Not Always Happenstance (Power of the Matchmaker)

by Rachael Anderson

  That, he didn’t know.

  The good, selfless person would lick his wounds and do as she asked, but Easton had always been more selfish than not-selfish, and since he didn’t want to let go just yet, he wasn’t sure if he could.

  What he could do was take her home.

  He leaned forward to grab the oars then thrust them into the water and began the arduous journey back to the dock.

  The moment the truck stopped in the drive, Lani fished the keys from the ignition and jumped out, speeding past Puna, who was pruning the bushes. She left the boat in the back of the truck, didn’t bother putting the fishing gear away, and didn’t even glance Easton’s way. She had to get away from him and the sooner the better.

  Once inside, she let the screen door slam behind her then ran to her room where she closed the door and leaned against it, gulping in huge breaths of air. Her entire body shook as she lowered herself to the ground and hugged her knees close while every ounce of self-preservation screamed at her to get on the first flight out of Maui and fly as far from Easton as possible.

  Only where would she go?

  After today’s revelation, California was no longer an option.

  Lani dropped her head between her knees as a renewed wave of heaviness hit her. It had happened so fast, yet gradually at the same time—gradual enough that Lani didn’t realize she was in over her head until it was too late. That moment came when she sat in the boat, plastered to Easton’s side. One sensation after another poured over her like the break of a wave, making her feel more alive than she’d ever felt with Derek. Like bursts of lightning, the revelations had come. Easton making her smile and laugh, catching her eye every time he moved and making her wonder about the world outside of Hāna. His kindness to her grandmother, the way he talked about his family, the way she’d clung to him like she’d never clung to anyone, wanting to do more than cling… it had culminated into one sickening and enlightening thought.

  I can’t marry Derek—not when I feel this way about someone else.

  Then Easton had reeled in that tiny little fish, and another wave of realization came. It had all been a ploy. Everything about him was a ploy. He didn’t care about anyone but himself. Once the prize was won, the game would be over, and everyone but Easton would lose.

  A knock sounded, and the door vibrated behind her back.

  “Lani?” came Puna’s voice.

  Lani drew in a shuddering breath and tried to force some energy back into her body. She needed to get moving and forget about this morning. If she could shake it off, maybe she wouldn’t feel the driving need to flee the island and go who knows where.

  “Can I come in?”

  Lani scooted to the side and rested her head against the wall, wondering how she was supposed to explain her pathetic state to her grandmother.

  But she didn’t have to. Puna walked in, took one look at her, and her expression became sympathetic. “You finally know, don’t you?”

  “Know what?” said Lani, too shaken to figure out what she apparently already knew.

  “What it feels like to soar.”

  The words caught her off guard, but Lani immediately dismissed them. Soaring was supposed to be freeing, exciting, thrilling—not sickening. No, what Lani was feeling was more like a splat.

  Five years Derek had waited for her to come back. Five years. After all this time—after all his goodness—how could she bring herself to tell him that all those years of dating and waiting had really been wasted?

  She couldn’t.

  “Puna, what am I going to do?” Her head felt heavy and cluttered, like an attic jam-packed with a bunch of stuff she had no desire to sort through.

  Her grandmother picked up her hand and set something hard, cool, and rectangular on her palm. A cell phone. She closed Lani’s fingers around it and said, “When you’re ready, you start by calling Derek, so he can move on with his life while you move on with yours. That’s what you do.”

  Lani stared at the phone for a full minute. “How do I tell him he’s wasted all those years?”

  Puna placed her hand alongside Lani’s cheek, forcing her to look up. “Derek has taught you much, and you have taught him much. The two of you have developed a strong friendship—one that can last beyond this if you’ll allow it. That kind of time is never wasted.” Puna patted her cheek. “Cheer up, mea aloha. Derek will be okay, and everything will work out in the end. It always does.”

  After her grandmother left, Lani stared at the phone, trying to think of the right words to say. When nothing came to mind, she finally forced her fingers to dial his number anyway. Then she drew in a deep breath and waited for him to answer.

