Coconuts and Crooks

by Christy Murphy

  He gave a little bow and said thank you. Then he said goodbye to Mom and Wenling. Mom took his card so she could call him.

  “Oooh,” Wenling said after he left. “The doctor likes you!”

  I shook my head no.

  “He does,” Mom said.

  “What about DC?” I asked Mom.

  “DC is being difficult,” Mom answered.

  How did she know that?

  “Maybe he needs a little competition,” Mom said. “Get him a little jealous so he knows not to get too comfortable.”

  “He can’t get jealous or compete with a guy he will never see,” I said. “We’re practically on the other side of the planet.”

  “We’ll see,” Mom said, and then she changed the subject. “It’s break time. Spread out and talk to the people. See what they know about the judge.”

  With that Mom and Wenling headed toward the people lined up at the food vendors to do some interviewing. I felt self-conscious at first, but I figured at least I could stand in one of the lines and see if I could strike up a conversation. I hovered close to one of the stands that was selling something that looked a lot like Belgian waffles, but the waffle pan was heated over a fire. It was kind of mesmerizing to watch.

  I attempted to make eye contact with people, but mostly I felt in the way. I heard someone say that life is like a party, and in this moment and so many others I found that to be true. For me life is like a party, and most of the time I stand awkwardly by the food.

  Thank goodness the break was only fifteen minutes, and Mom and Wenling came to rescue me.

  “Did you find out anything?” Wenling asked me.

  “Nothing,” I said. “How about you?”

  “People didn’t want to tell me much. They seemed almost afraid. I told them we didn’t kill him, but some of the people said that he might have been scared to death of us coming. Some people also think he was haunted by Lalaine’s ghost.”

  “Don’t be silly,” Mom said. “You put that idea in their head.”

  Wenling shook her head. “That’s what they say.”

  Mom looked doubtful. “People did notice that he left on Wednesdays. Nobody is saying who that mistress is, but she’s got to know more about the judge than anyone. Besides,” Mom said. “we’d planned on going to see your cousin Abigail anyway.”

  It didn’t take long to make the arrangements. Mom got in touch with Abigail, and we decided to go the next day, which was a Thursday, and stay over the weekend. As it turned out Abigail finished her nursing degree and had gotten a job at the same hospital as Joshua’s doctor friend. I hope that meant we wouldn’t bother telling Joshua about our trip, but Mom texted him “just to be polite.”

  We’d settled into a routine over the last few days. Mom and Wenling would wake up before me, get us breakfast downstairs and bring it to the room, and then we’d do a little legwork on the island and go to our headquarters at the Casablanca Cafe. At night Mom and Wenling would go on Instagram, and I would check on all the orders for our catering website.

  So far, we hadn’t been very successful finding out more about the judge, and Mom was told that Kim Lim was “out of town” every time we went to his office, and when we tried his house, the guard at the gate said the same. We also hadn’t turned up too many leads when it came to finding out what happened to Aunt Lalaine. Mom had put the word out to people around town that we were looking for the pedicab driver involved in the accident. So far we hadn’t had any luck tracking him down. Mom was sure that it was just a matter of time.

  I worried the case would take forever to crack, but I each time that thought crept into my mind I told myself that this was the adventure of a lifetime, and I wouldn’t ruin it by worrying about a man.

  The afternoon before the trip, while staring out at the ocean, I heard myself say something I’d never said before, “It’s a shame I didn’t pack my swimsuit.”

  Mom looked at me, astonished. “You don’t own a swimsuit.”

  I realized that was true. My alien thought surprised me.

  “The hotel has a pool, and maybe one of the days when we have extra time we can go to the beach,” I said. I’d realized we’d stared at the water here on the Boulevard, but there wasn’t actually a beach. There were just rocks and the seawall with a beautiful sidewalk that ran alongside it.

  “You know, the water is warm like when we went to Florida on vacation. Not the icy-cold water in California. You’d like the beach,” Mom said.

  “Maybe we could go to the mall and buy a swimsuit,” I heard myself say.

