In 1944, when Carmen finished sixth grade and Betty second, they bought a house in the last block of South 21st Street in San Jose. Manolo said nothing about their belongings in Hawai‘i. Dolores chose to believe he’d sold everything and put the money toward the new house. It sat on the corner of South 21st and a narrow half-paved alley. The house had two bedrooms, a laundry room, and living room. Off the kitchen, was a bathroom with a big claw-footed tub. Dolores spent a morning walking through the house dreaming of the future and then buckled down to cleaning it top to bottom.
Carmen helped with the housework and her sister. Since her sight was limited, she scrubbed the floor on her hands and knees, often in the dark.
“My little menehune,” Dolores teased her oldest. “You clean in the dark when no one is watching.”
“More like The Elves and the Shoemaker, Mama,” Carmen said. “They cleaned overnight while the family slept. Besides, I’d rather be an elf.”
“Either way, you will be a wonderful wife someday.”
“Wife! I don’t even have a boyfriend yet!”
“You’ll have to find one who’s not afraid of menehune.”
“Mama!”
Dolores laughed, and Carmen’s devilish smile rewarded her. It was a smile she’d seen often on Alberto but never on Manolo. Dolores remembered how Alberto would laugh at the girls’ antics and encourage them to play hard. How he would enjoy seeing how they’d grown.
During this time in California, the war seemed far away. Dolores experienced rationing and empty store shelves and fear of Japanese bombs, but the only daily evidence of war was an occasional blimp leaving Moffett Field to patrol the coast. Blimps never got her heart racing like squads of fighter planes over Honolulu or barbed wire fences along Waikiki. On June 6, though, the radio and newspapers erupted with news of D-Day. It reminded Dolores of Pearl Harbor, far away yet ever present.
July proved to be a bearer of more bad news. Two ammunition ships exploded at Port Chicago, in Concord, only an hour north of them in California. Two-thirds of the men who died were Negroes. When fifty Negro survivors refused to return to work, they were court-martialed.
“Negroes and Chicanos don’t get no respect,” Lucia told Dolores at work. Her hands deftly swooped over the pickles. “Our men serve country, die for country, but our families live under suspicion and distrust.”
“Japanese, too,” Dolores said, “now that we are at war. It was different in Honolulu.” Her hands were as quick as Lucia’s as they worked.
“Different how? I would expect people there to hate the Japanese, too.”
“Oh, there’s plenty of fear. Honolulu has always had a wide diversity of races though. I speak bits of Hawaiian, Spanish, Portuguese, and pidgin. I know words in Japanese and Chinese, too. No race is a target until a disaster happens. After Pearl Harbor, everyone became afraid of the Japanese. But I was never afraid of my neighbor Yoshiko or her sons. After Port Chicago, people are afraid of blacks.”
“And in LA, the zoot suiters are stirring up hatred for Chicanos.”
“Stay above it all,” Dolores advised. “Love everyone, even if it’s hard. That’s aloha.”
“Crazy Hawaiian,” Lucia teased.
The Port Chicago explosion was big news, but the personal bad news came later when Dolores returned home from work. It was that time of day when the girls were excited to share their day, but she was so tired she couldn’t process what they were saying and think about fixing dinner at the same time. The phone rang, offering a brief respite from the whirl.
“Ruth! So good to hear from you!”
“I’m sorry, Dolores. It’s not as good as you think.” Ruth’s voice choked with tears.
“What’s wrong?”
“Grandma Jessie passed away yesterday.”
“Oh!” Dolores sucked in air as her eyes widened in shock. She couldn’t picture Grandma Jessie’s kitchen without her. “Oh, no, Ruth, I’m so sorry.”
“She was only sixty-one. She died at home with family.”
“That’s what she would have wanted.” What would the family do without its matriarch? “May God bless her and welcome her to heaven.” Dolores made the sign of the cross.
Ruth filled in the details of Grandma Jessie’s passing, the service, and the family’s reactions. “Antonio and Helen are getting some pushback from my brothers about the house. The Rodrigues family still lives there. Some of the family believe one of my brothers should have the house now.”
