He gave me a nod, but didn’t come over to me, selecting a table as far away as possible. I paid quickly and left. In my pocket, my lava stone felt like it was on fire.
* * * *
Backstage on our opening night, the buzz had caught up with us performers. Kimo had instructed the production manager to fill our dressing rooms with whatever we required. My needs were simple. I wanted mineral water and cherries. I was staggered by the requests some of the others made. Lon and Eddie were sharing a room and I saw a TV being wheeled in there.
Roland I were sharing and he, like me, had little use for a TV. I was reading all the Hawaiian history I could lay my hands on and Roland was obsessed with his blackberry lately, a perpetual worried look on his face.
Kimo looked amazing in his red malo. He seemed to have lost weight, which surprised me. We said the group prayer and the sounds of the crowd applauding and cheering out front banished my misery for two and a half hours.
The smell of all the fresh island flowers was exhilarating. We all danced our best and gathered to watch his solo finale. I could not take my eyes off him on stage. We took our bows and then it was all over.
Kimo seemed pleased with our work, but he did not once make eye contact with me. He had said there would be a group dinner after the show, but when I asked a couple of people, nobody knew anything about it, so I headed home, exhausted.
Friday’s show and the two performances Saturday and Sunday were also sellouts and the crowds loved us. At the end of each show, we held hands as a group and said a prayer and Kimo would go out into the front of the house signing autographs and pose for pictures. The rest of us would slip away.
By Sunday’s matinee performance, Ginger was out front with him. I caught her ecstatic, frozen smile as she and Kimo posed together for the adoring audience and their snap-happy cameras.
I went to meet Nicky for coffee between Sunday’s shows. She was at her store in the old Mo’ili’ili district, which was currently at war with a proposed train line and I was relieved and happy find the aging gentility of the Manoa valley neighborhood intact.
Kaiona was behind the counter when I walked in. “Howzit, Bobby?” She hugged me. Kaiona was as beautiful as Nicky except she was tall, Hawaiian, and as exotic as a mystic goddess in the Garden of Eden.
“I think marriage suits you.” I studied her, holding her at arm’s length.
“Mahalo, Bobby. I think so, too. How are you doing?”
And I knew then that Nicky had told her.
“Eh, no complaints. The show’s going great. I’m really happy people seem to be loving it.”
“We were at the opening night.” She frowned. “I was hoping to see you. Everybody else showed up to the dinner, except you.”
I was shocked, actually. Kimo must have deliberately excluded me and I didn’t know what to say.
“Didn’t know about it.” I tried to sound breezy. I had left my stone at home and I was feeling lost at sea without him. “Is your old lady around, Kaiona? I’m supposed to be meeting her for coffee.”
“She’s out back waiting for you. Can I make you a cappuccino? How about a muffin?”
“Yes to both,” I said and went off to find Nicky.
We didn’t have much chance to talk openly. Kaiona stayed with us the moment she brought out the refreshments. I liked Kaiona, but wished I could have a heart to heart with Nicky.
Thirty minutes after I arrived, I made my escape, using the excuse of needing to get ready for the next show.
Nicky hugged me hard and I watched Kaiona watching us. I felt a major wave of disapproval from her about my relationship with Kimo. Something had subtly shifted between us and I wished Nicky hadn’t told her. That’s the trouble with coupledom. Your best friend blabs your secrets to their best friend. And your relationship is never the same again.
* * * *
The other members of the dance troupe went off to join Kimo and Mim for dinner on Sunday and of course, I wasn’t invited.
Mim, however, caught me as I was leaving the theater and admonished me. “You skipped Thursday’s chow-down, but I’m not giving up on you yet. Why are you avoiding us? Is Kimo such a tyrant?”
“No,” I said, startled.
“Well then, you’re coming home for dinner with everybody else.”
To say it was an excruciating experience would be a serious understatement. I didn’t know who was more uncomfortable, me or Kimo.
When he saw me trooping down the stone pathway to his house with Roland and the others, the look on his face would have smelted metal.
Mim was a gracious hostess however, and showed me around as Kimo and our stage manager got the barbecue started. I tried hard not to react when I saw the bedroom Kimo shared with Mim. It was a large room, with a huge, four-poster bed with a view of the Ko’olau Mountains, misted over now. The effect was one of being in a secret garden with bamboo growing outside another window and the en suite bathroom’s giant spa tub pointed toward the forest standing in a lush, protective splendor around the Wilder property. It was all very beautiful, but I felt nothing of Kimo here. It felt like it was all Mim.
I could tell which side of the bed was hers. Her nightstand was covered in knick-knacks and hand creams and a paperback copy of a Janet Evanovich novel.
Kimo’s side contained an antique version of the Emerson book I’d been reading in Puna and a single photograph, Kimo and Mim on their wedding day.
“We’ve lived here for five years and I love this house,” Mim was saying. “My husband never complains when I redecorate, which is often.”
I tried not to look at the multitude of family photographs on their grand piano in the living room. They looked happy together and I felt in that moment like everything that had happened between me and Kimo had been a dream. A beautiful, rose-hued dream that had vanished with waking light.
