The Aloha Spirit

by Linda Ulleseit

  “I met a boy that lives downstairs. He’ll be in my class at school.”

  “Consuela’s grandson?”

  Carmen nodded. “His mother works at the pickle place like you do. Anyway, Pedro says there is no Santa Claus. He says his mommy and daddy leave the presents.”

  Dolores didn’t know what to say. She’d worked hard to make Christmas and Santa special, hoping the girls would believe in magic as long as possible. Dolores brushed Carmen’s hair and counted out loud, a ploy to avoid answering. “Eighty-two, eighty-three….”

  “It’s okay, Mama. I won’t tell Betty. And if Daddy’s not here by Christmas, I’ll help you make Christmas presents for her.”

  Dolores set down the hairbrush and took Carmen in her arms. As she readied her girls for bed, she thought about Carmen’s words. Later, in the quiet apartment, she felt truly alone. She couldn’t even call Ruth or Maria to talk about her day. Grandma Jessie wasn’t just across the street. The wide net of uncles and aunts was too far away. And Alberto wasn’t on her couch. She vowed to make a home for her little family on her own.

  AT work, Dolores couldn’t wait to see Lucia. “My daughter Carmen met your son,” she said as she tied on her apron.

  Lucia nodded. “Pedro said he’d met the new girl upstairs.”

  Dolores laughed. “Your mother seems very nice.”

  “She’s a godsend. I never have to worry about Pedro while I’m at work.”

  The alarm klaxon sounded, and the conveyor belt moved. Both women stepped up to begin filling the day’s jars.

  “I worry about the girls when I’m here,” Dolores said. “I don’t like them alone all day until school starts. It will be Betty’s first year.” She smiled at Lucia. Two empty jars escaped past her.

  “Why not have Mama watch them? I’m sure she’d love to play with little girls for a change.”

  A tremendous weight slid off Dolores’s back. “Oh, what a good idea.”

  “I’ll speak to her tonight, then come upstairs and meet your girls.”

  Dolores grinned. “Wonderful!”

  ALL that summer, Dolores cleaned house at night while the girls slept. She ran to close the curtains when the approaching train whistled, trying to keep the soot out as best she could. Dolores struggled to balance household with workplace and keep everyone happy, healthy, and fed. Nowhere could she find time or energy to contemplate aloha.

  Paul took them to see Song of the Islands, with Betty Grable and Hilo Hattie, at his theater in Sunnyvale. Dolores enjoyed watching the girls with their uncle. She wished her niece could join them, but that would mean Sofia would come, too, and that would ruin the entire outing. The girls sang the movie’s silly songs for weeks, and it made Dolores miss her island home. This tiny apartment in Sunnyvale was not yet home although she tried her best to make it so.

  In the meantime, she heard nothing from Manolo. It reminded her of the years she had worked for Noelani and heard nothing from her father. The only difference was that she had longed to hear from her father while she dreaded any message from Manolo. She also didn’t hear from Ruth or Alberto. She imagined a chatty letter from Ruth that filled Dolores in on all the family gossip. In her heart, she imagined a letter from Alberto that told Dolores how much he missed her.

  School started in September. To Dolores’s dismay, she discovered Carmen’s fifth grade and Betty’s kindergarten would be at two different schools that started at different times in two different directions from home. After much consideration, she broached the subject to her girls at dinner one night.

  “I have to work to pay the bills, girls. You know I can’t stay home with you. Work starts long before you can be at school, and it’s too far, too dangerous for you to walk. Carmen, I know you wanted to go to school with Pedro, but his school doesn’t accept blind students. I think you both need to stay at home for now.”

  “Home?” Betty’s face threatened to crumple. “No school at all?” She’d been looking forward to school.

  “I’m sorry, darling. When your father comes, you can go to school.”

  “We understand, Mama,” Carmen said. “We’ll be good.” Her tone was calm, but her face was tragic. Carmen was terrible at controlling her face, maybe because she couldn’t see how emotions were reflected there.

  “Consuela will look after you.”

  Consuela refused any payment, but Dolores promised to bake her cookies as often as her ration book allowed. Dolores’s heart pained to see her girls having to spend so much time indoors. The neighborhood where they lived, though, was industrial. Too many big trucks and trains, too little grass for play.