  Please be able to forgive me for this, she thought as it rang.

  “Hey, Lani,” his deep, mellow voice answered right away. “This is a nice surprise. You don’t usually call so early.” It was just after five in the evening his time.

  A lump the size of Jupiter formed in Lani’s throat. She tried to swallow it, but it wouldn’t budge.

  “Lani? You there?”

  “I’m here,” she finally croaked in barely a whisper.

  “Is everything okay?”

  A heaviness filled the silence the way sand filled an hourglass, in a steady stream, flowing down and expanding until there was no more room for anything but the truth.

  “Derek, I haven’t been fair to you.”

  A stoic silence met her awkward apologies and explanations, her pleas for his forgiveness. She droned on, filling the gaps and crevices with more and more words—empty words, painful words. And when nothing more could be said, she ended the only way she could.

  “I’m so sorry.”

  He didn’t answer right away, and when he did, his voice was sad—sadder than she’d ever heard it. “I’m sorry, too. But if I’m being honest, I’m not surprised. Deep down, I knew. I just couldn’t make myself believe that you didn’t love me.”

  “I do love you, Derek.” If nothing else, he needed to understand that.

  “I know,” he said. “Just not enough.”

  Lani had no reply for that. You deserve better or There’s someone out there more right for you than me sounded trite and weak, even though both were true.

  “Will we stay friends?” she said quietly, knowing it was too soon to ask, too soon to hope.

  He let out a deep breath. “I hope so. Eventually.”

  She nodded even though he couldn’t see her. It hurt, losing him.

  “Take care of yourself, Lani.” He was ready to end the conversation, and she couldn’t blame him. But hanging up seemed so final, so… done. She wasn’t prepared to be done with him, not yet. Why couldn’t they have started off as friends and remained friends? Why had she let it become a romance? Romance was like walking a tightrope towards someone else. If you actually made it to the other side, you were lucky. If you wobbled and shook and fell, so long to that person forever.

  Forever was a long time to not hear Derek’s voice or see his smile or feel the comfort that always came from one of his hugs.

  “You take care too, Derek,” she forced the words out, and as soon as she said them, the line went dead.

  Lani actually liked that he hadn’t said goodbye. It gave her reason to hope that maybe, someday, they could be friends again.

  For three entire days, Lani managed to avoid Easton. She let Puna serve breakfast and took over the indoor duties. She scrubbed floors on her hands and knees, polished and dusted every frame, light fixture, and blind, and even oiled the chopping block in the kitchen. Their home and office had never looked—or smelled—so good.

  If she had to run an errand or needed to get away, she’d peek out the window, make sure Easton was nowhere in sight, then make a beeline for the truck. She’d drive to town or meet up with Ahe and her other friends somewhere. On the third day, when she couldn’t find anything else to clean, she bumped up the monthly Costco run by a week and drove the dreaded Hāna Highway. She rolled down her windows, let the fresh
air clear her mind, ignored all the curves of the road, and enjoyed the scenery like she hadn’t since the first time she’d traveled to Hāna.

  If there was a positive to Easton’s disruption of her life, it was this. He’d given her the freedom to remain in Hāna indefinitely, and she was grudgingly grateful for that. She just needed him to leave so that life could get back to normal.

  On Wednesday morning Lani awoke before the sun. After tossing and turning and trying to lull herself back to sleep, she threw the covers off and paced her room. Then she paced the front room. When the walls began encroaching on her, she went out to the lanai and watched the horizon turn from a grayish haze to a light pink. As soon as Easton’s bungalow became visible, she walked back inside, left Puna a note asking her to serve the muffins, fruit, and juice she’d prepared the night before, and quickly dressed.

