Jean wiped her nose and kept on writing, transferring the draft onto a starched sheet of stationery. She finished with a large swoop of the pen.
“Read it to me,” Violet said.
Dearest Bud,
I hope this letter finds you in good health. After the battle of Saipan, I got word from the current marines at Camp Tarawa that you had survived. This was of such great relief to me that I fainted and had to be lifted from the ground and given smelling salts. They say that mail delivery has been halted, so I’m sure your letters are somewhere at the bottom of a ship’s hold. But enough of that. I have the most swell news this side of ocean. I’m pregnant! You and I are having a baby. I’ve decided to leave Hawaii and move to Texas, since I think the baby should grow up with his Daddy. And I miss you. Oh, how I miss you. For a whole month after you left, I cried buckets and didn’t catch one wink of sleep. I’m better now that I have a part of you inside of me.
I have purchased a ticket on the Lurline and should be arriving sometime around Christmas. In addition, I would prefer not to have this baby out of wedlock, so I’m bringing my grandmother’s ring. Soon we will be together again, my most handsome love!
Yours,
Alma Jean Quinlan
In many ways, the letter was just short of real. And Jean would have been more than eager to row her own boat to Texas if Bud had so much as hinted. Why did females seem prone to doing just about anything for a man?
“Well, if that doesn’t scare the living daylights out of him, nothing will. Worse than any Japanese soldier.”
Jean didn’t look convinced.
Violet softened her voice. “Even if he was married, he didn’t fake his feelings for you.”
Jean sighed and bent forward, laying one cheek on the table. She looked up at Violet with one blue eye. “I don’t know what to believe. You really think I should send it?”
“Do what feels right.”
The house creaked, even in the stillness. Violet could almost hear the sound of Jean and Bud laughing at their own inside jokes.
“It feels mean,” Jean said.
There was something heartless about the whole thing. “Sleep on it, then. Main thing is you got the words out.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Ella
The day started out yellow and progressed from there. Yellow light on the walls, yellow eggs, yellow flowers on my nightgown. When I first wake in the mornings, I can usually tell what kind of day it’s going to be by the first color I see. Some I like better than others, but yellow is my favorite because then I know happy things are going to happen. I’m not sure why this is the case, but it always has been.
Last year, it seemed like I might never see yellow again. Papa added a burst of sun to my life. I knew that some of the kids called him Herman the German because he could be strict, but he was the school principal. That was his job. He also had a small mustache, like Mr. Hitler. At home, he let his soft side out as best he could. More with me than with anyone, even Mama. He wasn’t the kind of man who hugged a lot or said mushy things, but he liked to kiss the top of my head and hold my hand. He did stuff with me, too. Like take me bamboo pole fishing down at Kawaihae for yellow tang or show me how to stick seeds in the ground, whenever he had the chance. He was busy, but I felt important around him. Like I was his number one.
On some days since he’s been gone, the night follows me into the day. Everything is black like one long night. Usually it takes a butterfly or a flower to make me see color again. The butterflies in our yard like the purple and orange lantana, and Mama says they are pollinating.
One more thing about yellow. I hear a lot of mention that Japanese people are yellow. I’ve been caught staring in school a few times, especially in gym class, trying to figure out why. So far, none of the ones around here look yellow. If anything, they are brown. I don’t want to offend Umi and Hiro, or Setsuko, because they’re a little touchy about that kind of thing, so I keep my mouth shut. To tell the truth, though, I’d rather be yellow than black or white. It’s a nicer color.
* * *
Mama let me help her get ready for the USO dance in Waimea. She spent all her time worrying about me and I spent all my time worrying about her, so her going was probably a good break. Jean always pestered her that socializing with adults was important. Mama was still young, after all. I knew Zach and Parker wouldn’t let anything happen to her, so I felt unusually relaxed about the whole thing.
Jean already knew what she was going to wear. A red skintight affair that dipped low between her bosoms, which were almost nonexistent. She said it was seasonal, with Christmas coming up and all. The front part of her hair was piled on her head like ropes of silk, pinned up with every bobby pin in the house. She looked like a pinup girl from the war posters. Minus the bust. The ones that sing for the soldiers in Europe.
Mama had three dresses laid out on the bed. “None of these are any good,” she said to Jean in a whiny tone.
“If you weren’t so well-endowed, I could lend you one of mine. And don’t try to get out of it.”
I was starting to understand that Mama was nervous about the dance. “You look like a movie star in the yellow one,” I told her.
She tried on the yellow one again. When Jean zipped it up, Mama had to hold her breath. “I look like a hussy.”
“You look nothing of the sort. If you’ve got it, flaunt it,” Jean said.
Mama rolled her eyes. The dress really lit up the gold in her hair, which she had set earlier with big rollers and Aqua Net. She had curled mine, too, and now I looked like Shirley Temple minus the cheeks. I couldn’t wait for Umi and Hiro to see my new look. Strangely, the thought of Hiro seeing me like this caused a flurry in my stomach. Not the kind I usually have. A good flurry.
Irene showed up ten minutes later. She wore a ruffly pink number and a crown of flowers in her hair. Her sparkly shoes, which she left at the front door, were the fanciest things I’d ever laid eyes on. “Cute as a button, Ella,” she said as she bent to kiss me.