  Every night the girls greeted her with smiles and stories about their day as if it had been the best day ever. Dolores’s heart swelled with pride and love as she took them in her arms. She worked hard to make a happy life for her little family. Sometimes she imagined Alberto coming home to her each day. She waited in vain for a letter from him, or from Ruth telling her about him.

  TWENTY-FIVE

  Christmas 1942

  In October, Dolores rushed downstairs to retrieve the laundry and arrived before the machine finished the load. She’d started dinner, and she didn’t like to leave the girls when the oven was on. When she returned Carmen was sitting on the couch holding Betty tightly on her lap. Dolores recognized the tactic. Carmen had exhausted reason with her sister and resorted to physical restraint.

  “Betty, have you been giving your sister a hard time?”

  “I wanted to cook dinner,” she said with a scowl.

  “I’ll take her, Carmen. Thank you for keeping her out of the kitchen.” Carmen released her sister and escaped to the other room. “Come on, sweetheart, you can help with dinner.”

  Dolores took Betty’s hand and they went into the tiny kitchen. Betty stood right behind Dolores as she opened the oven door and took out the pan with the chicken. Scents of garlic and onion and potato surrounded them. “Mmmm, smells good,” Dolores said.

  “Mmmm,” Betty mimicked.

  Dolores had been just a year older than this baby when Noelani put her in charge of laundry. She feared she’d coddled her youngest. “Come here, Betty. Let me show you how to cook this.”

  Dolores put the six-year-old’s hand on the big wooden spoon and folded her own hand over it. The two hands reminded her of Grandma Jessie with her battered silver spoon. How many children and grandchildren had the older woman taught to cook? Slowly Dolores and her youngest daughter stirred the chicken broth in the pan and spooned it over the chicken. Together they scooped the onions out of the broth and put them in a bowl. “Good job! Can you go tell your sister now that dinner is ready?”

  Betty beamed at her mother and scampered off. Dolores put the chicken on the cutting board and sliced enough for dinner. Tomorrow she’d make soup from the carcass and leftover meat. She could stop at the corner market on the way home for carrots and celery. With careful planning, this bird could last more than a couple of days.

  At dinner, the girls chattered about Halloween.

  “I want to be a princess,” Carmen declared, “with a pretty dress and a crown.”

  “I think we can manage that,” Dolores told her. “And maybe we can make your good shoes fancy enough for a princess. How about you, Betty?”

  “I want to be a witch!” She widened her eyes and showed her teeth and cackled.

  “I can make you a witch’s hat and cape. And you can use my kitchen broom,” Dolores said.

  After dinner they snuggled on the couch and listened to Fibber McGee and Molly on the radio. The girls laughed at everything that fell out of his closet. Sundays were their only days together, the only day Dolores wasn’t working. Between church, laundry, and cleaning, Dolores made sure she saved time just for them. Sunday evening time was as sacred as church in the morning.

  In the morning, Dolores let Betty sleep in but woke Carmen to let her know she was going to work. Carmen got up, her hair mussed and her eyes half open.

  “I put out
the Rice Krispies,” Dolores told her. She knew Carmen could manage cereal for both of them. Dolores hated leaving them for six days of twelve-hour shifts and thanked God every day for Consuela. “Bye, darling.” Dolores kissed Carmen on the top of her head.

  As Dolores reached the bottom of the stairs, Consuela opened her door.

  “Buenos dias, Dolores. Do you have time for coffee?”

  “Oh, no, I don’t, Consuela. I would love to, but I have to get to work.”

  “Lucia left twenty minutes ago. You go. I’ll see to the girls.”

  “My brother, Paul, might come by today.”

  “Ah, yes,” she nodded in recognition. “The tall one with the brown hair.”

  “Yes, that’s him. I really must go. Thank you so much.”

  Dolores ran all the way to the bus stop so she didn’t miss the bus she needed. At work she hummed, and the other girls teased her about having a boyfriend. None of them believed she had a husband. What would they say if they knew the man she wanted in her arms was not her husband?

