I Heart Hawaii

by Lindsey Kelk

  Kekipi might have sounded convincing but I wasn’t altogether sure the god of nightmares had been entirely banished from this island.

  ‘You can’t come and visit,’ I said loudly. In the distance, Louisa’s horse sped up. ‘We’re busy. Until Christmas.’ I wasn’t even thinking about what I was saying, words flew out of my mouth in something like sentences only to be batted away by my mother’s tuts and sighs. ‘And for the last time, she’s not with strangers, she’s with her father and her grandmother and I am allowed to do something other than take care of a baby for the next fifty years.’

  ‘Well, that’s a fine attitude to have,’ she replied. ‘I don’t know why you bothered having a baby in the first place, Angela, I really don’t. You couldn’t go back to work fast enough, you practically hurled that child at a nanny, and now you’re off on your jollies, leaving Alex holding the baby. That poor boy.’

  I didn’t know what was more shocking, my mother’s 1950s attitude towards childrearing or her sudden attack of compassion for Alex. Actually, I did, it was definitely the latter.

  ‘Alex is fine.’

  ‘Is he?’

  I bit down on the inside of my mouth. Too close to the bone.

  ‘I can’t think of a single man who would be “fine” with his wife traipsing off on holiday leaving him alone all weekend,’ Mum said.

  ‘I can,’ I heard Dad reply. ‘When are you going? I’ll drive you to the airport.’

  ‘OK, this has been a lovely chat but I’ve got to go,’ I said as they started bickering. ‘Have a lovely time at the wedding.’

  ‘Angela? I’m not finished—’

  But she most certainly was.

  I swiped at my phone screen, trying to end the call, accidentally pulling on Alani’s reins at the same time. He flicked his head over his shoulder, as if to make sure I meant it, then before I could blink he broke out into a gallop, hooves thudding along the ground, mane streaming out behind him, leaving me clinging to his back with every ounce of strength in my being as my phone slipped out of my hand and under his feet.

  ‘Stop!’ I wailed, trying to pull on the reins without falling off the saddle. Someone was getting a Thighmaster for Christmas and that someone was me. ‘Alani, slow down!’

  But strangely enough the horse didn’t understand English or at least he was choosing not to. We tore past Louisa, my bag slapping against me over and over as I bounced up and down in the saddle, before whipping around a corner and bringing the rest of the group into view.

  The rest of the group and the edge of a cliff.

  Closing my eyes, I held on as tightly as I possibly could. I knew if you were in a car accident, you were supposed to go limp, something I had practised many thousands of times while travelling in a New York cab, but it was very hard to relax on the back of a runaway horse. Even if I had wanted to breathe, I couldn’t, because every time Alani’s feet struck the ground, the air was knocked out of me. My surroundings were nothing more than a blur.

  ‘Angela!’

  I heard someone screaming my name but I had no idea who it was. All I knew was the wind in my face, overwhelming fear and an unpleasant smell – I couldn’t in all confidence say whether it was coming from me or the horse.

  Without warning, without slowing down, Alani skidded to a halt and whinnied loudly. Slowly, I cracked open one eye. In front of me was a large picnic table, fresh fruit, bottles of champagne and the terrified frozen faces of my friends and strangers. With a happy head toss, the horse neighed once, trotted over to the table and helped himself to an apple.

  ‘Angela, are you OK?’ Jenny asked, still not moving.

  ‘I dropped my new phone,’ I whispered as Kekipi prised the reins out of my hands. James grabbed hold of me around the waist and peeled me off the back of the horse.

  ‘We’ll get you another phone,’ she assured me. I clung to James’s neck, not altogether sure my legs would work. ‘What happened?’

  ‘My mum called,’ I replied, shaking from head to toe.

  ‘That is enough to make anyone bolt,’ she said, full of understanding.

  Kekipi thrust a glass of champagne into my hand as I tried putting one foot on the floor. ‘I’ve got a flask in my bag if you need something stronger,’ he whispered.

  ‘I think I’d rather go back down in the Jeep if that’s OK,’ I said, finally making eye contact with my apple-munching nemesis. Alani looked exceptionally pleased with himself for someone who’d been three feet away from Thelma and Louise-ing the pair of us into the Pacific Ocean not two minutes earlier.