I blushed. No one ever told me I was cute. They usually told me to eat more.
By the time Jean dragged Mama out of the house, I was ready for them to leave. So much fretting over how they looked. I’d never seen Mama act this way.
It had to do with the soldiers, Parker especially.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Violet
From the moment they walked up, Violet wished she hadn’t come. People were dressed to the nines, and spilled in all directions from the red-and-white schoolhouse. Right in front of them, a couple was necking against a post, oblivious to all passersby. The music could be heard from across town, and her teeth chattered from the cold. Waimea could get downright chilly, being at a higher elevation than Honoka’a.
At the top of the steps, she spun around. “I have to go back to the car and get my sweater.”
Jean gripped her shoulder and delivered a menacing look. “Don’t think you’re going to hide out in the car all night, miss ‘I’m too old for this.’”
“Back in a jiffy.” Violet tore herself away.
Too bad hiding in the car was out of the question. There was also a side of her that looked forward to dancing. All that practice bopping around the living room with Jean would not go to waste. With sweater in hand, she returned. Jean and Irene were nowhere to be found.
You can do this. She stepped tentatively inside the room. Women lined one side, and men, the other. In the middle, couples danced away. The all-military band was playing Bing Crosby. In the dim light, Violet felt less self-conscious. She scanned the crowd. Across the room, one head stood out above the others. She navigated through bodies to reach him.
“Zach!”
Then she saw Irene and Jean and Tommy. But no Parker. Which probably meant one thing. He was dancing. With a woman.
Tommy wasted no time in pull
ing all three of them out on the dance floor. Violet felt stiff-hipped at first, but the crowd was dense enough that no one would notice. Pretty soon, Zach joined in. “Watch out—he’s a shin cracker,” Jean said, her voice nearly lost in the music. Irene didn’t seem to mind, and before long, the two were on their own. Tommy had taken to twirling and dipping Jean, letting her hair fall back to the floor.
Nothing worse than feeling like a fifth wheel.
By the time Violet concluded that signing on as a chaperone would have been a better idea, she spied Parker. He was dancing with two women, one of them hula-hand girl from the beach, the other a tall blonde in a strappy red dress. Violet abruptly turned her back to them. Of course, he would be dancing with girls. All the same, her stomach flipped and flopped. Her mouth went dry.
“I’m going to get some fresh air,” she yelled into Jean’s ear.
Elbowing her way through the crowd, she finally arrived outside. Sweat froze on her arms. With any luck, there would be a beach blanket in the trunk of the car. A hand gripped her arm just as she reached the bottom step. She thought it was Jean, come to drag her back.
“Let me go!” she said.
The hand released.
It was Parker. “Are you all right?” he said.
She swallowed hard. “Oh, I thought you were Jean. Yes, perfectly fine.”
“Where are you going?”
Trying to get away from you. She opted for a sliver of truth. “I enjoy being outside at night. Plus, that room was feeling stuffy with all those bodies crammed together.”
“Agreed.” He looked past her at the jeep parked alongside the road. “I have an idea.”
“No, thanks.”
The sooner she got to the car, the better.
“Please?”
It crossed her mind that Parker might be arrogant, but he was also human. Maybe he just wanted what everyone wanted. A healthy slice of love and companionship. Hard to fault someone for that.
She crossed her arms over her chest. “Tell me, first.”
“You wouldn’t do very well in the military.” He pressed his hand to her lower back. “I’m going to need you to trust me.”
She looked up, as if an answer might appear in the sky. The moonless night was spattered in stars, so much so that you could see trails of dust from one horizon to the other. Why not? “Fine.”
Parker seemed caught off guard that she agreed and escorted her to the jeep. Along the way, he looked around nervously. Everyone was too huddled in groups, smoking cigarettes and caught up in their own worlds. Was he that embarrassed to be seen with her? What if he didn’t want hula hands to see them leaving together?
They roared down the road, her hair standing up in all twelve directions. At least it was dark. Less than a minute later, he turned the jeep up a steep hill and pulled over at the top.
Parker gestured to the barely visible outline of a grassy cinder cone known affectionately as Buster Brown. “Seems like half my life has been spent running up and down this damn pu’u. But I’ve sort of formed a love-hate relationship with it.”
A faint breeze moved in the window. “Going up that thing with a heavy pack would kill me,” she said.
“You’re telling me. A paniolo by the name of Teixeira told me that the Hawaiians called it Hoku’ula, which means ‘red star.’ That got me thinking and I sneaked up here one night. Just me and the stars as far as the eye could see. Now I can’t stay away.” He opened the door. “Come on.”
“Up there?”
The alarm in her voice must have registered, because he laughed. “Don’t worry. There’s a clear spot right over here.”
Parker grabbed her hand and led her into the pasture and away from a stand of juniper trees, whose tangy scent soaked the air. Unable to concentrate on anything but the sound of his breath and the warmth of his hand, Violet followed along blindly. The possibility of being kissed simultaneously plagued and thrilled her.
When he stopped abruptly, her chin hit his shoulder. “Ouch!”
