Chapter Five

Somebody was practicing the organ in the church on Lilikoi Street, and Raymond heard the same three bars of "How Great Thou Art" five times as he cut across the church lawn. The music faded when he plunged into the fenced-in corridor and flip-flopped through the ironwood needles. He came out of the tunnel and stretched his arms out, taking it all in. The salt air refreshed his lungs and the sound of the surf soothed his heart. He kicked off his thongs under a tree and hung his towel on a twisted branch, not caring whether they got stolen or not. The sand felt like heaven between his toes. Suddenly feeling light, he took off down the beach, his feet pounding the hard sand closest to the water's edge, dodging the foam as it flowed in and out. Behind him he left a shallow trail of prints that the waves consumed as quickly as he left them.

He ran all the way down to where the beach curved away, then turned around and sprinted back. Not thinking, he dove into the sand and rolled in the soft powder, then threw himself headlong into the waves and ran his hands all over his body, swishing the sand from his skin. He panted like a dog as he walked out of the water and sat on the edge of the grass at the top of the beach.

The grass was an Oriental strain which had woven itself into a solid, spongy mass. It formed a natural terrace overlooking the beach. Raymond sat and watched the surfers, out past the barrier of the reef.

"Nice view, huh?"

Raymond turned around to a nice view of a pair of legs, their feet planted in the grass right behind him. He looked up to see the face, then the bright red hair.

"Hi," he said.

The girl jumped down onto the sand. She was wearing a white tee-shirt. Underneath it, he could see the three triangles which made up her bikini. Red, he observed. She squatted in the sand and looked up at him. "I thought that might be you. Your hair gives you away, you know."

So does yours, Raymond thought. He was scrabbling for something to say when she jumped onto the sand, took three giant steps down the beach and dove under a wave just as it curled in. Raymond watched as she splashed back onto the beach, flipped her hair back and sat, dripping, on the sand in front of him. He put his hands in his lap and tried not to be obvious about checking her out.

"I'm Susan, by the way."

"Cool." Talk about school, he told himself. Or music. Or the weather. Don't just sit there, staring at her. "Tell me about Wailele," he said, finally.

"What about it?"

"Well, what's it like?"

She smiled sardonically. The makeup was gone, which made the black eye more obvious. "I think you pretty much found out today at lunch time. 'Course the North Shore isn't quite the West Bank, but it's not Shangri-La, either."

"How'd you get the shiner?"

She stood up, moved up and sat on the terrace a few feet from him. He looked at the sand where she had been sitting. Nice bun-marks.

"I was kind of a bitch that day, huh? I'm not usually like that." She sighed. "I was wearing a mini and those fishnet stockings—one of them called me a whore."

"And?"

"I told him to go have intimate relations with himself. I also happened to mention that his parents weren't married." Susan sighed again, and Raymond couldn't tell if it was real or put-on. "It was my fault, really. I shouldn't have come down to their level. I mean, the best way to deal with them is to go right above them. Call them monosyllabic sub-Cro-Magnon ignorami and they think you've given them a compliment. You can't be offended by someone you don't understand."

"They offend me, and I don't understand them."

"That's because you're still dealing with them on their own level. It's all a matter of levels—you know?"

Raymond nodded. "So, the Blood hit you?"

"Yeah, with his elbow. I mean, he got arrested, but still. Could've done without the black eye."

He examined her then, without any makeup, in a normal bathing suit, wearing a normal tee-shirt. He thought she looked prettier with nothing on her face. Aside from the bruised eye she was actually cute—not a word he would have applied to her at first. She had freckles.

"So, what happened today between you and Anthony?"

Raymond smiled at her. "My formal introduction to the Bloods."

"Do tell."

"One of them faked a punch at me and I belted him one. I can't figure it out. What makes a person do that?"

Susan shook her head. "They should give a course. 'Blood Behavior 101.' This is one of their favorite pastimes—it's to test your reflexes. They jump at you and you're supposed to stand without flinching. If you flinch, they laugh."

"But what kind of idiot is going to just stand there like a post while somebody takes a swing at you?" He kicked at the sand. "I just don't understand the mindset."

A brief smile passed across her face. "Think about what you just said. I think you answered your own question."

They sat there for a moment, watching the waves, the surfers, the clouds. Raymond squinted at the sun. "You know, before I came, everybody told me this place was, like, the perfect paradise. And you know what?"

"It's not."

"It's not," he agreed.

"For real."

