Fly, Butterfly

by Annicken R. Day

  I walked over to greet George, who stood up and introduced me to a large dark-haired man with a ponytail. The man offered me a drink, which I received thankfully. It felt good to have something to hold on to. The drink tasted of coconut and rum, and it was pretty strong. Already after two sips, I could feel the warming sensation of alcohol in my blood.

  After William had chatted his way around the group, he finally came over to me. “Thank you for coming. It means a lot to us,” he said, nodding to his father, who was chatting with some of the other guests.

  “Of course. I was looking forward to it,” I said. I felt I should clear the air but didn’t quite know how to begin.

  William eyed my glass. “Can I get you another drink?”

  He was polite, a gentleman, just like his father.

  “Thanks, I’m good,” I said. “My body needs to adjust slowly to the rum.”

  The warmth of his smile helped me summon enough courage to say what I needed to say.

  “William, I need to apologize for earlier. I don’t know what came over me, and I’m really embarrassed about it. It’s really no excuse, but the dog kind of freaked me out.”

  At the mention of the dog, we both started laughing. And I realized that the whole situation was pretty funny. The tension was gone, and it suddenly felt friendlier and more relaxed between us.

  “Frankly, Maya, I have to say that I found your temper quite refreshing,” William said.

  “Oh really?” I said. “What makes you say that?”

  “When Dad pointed you out to me, sitting in your meditation pose on the beach, I thought you would be another one of those soft-spoken, tree-hugging, new-agey types that this island attracts in hordes. Not that there is anything wrong with that. It was just refreshing that you weren’t one of them.” He smiled and walked away to attend to some other guests, leaving me there, wondering whether I had just received a compliment or not.

  The group suddenly became quiet when the large dark-haired man with the ponytail stood up and announced, “Aloha, friends.”

  I realized he was some sort of minister.

  “We have gathered today to remember a beautiful soul, known to you as Aimee, who ten years ago crossed over to the other side.”

  He got quiet. A few seconds later, a strong, warm voice filled the air.

  Facing the ocean, George began singing “Some Enchanted Evening,” the song from South Pacific that he had sung to Aimee on the day they got married.

  Everyone stood still and watched George as he walked down to the water, carrying a big lei, made up of flowers of every color. He finished the song at the exact moment that the sun set in the ocean, then he threw the lei out on the water.

  We watched the flowers dance on the soft waves, while the man with the ponytail said a prayer in Hawaiian. When he finished, William walked down to meet his father at the shore and put his arm around him. Together they walked back up to the group still standing quietly around the bonfire.

  William nodded to the ukulele player, who started playing again. People resumed talking and laughing, and the ceremony became a cheerful party again.

  Suddenly, William was right in front of me again.

  “Enjoying yourself?” he asked, flashing his boyish smile.

  “Yes, I am. I’ve never attended a ceremony like this before, where sadness and happiness go hand in hand.”

  “Mom always liked a good party,” William said with a smile. “She would have hated it if we just sat around with sad faces and mourned her on a day like this.”

  We watched an elderly couple dancing to the music from the ukulele. The old man was leading, and the woman was in his arms, smiling up at him like a schoolgirl. It was endearing to watch.

  “Can I get you another drink now?” William asked. “That is, if your body has adjusted to the rum yet?”

  I laughed and nodded. “I’d love one.”

  I had never been a fan of hard liquor, but coconut and rum was surprisingly enjoyable, especially in these surroundings.

  A few minutes later William was back with a new drink. I realized I had been following him with my eyes the entire time, noticing how he walked, how he talked, how he poured the drink, the way he held his head, how he smiled, how he laughed, and how warm and friendly he was with everyone.

  “Careful, Maya,” a voice inside of me said, but I wasn’t sure which one it was.

  When William came back and handed me my drink, our hands touched for a moment and a shiver ran through my body.

  He gave me a concerned look. “Are you cold? Can I get you a blanket?”

  “Thank you, that would be nice,” I said, even though I wasn’t cold at all.

  As he carefully put a blanket over my shoulders, his hand touched my back, and I shivered again. What was happening to me? This was very unlike me. I decided it must be the rum going to my head. I made a mental note to be careful with the alcohol. I didn’t want to embarrass myself in front of William—again.

  It was a nice party. Everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves, and when it got dark, one person after the other started to leave, hugging George and William goodbye as they left. Pretty soon, it was just the three of us left around the bonfire.

  William was sitting with one arm around his father, the other holding George’s hand. The love expressed between them was moving. I felt I was intruding on something deeply personal, so I stood up, signaling that I would leave as well.

  “Can’t you stay for a little while longer?” George asked.

  William smiled and patted the pillow beside them.

  “Yes, please, Maya, do join us. We still have plenty of rum to finish,” he said and poured me another drink.

  I smiled and sat down on the pillow beside William. I had a warm sensation in my body, and it wasn’t only because of the rum.

  For a while we all looked silently into the bonfire, sipping our drinks, listening to the sound of burning fire mixed with the ocean waves.

