Auntie Mana would’ve described as an ‘
ali’i
-sized
girl’ had expressed dismay at being asked to step on a scale.

“No worries,” said the equally
ali’i
-sized
gal working behind the desk. “See? There’s no numbers on the scale.”

She was right. The read-out was
discretely positioned so only the gal behind the desk could see how much each
person weighed. She’d assigned the seats accordingly and now we were taking our
positions alongside the helicopter.

I got number five and Hatch was
six. I figured that meant we’d be in the back since the helicopter only held six
passengers. But as they loaded everyone in, it soon became clear we’d be
sitting in front. I was positioned next to the pilot. The large bubble window
gave me a perfect one-eighty view.

“Welcome aboard,” the pilot said
as we got in and put on our headsets. I slipped into my shoulder harness and
clipped on my seat belt.

“Hey,” I said. “Good to be
here.” But then I realized no one could hear me. Only the pilot had a mic on
his headset. The passenger voices were lost in the
whoosh, whoosh, whoosh
of the slowly turning rotors.

When the bird lifted off, I
remembered how effortless flying in a helicopter felt. The pilot said it would
feel like riding a magic carpet. I thought that sounded a little too cute, but
kept it to myself. He said if we had questions to use the handheld mics in
front of us. There was one in the front and one in the back. We flew up and over
the resorts of Poipu. The pilot asked each couple where they were staying and
he pointed out each resort from the air.

We flew into brilliant green
canyons cut deep with sheer cliffs on all sides. As we shot up the cliff sides
to get into the next canyon I found myself lifting my toes to help the
helicopter clear the treetops.

Waterfalls and rainbows popped
into view as we glided in and out of the canyons. Even though I’d scoffed at
the pilot’s ‘magic carpet’ remark, I was starting to agree.

We approached the North Shore
and I peered down at the beach bordered by deep green jungle and tried to find
a recognizable landmark. I picked up the handheld mic and pushed the ‘talk’
button.

“Have you ever heard of Taylor
Camp?” I said.

“Sure,” said the pilot. “It’s
pretty much gone now, but back in the seventies a bunch of hippies lived up
there. They built amazing tree houses. The guy who owned the land, Howard
Taylor, was the brother of actress Elizabeth Taylor.”

“Isn’t it around here
somewhere?” I said into the mic.

“Yep, hold on.”

He pulled the joystick back and
left and the helicopter wheeled into a tight turn. Even with my headset on and
the rotors roaring I could hear the people in the back go, “Whoa” as my stomach
lurched with the turn.

“It’s right down there. Do you
see that stretch of sand? That’s Ke’e Beach Park. Taylor’s Camp was around
there somewhere. I think if you want to see it, the trail’s still visible. But I’m
not sure. I’ve never been up there.”

We swooped over a cluster of
buildings and homes set along a wide bay. “That’s the little town of Hanalei
down there,” said the pilot. “Anybody know what Hanalei’s known for?”

I let someone else get credit
for knowing about “Puff the Magic Dragon.”

The pilot nodded. “Yeah, that’s
from the old days. How about more recently? Did anyone see the movie, ‘The
Descendants’? Hanalei is where George Clooney tracked down the guy who was
having an affair with his wife.”

The large-size woman in the back
picked up the mic. When she got it to work she said, “That woman should get her
eyes checked. You’d have to be blind to cheat on George Clooney.”

We flew straight toward a thin
ribbon of waterfall streaming down thousands of feet from a dark green cleft in
the side of Mount Wai’ale’ale. As we headed deeper and deeper into the canyon the
pilot said, “Mount Wai’ale’ale is one of the wettest spots on earth. Its
reported rainfall is over four hundred inches a year.” At the last possible
moment he nimbly turned the chopper around and headed back out and I allowed
myself to exhale.

 We left the mountains and
skimmed over flat green fields on our way back to the airport. The pilot said,
“Anyone want to guess how fast we’re going?”

I looked at the gauges and saw
one labeled “KIAS.” In airspeed the value is measured in knots per hour, not
miles per hour. In air marshal training we’d been given a rudimentary flying
lesson. They’d told us they never expected us to fly a jumbo jet or anything,
but they wanted us to at least be able to communicate with air traffic control.
I took the lesson seriously. It wasn’t that hard for me to imagine I might be
asked to land a plane someday.

“Eighty miles an hour?” said a
guy in the back.

“Nope,” said the pilot. He
looked over at me. “How about you? Care to take a guess?”

I flicked on the mic and checked
the speedometer again. “Well, it reads one-hundred thirty knots indicated
airspeed. So, that would be about a hundred and fifty miles per hour.”

“You’re pretty good,” he said giving
me a big smile. “Are you a pilot?”

