He’d finished his first taco when she finished the condensed version of who she was and why she was bothering him. After she stopped talking, he looked up without lifting his head as though checking to make sure she was done.
“I just want to know more about Noelani,” Sadie said, shifting under the discomfort of the information she’d left out—Charlie. She didn’t feel ready yet to mention him, not until she better understood this man. She hadn’t expected him to be so stoic and uninterested. Weren’t social workers supposed to be . . . well, social?
“I didn’t know her that well,” Mr. Olie said as he began wrapping another taco. “I don’t think I’m the person that’s going to make you feel better about this.”
Fish Tacos
Cilantro Sauce
1/4 cup mayonnaise
2 tablespoons cilantro, chopped
1 tablespoon lime juice
1 clove garlic, minced or pressed
1 teaspoon water
1 teaspoon white sugar
1/8 teaspoon cumin
Fish
11/2 pounds white fish cut into 1-inch cubes (halibut, cod, roughy, snapper, perch, swai)
2 tablespoons chopped cilantro
1/2 cup pineapple juice
1 tablespoon butter
1 clove of garlic, minced or pressed
1/4 teaspoon white or black pepper
1/4 teaspoon cumin
1/4 teaspoon salt
Zest of one lime
Flour or corn tortillas, warmed
Toppings
Shredded lettuce or cabbage
Diced tomatoes
2 mangoes, cut into slices (mangoes make all the difference)
Avocados or guacamole (optional)
Freshly squeezed lime juice (optional)
In a small bowl, mix all the ingredients for the cilantro sauce. Set aside.
Cut up fish and put into a small glass or plastic (anything non-metal) bowl. Add cilantro and pineapple juice. Set aside. (For a tangier version, soak fish in 2 tablespoons lime juice instead of pineapple juice.)
In a frying pan, melt butter on medium-high heat. Add garlic and sauté for 1 minute. Add spices and sauté for 30 seconds. Drain the pineapple juice (or lime juice) from the fish. Add drained fish to butter and spices. Sauté for 2 minutes, stirring constantly. Add lime zest. Cook an additional 3 to 4 minutes, stirring constantly until fish begins to flake apart. Remove from heat.
To prepare tacos, place a large spoonful of cooked fish in the center of a warm tortilla. Add toppings as desired. Top with cilantro sauce. Add lime juice, if desired. Roll up and eat.
Makes approximately 8 tacos.
Chapter 12
I don’t expect anything will make me feel better,” Sadie said. “I just want . . . understanding.”
He harrumphed and then waved at the chair across the table. Sadie felt a flutter of victory. He was inviting her to sit. That was a good sign! Maybe IZ’s aloha spirit was rubbing off on this man too.
Once she sat down, Mr. Olie stared at her, and she was surprised by his anger. Not the aloha she was hoping for. Was he angry about what had happened to Noelani, or was he angry with Sadie for interrupting him?
“Understanding is a worthless pursuit. Understanding Noelani Pouhu is even more so.”
Definitely angry at or about Noelani.
“I just have a few questions,” Sadie said, feeling a rush of courage as she reviewed what she knew about Noelani’s situation and put her questions in order of priority. She had a feeling Mr. Olie wasn’t going to tolerate a long discussion.
He let out a breath, giving in, and nodded quickly, as if saying “Let’s get this over with.” He went back to his meal.
“I understand Noelani lost custody of her son on O’ahu two years ago, then transferred here for rehab after her release. Her son was transferred to a foster home here too, right? To Kaua’i?”
He nodded, but only once.
“It seems as though the state was working hard for them to reunite. I imagine it can’t be easy to change jurisdictions.”
“It isn’t,” he said. “But there were special circumstances.”
“Can I ask what those special circumstances were?” Sadie felt a tremor of excitement at the prospect of figuring something out.
“No, you can’t,” he said, sounding offended. Her excitement died instantly.
“Okay,” Sadie said, trying to rebuild the confidence this man was shattering one word at a time. “Can you tell me if she and her son were close to being reunited?”
She held her breath, sure he was about to have her thrown out of the restaurant. Instead, he took another bite of his taco, chewed, swallowed, and then spoke.
“Last month the judge gave her ninety days to get an apartment. If she had her own place by that time, her son could be returned to her for a probationary period of time,” Mr. Olie said, rerolling his taco, but not lifting it for another bite. “All she had to do was find a place to live and pass her weekly drug screens. I thought she was on her way, but I was wrong. What else do you want to know?”
“Um,” Sadie said. She hadn’t thought of another question, and his intense stare made it hard for her to think clearly. “What was she like?”
His eyes narrowed slightly, and Sadie had the distinct impression he was disappointed in her question. It confused her. “What was she like?” he repeated.