In the dark, he felt for her face and rubbed lightly, his fingers rough against her skin. Violet had the desire to bolt. But instead, she shifted position so she was farther away from Parker. The entire western sky spread out before them, falling into the straight line of the sea.
“You ever notice how trustworthy stars are?” he asked.
“How do you mean?”
“Just that you can count on them being up there wherever you go. I could be sitting on the old log back at a campfire in California, or at the top of a mountain on Island X, and there they are.”
She gave his thought space to settle, and wondered about this mysterious island the marines always spoke about. A stepping-stone in the Pacific. One probably full of gun-wielding men who had a single-minded hatred of the Americans. If nothing else, at least she knew these marines were training their okoles off.
“Do you know which star is the red star?” she asked.
“No, but I want to find out before we leave.” His voice dropped off. “Which is going to be sooner than I thought.”
“What do you mean?”
“December 25.”
“Christmas? You’re leaving on Christmas?” The words came out fractured.
Parker nodded. “Orders came down this morning that from Christmas on, we need to be ready at a moment’s notice.”
“But that’s less than three weeks away.” Violet could feel the blood rushing to her ears. She twisted her hair in her fingers. What kind of lunatic decided to ship out on Christmas?
“We need to keep pushing forward,” he said. “They haven’t said where we’re going, but I have my ideas. It’s not going to be pretty. You saw the first round of marines after Tarawa. I have a feeling this is going to be worse.”
Send someone else, not our men, she pleaded silently. “Don’t say that.”
“Pretend I never mentioned it. We should get the jeep back before anyone notices it’s missing. But I wanted to introduce you to my spot.” He cleared his throat. “I also have a favor to ask of you.”
“Wait—that’s not your jeep?”
He draped his arm around her shoulders, steering her back toward the vehicle. “Technically, it belongs to the military. But Captain Riggs drove it tonight.”
“Jeez, you fellas are too much.”
Only last weekend, Zach had been raving on about how he and Parker had been on liberty in Hilo, stupid on beer, and needed a ride back to camp. They came upon an army command car and decided they would borrow it. They roared up the saddle road, only to run into a guard shack just out of town. Zach slammed on the Reverse madly, while the sentry was yelling, “Halt!” They made it back down the mountain with a few rounds shot over their heads, and parked the car a block from where they’d found it.
“What are they going to do to me?”
He had a point.
“So, what’s the favor?” she asked.
“I need an accomplice tomorrow for a covert mission.”
Violet laughed. “Come on. You can’t be serious.”
“I am.”
“You have plenty of men to choose from, then.”
“None of them can know. Plus, I want you, Violet.”
Air-raid sirens went off in her head. She held on to the air in her lungs while thinking of an answer. Alone with Parker was a dangerous place to be. Where would they go? What would Jean say?
She thought about Herman.
“This isn’t a date, is it?”
While a date was off-limits, a mission was perfectly acceptable.
“No, ma’am.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Ella
Parker exchanged Zach and Roscoe for Mama this morning. There was no way I was going to tell her this, but I was thrilled. It was a pretty even exchange. All I could think about was wiggling a st
ick for him and running through the tall grass behind our house. I wanted to take him into town and show him off. Roscoe walked straight over and rubbed against my hip and sniffed my kneecaps. He was getting bigger by the hour, and stronger. If you’ve ever seen a movie in slow motion, that was kind of how he moved. Unless he was pouncing. You could also see that his leopard spots were disappearing, making him look more lionish. Parker said when he got to be full grown, his mane would fill in.
Even though milk was scarce, most of it going to the soldiers at camp who need it more than we do, Jean let me fill a small bowl for Roscoe. There was still cream on top, and when Roscoe was done, his muzzle stayed white.
When Jean and Zach get together, they talk a lot. Both of them were sitting in the living room, listening to Christmas songs on the radio, babbling away. I entertained Roscoe as best I could, but he finally stretched out on the floor and yawned. Jean said we could let him in.
“Can we take him into town?” I asked.
“Sweetie, Zach and I are taking a walk down memory lane. We only have another two weeks until they leave and I want to soak him in. How about we go after lunch?”
Mama hadn’t mentioned this and I wondered why. Probably because she didn’t want me to worry. “It’s not your job to worry, Ella. It’s mine.” “Two weeks?”
“They’re on standby to leave.”
“What about Roscoe?”
There I went again, more concerned about the animals than anything else. It was what the nurse Mrs. Baker calls a weakness. She says we all have them.
“Roscoe is staying,” Zach said.
A ship was obviously no place for a lion. And neither was a battlefield. “Good, because the Japanese might end up eating him if they caught him.”
Zach’s face turned sour and I think he knew what I meant. “We wouldn’t want that.”
The kids at school liked to talk. And since I know how to listen without being noticed, I’ve heard a lot of stories. These are not the kind of stories that Mrs. Hicks reads us in class. And I don’t even know if I should be mentioning this. But the Japanese in Japan eat Americans. How scary is that? Some people say it’s because they’re hungry and just trying to stay alive, others because they’re evil. None of the Japanese I know are evil, but who knows.
Island of Sweet Pies and Soldiers Page 19