  “What a beautiful ceremony it was,” I said after another moment of silence. The two men nodded and smiled back at me, their faces lit by the warm light from the flames.

  “Cheers to Mom,” William said and lifted his glass.

  “Cheers to my love,” George chimed in.

  “Cheers to Aimee, whom I wish I had met,” I said as I raised my glass.

  A big wave hit the shore and I took a deep breath. The sand was starting to get cooler under my feet. I moved closer to the fire and wrapped the blanket tighter around my shoulders. Thousands of stars were lighting up the sky, one of them shining brighter than the others.

  While William put another piece of wood on the fire, I thought about how little I knew about the woman these two men had loved so much.

  “What was Aimee really like?” I asked, when William sat down again.

  George and William exchanged glances, and then they both burst out laughing.

  “You go first,” George said.

  “No, you go, Dad. After all, you’re the one who chose to marry her.”

  “OK,” George said and took a deep breath. “To describe Aimee is like describing the island of Kaua’i, I guess: magical, beautiful, powerful, emotional, and strong.”

  I smiled. There was so much love in George’s eyes.

  “She was someone you definitely didn’t want to mess with! Aimee fascinated me from the moment I met her. She was not like any of the other women on the set.”

  William smiled at his father. He had clearly heard this story many times before.

  “While the other actresses seemed to accept and do what they were told, Aimee was opinionated and passionate and quickly became a headache for the film director. She didn’t believe in following orders. She always had her own ideas for things, including the scenes she was in.”

  George was looking into the flames, smiling.

  “In the scene when the marines were visiting Bali Ha’i for the first time, they were welcomed by the local girls. Aimee was supposed to wear a white dress and
put a lei over the head of one of them when they stepped on land. But when she showed up for her scene, her white dress was torn and muddy and full of sand, and her hair was a mess. She was smiling from ear to ear, and her eyes were shining like two happy stars. I had never seen anything so beautiful in my entire life.”

  I looked over at William. He was chuckling, as he anticipated the next part of George’s story. I couldn’t help but smile. It was nice to be included in the telling of these stories.

  “When Joshua Logan saw her, he shouted, ‘What the hell, Aimee?’ He scowled at Aimee as she lifted her stubborn little chin and looked the famous film director right in the eyes. She said, ‘Don’t you find it strange that on a desert island, far out in the South Pacific, hundreds of local girls are wearing clean white, starched dresses and have perfectly coiffed hair? I’m just helping you make the scene a bit more believable.’”

  Now I was chuckling. Aimee sounded amazing—strong willed and fearless.

  William leaned over and put another piece of wood on the bonfire while George continued his story.

  “Needless to say, she was taken out of the scene, and the role was given to someone else. She was such a rebel, so full of laughter and heart. And even though there are hardly any traces of either of us in the final version of the film, I know the whole purpose of us being in it was so we could meet.”

  George smiled and gave William a little shove. “Which you should be really happy about, by the way.”

  William laughed and teasingly nudged his father back.

  “Now it’s your turn,” George said, turning toward his son. “Tell us what it was like having Aimee as a mother.”

  William laughed. “What can I say? It was like being on a never-ending adventure. Mom didn’t believe in strict rules or punishment like many other parents do.”

  George smiled, proud and happy to hear his son share his story.

  “‘You’ll end up doing whatever you want to do anyway,’ she used to tell me. And, of course, she was right.”

  I put my drink down in the sand. There was something about Aimee that reminded me of Mom.

  “This is perhaps common knowledge now, but in the seventies this was pretty radical parenting. I remember learning right from wrong by observing my parents and by making my own mistakes and learning from them.

  “If I wanted something, I needed to make good arguments for it and build my case. If I disagreed or didn’t want to do something, and I had good enough reasons for it, she gladly let me convince her or change her mind. And I never needed to keep any secrets from her, because I always felt that she supported me and respected my decisions, even when they were really stupid.”

  George was still smiling. William stood up to refresh his drink. He gestured to me, to see if I wanted more, and I shook my head. I’d lost count of the number of drinks I’d had, and even though it was just a short walk back to the beach house, I wanted to be able to make it on my own.

  William took a sip of his drink and continued, “One time my friends and I decided to hike down the Nā Pali Coast, also known as the Kalalau Trail, which is strictly forbidden if you don’t have a guide or a permit, or—in our case—adult supervision.

  “We were fifteen, cocky, and way too sure of ourselves, and decided to go it alone. Mom knew of our plans and asked if we had thought it through, if we realized the risk, and if we were willing to take the consequences should we get caught or should something happen to us. I said yes to it all, and she didn’t say anything else except, ‘Bring enough water and food and wear something warm.’”

  George nodded at the memories. The reflection of the flames danced in William’s eyes as he continued telling his story.

  “Two hours into the hike, we were surprised by the weather. We had checked the forecast, and it looked good, but the weather can be very unpredictable around here, and if there is somewhere you don’t want to be in a rainstorm, it’s on the Kalalau Trail. The rain soon turned the trail into a mudslide that could have pulled us right down the rocky side of the mountain.”

