Tiare in Bloom

by Célestine Vaite

  “Hum,” Ati agrees, thinking that the problem with good women is that they’re already taken.

  “Do you want me to find you a good woman?” Mama Angelina asks eagerly. She insists that she knows what a man wants in a woman. She knows because she’s lived with a man for more than thirty years.

  According to Mama Angelina, the first thing a man wants in a woman is for her to be nice, but she’s got to be nice to look at too. Not too beautiful though, otherwise he’ll be spending his time being jealous.

  A good cook, but there’s no need for her to be a cordon bleu — when food is cooked, it’s edible. Tidy, but there’s no need for her to be a neat freak, because men are not obsessed with tidiness as long as they can find socks and towels.

  Not the kind who plays games. Men don’t like women who play games, they like women who say what they think, easy-going women, someone you can laugh with after work and have a few drinks. A bit masculine on the surface and —

  Ati gets up, meaning, Thanks for your visit. To make his message clearer, Ati kisses his mother good-bye.

  Mama Angelina slowly rises and leaves. But not before telling her son that with all the women he’s had in his life none have truly loved him because none have wanted to have his children.

  “When a woman loves a man,” she says, stopping the door with her foot, “she wants his children. Hurry up, Ati. Find that woman.”

  As the door closes, she adds that he’s forty-three and that soon he’s going to be infertile.

  This is Ati’s story for the day, and from now on, so Ati tells Pito, he might have to start meeting women in a restaurant. In his mind, the restaurant is a great place for a man to get intimate with a woman. You don’t get distracted like you do (and so easily) when you’re in bed and she has you by the couilles. Now, Ati is not saying that a man can’t get intimate with a woman in bed (because he does), but he’s looking for something else these days.

  Ati has never invited a woman to the restaurant, he continues. To the bar, oui, the hotel, oui, his mother’s house, oui, his apartment, oui, but never to the restaurant. For him, restaurants are for couples who have been married for too long and for friends who are not that close.

  “Oh,” Pito shrugs, “me and restaurants —”

  Also, Ati continues, he must stay clear of married women. Married women are very discreet, and they are, well, very, well . . . no need to draw a picture. What Ati means to say is that when a married woman decides to fool around, the man she chooses will be spending a very pleasant evening indeed, and then there’s no harassing him the morning after. She doesn’t ask, “When are you going to call me? Are you going to call me?” She just gives him one last passionate kiss, her hands firmly grabbing him on the arse, then she winks at him, blows him a kiss, and leaves.

  Oui, Ati has a very weak spot for married women, but he wants something more now. “Ah, you’re lucky, copain,” he sighs, one hand on the motor gearshift and the other resting on his knee. “How come a woman like Materena never came my way?”

  “Try living with her,” Pito grunts.

  A Story of Arse

  Usually, cleaning the house calms Materena. She has used that technique many times in her life as a mother and a wife, but the problem is that there’s not much cleaning to do since her three children have left home. So Materena, now picking up fluff off the carpet, is still shocked and fuming about the words that came out of Pito’s mouth last night. He did well to disappear before she picked up the kitchen knife and killed him.

  She doesn’t understand his meanness. Why wouldn’t her father want to know her, eh? She’s not a beggar, she’s not living in the streets. And her parents’ story — it wasn’t just a story of arse. They had tender moments together, Tom and Loana . . . Could it really be true that her husband thinks so little of her?

  A tear rolls down Materena’s cheek. She wonders if she will ever forgive Pito completely.

  The phone rings and Materena goes to answer it, dragging her feet with her carpet fluff rolled into a ball. She’s not in the mood to talk, but it could be one of her children calling.

  Sure enough, as she picks up the phone, she hears the international click before her daughter’s sweet voice calls out, “Iaorana, Mamie!” Out of three children living away from home, the one calling home the most is the daughter.

  “Eh!” Materena immediately feels much better. “You’re fine, chérie?”

  “I’m fine, Mamie, and you?”

  “All is fine, chérie. Alors, what is the news?”