Sadie nodded. “What was she like with her son? Did they have a good relationship?”
“They seemed to.”
“Oh, um, good,” Sadie said. “Do you think she was still using drugs?”
“She’d passed all her screenings since coming to Kaua’i,” Mr. Olie said. “She got a full-time job at the motel a few months ago and was getting closer to reunification every day. But she wound up dead in the ocean so something went wrong.”
He seemed to have the same opinion Officer Wington did—that Noelani’s death was drug-related despite no conclusive evidence. Before Sadie could figure out another question, Mr. Olie continued.
“I had a heart attack five years ago and took early retirement,” he said, taking the conversation in a totally different direction. “I returned to work three years ago, part-time, and decided to make every case count. I fought harder than anyone else would for my clients. Reuniting families was my specialty and the best part of my job. I had the seniority to handpick my cases, and in time, people brought me cases they thought I would really sink my teeth into. I’ve had an impressive record. Noelani’s situation was unique, and the department worked hard to help her make a go with this. They even let her leave O’ahu and transferred her son to Kaua’i in the name of reunification—ohana—family. I was the perfect guy for the job.
“As of six months ago, I had three of these types of cases I was working, and they were all looking good. The first family consisted of a single mother—a widow who’d turned to prescription pain medication after her husband died—and her three kids. Grandmother had taken over guardianship of the kids so Mom could go to rehab without her kids going into foster care. She completed treatment and was working on getting a job while living with her mother and the kids as they reestablished their relationships.
“We were days away from Mom taking back guardianship of her children when she came into my office, high as a kite, wanting to sign away her parental rights. I did everything I could to convince her that it wasn’t the right decision—I even made her wait two days before I’d let her sign—but she came back—sober—and signed her kids away. Then she hopped a plane for the Big Island to meet up with some tweeker she’d met online. Grandma was diagnosed with colon cancer two weeks later.
“So, I’ve got three kids—ages ten, twelve, and fourteen. Their father is dead, they were abandoned by their mother, and they are about to lose their grandmother, and I don’t have anywhere to send them. They’re native, which means they require a special foster home, and I don’t have any homes that have room for three siblings. Last night, the fourteen
-year-old was arrested for public intoxication, and I can’t help but wonder who’s going to raise her children one day.”
“I’m so sorry,” Sadie said, reflecting on how much hurt he witnessed through his work. She could hear both anger and exhaustion in his voice.
“The other family was a mom, a dad, and two preteen daughters; haoles who’d come from California so Dad could surf now that he was off parole for aggravated assault. He decided to grow his own weed instead of getting a real job, got caught, went to jail, the house fell apart, Mom was arrested for check fraud, yada yada yada. But they were devastated when the kids were put into temporary placement, and they worked hard to get their lives back on track, which happened in January.
“This last Valentine’s Day, Dad got drunk and beat Mom unconscious. The two girls are now in two different temporary homes because I don’t have a home that will take sisters in their age bracket. We’re all waiting to see if Mom, who’s been in a rehab facility due to the significant injuries she sustained from the beating—including neurological damage—will ever be able to care for them again.” He looked past Sadie for a moment before bringing his gaze back to her.
“My third case was Noelani Pouhu and her son, and it was feeling like a slam dunk, especially compared to those other two. Noelani took every class we offered, she toed the line to perfection, passed every drug screen, involved herself in a church and her community; she really seemed to step up.” He took a breath before going back to his meal. He took a bite, and then a long drink of his Coke.
“I can’t imagine what that’s like to see those things up close,” Sadie said when he didn’t comment further. What else could she say? “I’m sorry.”
He grunted and kept eating.
Sadie waited a full minute, expecting him to break the awkward silence. He didn’t. She finally felt she had no choice but to do it herself. “When did you last see Charlie?”
His chewing slowed, and he looked up at her. “How do you know his name?”
Sadie felt her cheeks flush. “I, uh, talked to the police this morning.” But she didn’t think they had actually told her his name. She hurried to continue. “Have you talked to him since his mother was found?”
Mr. Olie’s wide shoulders went up as he took a deep breath, then he put his fork and knife on the edge of his plate and glared at her until Sadie felt herself shrinking beneath his gaze. He’d softened during his monologue, but his anger was back now. It was all Sadie could do not to excuse herself and flee for home.
“What do you want from me? I can’t give you peace about Noelani, and I can’t give you hope for Charlie’s future. He’s a ward of the state now, and he very likely is highly traumatized by all of this because I promised him—promised him—that he and his mother would be a family.” He paused long enough for his words to sink in. “I can’t make you feel better about what happened to you or to Noelani. She was an addict, but I thought she had it in her to beat the statistics. I believed her when she said she would do anything to get her son back. I was wrong.”