  I held my breath, waiting for him to continue his story.

  “There were five of us. We were all used to nature and climbing, but we were terrified. We simply couldn’t move. There was nowhere to hide from the rain, and we all knew the dangers of mudslides.”

  My eyes widened as I looked over at George, who nodded to punctuate the gravity of the situation. I think the two of them enjoyed keeping me on edge with the vivid story.

  “No one knew where we were except my parents. All the other boys had told their parents they would be sleeping at each other’s places. They knew they would never be allowed to hike the Kalalau Trail by themselves.”

  The tide was getting closer and almost reached our chairs and pillows. We all stood up and moved to the other side of the bonfire.

  “Then what?” I asked. I could almost see the terrified boys in front of me.

  “I’ll never forget when I heard the voices of Mom, Dad, and the park ranger,” William said, with relief in his voice.

  “They showed up with ropes and blankets and helped us back to safety. When we got back, Mom made sure we all had warm showers, dry clothes, sandwiches, and hot cocoa in front of the fireplace. There was no judgment or criticism. She just washed everyone’s clothes to get rid of the mud, made up beds on mattresses on the living room floor, and woke everyone up for breakfast the next morning.”

  “That’s incredible,” I said.

  William nodded. “Over breakfast she asked us to share what we’d learned over the past twenty-four hours. After everyone had shared their lessons, she nodded and smiled. ‘As long as you all learn,’ she said. Then she told us we all had to work for half a day each to pay the park ranger back as a thank you for helping with the rescue.”

  George smiled and nodded knowingly. He clearly liked this part of the story.

  “Some had to cut the lawn. Others had to pick up trash on the beach. She gave all of us different chores that she paid for, and then asked us to personally go and pay the ranger and thank him for what he did.”

  My admiration for Aimee grew. I couldn’t let go of the feeling that my mom probably would have done something similar.

  William continued, “She never told any of the boys’ families and said it was up to them if they wanted to share what had happened. In fact, we never spoke of the incident again until many years later. I asked Mom how come she hadn’t tried to stop me from going on the trip when it was clearly a bad idea.”

  I looked over at George who beamed with pride as his son spoke of Aimee.

  “She just looked at me and asked whether it would have made any difference, and I told her that I probably would have found a way to do it anyway.”

  Aimee clearly knew her son very well.

  “So, what did she say then?” I asked.

  William laughed. “Mom just looked at me and said, ‘Well, there you go. Life is full of choices and risks, and we all have to learn from our own mistakes. And you clearly needed to learn a lesson to not make the kind of mistakes that could kill you.’”

  William smiled and shook his head. “I definitely learned from that one, and so did my friends.”

  George chuckled. “What your mom never told you was that we notified the park ranger before you left, and we were just twenty minutes behind you. We let you stand in the rain for a while, to make sure you learned your lesson.”

  A smile broke across William’s face. He grabbed some sand in his hands and threw it playfully toward his dad.

  “You bastards! You never told me that!” He laughed and then turned to me.

  “See what I was up against?”

  George and I both laughed.

  “Aimee sounds like such an amazing woman,” I said.

  “She certainly was,” George said and smiled warmly into the fire. “And not only as a wife or mother. She was also one of the most accomplished businesswomen on the island.”

  “Really?”

  Ge
orge chuckled at my reaction and continued, “When William was just two years old, she started her own business. She’d been out shopping for children’s clothes one day and thought the clothes in the stores were too expensive and of poor quality, so she started making her own clothes out of good material, with fun, playful designs.

  “When the other parents saw William dressed in the clothes that Aimee had made for him, they asked her if she could make clothes for their children, too. Pretty soon, more parents started contacting her, and the demand for her clothes exploded among all the parents on the island.”

  William smiled. Now he was the one who looked proud.

  “She quickly outgrew our living room and rented a house to use as a makeshift factory. She hired some local people, trained them, and pretty soon, she had her own clothing brand and a chain of stores that became hugely popular on Kaua’i and quickly expanded to the other islands as well.

  “And the funny part is that she ended up employing Dad,” William added, laughing.

  I laughed, too. This was all too much.

  “She needed someone loyal and handy to help her build and open new stores, so Dad got the job, and she bossed him around and made him travel around to the different islands while she was here on Kaua’i, running the company and raising me.”

  “Which by the way was a much tougher job than managing the company,” George teased.

  William laughed and gave his dad a playful noogie.

  “Aimee was a super woman in every sense of the word,” George said, “but also the warmest, sweetest, and most fun-loving person you’d ever met.”

  William said, “Remember how Mom and I used to go body surfing, Dad? We were out in the waves for hours, and then we ate grilled fish and played cards afterward. Of all my childhood memories, those are some of my favorites.”

  “And my best memories are from after you went to bed,” George teased as his son rolled his eyes and pretended to put his fingers in his ears.