  That night Dolores fell asleep during a radio comedy. When she woke up, the room was dark, but the curtains were still open. The radio was playing war news. She shut it off. In the girls’ room, Carmen and Betty were in their pajamas and saying their prayers. Dolores stood in the doorway and watched, her heart spilling over with aloha. She could do it. She could run her life without Manolo. Dolores could almost hear Alberto telling her to stay the course and weather the storm. Her heart flipped over at the image. She smiled and blew kisses to her girls.

  When the girls were asleep, Dolores made soup from the chicken. After it had simmered for an hour, she put it in two bowls, one for their dinner tomorrow and one for Consuela. Finally, Dolores fell into bed like a stone.

  The next day, she came home to two chattering girls. “Look, Mama,” Betty said, pulling her by the hand. “Consuela brought cookies. Carmen said we couldn’t have any without asking you.”

  “That was very grown up of Carmen,” Dolores said. The cookies were homemade shortbread. Consuela had used her rationed butter and sugar to make them. Dolores ate one and gave each of the girls one to eat before dinner. They were wonderful.

  Over the next few weeks, Dolores settled into a routine. Paul stopped by during the days she worked, just to check on the girls. Consuela kept them at her place for much of the day, and Carmen did a great job of entertaining her sister. Dolores was proud of how they all managed. In Honolulu, the girls had been too busy with cousins, with aunts and uncles coming and going, to miss their father. They noticed his absence more now. Dolores felt guilty that she continued to pray he’d stay in Hawai‘i.

  “Mama, when’s Papa coming?” Betty asked her every night as Dolores tucked her in to bed after they said their prayers.

  Dolores wanted to answer with a flip response like “When pigs fly,” but she couldn’t. “He’ll be here soon, darling. He has to sell all our furniture. That might be hard during wartime when everyone is trying to sell stuff and come to California.”

  “Do you think he’s all right, Mama? It’s just that today is Friday the thirteenth, and I don’t want bad luck to bother Papa when we aren’t there.”

  Stunned for a moment, Dolores couldn’t believe she’d forgotten the unlucky day. She’d never done that before. “Grandma Jessie gave him a rabbit’s foot, too, right? Did you have yours today?”

  “I made sure,” Carmen said, pulling her own out from under her pillow.

  Betty’s little face twisted in concentration. “Do you think he remembers us?”

  “Of course, he does. He misses us all very much, I’m sure.” Dolores gave her a kiss on her forehead and the furrows of worry eased.

  “Sleep now, sweetheart. Think of Papa in your dreams.”

  As Christmas approached, Dolores got creative with her budget. She wanted the girls to have a real California Christmas. They hadn’t brought toys with them from Honolulu. They needed winter clothes, too. She bought a doll for her niece, a bottle of inexpensive perfume for Sofia, and a tie for Paul.

  Using two weeks’ worth of her sugar ration, Dolores made an eggless chocolate cake to bring to Paul’s for Christmas dinner. Last year, she’d made a similar cake for their family picnic at Kapi‘olani Park as Honolulu had been reeling from the attack on Pearl Harbor. She knew she could be just as content without Manolo this year but wasn’t sure the girls would agree.

  Paul had decked his house in electric Christmas lights that made Betty’s eyes go wide with delight. Inside, a large fir tree stood in the front room. Gaily wrapped presents covered the red blanket underneath it. Old European glass ornaments that must have been in Sofia’s family for generations hung from the tree’s branches. Dolores had gone to Sears for ornaments to put on the tiny tree in her apartment. She was disappointed that the familiar shiny balls weren’t shiny. A clerk explained that the factory couldn’t get any silver to coat the inside of the glass globes. All metal was going to the war effort. Even the caps and hooks on the ornaments were made of cardboard.

  “Mele Kalikimaka, Auntie Sofia,” Betty called as she dragged Carmen to the tree. “Pretty, Carmen! The tree is so pretty!”

  “What did she say?” Sofia asked coldly.

  “Mele Kalikimaka is Hawaiian for Merry Christmas,” Dolores said.

  “In America we speak English,” Sofia said.

  Dolores clenched her teeth and smiled.

  “It’s Christmas, ladies,” Paul said. “Would you like a martini, Dolores?”

  “Thank you, Paul,” Dolores said, resisting the urge to say mahalo.

  “I may need more than one,” Sofia said.