“I don’t understand. Helen’s your sister. Why shouldn’t her family live there?”
“João and Frank say the Rodrigues boys get everything. Alberto just laughs. He never takes anything seriously.”
“Alberto can’t possibly be getting any more now than he was before.”
“People argue when someone they love dies. It’s sad. This, too, will pass. Gotta go before I spend the family fortune on this call. Bye, Dolores.”
“Mahalo, Ruth, for calling us.” She hung up the phone and called the girls into the kitchen.
Carmen, at twelve, was tall and lanky like a colt. Her blue eyes sometimes slid to the side and revealed their lack of vision, but her hair was always brushed. Betty still had a round face and chubby cheeks, even at eight. She always had some sort of stray animal to care for. Today she held a frog. Normally Dolores would make her take it outside, but today the news wouldn’t wait.
“Mama, are you crying?” Carmen asked.
“Yes, darling. Come here.” Dolores enfolded both her girls in a big hug. “That was Auntie Ruth on the phone. She called to tell us Grandma Jessie died.” Her voice cracked.
“She’s not at home anymore?” Betty wanted to know.
“No,” Carmen’s voice was harsh with emotion. “We won’t see her again. Ever.”
“But I love her.” Betty’s round eyes filled with tears.
“We all do, darling, and we will forever,” Dolores said, “but she’s gone to be with God.” She laid her cheek on Carmen’s head and held them as the girls cried. She stifled her own tears to murmur soothing words to her girls.
That night dinner consisted of grilled cheese sandwiches and Campbell’s tomato soup. Manolo raised an eyebrow when he came in from work, either at the food or his daughters’ reddened eyes. He sat at the head of the table and Dolores served him his dinner and sat beside him.
“Manolo, Ruth called today.”
“How nice. Did you two catch up?” he said.
“May we be excused?” Carmen asked. Dolores nodded, and the girls escaped to their bedroom.
“She called to tell us that your mother passed away,” Dolores said when the girls had gone.
“What?” Shock transformed Manolo’s face. He took off his glasses and laid them on the table. He put his head in his hands and asked, “What happened?”
“She died at home in her kitchen.”
Manolo got up from the table, picked his glasses back up, and left the house. Dolores cleared away the dinner, listened to the girls’ prayers and got them into bed. Finally, she went to bed herself.
Manolo came home the next morning with a case of Olympia beer, the first that he’d bought in California. That’s when Dolores cried.
That day at work, she was tired and quiet.
“What’s wrong?” Lucia asked.
Dolores searched for words to explain her fear of Manolo’s return to drinking. Lucia had been delighted on Dolores’s behalf when Manolo arrived from the islands. She knew none of his history. “My mother-in-law passed away.”
“Oh, mija, lo siento, I’m sorry.” Lucia patted Dolores’s arm with a pickle-scented gloved hand. “Was she ill?”
“It was sudden.”
Lucia nodded. “The worse for shock. Your husband, he will be fine. You need to be strong for him, si?”
Dolores nodded. Her thoughts hadn’t been on being strong for Manolo but on how many beer bottles would be missing in the fridge tonight. If he started drinking again, if he spent nights away, she’d
have to be closer to the girls during the day. It was all right to leave them home alone or with Consuela when they lived close to the plant in Sunnyvale, but San Jose was farther away. Long shifts at the pickle plant wouldn’t do.
After work, she went to Paul’s house, which she seldom did. Dolores rang the bell and held her breath. She didn’t know what she’d do if he wasn’t home. She was in no state to deal with Sofia. She exhaled in relief when her brother opened the door.
Paul stepped back and motioned her into the house. “Dolores! What a nice surprise. Sofia isn’t here right now. She and little Dolores went to church.”
Dolores appreciated Paul’s reassurance as her forehead wrinkled. Had she forgotten a holy day? “Church?”
“They go a couple of days a week to pray.”