  Well, the news is the same — studies are getting harder, four more students have dropped out, but Leilani is determined to get her medical degree — she knows she was born to save people’s lives. Otherwise, she’s still enjoying her part-time job at the bookshop, caught up with brother Tamatoa, and made a new friend . . . Leilani rambles on, and Materena knows that it’s only a matter of time before she comes back to her favorite topic of conversation: the ex-boyfriend she left behind so that she could fulfill her purpose in life.

  Hotu, sexy dentist: good-looking, down-to-earth young man who has already spent years studying overseas. Hotu this, Hotu that, fabulous rowing champion, more sexy than him you die. Hotu, whom Materena is not allowed to call because he might think Leilani is spying on him, but at the same time, should Materena see something about Hotu in the newspapers (like a marriage announcement, for example), Materena is to immediately report the news to Leilani.

  And Materena is to definitely go and see Hotu in the flesh if Leilani dies — Leilani said this two weeks ago as a joke! She’d like her body repatriated back to Tahiti, of course, and for Hotu to dig her hole. She wants sweat pouring down his sexy back and she gives him permission to give her one last passionate kiss on her mouth. He doesn’t need to act proper at her wake, kissing her on the forehead. Kiss her on the mouth!

  “Mamie,” Leilani gushes, “I bought the cologne that Hotu uses.

  “Ah bon?”

  “Oui, and I spray it on my wrists when I go to bed, I smell my wrists and inhale him . . . I close my eyes, and I see —”

  “And what do you see?”

  “I can’t tell you!” Leilani exclaims.

  “Ah . . . it’s like that, eh?”

  Cackling, Leilani also admits that whenever she sees a man of Hotu’s build, her heart goes bip-bip! Here, yesterday she was walking to the bookshop where she works, when she saw a man hailing a taxi. He was tall, with a newspaper tucked under his arm, and from behind he looked a bit like Hotu. Leilani froze, right there in the middle of the footpath with people walking past and knocking her on the shoulders. She was like a coconut tree. And her heart was going bip-bip!

  She was so tempted to phone Hotu afterwards just to hear his voice, but they had agreed not to call each other because it would make things difficult but . . . Ah, she misses him like crazy. “Mamie, I’m sure you know what I’m talking about, it must have been the same for you when Papi was in France for military service.”

  “Girl, that was a long time ago,” Materena says, though she still remembers those days. Ah oui, she was obsessed with that boy Pito Tehana she used to meet in secret under the frangipani tree behind the bank. That was before he left for military service in France. And for the two whole years, Materena stayed faithful. She didn’t look at any other boys. She wasn’t even Pito’s official girlfriend back then, just this girl he knew and who was crazy about him.

  For two years Pito was constantly on Materena’s mind. She’d be slicing onions or folding clothes and she would see him, just like that. Sometimes he was smiling, sometimes he was winking. Other times he was kissing her on the mouth. And every day, for two whole years, Materena asked God for signs that Pito was thinking about her too. She even prayed.

  “You prayed?” Leilani sounds like she thinks it’s funny her mother prayed.

  “Oui, I prayed. I kneeled in front of the Virgin Mary, Understanding Woman, and prayed the same prayer. ‘Please make Pito come home to me, please don
’t let him fall in love with a girl there in France, Amen.’ You know your grandmother was very worried. One day, she said to me, ‘Girl, that’s a lot of praying you’re doing, I hope you’re not asking the Virgin Mary, Understanding Woman, for a miracle.’ ”

  “Well, your prayers were answered,” Leilani giggles.

  “Your father didn’t even send me a postcard.”

  “Oh, Papi isn’t the kind to send people postcards, that’s all. I don’t even know if he can write.” Leilani hurries to add, “Not like you, I mean. For someone who left school at fourteen to clean houses, you write well, Mamie, and you never make spelling mistakes. And you are so strong, everybody likes you, and you have fans —”

  “I don’t have fans,” Materena laughs.

  “You do, stop fishing for compliments, of course you have fans. If you didn’t have fans, your program would have been already axed.”

  “Ah.” Materena has never thought of her listeners as fans.

  “And what else are you up to?” Leilani asks.

  “Well, I’m learning to drive.”