One of the surfers caught a wave, and his shriek of exhilaration sounded thinly across the noise of the surf. "The ocean makes it all worth it, I guess. We've got lots of sand in Arizona, but not much water to go with it. This part"—he patted the sand below him—"I could get used to."

She leaned back on her hands. "Except that it's kind of a package deal, right?"

"That's it." Raymond glanced up the lawn at the house. It had an unfinished-wood porch and a wall full of picture window. "Man, it would be great to live in one of these houses—right on the beach, the sound of the waves at night, the sunrise in the morning."

"You can sleep over sometime."

He raised his eyebrows at her. She pointed to the window with the tie-died curtains.

"That one's my bedroom."

Susan's shirt was beginning to dry, salt-stiff. He watched as she slipped it over her head and stretched like a cat. Red bikini, he thought, scratching his nose. "Wow," he said, both about the house and about her.

She smiled, catching both meanings. "Funny how I take it for granted." Glancing up at the house, she said, "You want to come in for a drink?"

He flashed her a startled look. It seemed such a strangely grown-up thing to say.

She revised herself. "A Coke or something, you know?"

He stood up. "Wait while I get my stuff?"

"No problem."

He walked the whole way, wanting to run.

* * *

Raymond could smell the spaghetti sauce simmering before he even opened the back door. His mom was banging pots and pans, and didn't even notice he'd rinsed himself without being asked. Syrupy music floated above the sound of boiling water, and Raymond knew Danny was in the living room, glued to Barney.

"Who's here?" Raymond asked his mother.

"Just Danny and me." Mrs. Harmon sniffed under a lid, and added more oregano. "Message for you."

"Oh, great." He hesitated a moment, then pushed the button. The tape rewound and the machine beeped.

"Uh, hi Raymond." It was Julie's voice. "Remember me?" She laughed, then took a deep breath. "Raymond, I really need to hear your voice. I miss you so much. I guess you still know my number, unless you've blocked it out already. Call me, okay? And remember you promised me a letter."

The machine beeped twice, then clicked off. Mrs. Harmon maintained prudent silence as Raymond wandered down the hall. Danny was singing quietly with the television. Behind a closed door, Raymond picked up the crumpled letter from the corner and spread it out on his bed. It still read:

Dear Julie,

I

Nothing had changed, and he couldn't think of any lies that didn't nauseate him. What else was there to say? After a moment he still drew a blank, so he wadded the letter back up and threw it in the corner again, then went back in with his mother and her happy smells.

"Well, didn't you even notice?" his mother asked, finally.

Raymond face went blank. "What?" Something about the message? Had she cut her hair? It looked the same.

"The stranger in the driveway," his mother said.

"Stranger Danger!" Danny chimed from in front of the tube.

Raymond moved to the archway so he could see out the living room window. "You mean the car?"

"Duhh."

"That's only why I asked who was here …" Raymond broke off. "So what about the car?"

"I was just going to ask you to guess whose car it is."

He glanced through the window again. It was a dirty white Nissan, probably ten years old, somebody's beater. "What happened to the rental?"

"Just guess."

It was The Voice. He swallowed. "Yours?" he suggested, shrugging his shoulders.

"Nope," she said. "Yours."

Raymond blinked, running his fingers through his hair. "Mine?" He walked outside, and his mother followed him to the screen. Danny put Barney on "mute" and joined his mother in the doorway.

"Well, it's for all of us until the Oldsmobile comes, but after that you can begin taking it to school."

Raymond studied his mother's face through the plastic screening, looking for the angle. He couldn't see it. Nervous under scrutiny, she put her hands on her hips and asked, "What?"

He grinned, a bit sheepishly. "I was going to ask, 'What's the catch?' but then I decided against it."

"That's an improvement, at least." She shared his grin. "I guess if there is a catch, it's that I get a little more cooperation, and you get a bit more freedom. Or something. Are we clear on this?" His mother's hand roamed the wrinkles of her forehead. The two of them faced off for a moment, frozen in place and time, then she took a step forward and he accepted her into his arms.

It felt at first like he was a kid and she was holding him while he cried. It didn't matter that he was nine inches taller than her or that he was sixteen years from the womb and fifteen from the breast. But then he had the notion that it was she who was the child, she who needed the comfort. She pulled away after a minute, turning away from him.

"Well you might as well go try it out."

He grinned and climbed into the drivers' seat. The keys dangled in the ignition. "Does it have gas?"

"I filled it up on the way home."

Raymond depressed the clutch and turned the key, and the car hummed to life. "I'll be back," he told her, putting the car into reverse.