Dolores felt impious as she imagined four-year-old Dolores praying on her knees. “Paul, are you still thinking about buying that restaurant in San Jose?”
“Yes, we signed that papers earlier this week. Ross’s Steakhouse. It’s on San Fernando Street behind St. Joseph’s Church, between Market and First Streets.”
“I know it. Carrie Allen Photography is on the same block, and Lean’s Jewelry is on the corner.”
Paul nodded and waited for her to continue.
“Will you need help? Can you pay a waitress?”
“Dolores, what’s wrong?”
“I need to find a job closer to home.”
He looked at her but decided not to question her. “Can you help in the kitchen, too?”
“How about potato salad and chili beans?”
“When can you start?”
Dolores quit Del Monte the next day and said good-bye to Lucia.
HER feet hurt after a twelve-hour shift at the cannery, but everything hurt after a day at the restaurant. She lifted bags of potatoes, stirred pots of beans, and raced back and forth to please customers. Muscles hurt where Dolores hadn’t known she had muscles. She never complained, though. If she helped Paul make a success of the steakhouse, she would have a job close to home as long as she needed it.
Her second day at the restaurant was the first night Manolo didn’t come home after work. Dolores wanted to worry that something had happened to him, but old habits die hard. She assumed he was drunk somewhere. Sure enough, he found his way home well after midnight and noisily collapsed on the couch in the living room.
Life returned to what had passed for normal in Honolulu. She knew how to handle the situation, and she was even more capable now. She’d lived as a single mother for seven months. Ruth had given her Maria Gabler’s number, and one evening she called.
“You live in Mountain View!” Dolores exclaimed. “My brother is in Sunnyvale. We lived with him for a while after we arrived.”
“So close! I’m sorry it took so long for the mail to connect us. How are the girls?”
“They’re doing well. Your boys?”
“The same.”
Dolores chafed at the polite necessities. “Is Peter still in Honolulu? What do you hear from him?”
“Still active duty. Martial law forbids casual travel, and the military censors all his letters and phone calls.”
Dolores nodded. “I remember. When Yoshiko called her sons from Sand Island, they insisted she speak English.”
“That’s true everywhere, especially for Japanese.”
“Everything all right with you?” Maria asked.
Dolores said, “Paul’s restaurant is doing well. Betty tried to save a bird yesterday that flew into the window, and Carmen knows all the words to every song from Oklahoma!”
“And you?”
“I’m fine. I miss the family in Honolulu. It’s so much quieter with only us.”
“Manolo behaving himself?”
Maria had never approved of him. Dolores didn’t feel like having an I-told-you-so conversation. “Pretty much. He has a good job.”
They talked about the war, and more in depth about each of their six combined children. Somehow beneath the polite conversation, two good friends reconnected and vowed to stay in touch. Neither knew what the future held. Peter’s tour of duty would end. Manolo would drink. And what would Dolores and Maria do?
“Keep aloha in your heart,” Maria said before they rang off.
TWENTY-SEVEN
San Jose 1946
“Come on, Jack, where is he? You know I don’t normally insist, but this is important.”
“Ahh, Dolores, don’t be like that. Manolo will be home soon, I’m sure.” The man on the other end of the phone had a lazy voice with a placating tone.
She was not placated. “His sister is arriving today. He’s supposed to pick her up in San Francisco.”
“Oh, he’s in the city, I’m sure.” Jack’s laugh told her Manolo was on a binge.
“Then I’m just surprised you’re not,” she said icily. She slammed the receiver into its cradle.
Manolo’s drinking bouts had gotten more frequent and longer. Dolores wasn’t even sure he was going to work every day. But she never complained. It wasn’t often she called his buddies to find him because it was futile. They always covered for him.
“Girls! Put your shoes on!” Dolores called. “We’re going to the city.”
Carmen scrambled to get her sister ready while Dolores looked for the car keys. They weren’t on the hook in the kitchen where they belonged, but the car was in the driveway. She searched the dresser top and the end table on Manolo’s side of the bed. With a deep sigh, she brushed her hair out of her face and stood with a hand on her hip.
