The Hula Part Three Annabelle

I round the corner of Kuhio Avenue and Kanekapolei Street when I realize I’m practically running. My exit from the International Market Place is a blur. I slow down and wave to Mr. Yamaguchi, the manager of the Texaco gas station on our corner. He lives across the street from us and is married to Mrs. Yamaguchi, my Home Economics teacher. The Yamaguchi family lives next door to Mrs. Rodriquez, my future English literature teacher. There is no way I’ll ever get away with cutting classes. Not on this street. When I’m in school, our dog Whiskers spends much of her day with Mr. Yamaguchi, but she bounds across the street when she spots me, and we race home together.

Kanekapolei Street is a short block between Kuhio and the Ala Wai Canal. We share our side of the block with the Food Pantry Grocery store, their parking lot, and an enormous Banyan Tree. Banyan trees are not indigenous to Hawaii. Our tree and the Lahaina Maui tree are very old and are from India. Our part of Waikiki is only two blocks wide, from the Ala Wai Canal to Kalakaua Avenue and the beach. The streets around us are dotted with single-family wood-framed houses, with an occasional two-story apartment building. No high rises – yet. 

My mother, Annabelle, manages twenty-two pre- and post-war bungalows in the last half of the block. It’s quite an assortment of funky apartments, duplexes, triplexes, and two houses. The property is somewhat divided into three areas. Our area is in the middle, lined on one side with the two houses and a four-plex that faces the street. On the opposite side is a row of four one-story duplexes running the full length of the property. The center yard has dense foliage and random fruit and flowering trees. There are two two-story duplexes on the Ala Wai Canal side. On The Food Pantry side of the property, the front house is a sizeable one-story duplex, with a two-story four-plex in the rear.

I know all the tenants, mostly single military guys living off base, a few surfers, college students, and pretty girls on a last fling before they have to get serious about life—or so they say. One of these pretty girls is Sara. She’s twenty-something from Cleveland, Ohio. And the most free-spirited person I have ever met. She has long, wavy dark hair, is tall, and is very pregnant. She lives with two other pretty girls on the canal side of the property. She likes to visit and talk with my mom often (all the tenants do.) Sara and I used to go to the beach together, but we haven’t been together in months. Last Saturday, she came by in a big muumuu with a beach chair, and we went to the Hilton Hawaiian Village Lagoon. Once we settled in close to a line of Palm Trees, I went over to say hi to my beach-boy friends, and when I turned back, there was Sara, floating in the lagoon with this enormous belly sticking straight up. She was wearing a bikini and no muumuu. She caused a huge scene, and the beach manager asked us to leave the lagoon immediately. I didn’t know if I should be mortified or laugh out loud!  

Whiskers catches up to me, and we race through the yard, hitting the front door like a ballplayer sliding into home base. I take off my flip-flops at the door and brush off any leftover sand. I hear Annabelle, my mom, and my sister Jeannette talking in the kitchen. Jeannette is complaining about Vern, her husband. All the complaints are the same and have been for years. They live in the house next door. He’s a pilot in the Navy, commanding a squadron of F15 fighter jets. He loves flying jets, landing on moving aircraft carriers, and drinking, but most of all, he loves to hate anyone who is not like him. 

Entering the kitchen, I immediately knew I should have come in through the shower door. Our bathroom shower has a door to the outside so that you won’t track sand from the beach through the house. The shower entrance would have given me a few extra minutes to contain myself. Jeannette spots my excitement before I can conceal it. Quickly, I open the refrigerator door, hoping to block any questions. But I’m too late. Her radar is in full force, and she knows ‘something is up.’ Closing the fridge door, she catches my eye over the rim of her coffee cup.

Jeannette is eighteen years older than me, tall, thin, stylish, and beautiful. Tuesday through Saturday, she helms the customer service desk at the Liberty House Dept store on Kalakaua. Saturday night is usually date night with Vern at the Pearl Harbor Officers Club. I like to watch while she’s getting ready, especially when she does her makeup. By the time they leave for the club, she looks like a movie star. But right now, I’m getting the sinister big sister glare. 

