by Lynn Shurr
“I am sorry our conversation was not more lighthearted, Winnie, but rumors circulate in the village. If you plan to be involved with a Samoan man for any length of time, you need to know the facts of life here. It is not the Garden of Eden it appears to be.” The reverend walked with them to the door of his mansion. “I hope to see you in church.”
“We will be there.” The men embraced in farewell. The servant loaded the baskets onto their arms and the couple walked back to the Malala home as a cloud of steam rose over the jungle-covered sides of the mountain and the overflowing stream emptied its latest burden of water into the sea. Giving up, Winnie carried her shoes.
They arrived at the Malala house in plenty of time for the evening prayer service at six. When a boy clanged on the used propane cylinder serving as a bell, the village loungers and even Sammy Tau went inside for devotions. For ten minutes, Winnie participated in prayer ending with a hymn sung by Ela in a contralto voice rich as coconut cream. A dinner of steamed fish, taro, fresh fruit, and tea party leftovers, more than enough for Winnie, followed. Afterwards, she and Adam sat on the porch in the two rockers and enjoyed the evening ocean breeze along with the drop in temperature, though it remained as warm and humid as Louisiana in August.
“You know I could build my parents a bigger, better house, but no one can go to two stories without insulting the matai and the church. Only they are allowed a mansion,” Adam remarked.
“Your parents seem perfectly happy with what they have.” Winnie cooled herself with a fan of woven palm fronds. “There is something to be said for that.”
“They will never want for anything, but if I send them a special gift, they give it away.”
Winnie, catching on, nodded. “The fa’a Samoa at work.”
“Exactly.”
Ela came to the door and beckoned her son to come inside. “No, Winnie, stay and enjoy the evening air. I must talk to Adam. Do you need anything to drink? Noa can open a coconut for you to drink the milk. Very refreshing.”
“No, I’m fine, thank you.”
Within the house, windows wide open to catch that same breeze she enjoyed, mother and son conversed in Samoan, quietly at first, then rising in heat and tempo. Always so friendly, so even-tempered, Winnie wondered why they argued. She pretended not to hear. Using an app on her iPhone, she peered into the lowering dusk and matched the stars coming out so close to the equator, bright Canopus and the False Cross caught in the dense net of the Milky Way. Amid insect and amphibian noises from the rainforest, the soft rush of the waves on the sand, and the whine of the occasional mosquito she slapped with her fan, the village quieted for the night. One late stroller sauntered by the house, stopped, and climbed the porch steps. Uninvited, Pala seated herself with slinky grace on the floor by Winnie’s feet.
“All alone?” she inquired in a perfectly melodious voice. “Adam does not keep you company?”
“He is inside. I notice Sammy is not with you either.” Winnie flattened another annoying mosquito with one brisk swat.
“No, I only see him in the company of my family to protect my reputation. Besides, he is musu right now. A divorced woman like you has more leeway in your behavior.”
“How do you know my marital status?”
Pala inclined her head toward the open window. “Because they argue about you. Ela says women in her church group noticed the two of you go off into the bushes last night. Now, they wonder what you and Adam do under her roof.”
“We haven’t done anything under her roof.”
“But Adam says you are a divorced woman who can do as she pleases and not some shy village maiden. I am not particularly shy, but I am careful of my actions.”
“So I notice.”
“Ela says he should be looking for another village girl to marry, not running around with a fast palagi. Adam claims you are not palagi but have black blood. I don’t see it in you myself. I am darker. He thinks you should be respected because you are a nurse. Fine, Ela says. She does not want to lose him to a scheming mainlander, nurse or no nurse, because then he will never come home.”
“Thanks for the running commentary.” Winnie wished she’d accepted that offer of milk in a coconut. She could use the shell to conk the very helpful Pala over the head and shut her up, but that would probably break several village taboos. Across the way, she thought she saw Lita flitting between the houses with a young man in pursuit. “Maybe you should run along and see if your sister is in for the night.”