  I drank my champagne with shaking hands while everyone fussed around me. Was this my message from the gods? And if so, just what exactly were they trying to say? Never take a phone call while riding a horse? Core strength is key? Or maybe they were simply siding with Annette Clark. Maybe the gods of Lanai agreed that I was a terrible mother, so bad that I needed to be hurled into the ocean by a runaway horse.

  ‘Here, sit on these.’ Kekipi handed me a pair of ice packs. ‘Your backside is going to be black and blue tomorrow.’

  ‘Thank you,’ I whispered as he exchanged my champagne glass for a cocktail of fresh fruit juice and whatever he was hiding in his flask. ‘My backside appreciates it.’

  He gave me a solemn wink and went back to the table, leaving me sitting on the dusty floor, pressing ice packs against my bruised arse, drinking undeclared alcohol and staring out at the ocean to ponder my failures as a parent, a wife and as a daughter.

  Well, I thought, if nothing else, I certainly had a story to tell now.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Jenny hadn’t told us where the evening’s activities were happening but it wasn’t difficult to guess. After an afternoon sat on an ice pack, working on my laptop, I met Louisa outside my villa at exactly seven o’clock. We were dressed in gorgeous designer dresses that had been delivered to our villas, and followed the sound of music and laughter.

  We wove our way through the villas and out towards the main building. The whole pool area was covered with flowers, leading us down the stone stairs to the beach where a bonfire burned brightly and dozens of men and women were dancing in traditional Hawaiian dress, huge, happy smiles on their faces.

  ‘This is all for us?’ Louisa breathed. ‘Oh, Angela, this is insane. It’s not real life.’

  ‘You’re right,’ I reminded her. ‘It isn’t. It’s a press trip that was organized for a bunch of millionaire kids on YouTube who weren’t allowed to come because they haven’t learned one of life’s easiest lessons: Nazis are always bad.’

  ‘Tim was in a total mood when I called,’ she said, sticking out her tongue to protest against her husband’s sulking. ‘Did you manage to get through to Alex?’

  ‘I called from the room phone but he didn’t answer so I emailed him to say my phone was out of order,’ I breathed in. Was that pork? Smelled like pork. ‘He hasn’t replied yet.’

  ‘You told him your phone is out of order?’ Lou quirked an eyebrow as Jenny waved to us from the middle of a circle of hula dancers. ‘Angela, it got trampled by a horse that ran you halfway up a volcano.’

  ‘Yes, well, that feels like more of an in-person story to me,’ I replied, gingerly pressing the soft spot at the bottom of my back. Kekipi had been right. I looked as though I’d been indulging in at least seventy-five shades of grey and my backside was going to be a billion shades of bruised by morning. Thank god I’d already got my skinny-dipping adventure out the way.

  ‘Welcome to the Précis luau!’ Jenny sang, her hair piled high up on top of her head, every inch of visible golden skin shining like lava. She looked as though she’d taken a bath in highlighter, and knowing Jenny, that was quite possible. ‘Tonight is the absolute highlight of our trip, a true celebration of everything Hawaii has to offer. And like, really great cocktails. If everyone could take their seats, the show is about to begin. Time to celebrate True Soul mascara!’

  ‘Hashtag ad,’ I whispered to Lou.

  ‘Hash
tag True Soul,’ she replied, utterly earnest.

  ‘Love your dresses, ladies.’ Paige danced her way over in improbably high heels, her off-the-shoulder frock fluttering in the breeze as she moved. ‘How’s your arse, AC?’

  ‘You definitely want to ice it,’ James said with a knowing nod as he trotted up after his new BFF. ‘When I did my first intensive riding class for that Billy Buskin film, it was so bad I was filling my trunks with ice cubes in the end.’

  ‘There are millions of men and women all over the world fantasizing about you,’ I sighed. ‘If only they knew.’

  With that, someone turned up the music and I noticed there was a stage where the pool used to be. A dozen dancers in traditional Hawaiian costume began to twist and swirl and my drink began to kick in all at once. It was all beautiful and all so very much.

  ‘Angela, I’ve been thinking and I’ve had an idea,’ Louisa said, eyeing the elaborate cocktails in Paige’s hand as she moved towards one of the round tables. ‘We should get utterly twatted.’