  Wenling perked up. Her search for balut had turned up empty. “Do they have a food court?”

  “And there’s a grocery store in the mall,” Mom said.

  And with that we hopped into what Buboy dubbed The Mystery Machine, like on Scooby-Doo. His wife even made a little sign that hung on the windshield.

  Buboy pulled right up to the entrance of the mall. I was surprised to see armed guards just like at the courthouse. There was a small line where they were checking bags.

  We got in line, and the person in front of us recognized Mom.

  “Jo!” the woman said. “Is that you?”

  Mom didn’t recognize the woman, but after a short period of time they were talking in Visayan. Mom introduced me and Wenling to her. She was a schoolmate of Mom’s from a long time ago.

  “I try to speak in English so I won’t be rude,” the woman said.

  It became our turn in line, and the security guard checked us all, and we all entered together. The air-conditioning worked great. It surprised me that I found myself a little cold. Maybe I was finally adjusting to the heat. The two-story mall looked a lot like a mall in the United States, except it was a little smaller and a lot of the storefronts were empty. The four of us strolled through the mall, occasionally pausing to look at an item in a window.

  “I heard you were in town,” Mom’s school friend said. “I was going to pop by the Casablanca Café to see you. I had some news that might help your case.”

  Mom stopped walking, and we all turned to her. We must’ve looked so shocked that we made her nervous.

  “I don’t know if it’s a, what-do-you-call-it,” she said, using the same phrase Mom always used when she needed to think of a word. “Like news that is valuable for solving a mystery.”

  “A clue or a lead?” Wenling suggested.

  “Yes,” she said. “It may not be that. But a friend of mine said he thought the pedicab driver that was in the accident with your sister lived near the lake a few kilometers from the old fire station in Cristos.”

  Mom’s eyes widened, and she started speaking rapidly in Visayan. I could tell from the hand gestures that her schoolmate was giving Mom directions. They spoke for a few more minutes and then the woman checked her cell phone.

  “I need to go to meet my friend for the movies. Let’s have coffee sometime while you’re in town.” Mom agreed and the woman went to the escalator.

  “So are we going to try and find that pedicab driver?” I asked.

  “Christos is too far from here to go this late in the afternoon,” Mom said. “Let’s get your swimsuit, and we’ll get up early tomorrow and try to find him then.”

  Wenling spotted the food court and said she’d meet us later. Mom and I headed into Robinson’s department store to buy me a swimsuit. The moment we stepped into the swimsuit department of the store and saw the teeny-tiny bikinis, I knew this wasn’t going to go well for me.

  “No, we need something larger,” Mom yelled out to the clerk, as if it wasn’t the most embarrassing thing in the world.

  My newfound confidence about being in a foreign country and not worrying what anybody thought had faded in the face of all the tight Lycra and spandex.

  “This is another one that’s one-size-fits-all,” the salesgirl said as she held yet another teeny swimsuit over the wall of the dressing room. Fits all of whom? Dolls? Leprechauns? There’s no way a full-sized grown human could fit into these thi
ngs. I felt like a live-action Cathy comic strip.

  “Do you have any one-piece swimsuits? Or something that has a little more coverage?” I said, handing the two pieces of triangle cloth and a shoestring masquerading as a bathing suit back to the clerk.

  “I’ll go see if we have something in the back,” she said.

  Everything in the Philippines was small. Even the dressing room felt like it was too small for me. I was D-cup woman trapped on a B-cup island.

  “Let’s just go,” I said to Mom.

  “Just let her check the back,” Mom insisted.

  “Nothing even comes close to fitting,” I said, my voice tight and whiny like I was a teenager.

  “Is that you, Auntie Jo?” a familiar voice said from one of the other dressing rooms.

  “Gail?” Mom asked.

  “Don’t open the door,” I whispered to Mom. I was in my underwear and bra, and the look was not at all flattering.

  “I’ll only open it a little,” Mom said, managing to squeeze through the tiniest crack in the door. Mom had found a swimsuit in the first ten minutes, by the way.

