Shark Dialogues

by Davenport, Kiana

  “The whole district mourned. I never understood it when she was alive. She was like royalty. She had endowed scholarships, sent kids off to the mainland to law school and medical school. She never helped us, there wasn’t money then. And I think she wanted us to be like her, tough, doing it alone, grabbing life with our teeth. I thought I hated her for years. Then I discovered her.

  “She wanted so much for her daughters, slaved in canneries, lost a finger, sending them to Catholic school. And, because they were her daughters, they rebelled. Then we came along. Third-generation rebels. But there was Ming, a teacher, Jess, a doctor, me a lawyer. And Rachel, unspeakably beautiful and kind. Sometimes when Pono looked at us, I saw it in her eyes. Humility. Deep pride.

  “One night Toru, Run Run, all of us went into their room. It was still full of them, Pono’s perfume, Grandfather’s minty medication, and that stale, almost rodent smell of ma‘i Pākē he could never shake. We stood in that room, and what they had shared swept over us, because all they had for sixty years were dreams.

  “They had traveled round the world in their imaginations. Grandfather read her all of Marco Polo’s travels. They went to Persia, Manchuria. He read her all of Keats, Flaubert; they lived in France, and Russia. She knew these places, Simon. She talked so knowledgeably, we thought she had traveled the world. Music, politics, he taught her everything. They believed. They made each moment the purest essence of what life could be.

  “Grandfather wasn’t sure he believed in Fate. He couldn’t say they’d been destined for each other. But they had found each other and never let go. They were true. Grandfather said he believed that’s what love was. Enduring. Fanatically. Beyond reason. I think love replaced their need for religion. If they had been religious, maybe they wouldn’t have loved so deeply ...”

  Another day had passed while Vanya talked and, seeing the pull of moonrise on the feathers of an owl, Simon dropped his head and slept. And she continued talking, sometimes her words shrinking to the embryo of words, deciphering, reconstructing her life on the basis of sounds. She talked until the years, the memories were exhausted, then she lay down in their cave and slept, like a woman who had spent days stalking mammoths.

  This time when they woke, Waipi‘o Jimi had left them poi, fresh seaweed and ’ōpakapaka. They ate slowly, theatrically, with total concentration, the way people eat when there is nothing else to do. When they were full, they gazed seaward again, and Simon talked about his great respect for sharks, Great Whites that owned certain waters off Australia, different species he had seen traveling round the world, the most vicious being off Central and South America.

  “What is it like, that part of the world,” she asked. “I only know the Asian coast, and the Pacific.”

  And he began to talk, Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, the windswept beauty of Argentina’s pampas, lush viselike jungles of the Orinoco. She listened attentively, questioning customs, politics, the people. He knew Cuba, South Africa, the Seychelles, and slowly Vanya entered his world, became knowledgeable about distant religions, and climates.

  She talked about books he had never read, music he didn’t understand. He described foods she had never heard of, animals she could not imagine, the difference between sand in the Gobi and sand in the Sahara. He taught her similarity of words from Peru and Somalia, Ulan Bator and Holland. Eventually, Vanya began to think she had seen these worlds, had traveled through them. And as they talked, their worlds slowy intertwined, so it seemed they had traveled great distances together.

  One day Waipi‘o Jimi brought fresh-baked laulau succulent with grease, Maui onions like apples, the sweetest in the world. They sat chewing them with raw Hawaiian salt and Primo beer. Jimi watched Vanya, relieved, for each time he came, she looked more human, less like a ghost. He saw how she was coming back to life, her body robust, energetic, straining like five dogs on a leash.

  “A little news,” he said softly.

  Her eyes grew wide, she sat very still.

  “Toru got one girlfriend, look plenny serious. He mapping out his land, goin’ build one house. Slowly, he doin’ everyt’ing slowly.”

  Vanya closed her eyes, held her hands against her heart. “And Run Run?”

  “Old. Plenny old. I t’ink she die a little for you.”

  “And Rachel? Any word?”

  “Dat wahine on strange kine errand. People say she goin’ bring back Hire’s children.”

  “And Jess? The house?”