  “Mamie! You are a champion! Eh-eh, poor Papi, he must be feeling so intimidated by you, but he’s proud of you, he told me when he called me last week —”

  “Papi called you?” Materena asks, surprised.

  “Well oui! I’m not just your child, you know.” Leilani continues her story. Last week, when her father called for the first time, he said that he was very proud of Materena for her radio program and that he had listened to it once. Enfin, ten minutes of it. A woman was complaining of an article in the newspapers about a fisherman who had caught a four-hundred-pound tuna. The lucky fisherman was beside himself, he was going to get lots of money for his fish. But then he found out that his fish was pregnant, it had eggs, and the value of the fish dropped dramatically. “What are men trying to tell us?” the enraged woman shrieked at the top of her lungs, hurting Pito’s ears. “That when a woman is pregnant, her value drops?” Pito switched the radio off, telling himself, It’s not true! Women are taking themselves for fishes now?

  “You see?” Leilani cackles. “You can’t say that Papi isn’t trying to be supportive of you.” In her opinion this is a big step for her father to be taking, considering that he must be feeling a bit threatened at the moment. “But you know Papi, he’s a good man, he has his heart on his sleeve.”

  “Oh,” Materena says vaguely, “when he wants to.” She can’t believe Hotu isn’t dominating all of today’s conversation.

  “It’s like with Hotu and me.”

  He’s back!

  “You intimidate him?” Materena asks.

  “But non, he’s confident, he’s living his dreams, non, we’ve never intimidated each other, but look at us now — I’m here, he’s there. Doing sexy loving with a COCONUT-HEAD!”

  “Oh, how do you know this?” Materena does the reassuring voice. “He’s probably crying on his pillow for you.”

  “Mamie, he’s a man,” says Leilani, her sigh filled with resignation: you can’t change the world, men are like that, they need action, whereas women can go the distance with the memories and scents that go straight to the head.

  “Ah this, you said it, girl!” Materena exclaims. She knows what she’s talking about. While she was in Tahiti dreaming about her boyfriend Pito night and day, that con was doing romance with French girls. According to Pito, Tahitian military servicemen were very popular with the French girls — they found them exotic, with their smooth chocolate skin. Pito (still according to Pito) only had to wink and the girls jumped on him.

  “But not all men are the same,” Leilani adds. “Hotu and I had something very special.”

  “True.”

  “Our story wasn’t just a story of arse . . .” Leilani’s voice cracks. “We had our ups and downs . . . like you and Papi.”

  And Materena sighs, a heavy sigh from the soles of her feet.

  “Like everyone, chérie.”

  Bread Crumbs

  When Pito came home from his speedboat wandering with Ati on Saturday, Materena wasn’t home, and by the time he went to bed after a frugal dinner (corned beef straight out of the can), Materena was still not home. It was a nice surprise for Pito to open his eyes on Sunday morning and see Materena next to him. He was very tempted to try his luck, but decided otherwise — Materena never wants to do sexy loving before mass. But then Pito thought, eh, maybe she’s going to be interested if I do this . . .

  Then the phone rang and Materena sprang out of bed to answer it. Bloody telephone, Pito told himself, there’s never a moment of peace, it’s only quarter past five! Later, in the kitchen, he overheard part of Materena’s conversation with Rita. “Eh, eh, Cousin,” Materena was saying, “you got your period again . . . Rita, don’t worry, okay? Baby is going to come when he’s ready, eh? You’ve only been trying for the past five months, sometimes it takes a bit longer . . . True, at least it’s a lot of fun trying! Oui, Cousin, I see you at mass.”

  At the church, Materena completely ignored Pito as she always does — when her relatives are around, her husband doesn’t exist — and left with Rita immediately after mass.

  By the time Pito went to bed after yet another frugal dinner (corned beef straight out of the can), Materena still wasn’t home and he didn’t hear her get into bed in the middle of the night. She must have sneaked in.

  When Pito gets up next morning she’s still in bed, fast asleep, her eyes closed very tight. It’s not like Materena — Madame Énergie — to be in bed after six thirty in the morning. Even the next day after coming home from the hospital with a newborn baby, Materena would be up at five getting things done; café, breadsticks, omelettes; watering plants; being busy.