“You know,” she was saying now. “If Kimo hadn’t told me you were a mahu, I would never have guessed it. You don’t act gay at all.”
I didn’t know how to respond to that. “Well, I am,” was the best answer I could supply.
“He says you’re in love with some man you can’t have. That you’re a mess in your relationships. You need to choose more wisely, I think he said.”
“Kimo…said that?” Why was he even talking to her about me?
She shrugged. “You know men. Little patience for matters of the heart. What kind of guys do you like? I’d like to set you up with somebody. You seem really nice. In spite of all the horrible things Kimo says about you.”
“Mim.”
We both turned to find Kimo standing in the doorway of the living room, a pair of barbecue tongs in hand. He looked embarrassed, as well he should.
“What, darling?”
“Tell me what you want me to cook first.”
“See what I mean?” Her exasperation was all pretense. “Hopeless without a woman.”
Kimo’s gaze seared into me and that free-falling sensation of being a mouse swept up by a bird of prey slammed into my brain. He hated me. Why else would he be denigrating me to his wife?
Mim squeezed my hand as she took off to load her husband up with trays of food. I stayed out of their way, sticking close by Roland and his boyfriend, David. I limited myself to one Mai Tai and one portion of fish and vegetables. Down my end of the table, I picked at my food as Kimo and Ginger made fun of everybody else.
When Eddie and Ginger excused themselves, I took the opportunity to exercise the escape clause, too.
“Where do you need to go?” Eddie asked me. “I’ll give you a ride.”
“No need,” Mim said. “Kimo will take him.”
“Absolutely not,” I said as Kimo’s head flicked back and forth between me and his wife. “I’d much prefer he stay and entertain your guests. Eddie can give me a ride, right, Ed? My truck’s back at the theater.”
“Sure.”
I took some plates into the kitchen and Mim protested that I shouldn’t be helping.
I thanked Mim, who I was grudgingly aware, really was as nice as Nicky said.
Mim patted my back and wished me a good night.
“Visit us any time,” she said. “You’re family now.”
I felt really bad for what I had done to her, seducing her husband, and I walked out of their house knowing I had to let go of my feelings for Kimo. I had to forget all about him.
“Was it my imagination or is there trouble in that house?” Ginger gloated as she steered us in an expert way down the mountain road. “They were fighting every time our backs were turned.”
“Aw geez. I left my wallet in there,” Eddie huffed. “We have to go back.”
“Where did you leave it?”
“On the TV set in the kitchen.”
Gin and Eddie argued and, as we arrived back at the house, I blurted, “The gate’s open. I’ll run in and get it.”
Eddie started in on Gin about her feelings for Kimo again and I ran up the front steps, into the kitchen, in time to see Mim giving Jessie, our lovely little hula girl a huge and passionate kiss. The two women were practically giving each other a tonsillectomy.
I was stunned. Their rabid kissing continued as I stepped in quietly, picked up the wallet and left the house as quickly as I’d come.
And to think I’d felt guilty about seducing Kimo.
* * * *
The moment Gin and Eddie dropped me off at the theater, I called Johnny, who was more than happy to hear from me.
“What are you doing?” I asked him.
“Lying here thinking about you.”
“Liar.”
“I have a very hard dick right here that says I’m not.”
Suddenly I didn’t care whether he was seeing somebody else, if his feelings were elsewhere. I ached inside like I never had before.
“How would you feel about a visitor from Waikiki?” I asked.
“When?”
“As soon as I can get a flight out to Maui.”
“Give me an arrival time and I’ll pick you up. Be prepared to get your brains fucked out.”
That made me smile. “I’ll do that.”
Chapter Nine
“I’m sorry. It’s never happened to me before.” Never in a million years did I think these words would come out of my mouth. But they did.
Johnny lay beside me, stroking my arm. “You must be really in love with this guy, whoever he is.”
“He’s not in love with me.” The truth hurt. I could not believe I couldn’t get it up, but each time we tried I had the absurd feeling I was cheating on Kimo and I’d be a sobbing, crying, wreck.
Johnny wanted to go down on me again, but I knew the same thing would happen—I’d get good and hard, ready to go and the second I tried to fuck him it was all over.
“It’s never happened to me before,” I said again.
“Whoever he is, he’s a lucky man.” Johnny’s voice was wistful and I knew he, too, was hurting.
“No, I told you. He doesn’t want me.”
The words lay between us like a dead body.
“If I ask you something, Johnny, will you be honest with me?”
“Sure.”
“Is there something about me that makes men want to leave me?”
Johnny was all over me instantly. “Oh, no, baby. No.”
“Then why is this happening to me again?”
He kissed and rubbed my head. “It’s not you. You’re not unlovable. When you and I were together, it was all me. I wasn’t ready for you and cheating on you…hurting you was the worst thing I’ve ever done in my life.”
I lay back on the bed, looking at the stars over Lahaina. My mother had left me, Johnny had left me and, in the deepest cavern of my heart, Kimo was gone, too. It had to be something about me.
“Do you trust me?” Johnny asked me then.
“What do you mean? I trust you.”
