Tiare in Bloom

by Célestine Vaite

  Minutes later. “You’re still cranky with Papi?”

  Minutes later. “Come here, you.” And with this, Pito takes the baby into his arms and gently taps her on the bottom. She looks up to him with her big, sooky brown eyes and Pito goes warm inside. He can’t remember melting that way with his own children. In fact, he can’t remember holding them that way. When his children were babies, Materena was always in the whereabouts, and she’d give him the baby to hold only to take the baby back seconds later because . . . why? Well, maybe she didn’t trust him. She thought he’d drop her precious baby on the ground; or maybe she just wanted to hold her babies herself.

  Leaving him with a baby like that would never have happened twenty years ago. Materena would have organized her mother to come over to babysit, or she would have asked an auntie. Better yet, Materena would have gratefully accepted her cousin Rita’s kind offer to look after Tiare while Materena was at work.

  But although Materena is fine with Rita coming around during the day in her lunch break to hold the baby for a few moments — to help her conceive — she decided that tonight Pito would be in charge. Plus, Materena walked out of the house, without even making a fuss or giving him one thousand recommendations. She just walked out smiling and said, “I’ll see you two when I come back.”

  There was a day a long time ago, Tamatoa was about three years old, Leilani was just a baby, and Materena had to go somewhere for a few hours. That day, for some reason, Materena decided to let Pito mind the children but she gave him such a long list of things to do and things not to do (such as not feeding her beloved son chicken wings because he might choke) that Pito got very annoyed. He told Materena off, she did her long face, Pito yelled at her, she grabbed her children and fled to her mother’s. Pito copped cranky looks from his mother-in-law for weeks.

  But here he is fully in charge. He looks down at his granddaughter, and her big brown eyes are staring at him like he’s the most important person in the whole universe.

  “Dodo soon, okay?” he says, feeling pretty tired himself. Actually he might go to bed now. “Okay, dodo.” He carries Tiare to her auntie’s bedroom. The mattress has been moved to the floor and is covered with fluffy teddy bears the baby’s relatives from Faa’a and Punaauia gave her on her baptism. Pito brushes the fluffy things off the mattress with his hand. How many teddy bears can a baby play with? And what’s with the teddy bears anyway? People didn’t give babies teddy bears back in his day. But now it seems that the world has gone bear mad.

  Pito gently places Tiare on the bed — faceup. That is the only recommendation Materena gave Pito: until the baby is six months old, it should always sleep faceup. She gave him that recommendation at the baptism and explained why. It made sense to Pito, and when things make sense to Pito, he follows through.

  “Allez, princess; dodo.” He pulls her quilt over her body. “Sleep well, I see you tomorrow morning.” He softly kisses her on the forehead, switches the light off, and walks out. She whimpers and Pito stops dead in his tracks and waits. She stops and so he takes another step, and she starts whimpering again. He stops walking — she stops whimpering. He takes another step and she starts up again and doesn’t stop.

  He’s back in the room, she stops whimpering. Growling, Pito lies on the floor next to the mattress with his hand lovingly resting on the baby and counts one to ten to pass the time. Ten to twenty, twenty to thirty, thirty to forty . . . three hundred and seventy-five. Pito can stop counting. He can hear his granddaughter’s regular breathing. She’s asleep.

  But just in case, Pito lies still and waits for a few more minutes.

  Standing at the door, Materena looks at her husband fast asleep on the floor. “Eh-eh,” she whispers tenderly, a hand on her heart, with tears welling in her eyes. Many things in this world move Materena. Babies, children, love songs, love movies, sunsets, kindness, flowers, prayers . . . the list goes on. It isn’t difficult to move a sensitive woman to tears. But a man sleeping on the floor, his hand lovingly resting on a baby, is guaranteed to give a sensitive woman like Materena more tears and emotions, especially when she loves that baby very much. And despite the real fact that only four weeks ago she was seriously thinking of divorcing that man there, now on the floor looking so adorable.

  People might say that the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach . . . or more likely, in Materena’s experience, his moa. But the way to get to a woman’s heart, and just as fast, is an all-different route.