Annabelle tells me dinner will be ready shortly and to feed Naomi before I wash up. Naomi, the duck, is always busy forging for bugs in her large pen along the back side of the house. I don’t remember the story of how she came to live with us. I came home from school one day, and she was here. Naomi is big and white with a long yellow bill. Whenever Annabelle is in the yard, making her rounds on the property, Naomi is quacking right along behind her. They create quite a scene at the Ala Wai Apartments and Bungalows.

I have a reprieve for a moment while I feed Naomi. Jeannette has a sixth sense when I try to conceal something from her. She gets me every time. And today, of all days, she has to be sitting in our kitchen, chatting with our mom. She’s like a sniper waiting for me to come into her sights!

Reentering the kitchen, I’m perfectly aligned with Jeannette. She is sitting very still, with both hands wrapped around her coffee mug, holding it in mid-air and staring at me. This is not a good sign. 

“Did you remember to confess everything?” She asks. All I want to do is open the fridge door and block her question. “What are you doing over there?” I hold out the bag of greens, ‘I’m putting Naomi’s food away.’ Before I close the door, I am struck with the thought of a full confession right here, right now, about my epiphany. I’ll give her a full confession she’ll never forget. Before I can have a sensible talk with myself, I close the fridge door, look at my sister, and declare – ‘I’m done with confession. No more Saturday afternoons in church. No more making up sins to cover for my not having enough shameful thoughts and evil deeds.’ 

The silence is deafening. I have to catch my breath to calm myself and brace for what is coming. Annabelle and Jeannette look at me with a shared look of astonishment. ‘Oh my God, what have I done? I mumble to myself?’ This is not how I thought I would talk to Annabelle about this decision. I’m in big trouble now, and I’m right.

Jeannette moves so quickly from the table that she spills some of her coffee. I instinctively back up before she runs into me. She bellows, “Who the hell have you been hanging out with?” I have never seen her this upset. The fierce expression on her face, along with my nervousness, makes me laugh. In seconds, she is towering over me in her high heels, which adds to her 5’9” height and makes for an even six feet of scary big sister.

Annabelle has not moved from the sink. She is still holding the dish towel and staring at the two of us in the middle of the kitchen. Her expression goes from disbelief to curiosity at Jeannette’s reaction. My sister turns to her and says, “This is what happens when you bring a child to a jungle island and let her run wild. There needs to be more discipline. You need to find out who put those thoughts in her head. You need to take her back to the United States before it’s too late.”

‘We are in the United States,’ I remind her. “What?” she asks, whirling around to look at me. ‘We became a state in 1959. I don’t need to return; I’m in the United States.’

“Don’t change the subject. You can be such a brat.” I smile and say, ‘A brat! I thought that was your affectionate nickname for me.’ “Not today, it isn’t.”

“Jeannette darling, go home. I’ll deal with this.” Annabelle’s tone is reassuring, direct, and final.

I was more than happy to see my sister leave. Her overreaction to my declaration had taken me by surprise. She is not one for an outburst of emotion. If I had to guess her response, I would have said it was humor. I could hear her saying, ‘What, Hail Mary and Our Father overload?’ Maybe that’s what she really wanted to say, but it just came out wrong. Or maybe she is upset with Vern, and I was in the line of fire!

Annabelle folds the dish towel and lays it on the counter. With her back turned to me, she says. “Go wash your hands and face, and make sure the sand is left outside. You can set the table when you come back. It will be just the two of us. Jeannette and Vern are having dinner at the Fort DeRussy Offers Club.”

It’s hard for me to read her voice, her face I can always read. Maybe that’s why she continued to look out the window as she spoke to me. “Kath, while you’re washing up and setting the table, give some thought to what you said; we’ll talk about it over dinner.”