  “It is you!” Gail said to Mom. “Where’s Christy?”

  “She’s trying on swimsuits,” Mom said.

  “Me, too,” Gail said. “Do you like it?”

  “Very nice,” Mom said.

  Of course, she’d fit into one of these swimsuits.

  “Christy would kill to have your tan legs. You’re so dark, and she’s so pale,” Mom said.

  I smiled. In the Philippines everyone covets light skin. It wasn’t like Mom to make sideways compliments, but after the way Gail acted at the crime scene, she had it coming.

  “Lola is wondering when you’re going to visit? I told her you two may be busy after the judge was shot, but she worried you might be in jail since she hasn’t seen you.”

  “Tell Auntie Chooney that we’re fine and innocent,” Mom said.

  I heard footsteps entering and then heard the clerk say, “This one’s the largest in the whole mall. It’s got to be big enough.”

  Mom wasn’t even embarrassed on my behalf. “They found something for you, kid! Try this on!” Mom said as she handed the suit over the door.

  It was a simple one-piece that even had one of those old-school skirts on the bottom half that I liked. No strings. Two solid and wide shoulder straps with no buckles. Just a solid piece of fabric all around that would provide plenty of support—which was where I needed it. The entire thing was a nice shade of turquoise, and the skirting around it was white with turquoise polka dots. I liked it.

  Gail and Mom talked about Mom going to visit her aunt. Mom told her it would have to wait until after we came back from Cebu.

  I slipped my feet through the leg holes of the swimsuit. They were cut roomy enough for my thighs. So far so good. I pulled the suit up to my waist, and it fit nicely there. The fabric was stretchy.

  I pulled the first strap over my shoulder, but it got caught on my bra. I decided it wouldn’t be too unsanitary to take my bra off. Nobody was watching and a part of me wondered if most people tried on swimsuits with their bras off. The truth was the last time I bought a swimsuit I didn’t wear a bra.

  Braless, I was able to slip the one strap over my shoulder, but it was a little tight. I hoped when I slipped the other strap over my other shoulder it would fit less snugly.

  The only problem was there wasn’t enough leeway to get my other arm in. I looked at myself in the mirror, and with an exception to one strap being trapped in my armpit, the suit looked like it almost fit. I decided the best course of action was to slip both arms through the straps at the same time. The strap came off my shoulder no problem, but in order to get both arms to fit in at once I had to sort of squat down to have more room in the torso. Then I started to slide both straps up my shoulders. One side got kind of twisted, so I tried to untwist it with my fingers, but the strap had bunched up at an awkward place on my upper arm. I decided to stand up to force the straps to go higher onto my shoulders or to pull it down. Either would have worked. But instead I gave myself a startling kind of wedgie which caused me to lose my balance and fall backward against the door to the dressing room.

  Unfortunately the latch to the dressing room wasn’t entirely secure, or the weight of me falling against it was too great for it to hold, but the door burst open, and I proceeded to fall on my butt in the main area of the dressing room.

  “Oh my God!” Mom said, and then realizing what happened, she rushed to help me off the ground.

  Gail and the clerk both rushed to help me as well. My primary concern was getting the straps up on the swimsuit, as I was essentially topless.

  “Mom, help me pull these up,” I said, trying to work the strap as I sat up.

  With my body sort of hunched over, it was actually easier to get the straps over my shoulders. The only problem was that when I stood up, I was pretty darn close to having a wedgie. My underwear saved me, and the skirt around the bottom half of the suit kept everyone else from noticing.

  “It fits!” Mom said.

  I looked in the mirror. It kind of looked like it did, and since it was, as the clerk put it, “The largest one in the whole mall,” I said I’d take it.

  The only problem was I had to take it off.

  Mom and I exited the department store into the mall. Wenling rushed up to us, excited.

  “You didn’t find balut, did you?” Mom asked.

  Wenling’s face fell. “No.” Then, she looked over at me. “Why are you all…” and she motioned with her arms to indicate that my upper body looked like the Leaning Tower of Pisa.