Hatch tapped me on the shoulder
and gestured for me to hand him the mic. “No,” he said. “She’s not a pilot;
she’s a wedding planner. She’s used to answering dumb-ass questions.”

The pilot shot a look at Hatch.
Then he squinted in concentration and dropped the bird dead-center on the
landing pad.

***

“Whew. That was great,” I said after
Hatch and I had gotten far enough away from the rotor wash that we could hear
each other.

“Glad you liked it. Now let’s see
how much of this island we can cover from ground level.”

We stopped in a few of the
funkier shops in Kapa’a and then drove up to Kilauea. At the lighthouse
overlook we peered through the binoculars and saw albatrosses and red-footed
boobies on the massive rock cliffs. On our way back to the highway, we turned
in at the historic Kong Lung shopping center and Hatch bought me a gorgeous
silk-screened kimono with flamingo-pink lotus flowers.

“I think we should drive up to
Hanalei so you can check out where you’ll be going tomorrow morning,” said
Hatch.

I agreed, but as we descended into
the Hanalei Valley from cliffs of Princeville I felt my heart rate increase and
my fingers turn to ice. At the one-lane bridge on the outskirts of Hanalei we
had to stop for road construction.

“You okay?” said Hatch, reaching
over to take my hand. “You’ve been awful quiet. You know I’m willing to come with
you tomorrow if you want. I can poke around town while you’re at the lawyer’s.”

“
Mahalo
, but I’ll be
fine.”

We crossed the bridge and made
our way into town. By the time we found the address of the attorney’s office,
my stomach was roiling.

“You want to stop and check it
out?” Hatch said as we slowly drove past the brown two-story building.

“No, thanks. But I sure wish
that lawyer would’ve told me what this was about. Being back here brings up a
lot of stuff I’d rather not think about. I remember thinking if I could hold my
breath long enough, I could die and go be with my mother. A suicidal
five-year-old. How sick is that?”

“It’s not sick,” said Hatch.
“You were a little kid. Little kids need their moms.”

Hatch pulled into a parking spot
at the Ching Young Center.  “Hey,” he said. “You want to look around or have
you had enough?”

“I had enough of this place thirty
years ago.” Where had that come from? As soon as it was out of my mouth I felt
like I’d disrespected my mother’s memory. “I didn’t mean that. What I meant
was…” I stopped, unsure of what to say next.

“Hey, no worries,” he said. “Let’s
head back to Poipu. You’ll be back here soon enough.”

I nodded.

***

That night as we got ready for
bed, Hatch leaned over and kissed me. “It’s been great hanging out with you,”
he said. “I, uh…” He didn’t go on.

“Are you okay?” I said.

“Yeah, I just like being here
with you, that’s all.”

 We got into bed and, as usual,
he was his loving, tender self. But I could tell something was on his mind. I
had my own stuff rattling around my head, but I’d promised myself I wouldn’t allow
it to take over. Farrah would’ve been pleased I’d finally taken her advice about
‘staying in the present.’ Distracted or not, Hatch and I both managed to ‘stay
in the present’ for more than an hour.

CHAPTER
6

Wednesday dawned overcast and
cool for an end-of-June day. If I’d been working I’d probably be trying to
convince a tearful bride that rain on her wedding day meant good luck in the
marriage. I don’t have any evidence it’s true, but I’ve used that line more times
than I can count since island showers occur much more frequently than the Hawaii
Tourist Bureau will own up to.

Hatch got up and made coffee. While
I was finishing my shower he brought a cup into the bathroom. I wrapped a towel
around my head and put on my new lotus flower kimono which I’d already dubbed
my ‘lucky kimono.’ Without a word he took me in his arms and I nuzzled into his
chest. All I could hear was the drip, drip, drip of the shower and his strong
slow heartbeat.

“You gonna be okay today?” he
finally said.

“Yeah. I’m good. How about you?
What are you going to do while I’m gone?”

“I called the fire station up
the road and they’ve got a softball game against some off-duty cops from Lihue.
They said they’d loan me a glove if I wanted to play.”

“Will you be finished in time to
make our flight at five?”

“It starts at ten-thirty so even
if it goes to extra innings we should be done by one. Then we’ll probably grab
some pizza. Worst case, I’ll be back here by three.”

I bit the side of my lip.

“I know, it’s not fair,” he said.
“Me playing while you suffer. But the offer’s still open if you want me to go
up there with you.”

“
Mahalo
, but I’ll be fine.”

While I got dressed Hatch made
breakfast. Fresh papaya with lime, scrambled eggs and Hawaiian sweet bread
toast and guava jelly.

I pushed the eggs around on my
plate for awhile but couldn’t bring myself to actually take a bite.