  What she needed most was a day trip to Kapu Aina, her favorite spot on the island, but it wasn’t a good hike to take in the rain, and with the looming clouds, she didn’t dare risk it. So she dragged her bike from the shed instead, added air to the tires, and rode south on Hāna Highway during one of the few times of day when the road wasn’t lined with tourists. She made it about a mile when the sun’s belly began to rise above the ocean. Stopping for a few moments to admire the view, Lani felt at peace for the first time since she’d opened her eyes that morning.

  She watched a car pass, then hopped back on her bike and continued south. She didn’t stop until she arrived at the Pools of ‘Ohe’o. This was the only time of day Lani ever ventured here; the only time when it wasn’t bustling with people and voices and cameras. Most locals stayed away completely, but Lani loved walking the grounds, dipping her feet in the pools, and even hiking the Pipiwai trail when only the clack of the bamboo trees could be heard.

  Despite the overcast skies, the gates to the pools were open, so she wandered down, slipped off her sandals, and soaked her feet. The Seven Sacred Pools was a name invented a few decades earlier as a marketing ploy to draw more tourists to this area, so she didn’t place much stock in the name. But during moments like this when Lani was surrounded by the beauty of the rocks, water, lushness, with the landscape of the ocean before her, it felt sacred.

  She relaxed against a smooth rock and closed her eyes, letting the serenity and rising sun warm her body. She even fell asleep for a time—until engines and tires scrunching against asphalt awoke her from dreams of two men walking away from her—Easton going one way and Derek another.

  When voices in the distance grew louder, Lani pulled her feet from the water, pushed her feet back into her sandals, and trotted up the stairs to retrieve her bike. Soon she was riding north on Hāna Highway while most of the cars traveled south.

  About a hundred yards or so up the road, her tire blew. It went from inflated to deflated in a second, forcing her to skid to an awkward and bumpy stop. Seconds later, a raindrop landed on her nose, followed by another on her cheek and several on her arms. Lani looked up at the sky as the clouds let loose, and the light sprinkle became a gushing torrent.

  Lani glanced longingly up the road, knowing she was stranded for now. If she left her bike behind and tried to walk home, it would be an accident waiting to happen. No car would be able to see her in this mess. Across the street there was a wider shoulder near a large tree, so she waited for another car to zip past then ran her bike to the spot, where she could wait out the worst of the rain with whatever shelter the tree provided.

  Once there, Lani plopped down on a small lava rock and watched the rain come.

  “Aloha, Cora. Pearl,” Easton trotted up the lanai’s steps to get out of the rain. Once under the protection of the tin roof, he brushed the collected drops from his arms and shook his Red Sox hat off before putting it back on. He had to raise his voice to be heard above the pounding.

  “So much for that hike I was going to take this morning.”

  “Hiking would be a mucky mess in this weather,” agreed Cora with a smile. “Did you sleep well?”

  “Yes.” At least as well as someone could sleep on the awful mattress in the bungalow, though compared to some of the places he’d slept over the years, it was still a solid average.

  “There’s some food on the table over there.” Cora gestured with a wave of her hand. “It’s just a light breakfast this morning. I hope that’s okay.”

  “It’s perfect. Mahalo.” Easton crossed the porch and glanced at the door leading into the house, hoping for a glimpse of Lani. But she was nowhere in sight, just like the past three days. Apparently when Lani wanted to avoid someone, she did it well.

  He poured himself some juice then grabbed a muffin and a banana.

  “Come join us.” Pearl gestured toward the open seat next to them.

  Easton did and took a swig of what tasted like a mixture of freshly squeezed orange and passion fruit juice. He liked it.

  “Where were you planning to hike this morning?” asked Pearl.

  “Nowhere in particular. I wanted to drive down Hāna Highway, take the first road that I could find heading west, go to the end, and see where it took me.”

  Cora topped off his juice. “Lani usually gives everyone a map of some of the best trails around here. Didn’t she give one to you?”

  “She did. I just like finding my own way, I guess you could say. Speaking of which, do you happen to know of any lesser-known trails or destinations? I’m not much of a join-the-tourist-throng sort of guy.”