  ‘That’s your idea?’ I asked. ‘Get smashed?’

  ‘I’m talking you hold back my hair and I’ll hold yours, blackout, Ibiza holiday hammered,’ she suggested, slapping the back of her hand against her palm to emphasize her words. ‘How long has it been since you’ve been properly drunk?’

  ‘I’m pretty much tanked after two glasses of rosé at the moment,’ I confessed. ‘And I’ve got my phone call with the publisher in the morning. I’m not sure this is a good idea.’

  ‘It’s the greatest idea of all time,’ she said confidently, grabbing two cocktails from a passing tray and nodding towards James’s table. ‘In two days we’re going home, you’ll have Alice back, a job to do and a book to write, not to mention a broken bum. This is a no-brainer. Let’s get sloshed.’

  I considered the suggestion for a moment. It would be so unprofessional of me to get smashed on a work trip, let alone irresponsible and downright immature. But at the same time, if I was just a little bit tipsy, I wouldn’t be worrying about my husband, my baby, my job, my mother, all the pictures of my boobs that were floating in the cloud from my failed sexy solo photoshoot I’d invested an hour in the night before (and still not sent to Alex) or the fact that my bum really, really, really hurt.

  ‘I will have one drink,’ I confirmed, clinking my drink against hers. ‘And that’s all.’

  What harm could one cocktail do, after all?

  The show was amazing. I’d learned all about Hawaii’s history, eaten a tremendous amount of pig and been treated to the sight of James storming the stage to join in with the hula and looking like a complete plum. All in all, it had been exactly what I’d hoped this trip to Hawaii would be. Louisa was right, sometimes you just needed to get a little bit tipsy. Not as often as I did when I was twenty-six, but there was definitely a time and a place and the place was Hawaii and the time was now.

  ‘Hello madam.’

  I pushed my hair out of my face to find Kekipi, wearing nothing but a grass skirt, sitting in Louisa’s chair. When had she got up? I looked at my cocktail and tried to remember if it was my second or third. I’d said one but Lou kept filling it up and I wasn’t drunk so it was fine. Probably.

  ‘How are you feeling?’ he asked, filling up my cocktail from a jug in the middle of the table. ‘Bit like you’ve been gangbanged by an entire rugby team?’

  ‘I’ve never been gangbanged by an entire rugby team,’ I replied, shifting carefully in my seat. ‘But I would imagine it feels something like this, yes.’

  ‘You’re still young.’ Kekipi produced a single white tablet from where, I did not care to know, and pressed it into my hand. ‘And you need one of these. It will fix you right up.’

  ‘What is it?’ I asked, holding it between my thumb and forefinger and squinting at the writing on the pill.

  ‘It’s not heroin,’ he said.

  ‘Is it illegal?’

  ‘Not everywhere,’ he replied.

  It was good enough for me. I popped the pill into my mouth and washed it down with my drink. Almost at once, the throbbing in my tailbone seemed to lessen.

  ‘Thank you,’ I said, finding my smile all at once. ‘Do you think one will be enough?’

  ‘Oh, I would say so,’ he laughed, planting a kiss on my forehead. ‘Have a fabulous evening.’

  ‘He is so nice,’ I said to absolutely no one. ‘So considerate.’

  And I could have sworn the pineapple in our table’s centrepiece winked back at me.

  Once the luau had ended and everyone was milling around the stage, snapping pics with the dancers, I took myself off for a quiet, tipsy wander.

  Leaving everyone else locked in conversation, I wandered off, away from the pool and down the stone staircase to the beach, planting myself in the sand, away from the fire. I could still hear the party over the soothing swell of the evening waves, cresting in and rolling out, but it felt at a safe distance.

  ‘I wish Alex was here,’ I said to no one in particular. ‘It’s too beautiful for just me to see.’

  It’d be hard for him to be here when he isn’t even talking to you, the voice in my head reminded me.

  ‘Shut up you,’ I muttered, sticking my snout back into my drink. ‘No one is interested in what you have to say.’

  ‘My apologies, Miss.’

  I looked up to see a tall, gorgeous shirtless man hovering over me, holding a coconut. All the better for bashing me over the head with.