  His shook his head. “Strange t’ing. She not a big wahine like Pono, neh? But people say Jess start look like Pono, stand tall, important. Dark now, like kama‘āina, maybe little thickah round da waist. She even drive dat truck like Pono. Maniac! Strangest t’ing. Cousin o’ my cousin . . . calabash kine ... he work ovah Sugai Mill. Do pulpin’. He say when dat wahine, Jess, come round, he t’ink he go pupule, say she even smell like Pono now. And what you t’ink? She walk wit’ Pono’s cane sometime. Dat devil-lookin’ cane. Oooh, spooky, no?”

  Vanya hung her head. “And do they ever talk of me?”

  “What you t’ink, Vanya? You what dey live foah. Dey dyin’ in dat house, tryin’ find out how you are. But smart. Dey wait. I hear Toru and Jess sit in field and cry plenny. Dey love you, Vanya. No have to see you foah love you. Dey love you fifty years, forevah. Jess, she oldah in da face from grief. Happen plenny fast.”

  Simon studied Jimi, puzzled. “Have you actually talked to them?”

  He shook his head, “I no go from dis valley.”

  “Then how do you know these things?”

  Jimi laughed. “Hey, brah, you no understan’ Hawaiian kine, one big ’ohana. Cousin got cousin who got cousin . . . you know da kine? We got spies who watch da spies, like whatchoo call it? One big daisy chain!”

  “If I could get a message,” Vanya said, “that I’m okay, that I miss them . . .”

  Jimi’s body tensed. “Dat what Feds waitin’ for. Den dey know you here, foah shoah. Right now dey confused. Haole been here, flashin’ money, lots money, ask old-timers, taro farmers, have dey seen you? Folks say dey seen not’ing. One spy t’ink he see you go out on fishin’ boat, go away forevah. See, dey don’t even know foah shoah you still in de islands. One note, one written word, Vanya, you gonna bring plenny troops in here wit’ bazookas, gas bombs. Maybe dey find where all dem ammo crates is buried. You gonna hurt lotta’ folks been protectin’ you. But, one day, keiki . . . I tell you when da time is right.”

  He stood, looked down at Simon for a moment, then left. Next day when Vanya went down to a stream, Jimi was waiting.

  “Simon no look so good.”

  She flinched. “His arm is healed, just those few scars.”

  “Not talkin’ bout de arm. Why you no tell me he ma‘i Pākē.”

  “It isn’t!”

  “Somet’in’ plenny similah, sores on neck, one big ear, dat glaze in de eye.”

  She sat down on the grass and wept, then pulled herself together. “It’s from Agent Orange in the war, Jimi. Some of our boys came home with it, too. He’s got this medication, but it’s not strong enough. He needs to see a doctor.” She looked up at him. “What can I do?”

  “I seen dis stuff before, same like ma‘i Pākē. It spread, be plenny bad foah him. Den he don’ care if live or die. I try see one kahuna foah you, get special herb. Next time, I goin’ bring back noni and chili peppah, plenny seawater foah clean da blood.”

  He put his arms round her, held her like a child. “Vanya, you got be strong. Like yoah tūtū, Pono. When she and Duke runnin’ in dis jungle, bounty hunters closin’ in, she tell my fat’er she kill foah Duke, die foah him. Only t’ing kept dem goin’ was dat wahine’s will.”

  She breathed in carefully, smelled, had smelled, denied that smell for weeks, stale rodential odor on Simon of her grandfather’s sickness. Things feeding on, snuffing out Simon’s nerve ends, rot settling in. Sometimes he slept long hours, and she hunted alone, returning victorious with small kills, her hours away from him making their
hours together more meaningful.

  “You love me, Vanya. Say it.”

  She shook her head.

  “Then why did you let me run with you? Why am I here?”

  She looked into raveling mists, heard manic growth, dripping green, the jungle’s ancient songs. “You’re what’s left.”

  His laugh was hoarse. “God almighty, my liver’s crook, my ear looks like an udder, crud’s climbing my legs. You’d better hurry up, and love what’s left!”

  She laughed, pulled him to her chest, and rocked him like a child. A comprehension then, that this was permanent. She would be with him, no matter what. He was the pain she had been assigned.

