When in Vanuatu

by Nicki Chen

  It was all too complicated. Diana’s temples were pounding. Her stomach felt queasy. Everyone was looking at her. Finally she curled up on her side and closed her eyes, and they left her alone. But before she fell asleep, she remembered what Jay had said as he was helping her to shore. “Again,” he’d said. He’d been afraid of losing Diana to drowning the way he lost Celeste.

  When she woke up, Alexi and Suling had already gone, and Abby and Saudur were wading out to the speedboat. “Bye-bye,” Abby shouted as Saudur herded the twins ahead of him. Jay brought Diana a bottle of lemon squash, and she sat sucking the sweet, carbonated liquid through a straw while he took the snorkeling gear to a faucet to wash off the salt. When the boat came back, Jay helped her walk out to it and lifted her over the side. At Mele Beach, he lifted her out again. That Jay had recovered so quickly, that he could shoulder her weight on the way to the car and still carry both bags, didn’t really surprise her. Jay was the strong one. On land anyway.

  Nine minutes later they were back at Cloud Nine, Jay unpacking the car while Diana stood in the dining room thinking she had to cook something for dinner. She gripped the back of a chair and stared at the refrigerator, trying to remember what was inside. Green beans, she thought, tomatoes. Maybe a cucumber.

  “We could skip dinner,” she said.

  “Are you kidding?” Jay’s head snapped around. “I’m starved.”

  She knew that look, the unreasoning, angry look of his hunger. “But I can’t think of anything to cook.”

  “Let’s eat out then.”

  She groaned. “I’d have to clean up.”

  “This is Vanuatu. You don’t have to dress up. You can just take a quick shower. Come on. I’ll help.”

  He turned on the shower. Then he laid out a towel and helped her pull her T-shirt over her head.

  “Now,” she groaned as she peeled off her bathing suit and stepped into the shower. “I have to decide what to wear.”

  “Don’t worry. I’ll take care of it.”

  And he did. When she finished with her shower, she found a soft, easy-to-wear sundress on the bed.

  The logical place to eat, the closest, was Jenny’s Terrace, “good food in a casual setting.” The restaurant, part of Cloud Nine Apartments, was on the other side of the building above the office. Only one flight up, but still, Diana’s legs shook with the effort.

  “You’ll feel better after you eat,” Jay assured her.

  The ni-Vanuatu waiter who escorted them to their table was formal in a white shirt and tie. He pulled Diana’s chair out and asked if the table would be satisfactory, courtesies that added a touch of class to a smallish restaurant in a middle-of-the-road apartment building. The menu offered burgers, sandwiches, and spaghetti, but also leg of lamb, spicy coconut crab, and veal paupiettes.

  When Diana’s curried grouper arrived, she pushed the plate back and closed her eyes. It was just too much—all that fish and rice, the spicy fragrance of the coconut sauce.

  Jay stuffed a piece of steak into his mouth. “You need to eat,” he said.

  She took a deep breath. Reluctantly she picked up her fork and tried a small bite of rice and then a small sample of rice and fish. Jay was right. With every bite, she felt that much better. When she finished the rice and grouper, she started on the salad. It was small and colorful, papaya and red onions with thinly sliced ginger, capers, and oil and vinegar on a bed of lettuce. She started to say that they should grow papaya trees at their house—as soon as they found one. But Jay was staring at her, a strange smile on his lips. “What?” she asked.

  “Nothing.” He reached across and took her hand. “I was just thinking how lucky I was to be rescued from almost certain death by such a beautiful woman.”

  “You weren’t about to die.” She pulled her hand away. The picture he painted wasn’t her. The Diana she knew was as ordinary as white rice. “It was luck,” she said.

  He shook his head. “More than that. You were brilliant, honey. And strong. I didn’t know you were so strong.”

  “I’m not particularly strong. I just knew what to do.” She stabbed a bite of papaya and onion. “You can thank my dad for that.”

  “Your dad?”

