Authors: Everett Peacock
Idyllic
tropical splendor - well everyone needed some of that, or so went the
theory. Star had seen many a visitor come, snorkel, throw a BBQ in a
vacation rental and leave. Sunburned. Yet, there were always the
few that might under different circumstances move here, and fit in
just fine. They could be seen stopping to pick up a plumeria blossom
from the path through the old lava, or leaving the salt water on
their skin as long as possible before showering. Star had seen them
sitting alone, sharing a papaya with the mynah birds, or shifting
through the beach sand with their fingers, not really looking for a
shell, but enjoying the textures.
Those
visitors, she could sense, almost felt that they must have been here
before. How else could it seem so comfortable and so familiar?
Familiar in a fashion that their hearts told them this was how they
were meant to live, by the sea, under the moon, awash in wonder.
Janet
was one of those, Star thought. One of those most fortunate lost
souls that had stumbled upon this place before it was too late.
Too
late came in at least two different flavors here. The first kind of
too late was where a visitor or a tourist had become so jaded by the
harshness of the outside world that they couldn't appreciate what
Kapoho had to show them.
The
other kind of too late could be observed by simply looking across the
small bay to the thirty foot tall lava flow that had covered one half
of this pristine paradise back in 1960. Star's parent's house was
under there somewhere, what hadn't been burned. They had lived right
on a beautiful sandy beach, with a peaceful little stream flowing
from a large pond to the ocean. Star used to catch little fish there
as a child and release them up stream again.
Her
parents had never really recovered, emotionally or financially. They
moved to Honolulu, soon divorced and eventually both fled to the
mainland. Her younger brother had ended up in Flagstaff.
Star
found herself thinking about that too much for her liking and tried
to redirect her thoughts. It was what it was, she figured. Mother
had to destroy in order to create. As noble as that might sound, she
thought as she chased a yellow striped butterfly fish, it was still
painful.
Star
continued to watch Janet swim in the pools long after having climbed
out to sun herself in the late morning warmth. No one else was
around. No one else on the entire planet but Star, Janet, the baby
and of course, me.
~~~
I
had been sensing the baby every moment I could. Janet was still
clueless, but Star sure seemed to be paying a lot of attention to
Janet and her situation.
It
was an enchanting situation for me. The baby could now tell when I
was focused on it, well I mean him. I now knew a little bit more
about him. He would always laugh when he felt me there, then would
start his singing again. Of course he wasn't singing any words, so
humming was probably a better analogy.
The
light above me, the one I figured I would eventually have to go to,
was getting a bit closer. Now, with my discovery of the baby, I
wasn't so keen on making my way there. I figured I could just hang
out, maybe be one of those helpful souls that whispers into the ears
of the living.
Janet
sure seemed happy; at least the static had been gone for many days
now. Perhaps it was some of the baby's energy leaking into her
emptiness that helped. As I moved slowly through the papaya trees
following her, and the baby, I could feel them both changing. Janet
was becoming calmer and the baby was now looking for me, seeking me
out before I would come in close to focus. We were having a big
time, and I was as happy as I could ever remember being.
~~~
Star
noticed Janet suddenly get out of the water, take a few steps
forward, stumble and fall into the ferns. Immediately she jumped up
and ran as best she could over the boulders lining the pools to where
Janet was now vomiting.
“
Jimmie!
What's going... Are you OK?”
Janet
looked up briefly, some fear in her eyes, before pointing her face
back down to the moist jungle soil and heaving again. “I don't
understand,” she managed to say.
“
What
Jimmie?” Star asked, stroking her back until the convulsions
stopped.
“
I
quit drinking over a week ago...why am I still...” The spasms
rocked her again, and then right before Star, she collapsed,
unconscious.
“
Jimmie!”
Star yelled, the nervousness in her voice quickly moving to fear.
“Jimmie!”
Two
of Star's fishermen friends heard her and rushed over to help.
Moments
later Star and Janet were in the car, headed up to Pahoa town,
fifteen minutes away. There Star had a doctor friend with a small
lab. He was known to all who cared to ask, as a doctor who gave the
uninsured a break. Cash and often barter of some kind could secure
enough expert advice to keep everyone's low-rent lifestyle going.
An
hour later, with Janet comfortable and awake on a couch Star was
called into his office.
“
Starshine,”
he said in his booming voice. “This was no false alarm, you
did the right thing getting her in here when you did.”
“
Really?
