Mahu
Page 9
“Easy as pie,” he said, as the Windows warm-up screen appeared. “That’s not to say some of the files aren’t encrypted, too. We’ll have to see.”
Most computerese was gibberish to me. The computers we used at the station were very simple, and pretty user-friendly. You moved a cursor around, clicked on items on lists, typed in what you wanted to search for, that kind of thing.
Around noon Arleen came in. “It’s almost lunchtime,” she said. “My boy’s on a half-day today, so I’ve got to go pick him up.”
“I wish I had a kid,” Harry said, shocking the hell out of me. “How old is he?”
“He’s five,” she said. “You want to see a picture?”
Harry nodded. She opened her wallet and pulled out one of those studio pictures, the kid posed on a carpet with a teddy bear. “Cute,” Harry said. “What’s his name?”
“Brandon.” She had a couple more pictures, which she showed us. I looked at them politely, Harry with more interest. “He’s why I have this job, you know. I’m not some kind of criminal or anything. I just need to work, and this way I get to see my son as much as I can.”
“Cool,” Harry said.
“I actually have an associate’s degree in computer science,” she said shyly, making eye contact with Harry. Once again I was amazed at his ability to attract women. It was almost like I wasn’t there, this thing that was going on between them. “But I make more here than I could as a junior programmer somewhere, and the hours are better.”
Arleen gave us a menu for a local deli before she left, and we ordered take-out. Harry sat back down at the keyboard and I wandered around the office, looking for anything we might have overlooked. But I guess there just wasn’t much there to find, and I’d been over every inch by the time the delivery boy came. I paid him, tipped him, and took the sandwiches in to Tommy’s office.
“Find anything interesting?”
“Nothing much. But I still have to crack into his Palm backup software.”
Just then we heard the door open. Arleen had that same cute little boy with her who I’d seen before, with coal-black hair in a short crewcut, wearing blue and white striped overalls with a pattern of trains across the bib. He looked hapa haole, or half white, his eyes a little too round to be fully Japanese.
She smiled shyly, and introduced Brandon to Harry. I felt like drumming my fingers on Tommy’s desk, hurrying them along, but I caught myself. It was like this transformation was going on inside me—I’d never been an “us versus them” kind of guy, maybe because my family’s such a melting pot I never felt like there was a group I didn’t have at least one relative in.
But being gay was different. Every time I heard the word fag, I felt my body go tense. I was starting to look at straight couples together and get mad, that they had something I didn’t. I was about to start calling people with kids breeders. And all within less than a week. Kind of took my breath away.
It took Harry a little longer to break into the Palm Pilot software than it had to get past the computer’s password, but eventually he was able to synch up the Palm to a copy of Microsoft Outlook on Tommy’s computer, and export the calendar and address book. “This won’t be completely up to date,” Harry said, as the PC whirred and clanked. “I mean, if you’re expecting to see he had a meeting Tuesday night, it might not be there. This is only current up to the last time he hot-synched to the computer.”
“I love it when you talk geek to me. What does that mean in English?”
“It means that he carried the Palm around with him and made entries directly into it,” Harry said. “Adding people to his address book, putting in appointments, making notes. But in order to get that stuff into this file,” he pointed at the icon on the screen, “he had to perform this function they call a hot synch. You drop the Palm into the cradle, press a couple of buttons, and everything copies.”
We discovered that the last time Tommy had done a hot synch had been a week before. “So nothing on his calendar for last Tuesday,” I said.
“But you wanted some names and numbers,” Harry said. He clicked over to the address book. “Voila.”
We printed out his address book, which was unfortunately quite sparse. A few names and numbers I thought the FBI might like, but very little in the way of personal contacts.
We finished up after that, but it took a couple of minutes to get Harry past Arleen’s desk. Brandon was fascinated with his glasses, pointing again and again to his own reflection and laughing. Harry found all this very cute, though I got tired of it fast. I love my nieces and nephews, but I think they’ve gotten more interesting as they’ve started to have interesting things to say—usually around nine or ten. Harry promised to send Arleen some information on classes at UH, too, even volunteering to get together with her and help her polish her programming skills.