  Love Like When You Can’t Think Proper

  The dream she had last night, Materena tells Mama Teta and the other six memes who are gathered today to work on a quilt with Tiare comfortable on a mat, is the same dream she had four weeks ago, but it’s a bit different. She’s in the ferry, okay, with Pito, and they’re standing at the rail looking down to the dark blue sea, when Pito falls overboard. It’s not clear how Pito falls, but one minute he’s standing by the rail next to Materena, and the next minute he’s yelling his head off and plouf! He disappears into the dark blue sea with Materena looking down thinking that it’s so sad that she will never see her man again for her whole life.

  The seven old women have stopped their work and are now sitting still, needle and thread in hand, eyes focused on the storyteller, waiting to see where the story is heading to.

  So back to Materena’s dream last night. Same thing: Pito falls overboard, yells his head off, disappears into the dark blue sea, but this time Materena gets into action, and in the background, the music from The Pink Panther movie is playing.

  “Can we hear music in dreams?” Meme Agathe ventures.

  “Of course! She heard it, didn’t she?” Meme Rarahu replies. “Mamu, don’t talk. Materena, continue your story.”

  Okay, so Materena jumps overboard.

  “And?” Meme Agathe asks.

  And? Well, that’s the end of Materena’s dream.

  “That’s it?” Meme Agathe looks disappointed. “That’s the end of your story?”

  “Meme Agathe!” Meme Rarahu scolds. “You don’t understand, you never understand anything! There’s a message. Before, Materena didn’t jump from the ferry, but last night she jumped from the ferry. There’s a message.”

  “True,” Mama Teta agrees. “There’s definitely a message.”

  All eyes are now on the storyteller. What is the message?

  “Bon,” Materena cackles. “Bon.” She has a dreamy look on her face now. Last night after Materena woke Pito up tenderly and helped him to the marital bed, Pito was so sweet. He held Materena tight and whispered, “Materena, my chérie,” in her ears, over and over again. Materena expected Pito to jump on her at any moment, since they hadn’t done sexy loving in almost a month, but he kept on holding her tight, whispering her name and caressing her hair.

  It was a very magic moment for Materena. It was like she had just met Pito, and he was taking his time before jumping on her because she was so special and he was afraid that he’d do the wrong thing and she’d run away.

  And then they talked for nearly an hour! It’s years since they talked for that long. Actually, they have never talked like that. Usually one ends up saying something that annoys the other within three minutes.

  Materena felt like she was with a really good friend (but a really good friend; a friend who was making her feel, let’s be honest, a little bit . . . en chaleur). They talked about their children, their granddaughter, and how beautiful she is, but also very demanding when she wants. Pito held Materena tighter and said, “My chérie, I’m going to take my holidays as soon as I can to help you.” And then —

  “Alors?” The memes are getting impatient. “Your message? What is it?”

  “It could be that I’m —”

  “Oui, that’s it,” five memes hurry to agree. “You’re in love, in love like when we can’t think proper, that’s the message, you’re in love like when you first met Pito . . . It’s the big love between you two.” Two memes casually mention that, actually, they did notice som
ething different about Materena today, there’s a twinkle in her eye . . . But let’s get something straight, would Materena really jump overboard for Pito in real life?

  Materena thinks a little. Would she jump overboard in real life? Well oui, to save one of her kids, of course she would jump, one hundred percent absolutely. Although they swim far better than she does. And . . . oui, she’d jump to save Pito too.

  “Probably,” Materena adds.

  “Eh,” Meme Agathe cackles, “what is the craziest thing you’ve ever done for love?”

  Again, Materena has to ponder for a few seconds. Hmm . . . “I sneaked out of the shutter at night to meet Pito.” Materena adds that this was back in those days when he wasn’t her official boyfriend.

  “That’s not crazy!” Meme Agathe shrieks. “We’ve all sneaked out of a shutter to go and meet some boy we like!” She glances at the other memes to back her up on that one, but she gets only stares, meaning, speak for yourself.