  “When we first met, you terrified me. One of those men formed before the human race acquired a conscience. You looked like you could eat a human heart. If need be, you could eat your own heart. Now . . . you terrify me more.”

  “Because you love me.” He shook her arm gently. “Say it, stop giving me a hard time.”

  “I’m not giving you anything. What you get, you’ll have to earn.”

  Badgering, laughing back and forth, they lapsed into a kind of ease, acceptance. He was very ill, she was hunted, they were so enmeshed in horror they stepped back, eyed it with conspicuous detachment. One day he coughed up sputum, a new and a small pronouncement: he was carrying in his body, not life, but a disease whose final birth would be his death. He became feverish, his coughing escalated. Vanya dreamed she was holding his lung stretched taut at the end of a string. Walking it like a balloon. It floated, bounced along through trees, and then collapsed. What happened to the body? Where was the corpse? At night his hands and legs shook with a kind of palsy, his vision momentarily went. Sweat parted his hair in swatches and she bathed his face.

  “I want to love you,” he said. “Make love to you. Are you afraid?”

  Suddenly she felt virginal and shy. “I’ve been afraid all my life, Simon. I just can’t express it, that’s all.”

  “Until I’m laid out like a corpse, I’ll look after you.”

  She tried for humor, she always tried for humor now. “Funny, no? I join the revolution and end up a nurse.”

  “You didn’t join it, sweetheart, you hijacked it.”

  Weeks passed, another month. Some days were bad, some days better. One night he spat up something large and dark, a rancid cluster. He flung it off into the bush.

  “Jesus. I never thought dying would be so hard. It’s like a bloody profession.”

  She washed his mouth and hands. He reached for her, held her gently by the waist. “Say it,” he pleaded. “You love me.”

  She would not say it; it seemed that’s what he lived for now. Once she said it, he would die.

  Phantoms circled them, becoming shadows that fleshed out into human bodies. Three locals running, university students who had helped blow up another plant.

  “We came to join you, Vanya.”

  She sat with them, spoke softly. “Join me? Do you know how my days are spent? The man with me is dying.”

  They reared back, then relaxed. This was a new generation, for them death had the dark stain of a magnet, drawing revolutionaries, choosing one or two at random.

  “We will help you,” they said, “carry medication and supplies. In return, you can tell us what to do, how to organize these valley people. They trust you.”

  “What do you mean ‘organize’?”

  “Militarize.”

  “And, why?”

  “Sovereignty will take years. Some of our elders have waited sixty, seventy years for return of their lands. They’ll die before they see it. And what will be left for the rest of us? Nothing. Everything has been defiled. Only here is pure. Waipi‘o. As it was in Kamehameha’s time. We will defend it to the last.”

  “Defend it? From what?” She leaned forward, confused.

  One of the young men shook his head. “You didn’t hear? They already got surveyors up round these cliffs. Japanese developers have bought land surrounding this valley. They’re planning huge resort complexes built all the way round Waipi‘o. They’ll pollute our streams, kill off our wildlife, flush their excrement into our seas.”

  Vanya looked down for a long time. After a while she straightened up. “Go to where the crates are buried, dozens of them. I will give you the map. Take inventory. Bring me the lists.”

  “And then?”

  “Then I will begin to help you organize the valley. There are not so many left. They are old, but still warriors.”

  “Don’t worry, Vanya. Many are coming here to join us from outside. Soon as they heard of plans for Waipi‘o’s desecration, people started marching in the streets.”

  She looked out across the valley. “It will be taken, you know. By and by they will defeat us, wear us down. But that is not important.”

  They left quietly, and she stood still, breathing in the fragrant air.

  Simon struggled from his cot, and leaned against a tree. “I heard every word.”

  “And you think I’m a fool. That I should run away with you, turn my back forever.”

  “No. I don’t think that anymore. I’ve given up thought. Come here, sweetheart. I can’t make it that far.”

  They sat together hand in hand, looking through the tangled jungle, out across the haunted, beautiful and fragile land.

  “I’ve come to love it,” he said. “It’s like the Kakadu. You’ll save it for a while. Developers will back off until the press is bored. But bit by bit, they’ll hack it to pieces. They’ll bury you.”