  Dolores could almost hear the hmph at the end of her sentence. She ignored her sister-in-law and joined her daughters by the tree. Little Dolores hung back. She leaned against the couch instead of kneeling on the floor to inspect packages like her cousins. “Betty, why don’t you show Dolores the present we brought for her?”

  Betty spotted the package with its homemade bow and handed it to Dolores. The girl took it reluctantly, eyes on her mother.

  “Put it under the tree, darling,” Sofia said. “We’ll open the presents after dinner.”

  Dinner was a surprise. Honolulu had never rationed food, just gasoline. The island hadn’t needed it since so few supplies made their way to the islands. Besides, Hawai‘i had an abundance of bananas, mangoes, papayas, and other fruit growing everywhere. In California, Dolores dealt with ration books, and learned to plan meals. Nonetheless, Sofia’s meager Christmas dinner surprised her.

  Dolores’s chicken from the week before was almost bigger than the turkey. No more than two cobs of corn had contributed to the bowl of kernels. The gravy was thin. Conversely, a giant bowl of mashed potatoes dwarfed the other items. Dolores hoped her daughters wouldn’t say anything rude. She let Paul serve the food and took his lead on portions. Little Dolores didn’t eat as much as her cousins. Dolores thought rapidly. She might have to feed them more when they got home. What did she have in the cupboard?

  “How’s the movie theater business?” Dolores asked her brother as she cut her turkey.

  “People still love going to the movies. One of the few pleasures during wartime. We show newsreels between features though. How about your work at the plant?”

  “It’s the same every day,” Dolores said. “Not so bad once you get used to standing all day.”

  Sofia broke in. “As fascinating as this discussion is, can we focus on eating the Lord’s bounty?”

  Dolores stared. Sofia wanted them to eat Christmas dinner in silence? She tried to imagine Noelani’s brood keeping silent for a whole meal and had to stifle a laugh. The Medeiros clan, too. They would have looked at her in shock had she suggested such a thing as a silent meal. Alberto’s eyes would light up with the wicked twinkle that warned her he was about to tease her. But they weren’t in Honolulu anymore.

  Betty looked at her with big round eyes, and Dolores nodded. Both girls kept their eyes on their plates.
Little Dolores did the same. Forks clinked against plates as they ate. Dolores had never realized they did that.

  As the family finished eating, Dolores stood and gathered her plate and those of her children. She took them to the kitchen, rinsed them, and stacked them on the counter to wash later. Returning to the dining room, she asked, “Sofia, should I cut the cake now?”

  Sofia gave her a look that indicated Dolores was in the wrong somehow. Dolores took a deep breath and reminded herself it was Christmas. Before she could respond, though, the doorbell rang. Sofia’s frown deepened as Paul got up to see who it was.

  “Mele Kalikimaka, Paul.”

  Dolores closed her eyes and took a deep breath as her heart stopped beating and her stomach flipped on its side.

  The girls’ eyes opened wide and they ran to the door.

  “Papa, Papa!” Betty careened into him, hugging his legs.

  Carmen stood by the table with Dolores, her face glowing and her arms stretched wide.

  “Aloha, my darling!” Manolo said over and over.

  He came into the dining room and smiled when he saw Dolores. He greeted her with a kiss. No alcohol on his breath. Dolores smiled. She looked past Manolo, hoping someone else had come, too, but her husband was alone.

  “Merry Christmas, Manolo.” Dolores hated that her voice sounded as cold and detached as Sofia’s.

  “Have you eaten?” Sofia asked. “There’s food left.”

  “And a chocolate cake,” Dolores added. She went to the kitchen and found plates and forks. She took her time cutting the cake she’d brought and listened with mixed feelings as Manolo talked to her brother about his voyage and job prospects.

  Manolo was smart. He would get a job, and the money would help. But how long before he found new drinking buddies?

  TWENTY-SIX

  California 1944

  Manolo found a job and worked hard at Hendy’s Ironworks in Sunnyvale. He dressed in a white shirt and tie, neat as a pin, even when he wasn’t going to the office. Best of all, Manolo came home sober. He charmed Consuela, who made him something special to eat every couple of days. Dolores reduced her hours at work but refused to quit. She treasured Betty’s beaming face as the girl entered her kindergarten class in January. Carmen smiled just as widely when Pedro’s teacher made an exception and allowed Carmen to join her fourth graders.