  “Yeah. It’s funny, I hadn’t thought about it for years. For decades. But when I saw the way Suling was fighting and pulling you and Alexi under, I remembered something that happened when I was a kid.” She paused to savor the ginger. It was pickled, just the right complement to the papaya’s sweetness.

  “So,” he said, leaning closer, his elbows on the table. “What happened?”

  “We were at this little lake, Lake Surprise. Daddy and I were swimming. Mom and Andrew . . . I don’t know.” She shrugged. “They were probably sitting under a tree, sketching and reading, unless Andrew was cannonballing off the high dive.” She took another bite of fish, crunching through its crispy crust and licking the coconut curry sauce off her lips.

  “And?” Jay sliced off a piece of steak and popped it in his mouth.

  “Anyway, there was a commotion on the other side of the dock. Some woman thought she was drowning—even though she was only five or six good strokes from the dock. It seemed to me—in my childish arrogance—that I could dogpaddle farther than that.”

  Diana cleared her throat and looked away. “Naturally,” she said, “the woman’s friend and another person, some good Samaritan, thought it would be simple to pull her out. A perfectly reasonable expectation.” She glanced quickly at Jay. “I mean, who would think the person you’re trying to help would turn on you? But the woman was out of her mind with fear, so pumped up with adrenaline and frantic to keep her head above water that she climbed on top of her would-be rescuers and just about drowned them.”

  Jay looked at the scraps of meat on his plate and nodded.

  “Anyway . . .” Diana put her knife down. “I assume that’s what happened. All I knew was, people were shouting, everyone heading in the same direction. I dogpaddled over and waited my turn to climb the ladder. Daddy was way ahead of me.” She smiled, remembering his pale body as he hoisted himself onto the dock, ran toward the other end of it, water streaming off his body, and dove. A perfect racer’s dive. “He came at them from below and behind,” she said, “catching them unawares.”

  “Smart.”

  “Mmm.” She smiled, pleased. Jay and her dad would have liked each other. “I heard people talk about it as I stood on the dock.”

  “How did he know what to do?”

  She shrugged. “I never asked. In fact, I don’t remember that we ever talked about what happened.” Afterwards Daddy would have plopped down on their beach blanket. Mom would have handed him a towel to dry off. Then he’d lean back on his elbows. “Hey, Linda,” he’d say to her, “how ’bout one of those tuna sandwiches you have in the basket?”

  “How old were you?” Jay asked. “Eight, nine?”

  She thought for a moment. It must have been the summer after first grade. “Seven,” she said.

  “Amazing! And you remembered all this time.”

  “I guess so.” It did seem strange that she’d have a vivid memory of something that happened so long ago. “Maybe I dreamed it.”

  He laughed and patted her arm. “That would be even more amazing, a dream manufactured for the express purpose of one day saving your husband’s life.”

  “No, it really happened.” She stabbed the last bite of papaya. “I’m sure it did.”

  The waiter took their plates and returned moments later with a dessert trolley. They made their choices, coconut pie and soursop a la crème, and then retired to the open-air terrace.

  “I’m feeling better,” Diana said as she licked the rich, fruity dessert off her spoon. “Almost energetic.”

  “Saved by dessert.”

  “And coffee.” She was feeling better—still a little embarrassed by Jay’s praise, and yet enjoying that, too. She’d forgotten what a pleasant little jolt something like this could give to her self-worth.

 
She reached across the table for his hand. In the muted candle-light—one squat candle inside a darkened holder—his features flickered on and off. In and out like waves. Behind him, darkness extended out across the terrace and the parking lot and the edge of town all the way to the ocean. The endless, deep, dangerous ocean.

  He squeezed her hand. “My lifesaver,” he said, as though he’d read her thoughts.

  The moon that night was nearly full. On their way back to the apartment, they paused and watched its reflection quiver on the surface of the swimming pool.

  Later, cuddling in bed, Diana’s thoughts strayed for an instant to Celeste. She would always be young and beautiful, but she would never be the one who saved Jay’s life.