  “It doesn’t matter, Simon. It only matters that we tried, that we fought honorably for what was left.”

  That night while she slept he studied her face in moonlight, a beautiful face, full of a woundedness to which she refused to capitulate. And limning that beauty, the look of a child, innocent, loving him without knowing it. Knowledge of it would bring her despair. He would not ask for love again.

  Imua

  * * *

  To Press On, to Go Forward

  SPRING CAME, AND SOAKING RAINS. The land burst into “Kona snow,” white coffee blossoms smelling like gardenias, leaving locals reeling with their scent. Summer and the growing season, the never-ending cycle. Planting of new coffee trees, rejuvenating old trees, irrigating, weeding, pruning with sickles and light axes, all before harvesting season in late fall. In small greenhouses, Jess tended coffee seedlings in earthern pots. In two years they would be transferred to the soil. Some workers tended macadamia crops, avocado and papaya trees, enough to make a profit if the coffee yield that year were less than “bumper” crop.

  In June when warm trades came, Rachel brought her girls from Honolulu. They were beautiful and shy with the golden, rainy skin of Thais, bones delicate as birds, but unexpected strength in their backs and thighs. And there was wariness, remembrance of that other life, the one she had erased them from, still cantering beside them. At first they clung to her, afraid they had been brought there to be sold to field-workers. Trust would be slow in coming.

  Then, one day they laughed. Run Run made them laugh. They taught her a Thai word, ling ling, little monkey. She taught them tūtū, grandmother. They became her linglings, she became their tootoot. Toru gently hoisted them onto his horse, slowly trotting them in circles. He taught them how to play his ’ukulele. Jess peeled pomelos for them, braided flowers in their hair. Then they ran back to Rachel, holding her hands, counting her fingers, as if the act prevented her from forever disappearing. At dusk, she sat with them on the lānai, teaching them English, and they in turn instructed her in Thai, graceful words of patience, of acceptance.

  “Mai Pen Rai.” It’s all right. It doesn’t matter.

  When she stumbled on a phrase, they laughed, tinkling sounds running up and down the scale like intermission chimes in theaters. Jess watched them through a window, tradewinds rustling their hair, black, glossy heads shining against gentian fields behind them.

  “Moah bettah teach dem t’ings to survive,” Run Run said
. “All dis chat-chat waste of time.”

  Jess smiled. “Why can’t she waste a little time? What else is it for?”

  Rachel had bobbed her hair to a short, efficient pageboy, stopped designing her lips with rouge. She had cut her long nails to the quick and now walked at something of a ruthless pace. It was a source of humor to Jess because even in her mid-forties, with little threatening crow’s-feet and “hair lenghthening in the mole,” Rachel was still so lovely, her features still so perfect, people stopped and turned. And as Jess seemed to have appropriated so much of Pono—compelled by some extreme degree of aggressiveness to push everything aside that wasn’t necessary and worth the trouble—Rachel seemed to acquire traits reminding them of Vanya. No longer languid, mysterious and fraught, she made quick decisions, then acted on them, rode them to the ground. In rare pensive moments, she had the air of being twice as quiet that energetic humans have when they are still.

  Jess shook her head. “She’s like another person. It’s uncanny.”

  Run Run glanced at Jess’s proud stance, the human-spine cane always at her side like a scabbard. Run Run’s only regret was that she could never tell Jess the history of that cane, what was imbedded in the polished wood, the vertebral bumpiness that made it somewhat crooked. Even after Pono’s death, promises were kept. Now Jess yelled when workers turned lazy, cursed when she felt the urge, walked about whacking the cane, shameless as a crow.

  “We all changin’,” Run Run said. “All comin’ pickled into whatchoo call it?... eccentricity!”

  At certain hours of certain days the three of them sat in the kitchen, making up little packets—money, medication—that were light and traveled fast. They were passed to a worker in the field, from him to his cousin, from cousin to cousin and then from paniolo to local surfers who slid down muddy jungle paths to surf the black sand beaches of Waipi‘o. Surfers passed the packets on to taro farmers, who muled them into the valley to Waipi‘o Jimi, who finally reached Vanya. But Jess never knew the final destination of those packets. No word ever came.