“What if it wasn’t an overdose?” Sadie said. “The police said the toxicology reports were—”
“It was drugs,” he cut in. “I spoke to her the day before she took off. She’d petitioned for more visitation hours, and the judge had awarded them so I gave her a call. She turned the conversation to her frustrations with the apartment requirements we put on her: no roommates, certain areas were off limits, biweekly home visits for the first month. The waiting list for low-income housing was two years long, and she couldn’t afford much. She argued that we were making it too hard on her, said we didn’t really want them together. I got sharp with her—we’d just doubled her visitation hours, after all—but she hung up on me. I had a meeting with her and my supervisor the next Thursday for a drug test and to see where she was at with her housing situation. I hoped she’d be calmer by then. I got a call Wednesday night that she hadn’t shown up for her weekly visitation with Charlie. I made some calls over the next couple of days, which is how I realized she’d been missing for almost a week.”
“And you thought she’d gone back to the drug scene.”
“Parents who want their kids back don’t let anything get in their way. Her frustration was building, and she was seeing that this wasn’t going to be easy—and it wouldn’t get easier. That she hit her limit and went back to the drugs she’d been using since she was thirteen years old isn’t a stretch. I’ve seen it happen a thousand times. She knew she had a screening on Thursday. Failing it would be failing everything. She’d lose every bit of progress she’d made.”
Sadie blinked. She wanted to make her point again that there was nothing conclusive, but the way he said it made the explanation about drugs sound so plausible. He had far more experience with this type of thing than she did, and so did the police. Who was she to question their judgment of the situation?
Mr. Olie shrugged, resigned. “I’ve been a social worker for almost thirty years. I’ve tried to make a difference, but with the rise of hard drugs on the islands, the bureaucracy which has me doing more paperwork than face-to-face meetings with my clients, and the disintegration of overall values of people has worn me out. How can I swim against a current like that? Why do I put myself in the middle of helpless situations? The fact is that I thought I was helping Noelani, and I didn’t help her after all. I certainly didn’t help Charlie.”
“I think you helped her,” Sadie said, keeping her voice soft and, she hoped, nonthreatening. “Charlie saw his mother clean before she died. Maybe it doesn’t seem like much compared to what he lost, but one day he’ll have that to reflect on. One day he’ll know she was trying.”
“She’d been clean before,” Mr. Olie said. “For up to a year one time, but she never lasted, and while it was nice for Charlie to see his mom clean, one day he’ll also know they found marijuana in her stuff. He’ll know that the one thing she had to do to get him back was stay clean and she couldn’t do it. He’ll know it wasn’t worth it for her.”
“But she was clean,” Sadie insisted. “For a while. Charlie has good memories of that—certainly that has to count for something.”
“It won’t be enough,” Mr. Olie said, shaking his head. “It never is.”
There was something in his statement that held a question.
“Sometimes it is, isn’t it? You’ve done this for so many years—don’t you see successes too?”
He immediately looked away, confirming that Sadie had hit a nerve.
“Doesn’t Charlie still have a chance? Isn’t there hope for him?”
Mr. Olie sat back in his chair, glaring at her as he crossed his arms over his expansive chest. “What do you want from me?” he asked again. For the first time since they’d met, Sadie could see how broken he was. It hadn’t been his anger she felt after all. He felt like a failure, he felt used up, but there was something in the look he gave her that said he was also looking for hope of his own.
Chapter 13
I don’t know what I want from you,” Sadie finally admitted once she realized that, despite all the reasons for him not to, he’d made himself vulnerable to her. She looked at the table and considered her options, and then looked up, ready to make herself vulnerable too. “Charlie found me,” she admitted, her words cramming together as though in a hurry to get out before she changed her mind. “Yesterday. He showed up at my condo in Puhi with this list of questions about his mother.” She pulled the list out of her shoulder bag and placed the folded paper on the table between them. “I was going to call the police, but I left him alone and when I came back, he was gone.”
Mr. Olie glanced at the paper, his thick eyebrows pulled together, but didn’t reach for it.
She wondered if he was afraid to read it, afraid of becoming emotionally involved in whatever the list contained. Sadie couldn’t blame him. She’d read it, and she couldn’t let go of it now.
“He took all the cash from my wallet, but I don’t want to get him in trouble. I
haven’t told the police because I’m afraid they’ll take him out of his foster home—that happened to a foster family I know in Colorado—so I came to you instead. The police don’t seem to be actively investigating his mother’s death, and I don’t think Charlie believes his mom is really dead, and I’m just . . . I don’t know what I want or what I’m looking for except that it feels like something isn’t right, and maybe if I can answer these questions for Charlie I can help make it a little less wrong.”
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