I just met her a week or so ago, walking in the rain, on the run
from some heavies. I just guessed she was strung out and detoxing a
bit.”
The
good doctor looked up at Starshine and smiled. She would have made a
great social worker, or a nurse. “Well, there is some
confidential information I can only release to a relative.” He
walked around his desk and sat on the outer edge. “Are you her
mother?” he suggested.
“
Perhaps
I am,” Star smiled. “I sure feel like it, anyhow.”
“
Good,”
the doctor laughed. “Well, you're about to be a grandmother.”
“
I
knew it!” Star exclaimed. “I knew it. How far along is
she?”
“
Well,
I must say her prenatal healthcare seems to have been not only
non-existent but almost abusive. She is probably twenty pounds shy
of where she should be at five months.” He went back to his
desk and sat heavily into his chair. “Her blood work says she
is nutritionally deficient on just about every point we measure.
And,
I would guess she has been doing some kind of drugs. Most likely
alcohol.”
Star
shook her head. “You know doc, I don't even think she realizes
she is pregnant.” She looked up at him to see just how crazy
that sounded to him.
“
Yeah,
well I wouldn't be surprised. She's not showing much, she was
probably drinking like a fish I would guess, and she seems a bit
disconnected. I asked her several questions, you know, about who is
the President, what month it is. That kind of thing.
In
my opinion she is probably not competent to take care of herself,
much less a baby.”
The
doctor leaned back in his chair, put his feet up on his weathered
desk and asked “So, Star. Whatya doing for the next eighteen
years?”
Star
laughed out loud, perhaps a little too loud. “I probably don't
even have eighteen more years in me, Doc!” She looked toward
the closed door separating them from Janet. “Why don't you
give her the good news?”
He
looked down at his desk for a brief moment, not wanting to, but knew
it was part of the job. “How do you think she's gonna take it,
Star?”
Star
reached up to scratch her head and hunched her shoulders. Walking
over to the door to open it, she mumbled. “Let's go find out.”
~~~
Larry
had his feet up on the small handmade bench he had crafted for just
such a purpose. As such it was perfectly comfortable.
“
Shirley,
if you wanted to get rid of something, forever, what would you do
with it?”
She
looked at Larry for a moment longer than he had expected and with a
bit of a frown she scolded him for asking such a thing.
“
Larry!
First of all, I don't have such things that need to be disposed of
forever
.
Second, what could you ever be talking about?”
Larry
didn't answer. He took a long sip of his coffee, hoping his silence
would answer her question.
“
You
were saying something crazy was going on at the cabins,”
Shirley reminded him. “Is that what you're talking about?”
Larry
took another big scoop out of the pinkish red papaya and slipped it
into his mouth as he looked over at his wife with a mischievous grin.
She
lowered her eyebrows at him and he raised his at her.
“
Well?”
she asked, losing just enough patience for her interest in the story
to wane.
Sensing
his audience about to leave, he decided to step it up a bit. “Look,
Alex got a message from some Sergeant at Ft. Bragg. A soldier that
was supposed to show up there didn't, because he was still registered
at a cabin there at KMC.”
Shirley
took a sip of her coffee and watched him over the edge of her cup,
half expecting him to say they found someone dead inside the cabin.
“
Well,
this missing soldier, apparently, hasn't been there for a while, and
a girl, some crazy redhead that was staying in the same cabin has
been masquerading as this same soldier.”
Shirley
nodded a bit. “OK, this is interesting. What else?”
She set her coffee on the table next to her and picked up her papaya
and spoon.
“
This
missing soldier was last seen, supposedly, by some tourists from the
Lava Lounge...” Larry paused there, quite possibly for
dramatic effect.
“
Yes,
yes? Last seen...where?” Shirley demanded, now quite
interested.
“
Last
seen hiking into the Halema'uma'u crater restricted area, at
night...” Larry continued, pausing yet again.
“
OK,
what? What?” Shirley was leaning on the arm of her chair now.
“
Heading
to the lava pit with this same crazy redhead, never apparently, to be
seen again.”
“
No
kidding?” Shirley sat back in her chair thinking about that
one. “Wait though, I thought the Rangers kept a lookout on
that kind of stuff. No one can get to the crater without getting
spotted. Right?”
“
Yeah,
well, it looks like they did. I was up with Jack in the Jagger the
night those tourists spotted them. We were counting heads to make
sure whatever insane people hiked in would also leave. But, the rain
got heavy and we lost count.”