Pala’s voluptuous lips flattened across her teeth. Winnie half expected them to roll back into a snarl like the local dogs. Adam burst from the house, and her snarl curved into a pleasant smile. “You see I am keeping your guest company, Adam.”
“Yeah, thanks.” He unrolled a mat tucked under his arm and returned inside. A minute later, he bullied a single mattress onto the porch and threw it down on top of the mat. Adam took a wad of mosquito netting from under his arm and snagged it on a ceiling hook probably intended to hold a basket of ferns or flowers. “Now no one has to wonder where I am sleeping!”
Winnie pushed up from her rocker. “If my presence here is causing trouble, I should leave tomorrow.”
Pala answered her sweetly. “Oh, no one travels on a Sunday. It is a day of rest. You must stay.”
Adam glared at his former fiancée. “Pala, do you need us to escort you home?”
The village maiden rose as fluidly as the night mist on the mountain. “Not necessary. You know there is no crime in the community. Sleep well.” She left, hips pumping under a tightly wrapped lava-lava.
“Pala graciously translated what your mother said. Really, I should go back to Pago on Monday and let you enjoy the rest of your visit with your family.”
“I seldom enjoy my visits. Last year, my parents arranged my marriage to Pala. I went along with it and what a mess that became. I am beginning to feel slightly grateful to Sammy for taking her off my hands.” Clearly intending to sleep in full view of the village, Adam folded himself onto the mattress and unbuttoned the shirt he had worn to the tea party. “You should go in and get to bed. We have church in the morning.”
Winnie wanted nothing more than to slip under the mosquito netting, nip his slightly sulky full lower lip, and lay down with her head on his now bare chest. But, remembering the no PDA rule in force in his hometown, she said goodnight and went to sleep alone.
Chapter Twenty-Four
The improvised church bell sounded early beckoning worshipers to the LMS service. Winnie donned her white ensemble and walked between Noa and Adam to the sanctuary. Unsurprisingly since Ela sang in the choir, she left earlier after admiring Winnie’s wide-brimmed hat with its cheerful sunflower. Before leaving, she put out fruit and cakes for the family, but Adam warned Winnie to eat lightly.
“We will probably be invited to Sunday lunch, the to’ona’i, with the church leaders.”
“If it has a fancy name, this must be another feast. I’m not sure how many of these I can handle before I become as big as your mother.” Winnie had refrained from mentioning his mother’s size before the unkind words spoken during the argument and engraved in her mind by Pala, though in the morning Ela had treated her with perfect courtesy.
“My mother’s girth is widely respected. No one in my family goes hungry.”
The terse way he answered made her shut her mouth and quietly enter the snowy stream of Samoans in their whites on the way to church. In a custom-made linen suit complete with a vest but worn open-collared without a tie, Adam made a magnificent appearance, larger than life. He’d subdued his wild hair with a leather thong and topped it off with the most elegant of Panama hats. She did not envy Pala walking beside Sammy who looked as rumpled and dumpy in his clothing as an old-time Louisiana politician.
While the church seemed overly embellished to Winnie and she understood not a word of the service, she did enjoy the soaring voices of the choir whose music rose majestically to the high rafters. The singing reminded her of the Rev’s
AME church in that respect. As they left the building, the rotund minister and his wife, who matched him like part of a set of salt-and-pepper shakers portraying two chubby bakers, issued the dreaded invitation to the Sunday lunch. Of course, they accepted.
The entire congregation left one church and hiked to the other for the next service. As they prepared to enter Reverend Tomanaga’s sanctuary, Adam called out to Pala and Sammy, who walked slightly ahead in the midst of her family. “Since I will not be at your wedding, I want to present you with an early gift.” Adam held out the keys to his newly purchased Jeep and dropped them into Pala’s upturned palm.
Even her perfect mouth could think of nothing to say but, “Oh!”
Sammy Tau grabbed the keys and pocketed them in his lumpy suit. “Very generous of you, old friend.” With no more thanks than that and a scowl on his face, Sammy nodded for his fiancée to enter the church and turned his back on them.