  “Do you want to know about one of the crazy things I did for love?” Meme Agathe asks. And before anyone can tell her that non, they’re not particularly interested, she fires away, “I dyed my hair blond!” Blank looks, meaning, That’s it? And you call this crazy? Anyway, next!

  Well, Meme Rarahu walked twelve miles to see a boy she liked. She walked in the dark, alone, which wasn’t a small thing for her to do, since she was quite a peureuse in her younger days. She was mostly afraid of tupapa’u, the evil wandering spirits — petrified, as a matter of fact — but she wanted to see that boy so much she overcame her fear and walked the twelve miles, reciting prayers and looking behind her back every two seconds. She walked fast, of course. Actually, if she remembers correctly, she ran, mixing her prayers and thinking about scary stories nonstop, like the story of that three-month-old baby possessed by the devil. Then when Rarahu finally arrived at that boy’s house, he was busy with another girl! So Rarahu retraced her steps (same thing, praying and running) and she never saw that boy again. That was the first and the last crazy thing Rarahu ever did for love.

  For Mama Teta, the craziest thing she’s ever done for love, love for a man, she stresses, was promising her dying husband to remain faithful to him until her death. She was thirty-two years old, twelve weeks pregnant with Johno and the mother of three boys under the age of ten, with a husband she loved to distraction, even when he was alive.

  Her dying husband said, drawing his last breath, “Aita, Teta, don’t talk like that.” But Mama Teta repeated her promise. “There’s only one like you, how can I replace you?” And these were the last words Mama Teta’s husband ever heard on this earth. Nor did she fail her words. Oh, Mama Teta isn’t saying that she was a saint, non, she went out dancing in nightclubs to forget about her smelly boys for a while and be reminded that she was still a woman. She danced, flirted, played around. But she never fell in love again. She remained faithful to her husband in her heart. That is Mama Teta’s story (the edited version) — followed by another story and another. Everyone gets a turn to speak out.

  Now in the Radio Tefana studio Materena, greatly inspired, appeals to her listeners for their stories. Their stories of doing crazy things for love when they couldn’t think proper. Women jump on the telephone to share their stories with Materena and the whole island.

  Such as:

  Lying to the judge with her hand on the Bible to give her boyfriend an alibi. Yes, I swear on the Bible and on the head of my ancestors that on the night of the fourteenth of April my boyfriend was in my bed. So it is quite impossible that he was involved in the theft of ten hi-fis from Sony music shop in Papeete.

  Lending money to a boyfriend for him to invest, and then they would buy a block of land. But after she gave him the money sealed in an envelope, she never saw the boyfriend again. The last she heard about him, he was in Rapa Nui, growing flowers.

  Giving up sewing, which she loved but the boyfriend was feeling left out. Often, he would say, “You love your sewing machine more than you love me.” The woman gave up sewing for ten months, then she had to sew like crazy for about a year to catch up on the lost time after she chucked her boyfriend out.

  Giving away her chickens because her boyfriend couldn’t stand the noise they made in the morning. She didn’t even stop to think how special her chickens were — they weren’t just any chickens; they were the grandchildren of her grandmother’s chickens. And she loved her grandmother. By the time the woman realized her foolishness, all the chickens she’d given away had been killed and eaten. She yelled at her boyfriend for having forced her to give away her chickens. She punched him too. He packed his bags and left.

  There are still no stories from the men’s front, but the women keep on calling.

  Swimming across a shark-infested channel. Waxing. Tattooing his initials on the lower back. (Materena knows about that one, her own daughter having done this. Not on her lower back, though, on her hand for the whole population to admire.) Borrowing the ute — without permission — from one of the uncles to drive — without a driver’s license — the boyfriend home . . .

  Wait a second, there’s a man on the line, the two assistants exclaim through the intercom. A man! Quick, connect him through. His name is Hotu.

  “Iaorana, Hotu!” Materena cheers, but carefully. She doesn’t want to frighten the first male listener ever to call her program.

  “Iaorana, Materena, e aha te huru ite poipoi?”

  “Maitai.” Materena finds the young man’s sweet voice familiar to her ears, even though she hasn’t seen the Hotu she knows for a long while. “Alors? What is your story about doing crazy things for love when you couldn’t think proper? Tell us.”