  36

  Diana wasn’t stupid. She didn’t expect Vanuatu to turn her into a totally different person. No place can do that. But now, after two and a half months in this quiet, beautiful place, she was beginning to feel different. She felt it in her shoulders and neck. She felt it in the comfortable looseness of her muscles as she walked in the mornings exploring the town and countryside. She felt it in the ease of her laughter when she was with Abby and Suling.

  Yes, it was true; she was beginning to feel less stressed. But at this point, it was all just provisional. After two and a half months, they still hadn’t found a house; they still hadn’t been able to unpack their furniture and dishes and the personal belongings that waited at the port in a shipping container. And until they did find a house and settled into it, she wouldn’t truly be able to relax. Until then, their existence in Vanuatu would feel as fragile and vulnerable as a spider web on the wheel of a bicycle.

  Bette was losing interest, though, starting to take subtle jabs at them for being too picky. But really! She hadn’t shown them a single house in the past eight weeks that she could possibly have believed they’d like.

  To cheer themselves up after disappointing outings with her, they often dropped by the house in Tassiriki that was under construction. Jay liked chatting with Henri—although how they communicated in their crazy mix of French, English, and Bislama was a mystery. Diana left them to “supervise” the work while she walked around the grounds, gazing at the view and watching the house take shape. As time went by, she and Jay stopped by at odd moments, sometimes two or three times a week. That was their problem. They’d allowed the Tassiriki house to become the model for the kind of house they wanted Bette to show them.

  Without intending to, they’d fallen in love with the house, at least Diana had. Which was foolish. Even if they were willing to wait for it to be finished, it would never be available. Henri was building it for his own family, his wife, his only son, his son’s French girlfriend, and their future children. It would be his masterpiece. He wasn’t about to rent it out to them, no matter how many times they stopped by to look at it.

  Be reasonable, Diana told herself now as she stood waiting for Jay’s plane to land. They needed to stay away from Henri’s house and set their sights on the available options. As she turned her head toward the far end of the runway, a plane taxied toward them. An Air Calédonie 737. She let go of her musings and allowed herself to enjoy the drama of return—children pounding on the chain link barrier that ran along one side of the open-air deck, women giggling their anticipation. Diana, her chest rising and falling, edged forward, maneuvering into a spot between a solitary white woman and a bevy of small ni-Vanuatu children.

  She’d wanted to go with Jay on this trip, but he’d convinced her that Kiribati was the worst possible place he could take her. “Believe me,” he said, “you’d hate it. I’ll take you on my next mission. I promise.”

  “There it is,” somebody shouted.

  A child grabbed Diana’s skirt and quickly released it, embarrassed.

  The plane was unmistakable, large and white, a red hibiscus prominent on its tail. Curling her fingers through the metal links, Diana willed it to move quickly into position.

  The first person down the steps was a ni-Vanuatu government type in a safari suit, serious until he recognized his son’s voice and broke into a big white-toothed smile. Next came a tourist family and then a group of Melanesians buried to the ears in leis and greeted by a mini-riot of shouts and laughter from the observation deck. Tourists, business travelers, and families clattered down the stairway.

  “Mom, Dad.” The woman next to Diana pounded on the mesh. “Up here.” An older couple in matching purple and green Hawaiian shirts frowned and then, seeing her, smiled and waved furiously. The woman left in a flurry of lemony-sweet perfume and perspiration, the heavy metal door sucking shut behind her.

  Diana leaned her forehead against the mesh and watched a couple of stragglers stride across the tarmac and disappear into the terminal. Then no one. Even the wind stopped blowing. It wasn’t like Jay to be so slow. She stared into the arched opening in the plane’s bright white side.

  Finally he appeared, smiling good-bye to the flight attendant. Not so very late after all, other passengers right behind him. He jogged down the stairs and took off across the pavement, his heavy shoulder bag bouncing on his hip. Diana watched for him to raise his eyes, and when he didn’t, she called down to him. “Hey, Jay.”

  Without breaking his step, he looked up, waved, and smiled. A distracted smile that flashed and disappeared. As she pulled open the heavy door and hurried downstairs to meet him, Diana had a sinking feeling that Vanuatu wasn’t working out for Jay the way it was for her.