“I’ll say that was generous,” Winnie muttered. “Exactly how are we going to get back to Pago Pago now?”
“Someone will take us or we’ll ride the bus like everyone else,” Adam answered shortly and stomped inside to take a seat.
Noa gave her an apologetic smile. “He is irritable this morning, probably from sleeping on the porch or from not getting what he wants.” The smile changed to a small, suggestive grin. “It is never good to argue with Ela.”
Speaking of the devil, or perhaps God’s ambassador, Ela joined them, freed from her choir robes. As massive as her son in her whites, she wore a hat of such feathered grandeur and complexity Winnie’s Nana would have been envious on a Sunday morning in the States. In fact, Winnie could almost hear Nana’s voice saying, “If you keep giving it away, that man will never marry you.”
Marriage to Adam. It never entered her mind before now, that kind of commitment. Maybe sitting beside him in church brought on the thought. She tamped it down, considering what he could have had in Pala—beauty, great status, and the approval of the community and his family.
The order of service pretty much followed that of the LMS church. Again, Winnie enjoyed the voices of the choir and understood little until Reverend Tomanaga announced he would give the sermon in English out of deference for their visitor. He spoke of the need to forgive in order to keep both the family and village at peace, aimed directly at Adam, no doubt.
When the pastor began to read out loud the contributions to the church, he did not catch Winnie off guard as the previous minister had. Noa beamed when half the proceeds from his fish sales were mentioned. Adam had put a hundred-dollar bill into his envelope, Winnie a twenty, though nothing was expected of her as a visitor. That gained her friendly smiles.
Lastly, the pastor held up a set of car keys and scanned the congregation for an explanation. Sammy Tau rose and in a booming voice announced, “An early wedding gift that I give to the church, a new Jeep.” Many clapped.
Sitting across the aisle, Winnie watched Pala’s mouth drop open, clamp shut, and resume its serenity. Beside her, Adam stirred.
He stood leaving a large gap in the row. “I want to donate a proper bell tower to each church. They will not fit in the collection plate.”
The members of the congregation, and the matai who served as deacons, chuckled and showed thigh-slapping approval. Casting a triumphant stare on Sammy whose face had darkened with anger, Adam resumed his seat. Winnie suspected if he had been playing poker, he would have said, “I’ll see that Jeep, and raise you a million bucks.”
She whispered in his ear, “Where did that idea come from?”
“My generous nature.”
She could not deny that. He’d built an entire beach for her and left it for handicapped children to enjoy, but she strongly suspected his hatred of Sammy Tau propelled this offer. So much for absorbing the peace and love message of the sermon. Both men ignored it. The service ended, and on to another spread of food that made Winnie wish for a dress with an elastic waistband. No wonder every one of the big eaters preferred a lava-lava for most occasions. The rest of Sunday, she spent in a heavy meal-induced nap swinging gently in a shaded hammock because any other action on the holy day was frowned upon by patrolling matai.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Monday morning Winnie kept her promise to the village nurses to let one of them have the day off. Good thing she made her own plans because Adam had risen from his bed on the porch and gone to the communal garden to spend his day hoeing weeds and picking vegetables and fruits. She passed Sammy Tau back in his musu position on her way to the clinic. He spared her no greeting, not that she minded.
Helping with well-baby checks, Winnie soon learned her lectures on infant nutrition went unappreciated. In Samoan eyes, a fat baby meant a healthy baby, no changing their minds. She administered scheduled shots and kept her mouth shut about the rest. Her fellow nurse whose meals and housing the village provided waved her back to the Malalas for lunch. Adam had not returned from the plantation, though it appeared most of the gardeners were done for the day judging by the number of people lounging up and down the street. Noa encouraged her to help herself to anything in the house. His wife had gone to an aerobics class at the church hall. Now, that would be a sight to see—so much jiggling flesh bouncing to some lively exercise tune. Frankly, she still felt full from Sunday lunch and only nibbled her meal.