I finally got Harry outside. The trade winds had died, and Waikīkī sat under a dark gloomy cloud. As we got out to Kuhio Avenue, a guy in a red Porsche with vanity plates DR DR veered in front of a huge black Lincoln Navigator, and the Navigator almost crunched his very expensive bumper. There were times when I really wanted to drive a black and white again.
“You up for a little wahine action tonight?” Harry asked. “Canoe Club bar?”
I don’t know how it came out. I certainly hadn’t been planning to say it. I said, “Harry, I’m gay,” as we turned makai toward Kalākaua. “No more wahine action for me. I’m not lying anymore.”
“I wondered when you were going to figure it out,” Harry said. “Good for you.”
“You mean you knew?”
I looked over at him, and he nodded. “I wasn’t a hundred percent sure, but I had an idea. I mean, you could never stick with a woman for more than a week or so.”
“There was Peggy in high school. That was three years. Although I have to say I’m not quite sure what I’m doing dating her again.”
“High school was different. None of us knew what was going on back then.” He paused. “So what made up your mind?”
“It wasn’t really one thing. I don’t know why, all summer long, I’ve been noticing things I never noticed before. Porno magazines in a bookstore window. Two guys holding hands at midnight on the beach. Then I came here.”
I told him about that night, from the failed drug bust down to finding Tommy Pang’s body in the alley. “It doesn’t matter to me, you know that,” Harry said. “You’re my friend and I hope you’ll always be my friend, no matter who you decide to sleep with.”
I didn’t know what to say. I felt elated, and also a little scared and weird, like my secret was out. I’d told Akoni, of course, but the circumstances and his reaction had been so different. Harry put his hand on my shoulder. “Mahalo,” I said. “I’ll call you. Maybe we’ll surf tomorrow.”
“Just not at six a.m., okay?” he asked. “I need my beauty sleep.” Then he smiled. “Plus, now you’re not going to know if I’m alone or not.”
I nodded and smiled, and he crossed the street, heading back toward his apartment.
On the way back to the station I ran into Alvy Greenberg on patrol, under the trees behind the Royal Hawaiian Shopping Center. It was cool back there, nicely landscaped, quiet. We stood in the shaded lobby of the shopping center, surrounded by the hushed voices of serious shoppers and the occasional small child racing around the courtyard. We talked for a couple of minutes, mostly me expressing my frustration at how few leads we had on Tommy Pang’s murder. “I’m sure you’ll figure it out,” he said. “If you want my honest opinion, I think you’re the best detective we’ve got on the force.”
“Mahalo, brah. I appreciate the vote of confidence, even if I don’t feel like I deserve it most of the time.”
I walked past the open air market, full of t-shirts, plastic leis and coconuts you could send home like postcards. A parrot called out, “Hey, pretty baby,” over and over again. There was a lazy flow of tourists from one stall to the next, but nobody seemed to be buying much.
As I left the station, I passed an elderly Japanese woman, dirty and dressed in rags, sitting on the curb shouting obscenities. Alvy Greenberg was on his way to roust her, and I nodded as we passed each other.
I took my time walking home. At Kuhio Avenue and Lili’uokalani Street, a good-looking guy passed me, heading toward the beach. He had a surfer’s physique, like mine—strong chest, well-defined pecs, a dusting of blond hair down the center of his chest. His legs were long and his calves and thighs well-muscled. He was wearing a skimpy bikini that didn’t cover much, and as we made eye contact I experienced a sudden pang of horniness. Our eyes met for a moment, but both of us kept on walking. I couldn’t help turning to stare at him; though I forced myself to look away eventually, I watched his butt go halfway down the block before he blended in with the rest of the crowd. And then I knew what Akoni was worried about, and it scared the hell out of me.