  When he came out of immigration, she was waiting at the baggage carousel knowing what to expect. The warm hug, the slightly distracted look in his eyes. She knew. It was never easy for him to shake off everything that had been occupying his mind for the past week or two in the space of a single flight. He would want to talk about it.

  “So,” she said. “How was Kiribati?”

  “Oh, lord!” He shook his head. “I’ve never seen a place with so little margin for error.”

  “Oh? What do you mean?”

  The belt hadn’t started yet, but they were both focused on the little door at the end of it, watching for suitcases to emerge.

  “Even if they do absolutely everything right,” Jay said, slicing the air with his hands, “it’s questionable whether thirty-three scattered atolls can support life for so many people.”

  She raised her eyebrows. “How many people live there?”

  “About seventy-five thousand.”

  “That’s all? In the whole country?”

  “That’s plenty,” he said with a sad little laugh, “when the people are all crowded onto thin strips of land no more than a meter or two above sea level, when their main source of water is captured rain, and when the soil is so thin and chalky they can hardly grow anything except coconuts.”

  The baggage carousel groaned to a start, and everyone moved a step closer.

  “They must have fish,” Diana said, her eyes automatically tracking the first few suitcases making their way around the carousel.

  “An ocean full. But they depend on the lagoons and reefs, and they’re becoming more polluted every day.”

  Diana nodded and waited for him to tell her what D-TAP was going to do about it.

  “We’re giving them an interest-free loan to rehabilitate and expand what is at present a totally inadequate sewerage and sanitation system.” He swung his suitcase off the carousel and turned to Diana. “How’s everything here?”

  “Good. Except I haven’t heard a word from Bette all week.”

  “We can call her tomorrow.” He pulled out the handle on his suitcase and started for the exit.

  The rich aroma of espresso and warmed croissants filled the air as they passed the café in the lobby. Suddenly the chatter of passengers and their friends was interrupted by the loud scraping of an iron chair against the floor tiles. “Hey, Jay.”

  Diana turned to see Alexi brushing past the potted plants that marked the edge of the café area.

  “Oh, Diana, hi.” Dropping his hand-carry, Alexi turned away
from her and grabbed Jay’s elbow. “You’re not going to like this.” He frowned and lowered his voice. “They hired that consultant.” He looked over his shoulder. “The guy from Melbourne.”

  “What?! He was the only one with no background in sanitation systems.”

  Alexi threw his hands up and rolled his eyes in an appeal to the god of the ceiling. “That’s the way it goes.”

  “Son of a bitch!”

  Diana backed away and pretended to be interested in the couple pushing three oversized suitcases up to the counter.

  “I can’t believe it.”

  Alexi snorted and leaned close. “Now you understand what I’ve been telling you.”

  Diana turned back just in time to see Jay’s slow eye-blink and the disappointed look on his face, as though he couldn’t get over expecting the world to be better than it was—as though he couldn’t stop tilting at windmills.

  Alexi just shrugged and tossed his hand-carry over his shoulder. “I’m off to Fiji.” He took a few steps and turned back. “Hey, do me a favor, will you? Look in on my wife. She’s in the family way, you know.” He raised his eyebrows, beaming.

  What? Suling was pregnant? That was great news! Really it was. And yet Diana sighed as she looked out the car window at the spindly, wind-blown palm trees and the dun-colored cattle, staring and chewing. They rounded a corner and drove into a spray of raindrops—a rainbow-making mist, except there was no rainbow. Time to turn the wipers on. She glanced at the speedometer. Time to slow down.

  It may have been just seven minutes from the airport to town, but the way Jay was driving, they’d make it in five. He squealed around a corner, past a group of huts and small, square concrete block buildings. The mist became rain, and finally he switched on the wipers.

  She shifted her weight as they approached the turn to Cloud Nine. But when he didn’t turn, she had to grab the armrest to keep her balance. “Hey! Where are you going?”