“Do you trust me to give you a piece of advice?”
“Yeah…sure.”
“Whoever this guy is, give him time. Be patient and keep your heart open.”
I started, but Johnny put his hand on my chest. “I’m not laying blame at your feet for my failings. Or his. I’m saying I know what it is to love you. I know what it is to lose you.” His voice started to crack. “And I think he’s gonna miss you in the worst way imaginable and if you want him, Bobby, go into it heart wide open. Don’t let fear be your calling card.”
My feelings for Johnny took a sharp turn into deep, brotherly affection. His words meant a lot to me. I hugged him and started to get out of bed.
“Where the hell are you going?”
“I guess I’m gonna fly back to Waikiki.”
“And do what? Mope? Listen, it’s your day off tomorrow. Let’s just be together and have that dinner at Hailii Maile General Store and, if you feel like fooling around we will, if you don’t, we won’t. Fly back Tuesday in time for the show.”
“I’d like to visit Madame Pele.” I was thinking about my lava stone and how he’d enjoy visiting his brethren. Maybe he’d even become re-energized among his Maui siblings.
“Oh, you’re on your own there, baby. I know you love your Goddess, but I’m scared of her. Go visit her while I’m at work tomorrow.”
“I’ll do that.”
“You gonna lie back down and snuggle with me?”
“If you want,” I said.
Johnny’s almond-shaped eyes lingered on me. “Yeah, I want.”
And I lay with him listening to his rhythmic breathing, knowing that out there on another island, Kimo was lying in somebody else’s arms. I wondered if it filled her up, the way it did me.
His face swam into my brain and I saw him smile and laugh. I hoped she was making him feel that way. Then I realized I truly did feel that way. I wanted his happiness, above even my own.
* * * *
I dropped Johnny off at work on a sleepy-quiet Front Street. The Phantom Lover painting had been replaced by the typical floral stuff tourists usually went for, and he let me keep his red Honda, his pride and joy.
“So, I’ll see you at five. I’ll book the restaurant and I’ll get off early.” He looked at me. “I promise.”
He dropped a kiss on my lips, but I held his head to me, kissing him back with lots of tongue. “Oh, so now you want to make out.” Johnny shook his head and laughed.
I laughed too. “Is your cock hard?”
“Yeah, dammit.”
“Keep it that way.” I drove off and sped toward the south side of the island. I was driving against traffic as most people were heading toward the busier section of the island. I was heading to Makena, a remote section of the island, which was one of Pele’s homes. Haleakala Volcano, long dormant, erupted years and years ago, the lava flowing to the sea. The lava fields extended all the way to the ocean at Makena.
I could feel my lava stone springing to life in my pocket and I could hardly wait to take him to visit Madame’s vast, oceanic canvas.
On the Kings Highway, the road narrowed to one lane going each way and lei stands appeared on the sides of the unmarked road.
I hopped out at the only one that appeared to be open and snatched up fruit and flowers, leaving the required money in a plastic bucket. The honor system was still alive and well in Maui.
At Makena, the road became treacherous, yet the view was out of this world. Lava, lava, lava, as far as the eye could see, from the ocean to the peaks of Haleakala. This was all the result of the 1790 volcanic eruption that covered entire towns and villages. The road had been built in the bottom portion, along the shoreline, and I took my time making it over the rocky terrain until I arrived at the end of the road they call La Perouse, in honor of the French explorer. I locked the car. Car burglaries were alive and well in Maui, too.
Taking two huge stems of red torch ging
er and my lava buddy, I clambered out onto the stones that Madame Pele built. I walked quite a long way out and found a boulder big enough to sit on. Taking my lava boy out of my hand, I put him in the middle of a pile of stones. His own little coffee klatch.
I lay the stems of the ginger together on the stones, knowing they were biodegradable and I listened for Pele. I felt her voice on the wind. She was tired. I felt her aching age, her tiresome struggle with mankind, all that we do to her lands. Pollution, building, destroying. I felt her desolation.
Pele hovered near me and I felt her fill my heart. Warmth and passion filled me again and I looked at my stone, zinging in the sun. When at last I felt he’d had his fill, I picked him up and I felt his warmth. Not the raging heat from the first day I met him, but he was renewed and, for both of us, it was enough for now.
I looked forward to my evening with Johnny. It seemed ironic to me that when it didn’t matter, when our relationship didn’t require his presence, he was there. Just when I needed him most.
* * * *
Johnny and his loving affection were the best medicine I could have found. Our dinner at Hailii Maile was wonderful and I tried hard not to imagine being there with Kimo. This converted grocery shop was the best-kept secret in tourism and I hoped it stayed that way. We split the appetizer of Sashimi Napoleon and as we bit into the layers of fish and wantons, we paused for that small surprise right in the middle: the hidden shoyu leaf that packs a mouthful of spicy flavor.
It wasn’t there.
When we asked our waitress, she explained that an old Japanese man grew the shoyu and brought it to the restaurant himself layered in thin papers each and every morning. His recent passing meant that the shoyu was no longer available.
“It’s very difficult to grow,” she said. “You’re the first people in weeks to notice the difference.”
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