My life had become my latest case. And like a bulldog, I was going to keep gnawing at my personal problems until I had worked them out. I knew then that I couldn’t keep my sexuality a secret forever, and that revealing it would rip open my life and hurt many people around me.
I knew my parents loved me, but I also knew my father’s bad temper and remembered the frequent disparaging comments he’d made about māhūs when I was growing up. And though my brothers loved me, too, they had teased me mercilessly when we were kids. Suppose they chose to shut me out now?
I’d always appreciated my sense of being rooted in Honolulu. Landmarks in town had personal meaning to me, and my parents’ network of friends and distant relatives was all around. Now that I was an adult, I often ran into distant cousins and Punahou classmates at the grocery, on the beach, or on street corners downtown. What if I was shut out of that community, shunned? What if I didn’t belong in my own home anymore?
There was a storm coming. Akoni had just felt the winds a little sooner, and was scrambling to get under cover.
TERRI’S GIFT
When I got inside the red light was blinking on my answering machine. I thought it would be my mother, with some follow-up to the party of the day before, and I just didn’t feel like talking to anyone. There was still a couple of hours of daylight left, and I thought I might go for a swim. I hit the play button on the machine as I started to strip down.
It wasn’t my mother. A different female voice said, “Hi, Kimo, it’s Terri Gonsalves.” I dropped my shirt on the bed and stopped, listening. There was a pause before she went on. “I really need to talk to you, Kimo. Can you call me, please? Maybe we can meet.” She left her number. “It’s important, Kimo. Please call me tonight, if you can. Evan is working late.” She paused again. “I’m counting on you.” Then the line went dead.
I looked at my watch. It was almost six, and Terri answered on the first ring, as if she’d been sitting by the phone waiting for me to call. “I’m sorry to bother you, Kimo. I know you’re probably busy.”
“Never too busy for you, Terri, you know that. What’s wrong?”
“I’m worried about Evan. There’s something wrong with him—the way he’s been acting, it’s not like him. Do you think you could come over tonight? I can explain it.”
“Sure. When?”
“Danny’s playing at a friend’s house, and he’ll be home any minute for dinner. Do you think maybe eight o’clock? By then he’ll be asleep and we can talk. Evan won’t be home until midnight at least.”
I agreed to come out to Terri’s house on the Wailupe peninsula at eight o’clock. I finished stripping down and put on a bathing suit, and headed for the beach to get in a quick swim before dinner. I told myself I was just looking to cool down after the long, hot day, to refresh myself by contact with the ocean. But maybe I was hoping to run into the guy in the skimpy bikini, too.
Not that I would say anything to him, even if I saw him. As I walked to the beach, I wondered when I would stop running, when I’d make a move toward another guy the way the giraffe had moved on me at the Rod and Reel Club. I doubted I’d ever be blowing in a stranger’s ear, but I’d always been comfortable walking up to unescorted wahines, saying hello and trying to start a conversation. If it worked, it worked. If the girl snubbed me, I’d move on. It was just a matter of transferring that attitude to guys.
It had to be different, though. When you walked up to a girl, there was a big chance she wouldn’t like you, that she’d be engaged or dating someone, or just not interested. But chances were she’d be heterosexual, and wouldn’t be offended.
Unfortunately, the chances were that most guys on Kuhio Beach were heterosexual, too, and they’d be pissed off by any kind of overture, and ready to punch me out. Which left me at kind of a loss. The only men I can generally peg as gay are the faggy ones, and they don’t do it for me. The way I figure it is, if I was attracted to someone feminine, I’d stay with girls, and my life would be a lot easier. Unfortunately, the kind of guys who appealed to me were masculine, athletic, all male. I supposed there might have been a few of them at the Rod and Reel Club, and that eventually I’d have to make my way back there.
Once I got to the ocean, though, I stopped thinking. I swam out beyond the breakers, where the surfers waited, and then swam parallel to the shore down toward the old marine stadium. I did a couple of trips like that, back and forth, until my legs and arms started to feel like jelly. Then I floated for a little while, looking up at the crisp blue sky dotted with a few lazy clouds. As it started to get dark I realized I had to get in, to grab a quick dinner and drive out the Kalaniana’ole Highway to Terri’s house in Wailupe.