“Now go. Wash up and wash those feet while you’re at it. They’re covered in sand…you and that beach.”

Walking into the bathroom, I close the door and walk through the shower to the outside. I rinse the sand and dirt off my feet under the outside faucet. I abruptly sit on the wooded steps and dry my feet with a hand towel. There are way too many thoughts in my head. Whiskers bounds around the side of the house and skids to a stop in front of me. She is such a funny-looking dog; she makes me smile. Her legs are too long and skinny for her body. Her fur is white, wiery, and not thick enough to cover the pink and grey spots under her fur. Her ears are big and stand straight up; she sits, cocks her head, and stares at me. It’s like she’s waiting for me to say something, so I do. 

Wow, this is not going as I had planned, I say to Whiskers, this is going to be a long night. I’m trying to organize my thoughts when I realize it’s getting dark. I dart back through the shower to the sink and wash my hands and face; I have both hands pressed to the towel, drying my face, when Annabelle says, “ I’d like to eat tonight if you don’t mind!” Quickly, I throw the hand towel in the hamper and make my way to the kitchen.

The kitchen table is second-hand but new to us. The four red and grey chairs match the red table top with silver metal legs and trim. Pretty snazzy, I thought as I set the table for two. Annabelle likes a properly set table with cloth napkins, her “good” plates—which are actually our only plates—and glasses. 

The smell of the simmering lamb chops draws me to the stove. I watch the boiling broccoli and listen to the rice cooker lid clanking softly. I start to imagine what’s going to happen with Annabelle. Judgment day is here, and the courtroom is disguised as a table set for two. The judge and jury are dressed as one in a checked apron, the gavel – a wooden spoon casually sitting in the apron pocket. This imaginary thought makes me smile, and I relax a bit.

I turn and look at Annabelle and say, “Okay, I’m ready.” She gives me a half-laugh and says, “Sit down. I’m not passing judgment yet. And take a breath; you’re not breathing.”

We plate the food and take the first bites in silence. Whisker’s occasional scratch at the back screen door is the only noise. The quiet is broken with a look. Annabelle has a way of harnessing your attention without a word.

“As you know, when your father died, I didn’t go to church or talk to God for a year. I felt abandoned. I was drifting endlessly in sorrow. Your father was my rudder, my guiding light. I no longer had a safe harbor, no cove of contentment. Just opening my eyes in the morning made it feel like I was raising the heavy velvet drapes in an abandoned Opera House. I know you remember those times, that endless year. We have never talked about it. I know how it affected you. I know it was frightening for you. I would drink too much and argue with God. Thinking about it now, I realize I never won those arguments.” 

“At my darkest moments, I would remember your father, on his knees every morning, beside the bed, saying his rosary. I could see his face in the dim morning light. The soft, indistinct murmuring of the prayers. His eyes closed, deep in his communion with God. His state of Grace. Those memories of his Grace in the morning light slowly began to replenish my faith that life goes on, and I began to heal.”

“I know you have not lost your faith. You are your father’s daughter, and faith runs deep in the McLaughlin Clan. Why don’t you tell me about your day and your epiphany?”

My epiphany! How do you know about that? I ask in astonishment.

“You are also your mother’s daughter and something this big would have to be more dramatic than just a thought! Am I right?”

I want to shout, ‘I love you, Mom.’ She’s right. I rush through the remainder of my dinner. I don’t want to pause for chewing in the middle of my story. I have Annabelle’s undivided attention. I’m secure in the knowledge that she will understand. She knows I’m not abandoning God. I’m searching for a more personal connection with Him. When she spoke of my dad saying his rosary with the dim morning light illuminating his face. That feeling is what I will search for. Maybe it’s not a hula, maybe a Buddhist chant, perhaps just sitting on the beach, watching the sun, in all its magnificence, descend to begin a new day on the other side of the world. 

A sense of contentment surrounds me, knowing that my new day is beginning now.        

The Hula continues in the coming new year…