“Mama? Looking for these?” Carmen held out the keys.
“Carmen, where did you find them?”
“On the table in the family room.”
“Oh, sweetheart, you find things better than anyone I know!” It was true. Where Dolores would scan a room with her eyes, Carmen had to feel her way around it. She looked for things methodically with her hands. Nothing hid from her for long.
Dolores hustled her daughters into the used Chrysler Manolo had bought for her when he arrived in California. The tank was only half full, so she stopped for gas at the Shell station. The attendant filled the tank, washed the windshield, and checked the oil and tires. A radio in the office played Perry Como’s hit “Prisoner of Love,” and Dolores sang along.
“Carmen? How much is dollar sign point two one?” Betty loved to test her older sister even though she knew Carmen was smart.
“That’s twenty-one cents. Gas is twenty-one cents a gallon,” Carmen said.
“Is that a lot?” Betty asked.
“It is if you don’t have any money,” Carmen said. Both of them laughed.
Dolores paid the attendant, and they got on the road. It was an hour’s drive to San Francisco along Highway 101. They’d been there before, of course, but it wasn’t an everyday occurrence. Dolores pulled out the folded road map that lived in the glove compartment. “Here, girls, look at this.”
Betty unfolded the map and laid it across both laps. She peered at the map. “Paved roads are red. Here’s 101.” She looked at the passing street signs. “We’ll pass Sunnyvale soon.”
Dolores listened to her daughters discussing the names of towns and smiled. They were so wonderful together, such a blessing. And soon they would reunite with Auntie Ruth and their cousins. Right now, Ruth and the kids were on an airplane, approaching San Francisco. She could hardly wait to hear Ruth tell of their adventure. It was much faster to fly than sail, but it must be more terrifying, too.
Martial law in Hawai‘i had ended six months earlier, in October. The 1946 passenger demand meant planes now flew out of John Rodgers Airport in Honolulu. The cruise ships were losing business. Dolores remembered watching planes land with Alberto and the girls. His teasing grin haunted her still. She missed him, but he’d sent no word. How could he? What would he say in a letter? Not what she wanted to hear.
Dolores parked the car at San Francisco Airport and hustled the girls into the terminal just as passengers left
the Pacific Ocean Airlines plane. Rosa spotted them first and ran to Carmen. Her scream of delight warned Carmen of the greeting that almost knocked her off her feet. Winona and William sauntered over. They were teenagers now and had to be cool, but their eyes darted back and forth and ruined all efforts to appear disinterested. When she saw Ruth, Dolores felt tears welling. The two women clung together in a hug and sobbed out greetings.
“Mom, it’s only been four years.” Adults clearly embarrassed Winona.
Dolores pulled away from Ruth and wiped her eyes. “Longest four years of my life.” They laughed.
Arm in arm, Dolores and Ruth walked through the airport and laughed like girls. In fact, Carmen and Rosa mimicked their hooked arms and laughed, too. Carmen took Betty’s hand so she wouldn’t feel left out. Ruth’s older teens walked apart from them and pretended they didn’t know the adults. Dolores stuffed the luggage into the trunk of the Chrysler while Ruth stuffed the teenagers in the back seat with Carmen and Rosa. Betty sat between the adults in the front.
“Where’s Manolo?” Ruth asked, her voice over-innocent.
“He would have picked you all up, but he’s not home.”
“Don’t tell me he had to work, Dolores.”
“I won’t. I don’t know where he is. Some nights he doesn’t come home.” Dolores struggled to keep her tone even so she wouldn’t alert the big ears in the back seat.
“Was it easier or harder to be here without him? Before he came over, I mean.”
“In some ways it was harder, but in the ways that counted, it was easier. I mean, I was used to being without him, but I wasn’t used to being without you and all the family.” Dolores paused. “How is the family?”
“Alberto’s fine,” Ruth teased. She laughed when Dolores blushed. Good friend that she was, Ruth changed the subject.
The Aloha Spirit Page 26