I found my towel on the beach and started drying off. While the towel was over my head, someone said, “You’re not surfing tonight.”
I looked up. It was the guy I’d seen on Lili‘uokalani, sitting up on a beach towel a couple of feet away. I realized I’d probably seen him on the beach a couple of times, but hadn’t taken much notice of him, thinking he was a tourist. But now, after my reaction to him back at my apartment, I got nervous, feeling like there was a big empty place at the bottom of my throat. “No, I surfed this morning,” I said, trying to sound casual, but sure my voice was squeaking. “I just wanted to do a little swimming tonight.”
He nodded. “I swim every day, but I haven’t gotten up the nerve to try surfing yet.”
“You should try it, it’s fun,” I said, trying to keep the towel around my swimsuit to avoid any embarrassing revelations. “People around here are pretty friendly about giving advice.” I paused. “I could give you a couple of pointers some time, if you want.”
“That’d be great.” He stood up and walked over to me, with his hand outstretched. “I’m Tim, Tim Ryan. I just moved to Waikīkī a couple of months ago.”
I gave up holding the towel and shook his hand. I told him my name and asked what he did. Fortunately my interest in him wasn’t too evident, and I could relax a little.
“I’m an attorney,” he said. “It’s boring.”
I laughed. “Not from my perspective. I’m a cop.”
“Really?”
We talked for a couple more minutes, and then I caught a glimpse of his watch. “Jesus, it’s late. I’ve gotta run. Maybe I’ll see you around this weekend. I can give you that surfing lesson.”
“I’ll look forward to it.” He looked directly into my eyes and smiled, and I felt a shiver run down my back. I smiled myself, a goofy kind of grin. We shook hands again, and I picked up my towel and headed down Lili‘uokalani toward my apartment.
He was a nice guy, I thought, as I walked. This was a perfectly innocent conversation. I’d never been sex-mad, like some of my friends in high school and college, imagining that every time a woman talked to me it was because she wanted me. I hoped I wouldn’t change now. T
im Ryan was probably just a good guy who was interested in making some friends and learning to surf. Of course, there was the way he looked at me, and smiled. I realized then he must have noticed me watching him earlier that evening.
I’d been around the sex wars long enough to know what that kind of smile meant. It was funny to realize it meant the same thing from a woman or a man, but I knew then that I was going to sleep with Tim Ryan, and for the first time in my life I thought, that’s okay. It’s like I was giving myself permission to be who I was, and that felt good.
I had barely enough time to microwave myself a couple of frozen burritos and jump into my clothes before I had to leave for Terri’s. When she and Evan got married, her parents gave them a honeymoon in Europe and the down payment for this house, a four-bedroom ranch on the makai side of the Kalaniana’ole Highway. On the mauka side of the highway, the Wiliwilinui Ridge is very steep, but it opens out to a flat plain and a little peninsula that sticks out into the Pacific. It’s a dramatic vista, the stony mountains coming almost to the water’s edge, with Koko Head in the distance.
The neighborhood, full of ranch-style homes with broad lawns, is protected from the busy highway by a yellow brick wall. If you don’t look up at the mountains or the towering palm trees, you could be anywhere in suburbia—sidewalks, basketball hoops in driveways, lots of boats on trailers. Terri’s house isn’t on the water, but Wailupe Beach Park is right next door. There’s a nice lawn, and a semi-circle driveway, and a row of tall coconut palms. When I drove up it was dark and the neighborhood was quiet. I could see a light on in the front window.
Terri heard me pull up on the gravel driveway and came to the front door. She looked even prettier than she had in high school. She was still slim, and her brown hair was cut in the same page boy she’d had since she was a teenager. Back then, when I didn’t understand the feelings I had for guys, I wanted to marry Terri Clark. She was smart and funny, along with being beautiful, and we used to pass each other notes in algebra class.