  “I’m packing my suitcase to catch a plane to France tomorrow morning,” the young man says. He wouldn’t call this crazy, though, he insists, he’d call this natural. Not catching that plane would be the crazy thing to do.

  “Who are you catching that plane for?” Materena asks, though she knows. She’s now sure the man on the other line is the sexy dentist Hotu, her daughter’s ex-boyfriend.

  “The love of my life.”

  Ohhh, Materena is so moved. Here she is, placing a hand on her heart. Her two assistants are doing the same.

  “When did you decide to catch that plane?”

  “This afternoon.”

  “And what made you make that decision?”

  “My heart . . . longing for her so bad.”

  Materena is going to cry in a minute. In fact, tears are already plopping out of her eyes.

  She’s so glad Hotu isn’t ruining this magical moment with a comment like “And my other parts are longing for her too, he-he-he.”

  “The love of your life, she knows you’re on your way?”

  “Non.”

  Eh hia, now this whole thing is starting to sound dangerous. It reminds Materena of Meme Rarahu’s story of walking twelve miles in the dark. Materena knows there’s nobody on Leilani’s horizon at the moment. Or at least, Leilani hasn’t mentioned there was somebody, but it doesn’t mean that there’s actually nobody. Leilani could be keeping her news a secret, and . . .

  And not counting the fact that Leilani might want to get herself emotionally ready for this big reunion, wash her hair and everything. So, without sounding like she’s trying to pour cold water on Hotu’s romantic plan, Materena tells him that he might consider giving the love of his life some hints that he’s on his way.

  But Hotu maintains that he’d rather throw himself overboard and see what happens. He will only be in Paris for six days because that’s all he has, that’s all he can give. At the moment anyway.

  “Good luck, then,” Materena says.

  “Could I say something off the air? Off the record?”

  “Hold on, it’s time to play a song anyway.” And seeing the special occasion, she requests a song that has been covered by many Tahitian bands, a song that is always played at weddings, a song that makes women want to hold their men. So please, “Guantanamera” for the ladies, a
nd the gentleman.

  Off the air . . .

  “It’s me,” the young man says.

  “The Hotu I think it is?” Materena asks just to make sure. “Leilani’s Hotu?”

  “Oui, c’est moi. Eh . . .” Casually, Hotu asks Materena if the love of his life is seeing anyone.

  “There’s only one boy in her head, and it’s you,” Materena says. She gives the young man her blessings but still wishes him good luck.

  Waiting for the song to finish, Materena ponders if she should call her daughter to advise her of Hotu’s arrival so that Leilani can do her things — shave her legs, pluck her eyebrows, buy a beautiful dress, things like that. But then it would ruin Hotu’s surprise, and anyway, he’s already seen his girlfriend in a ripped, oversize T-shirt with her hair all over the place and hairy legs.

  No, no need to call, Materena decides, Hotu’s so hooked on Leilani he’s not going to care about what she looks like when she opens the door.

  “Girl?” Materena smiles tenderly, eyeing Pito doing up his tennis-shoe laces. “Hotu is on his way to see you. He’s already on the plane.”

  “AHHHHHHH!” A shriek of delight. “But I haven’t shaved for weeks!” Panic sets in. “I haven’t plucked my eyebrows either! What am I going to wear? I’ve got to get ready! Okay, nana Mamie!”

  This is the shortest phone conversation Materena has ever had with her daughter. Not even thirty seconds.

  Magnet for Pulling Women

  His tennis shoes tied, his granddaughter safely tucked in his arms, Pito is on his way to do a bit of walking around the neighborhood, a bit of exercise. They might even go as far as the international airport. When you have a hot woman, you’ve got to keep fit.

  “Be careful of the dogs!” Materena calls out to Pito as he steps out of the house.

  But it isn’t the dogs that Materena should be worried about, it is the women! For Pito is about to find out that a man with a baby in his arms is Prince Charming as far as women are concerned, even if he isn’t, well . . . very appealing to the eye.