  Cora crinkled her brows in thought for a moment before saying, “Kadir used to love to wander the hills above the property, but I wouldn’t call it a destination hike. Sorry, I’m not very helpful, am I? Lani will probably know some other places. You should ask her. Or even Ahe. That group is always traipsing off somewhere.”

  “Good idea,” said Easton, although something told him that neither Ahe nor Lani would be too forthcoming. He took a bite of his muffin and glanced at the door again, wondering where Lani was and how long it would be before she stopped avoiding him. He missed her.

  “Looking for someone?” Cora asked casually—a little too casually.

  Easton cleared his throat and returned his attention to the two women. “I think your internet is down. I tried bringing my laptop to the lobby a little while ago and couldn’t connect to your wi-fi like I usually can. Any idea why, or if it will be working again soon?”

  Cora’s lips puckered into a frown, and she shook her head. “Sorry. I don’t know much about that sort of stuff. You’ll want to ask Lani about that as well. Or you could always go to the lobby at the Travassa and connect to theirs. Some of the staff are Lani’s friends, and they’re nice enough to give our guests access to their internet when ours goes down. But you’ll still need to ask Lani what the password is because I can’t remember.”

  Easton would love to ask Lani about the password. He’d love to ask her a lot of things, such as when she was planning on talking to him again. “Any idea where I could find her this morning?”

  Cora offered him a rueful smile. “Wish I could, but she was up before me today again. Left a note saying she had a few things to do and would be back later this morning. I’m sure she’ll show up any moment now.” She didn’t look too convinced.

  “Would she have taken the truck?” Easton asked.

  “Considering it’s our only car, I’m sure she did.”

  “Then she’s got to be around here somewhere. I saw your truck out front on my way down—the same place it was parked an hour ago when I tried using the internet in the lobby.”

  “Really?” Cora frowned. “I haven’t seen her at all. It’s not like she’d go walking off in this weather.”

  Pearl slowly raised her cup of cocoa to her lips, but not before Easton saw a hint of a smile. When she was done sipping, she said, “I heard some noise coming from the shed early this morning. Is there some other mode of transportation she might have taken?”

  Cora’s frown became an expression of concern. “Oh dear,” she said, slidi
ng her chair back. “She probably went for a bike ride and is soaked to the bone right now. I’d better go find her.”

  Before she could stand, Easton set his cup down and hopped to his feet. “Why don’t you let me go? I’m already wet and need to talk to her anyway. Any idea which way she might have gone?”

  “That would be wonderful,” said Cora. “Mahalo, Easton. Some mornings she likes to ride to the Pools at ‘Ohe’o, but… yes, I would bet my knitting needles that’s where she went. Do you know where ‘Ohe’o is?”

  “I was there last week. I’ll see if I can find her.”

  Cora touched his arm. “Her bike is neon pink. Ahe made her paint it that color so she’d be seen easily.”

  Easton hid a smile and jogged down the steps again, into what was now a light shower. Two minutes later, he was in his rented Subaru, driving south on the Hāna Highway. Fifteen minutes after that, the rain had become a sprinkle, and he finally spotted a neon pink bike being pushed by a woman with dark, wet hair and clothes plastered to a beautiful, slender body with curves in all the right places. His heart beat a little quicker at the sight.

  He immediately pulled to the side of the road and got out of his car. Lani had stopped walking and was looking at him—or, more specifically, his car.

  “You’re looking a little soggy,” he said. “Want a ride?”

  Her expression was one of indecision before she said, “No. I’m good.” She continued pushing her bike, the front tire completely flat.

  “You sure?”

  “Yep.”

  He glanced at his watch to check the time. “It took me about fifteen minutes to drive here, which means, at the rate you’re walking, it will probably take you about an hour to get home.” He paused, letting his words sink in before adding, “Still sure you don’t want a lift? In fifteen minutes, you can be in a nice, hot shower.”

  She continued to trudge along, her movements determined. When her front tire dropped into a puddle and splashed muddy water up her legs, her jaw clenched.