"Not too fast!" she called after him.

* * *

Raymond had driven straight to Susan's. She had gotten in.

"I'm impressed. Really, I am."

He suddenly felt foolish. What did he think would be was so impressive about an old Sentra?

"I thought you might want to come for a ride."

"Sure. Why not?" She still had on the red bikini, but a different tee-shirt—a green one with frogs surfing on it. She climbed in and buckled her seat belt. After gunning the engine a few times, he pulled out of the sandy driveway and peeled out onto the highway.

"Testing your new wings?" Susan asked.

"Just want to see how it goes."

Raymond accelerated as they rounded one curve. He floored the gas and waited until the engine roared up in RPM's before he shifted. Then they swung around another bend and he slammed his brakes. Tires squealed. He cranked the wheel and they skidded off the road and stopped.

There were six of them. Bloods. He'd almost ploughed right through them. They finished crossing the road and continued up the other side, laughing and pushing each other, barely noticing Raymond and Susan in the car.

Raymond turned off the engine and took a deep breath. Susan sat silently in the other seat.

"Damn," he said.

Susan rolled her window down and looked at Raymond. "Damn, what?"

Raymond smiled. "Damn, I missed 'em."

Susan nodded and stared straight forward; Raymond started the engine and pulled back onto the road. He found himself heading toward Wailele. They drove the country stretch in silence: fields on one side and jungle on the other. Raymond was tempted to turn the radio on to drown out the noise of the silence, but he knew that would only defeat the purpose.

Wailele High School looked peaceful in the dark, with only a few security lights shining down from poles. A chain had been pulled across the entrance to the parking lot and locked in place. It looked safe and secure. Raymond squinted at a hill beyond the school. "What is that, lightning?" In a second, another burst of light silhouetted the hill for an instant, turning the sky purple.

"It's quite fascinating, actually," Susan told him. "It's the only place in the world where lightning strikes the same place five thousand times every night." Her tone sounded strange, almost bitter.

The sky flashed again—a heartbeat.

Raymond urged the car forward, heading for the hills. Everything had turned gray with the evening. It was a strain to see the outline of the mountains against the indigo sky. Another flash. He drove around a curve at the base of a cliff, and slowed down. Braking some more, he pulled across the highway and stopped on the shoulder.

"Parking already?" Susan asked. "I hardly know you."

Raymond ignored her. A panorama stretched before him, of fields running into hills and rows of propellers swinging in tandem. The rising moon provided just enough light to see clearly. On the crest of one of the tallest hills, a huge windmill slowly churned, beacons on the tips of its blades blinking every three seconds.

Raymond tapped his thumbs on the steering wheel. "This is … ?"

"Where your mom works. Yes."

They watched for a while, listening only to the engine.

He suddenly hated the place. This was the cause of his entire Hawaii hassle: his mother's obsession with alternate energy had brought them to the island because of this particular series of hilltops. With a wrench of the steering wheel, he pulled onto the road. The tires screamed on the pavement as he headed for home, the needle of the speedometer inching up to fifty, then sixty.

They passed Wailele High, whizzed past the police station. "You know how James Dean died?" Susan asked.

"Car crash, right?"

She paused. "He was going over a hundred and he ploughed his Porsche Spyder into another car. The steering column rammed all the way through his body."

"I don't think this little rice-burner would even do seventy."

More silence, except motor sounds. Raymond glanced over at Susan. She kept staring straight forward, one arm out the window, no expression on her face. He listened carefully and thought he could hear her humming. When he looked over at her again, she made no response.

In minutes he pulled into her driveway. She unbuckled and made a motion to bail out.

"Susan?"

She stopped in the seat with her feet on the ground, and looked at him over her shoulder. "Yeah?"

He thought for a moment, then turned off the engine. "What's the problem. What did I say?"

"What do you mean?"

Was she teasing him? Her blank expression was masterful. "After the Bloods …" He clamped his jaw muscles, set his face in stone. "Never mind. I'll see you tomorrow in Gruber's."

She gave him a last look, but he ignored her, turned the ignition key and gunned the motor.

"Nice car," she said, and got out. Raymond put the stick in reverse, but waited when she came around to his window. "Almost forgot to remind you. Bring a bag lunch tomorrow. They're having burritos."

He nodded, smiled and pulled out onto the highway, heading back to his house. If he squinted, he could see the pulsing of the windmill, miles beyond the hills—lightning striking over and over again.

© Copyright 2002 by David S. Baker