  Pito watches his wife for a while, thinking how tired she looks. He bends down to kiss her on the head, then pauses; he might wake her up. So, walking very quiet steps, Pito leaves for work, worried a little and starving hungry. He didn’t have much to eat this morning. There was nothing in the fridge.

  Now, lunchtime, he’s devouring his sandwich as if his life depended on it. All the colleagues are — working does make a man hungry — except for Heifara, sitting with his mouth shut, his eyes staring at the sandwich bought at the snack nearby. He’s been weird all morning, actually. It’s not like him not to talk.

  “Heifara,” Pito says, “tama’a.”

  Heifara looks at him for a minute before deciding to spill the bucket. “I’m in a difficult situation.”

  “Ah oui?” Pito asks, to show some interest.

  “Oui, I’m in a very difficult situation,” Heifara says. He looks at his colleagues to see if they’d like to hear about it, and they seem interested. So Heifara tells his story about his difficult situation with his wife.

  When he came back from his two-week surfing holiday in Huahine, relaxed and in a very good mood, things weren’t quite right. There was no “Oh, chéri! Welcome home! I missed you so much, make love to me!” from his wife. Non. Instead, what she actually said was, “I want a separation.”

  Heifara admits to his surprised colleagues that oui, of course he was shattered. “Salope,” he spits.

  “Just like that?” Pito asks, confused. The last time Heifara talked about his wife, she couldn’t keep her hands off him, she was wild with desire. Okay, that was about six months ago, but still, eh? Now she wants a separation?

  Heifara confirms the fact with a sad nod and raises his left hand, the one with the missing finger, the finger he lost years ago when his wedding band was caught in the machine, shredding it to pieces.

  Heifara always raises his left hand (since he lost the finger) whenever he talks about his wife. My wife, he says, winking and raising his left hand as if to say, My wife is worth me having nine fingers instead of ten. But today the raised hand looks more like it’s saying, I lost a finger because I married that bitch!

  Pito remembers when Heifara joined the company and how much he got on everyone’s nerves. When a colleague gave the young recruit advice re
garding work safety, Heifara would say, “Yeah, I know.” Soon Heifara’s nickname was “Monsieur I Know.” Then he lost a finger and the colleagues said, “Serves him right, he never bloody listens,” but they kept an eye on him for months after the unfortunate accident. Nobody wanted another lost finger.

  Heifara, sad-faced, still has his mutilated hand in the air.

  Purée, Pito thinks, looking at his colleague from under his eyelashes as he finishes his sandwich, is this what a man gets when he goes away on a short holiday after months working like a dog in the heat and the noise, and for the lowest pay on the island? “Your wife,” Pito asks, curious, “she was cranky with you when you took off to Huahine for two weeks?”

  Heifara informs his audience that non, his wife wasn’t cranky at all, and in fact, she had a smile from one ear to the other. “Have a wonderful time!” she said sweetly when she dropped Heifara off at the domestic terminal. “I hope you’re going to catch millions of waves!”

  Millions? Pito tells himself. This is an angry woman talking.

  “She said . . .” Heifara’s voice trails off. He needs to find the correct words to express his disenchantment, and the colleagues aren’t going to hurry him up. They just look at him with compassion because he’s young. If Heifara were their age, they might have said, “Ah, pull yourself together, copain, you’re going to give us a bad name.” But right now, the colleagues, Pito included, are thinking, Take your time, kid, if we ever came back from holiday and the wife said, “I want a separation,” we would . . . Well, purée de bonsoir, there would be holes in the walls.

  Anyway, Heifara continues, she told him that she’d been unhappy for the past two years and has tried to tell him about it but he didn’t listen. “She’s talking conneries,” Heifara spits. For instance, his wife said that she’d tried — millions of times — to make him understand that she needed help around the house. But when Heifara did help with the housework on the weekend, his wife would always get cranky. “Get out of my way!” she’d growl. “You’re only making things more difficult for me. I have other cats to whip.”