As she prepared to return to her volunteer work, Adam arrived bearing a huge basket overflowing with taro, breadfruit, and a few purple eggplants, as well as carrying over one broad shoulder a bunch of bananas big enough to feed every monkey in the San Diego zoo. Winnie doubted if most men could have lifted his burden let alone hauled it back to the village. Ela, her lighter skin heavily flushed from exercise, came up behind him and immediately began berating her son.
“What did he do wrong?” she asked Noa.
“Again, too much food for our household. She says he must offer it around the village. His excess embarrasses her.”
Still, Ela rooted in the basket, choosing some choice taro and breadfruit, claiming the eggplants as well as removing a hand of bananas from the bunch for their dinner before waving Adam away to distribute the largess. He failed to meet Winnie’s sympathetic eyes as he went, but she noted he did pause to sling a few bananas into Sammy Tau’s lap. If the word the musu man uttered meant “thanks,” it came out sounding more like a curse.
Not knowing when Adam would return, she went back to her work at the clinic, but the only crisis of the day involved a cut requiring a tetanus shot and a bandage provided while the other nurse conducted a class in diabetes management. The disease flourished in the village since the introduction of junk food into the Samoan diet and their great regard for size and feasting, trim Nurse Talo told her.
“Country people,” Talo snorted. “They like fleshy women, and don’t want to change their ways. I’m far too thin for the men around here. Frankly, I am surprised Adam Malala prefers you over the local women, but then, he has been more exposed to American culture.” Again, Winnie wondered if Adam would ultimately decide to follow his mother’s wishes and take a village bride, but she did figure the lack of interest in Nurse Talo had more to do with her sharp tongue than her build.
Her companion killed the last few hours of the day paging through a lurid movie magazine that certainly reinforced the idea of foreign women being loose. As the regular afternoon rain poured down, her fellow nurse yammered on about getting her free day off tomorrow thanks to Winnie. She planned to be at the head of the trail waiting for the earliest bus in the morning to go get her delicious scoop of American civilization. Talo pumped Winnie on opportunities for nurses stateside and hinted she wouldn’t mind seeing New Orleans, showing no less enthusiasm for the idea when Winnie revealed she currently lived with her sister three hours from the big city. Relieved when the day ended, she went back to the house and helped Ela make a large chop suey with rice for dinner, which Adam ate with little appetite, a first for him since they’d met.
In the eve
ning, Winnie sat in the porch rocker again, and Adam, head lowered in his hands, hunched on the front steps not saying a word. “You’re not going all musu on me, are you?” Winnie asked.
His grin flashed in the twilight. “Where did you learn about musu?”
“From your mother and the living example of Sammy Tau. I really don’t understand how one man can choose not to work and you do and get chewed out for it.”
“You see, I work too hard. I show ambition and pride in what I accomplish. Here, this is wrong. Maybe my mother is correct. I am too accustomed to the cheers of the crowd, to having fans and plenty of money to fit in here anymore. Maybe I never did. Looking back it seems those six boys sent to Pago Pago for school were the ones who were different. Davita had an early religious vocation that made him stand out. Sammy and me excelled at sports, Pisa and Pati at schoolwork. Poor Losi, how he could sing and dance as well as paint. The matai sent us out into the world where we could use our talents—and send money home.”
Winnie’s rocker creaked lightly against the porch floor. “That seems very calculating.”
“Or very wise. The village benefits, and we don’t upset the fa’a Samoa.”
“To be honest, I don’t think I could live the fa’a Samoa either.” She hadn’t meant it as anything more than a sympathetic comment, but Adam’s head snapped up.
“Who asked you to?”
“I didn’t mean that in any special way. I know I am an outsider here, one who doesn’t fully understand. Your people are generous and hospitable, the islands gorgeous especially in places like this where the old ways hold, but I feel so out of place. I should leave soon and let you figure out what you want to do without my hanging on you.”
“You don’t hang on me. Winnie, you anchor me to the wider world. You should go inside now before I am tempted to forget my good intentions and take you for another romp in the bushes.”