  ‘Oh, not you,’ I said, scrambling to my feet, ready to apologize to my would-be attacker. ‘I’m sure everyone wants to know what you have to say. I’m so sorry.’

  He laughed, shirtless, and held out his hand, still shirtless. Without knowing quite what else to do, I shook it and stared back at him, somewhat alarmed.

  ‘Did you enjoy the show?’ he asked.

  I nodded, trying not to look directly at his nipples. ‘Yes, it was very good.’

  ‘Glad you enjoyed it. I’m Kai,’ he said. ‘I love your accent. Where are you from?’

  Now, I was married but I was not blind or dead. He was totally flirting with me. Half-naked, and flirting.

  ‘England,’ I replied, tucking my hair away behind my ear. I didn’t want to lead him on but I didn’t want to be rude either. Plus, I was drunk. ‘But I live in New York now, with my husband. I’m Angela.’

  ‘That’s cool,’ he said, rolling back his shoulders and flexing his pecs. I blinked. Did I just imagine that? ‘I’ve always wanted to visit New York. And London, man, that would be so great. Is it just like it is on TV?’

  ‘Depends what you’ve seen,’ I said. Was it normal for someone to have that many muscles in their stomach? Didn’t people normally talk about a six-pack? Because I could count at least eight and he wasn’t even clenching. ‘But I’m going to hazard a guess and say no.’

  ‘Wow, you’re just dashing all my hopes and dreams tonight, aren’t you?’ He ducked his head before looking back up at me with huge brown eyes.

  ‘That’s pretty much my thing,’ I replied, glugging my drink back as quickly as possible. ‘Are you from Lanai?’

  ‘Oahu,’ he answered, resting one hand on his naked hip. I noticed his loincloth was riding dangerously low, which was also when I noticed he was wearing a loincloth. ‘I moved here to get away from it for a while.’

  ‘I’ve never been to the Oahu but, if you needed to get away from there, I’m going to hazard another guess and say New York and London might be a bit much. Besides, how could you leave this? It’s paradise.’

  ‘That is true,’ Kai said, his eyes on the horizon. I followed his gaze and saw little lights way, way off in the distance on a neighbouring island. ‘But I do sometimes wonder what else might be out there for me.’

  ‘No one knows how far you’ll go,’ I commented wisely.

  He looked back at me, a confused expression on his face. ‘Why have I heard that before?’

  ‘Moana,’ I said, sucking on my straw before clearing my throat
. ‘I have a child.’

  ‘You look way too young to be a mom.’ Kai took a step closer and I took a deep breath in, very aware of how far down the beach I had wandered. There was no one around us, not a single soul. What if he wasn’t from the show? What if he was a Hawaiian serial killer who preyed on tourists who wandered away from the group and got lost on the beach and he worked on his abs especially hard to distract them because no one ever got mad at hot serial killers? I’d watched three episodes of The Fall, I still fancied Jamie Dornan, I knew how this worked.

  ‘Well, it is quite dark out here,’ I babbled, looking over his shoulder for an escape. ‘And I am wearing a lot of makeup and also—’

  ‘Oi! Clark!’

  I blinked, looking up the beach to see James charging across the sand with his trousers rolled up around his knees.

  ‘Are you harassing this terribly handsome young man?’ he asked, barging in between myself and Kai with a hollowed-out coconut cocktail in his hand. I watched as he tried to get the straw from his drink into his mouth three times in a row and failed.

  ‘Oh my, is that a loincloth?’

  ‘It’s a traditional malo,’ Kai replied, setting his shoulders and puffing out his chest. ‘As worn by Hawaiian warriors.’

  James looked at me and looked back at Kai before spluttering with laughter. ‘Is he cracking on to you?’

  ‘No!’ I cried, my head beginning to spin. ‘Absolutely not.’

  ‘Is this your husband?’ Kai asked. ‘I’m sorry, sir, we were just talking. Have a beautiful evening, both of you.’

  And with that, shirtless Kai and his loincloth scrambled away, up the beach and back towards the villas. Not a serial killer, just a horny youth. Probably still out to take advantage of drunk tourists who didn’t know better, though.

  ‘Oh my god, Clark, I can’t take you anywhere,’ James said, shaking his head in faux disappointment. ‘What would Alex say?’