  “I pulled a muscle trying on my new swimsuit.”

  Wenling paused, and not knowing what to say continued with her original thought. “Guess what I found!”

  “A break in the case?” Mom asked.

  Wenling’s face fell again. “No.”

  “What?” I asked.

  “Now it’s not so exciting,” Wenling said.

  “Okay,” Mom said and then looked over to me. “Did you want to shop for anymore stuff for our trip, kid?”

  I needed more clothes, but I’d already gotten sweaty and pulled a muscle trying on bathing suits so I figured I’d make do with what I had. “Sunscreen?”

  “Decaf! The Bo’s Coffee here has decaf coffee!” Wenling said.

  “Can we go to Bo’s?” I asked Mom like a kid excited that the ice-cream truck was coming down the street. I’d had to pass on my morning coffee because of the fainting incident.

  “Sure,” Mom said, and Wenling led the way.

  Bo’s Coffee was on the first floor and was located on the outer perimeter of the mall. You could enter from the outside or the inside. As we sat down for my glorious half-caf coffee, I noticed an outdoor escalator.

  “Where does that go?” I asked Mom.

  Mom asked a woman at a nearby table. The conversation lasted longer that I thought it would. It turned out that Mom knew her—she was the daughter of a schoolmate of Mom’s from what I could tell.

  While they caught up, I watched Wenling as she busied herself taking a photo of her cappuccino to post online. The barista had made a really cute snowflake design in the foam. “In States they don’t do this. Mostly they make a leaf or a heart,” she said. I’d noticed the longer we’d been on the island, the more Wenling and Mom seemed to drop articles like “the.”

  She showed me the photo, and we picked out a filter for it. She was right. The detail in the foam art was impressive.

  Mom wrapped her conversation with the woman next to us. “The escalator,” Mom said, pointing at it, “goes to the movie theater upstairs. The mall closes at nine, but the theater stays open later. So does Bo’s.”

  I nodded. That’s why we ran into Gail. The movie theater she manages was right upstairs. She must’ve been on break. Lucky me.

  While I was looking at the escalator, a man waved at me.

  “It’s Dr. Acostas,” Mom said, elbowing me to wave back.
/>   I waved, but I didn’t want him to think he needed to come over, so of course, he came to the table.

  “Hi!” he said, all smiles with this perfect teeth.

  “Have a seat,” Mom said.

  I hoped he’d say he was in a hurry, so naturally he sat down. I wasn’t sure why I was so negative about him taking time to sit with us.

  “I got your text,” he said to Mom. “I was hoping to be able to get away this weekend to join you, but I won’t.”

  “It’s fine,” Mom said, “we were just getting some shopping in for the trip.”

  I prayed Mom didn’t bring up the swimsuit.

  “Christy and I wanted to get new swimsuits,” Mom said. “Christy wanted to take a swim. The ocean is so cold in California.”

  “There’s a beautiful resort in Dauin that you can go to for lunch and then enjoy the private beach,” he said.

  “We’ll have to check that out,” Mom said.

  “Perhaps when you guys get back, I can take you out,” he said.

  “We couldn’t let you do that,” I said.

  “Yes we could,” Wenling said.

  “Then it’s settled,” he said, getting up. “I’ll call you next week after you’re back.”

  “Before you go, let’s get a picture,” Wenling said.

  I would’ve thought the doctor would’ve been too busy to take a picture, but I was beginning to learn that Filipinos love getting their photos taken.

  A woman nearby volunteered to take the picture for us, but afterward Wenling insisted on taking a picture of just me and the doctor.

  “Great idea,” he said.

  “I don’t want to keep you from your engagement,” I said.

  “What could be more important than taking a picture with the most beautiful woman on the island?” he said.

  I had no response to that except to wonder what this guy’s angle was. What’s wrong with me that I can’t take a compliment?

  Wenling, being the budding photographer she is, guided us to a nearby palm tree and snapped the photo. The doctor put his arm around me, and we both smiled.

  “Please tag me in that photo,” Joshua said.

  “You’re on Facebook?” I asked.