The Tattoo

by Chris Mckinney

  Ken laughed. Cal kept his eyes closed. “Yeah,” Ken said, “beating on prisoners is real legit.”

  Ken flew again. It was like hearing a giant wet rag hit the wall. “You fuckas deserve it,” Tavares said. Then he whispered in Cal’s ear. “You betta finish da tattoo quick, cause pretty soon, he eida goin’ be back in solitary, or dead on dis floor.”

  The door buzzed and Tavares stomped out. Cal opened his eyes. Ken was sitting against the wall, smiling. “Well, you heard the man. Let’s get this tattoo finished. I refuse to die without it.”

  Cal took the gun out of his mattress as Ken checked his back for broken ribs. When both were ready, Cal began filling in the symbol. Ken cleared his throat and continued his life story. It would be another three hours before Cal would remember that he left a rubber glove up his ass.

  chapter two

  “Last night I dreamt I was returning,

  and my heart called out to you.

  But I fear I won’t be like I left you,

  me ke aloha ku‘u home o Kahalu‘u.”

  Ku‘u Home O Kahalu‘u

  Olomana

  KOA

  Sitting in a fucking box for the last two years has given me a lot of time to think about the past. Hell, sometimes I get so lost in those past images, I forget where I am now. For hours I’ll be swimming in the pool of my imagination, basking in the light, eyes squinted, back-stroking in the chlorinated water. Sometimes I’ll open my eyes wide at the sun, see nothing, see everything. When the bright blinding haze passes, I’ll see the rectangular light shine through the door of the cell. The toilet, the sink, the stainless steel mirror. The slippers on my feet which cost three packs of cigarettes, the customized hem on my state government-issued trousers which cost me four. Sometimes I’ll look out the window and stare at the two rows of high fence which surround Halawa. The coiled razor wire on the top of the first. Reality. I figure it’s healthy, though, the escape, to look at your mind instead of your fence and your cell, as long as you open your eyes every once in a while no matter how much it hurts.

  Most of the guys in here remember well enough. They remember why they’re here, the death, the theft, the violence, the distribution of drugs, but I don’t think too many of them ever ask themselves what went wrong. When it went wrong. Break down their lives and find out how all of this shit happened. A lot of them only remember in order to escape from reality. They concentrate on the “good things” in life and they can’t wait to get out. Wine, women, and song. Fucking stupid. It’s like thinking about food when you’re starving to death.

  I figure when you break down a young life like mine, twenty-eight years of existence, you’ve lived through three stages of your life. In each stage, the thing that your life revolves around changes. I suppose if you were writing a book on it, you’d call each stage, in the order that they occur: family-centric, peer-centric, mate-centric. Here, you call them your madda an’ fadda, your boyz, and your chick. All three of these suns in your life can fuck you up forever. I figure if all three screw you, there’s an almost absolute chance you end up in here for life or in a fucking hole in the ground. If only two fuck you over, you got a slim chance, but it’s hard for just one to save your ass. And if just one screws you up, chances are you’re joe-schmoe out there, fucking dragging your ass through life. Low-pro, one in the herd.

  I was in junior high when I met Koa Kauhi Puana at King Intermediate School or, as we used to call it, “King Zoo.” The Puana family was legendary on the Windward side of the island, a huge Hawaiian clan, most of whom were concentrated within walking distance of each other in Kahaluu. Even though Kahaluu occupies a small area, it’s really easy to find. All anyone has to do is drive up Kamehameha Highway, the main coastal road on the east side of the island, and look out the window at the ocean. When the brilliant blue and green patterns of the waters of Kaneohe Bay suddenly turn shit-brown, it’s like a sign reading, “Welcome to Kahaluu.” As you continue to drive north, and the brown water returns to blue, you know you’ve made it out.

  The Puanas lived about two miles in the shit. They occupied five or six houses in the area, but the main house, the one owned by the eldest son of each generation, sat on a big, weed-infested hill overlooking Kamehameha Highway. From its height, one could survey the landscape below; the shack-houses on both sides of the black Highway, the slimy-mud beach, the polluted brown ocean. Some of these houses were roofed with rusted corrugated sheet metal, the rest with cheap, dried-out wooden shingles. Within twenty-five yards of the shoreline, old flat-bottomed boats were scattered about. They were tied to rusted poles protruding from the ocean surface. Some of them were half-sunk, others looked as if the barnacles were one bite away from devouring the vessel whole.

  The view was better if you turned around and faced the mountains. The Koolau Range rose about a mile or two away. The range was the barrier between Honolulu and the Windward side. The mountains were pure green. It was wet up there. Mosquito country, rain country. Those of us who knew the area knew that the mountains were veined by little streams, streams that became more contaminated as they neared the sea. Plumbing. Prawns, medaka and talapia swam in it, unleashed poi dogs, mixed-breeds drank from it. I used to look at the mountains from atop the hill and wonder what I would have to do to get to the other side.

  The Kahaluu sounds resonated atop the hill. The fighting chickens crowed every morning. The daily traffic whizzed by on the Highway. Hungry dogs barked, some in cages, others tied to about ten feet of rope. Pigs squealed, sensing their demise. And as day turned into night, the drinking began. Laughing. Brawling. The same Hawaiians strummed the same Hawaiian songs every night. I could live two lifetimes, never hear “Sweet Lady of Waiahole” again, and die a happy man. At dawn, when the last alcoholic had passed out, the roosters crowed, and the cycle began all over again. Sometimes I think Pandora’s box exploded in Kahaluu.

  Puana Castle, like the kingdom below it, was hardly impressive. It was a one-story, five-bedroom, two-bathroom house. White lead paint. Wooden. Bed sheets hung in doorways instead of doors. Old, stained linoleum lined the floor. Screens, no windows. In both bathrooms the wood along the tubs was soft and swollen. Leaks, cracks that you couldn’t even see. The water that made it through the pipes travelled to a cesspool. The waste in Kahaluu stays in Kahaluu, there is no modern sewage system.

  Puana Castle’s king, Koa’s father, was a sight. James Puana was the only man I had ever seen manhandle Koa. Fucking huge. About six-four, maybe three hundred and fifty pounds. He had a huge belly which was solid, not jiggly. His torso was like one of those mountains which rose behind his property. He had a huge head. The kind of head that looked so hard that if you were to hit it with a baseball bat, you’d probably just piss him off. Huge everything. I remember the first time I shook his hand. He had these sandpaper palms and fingers as thick and hard as a broomstick. They squeezed down on my fingers, and I had a hard time keeping a straight face. The old man was all smiles, though. Easy-going, friendly, funny in that sort of “I’ll laugh at your lame jokes because you’re so fucking huge” way.

  Aunty Kanani, his wife, on the other hand, was like a one-hundred-and-fifty-pound Portagee firecracker. Lighter than Uncle James in skin color and body weight, heavier in temperament and voice. Every other word out of her mouth had “fuck” in it. Hell, Koa and I probably got our chronic bad language from her. She was never menacing, though. Her anger came off as comedic, in a way.

  “Hey, Japanee boy, you betta fuckin’ eat ah you skinny shit. Hea. Go warm up dis roast pork. An you betta eat ‘um all or I goin’ kick your skinny ass.”

  “Ma, no bodda Ken. Fuck, we jus’ went eat.”

  “Eh! What da fuck I told you about dat fuckin’ swearing.You like one slap, you fuckin’ kid? An no try tell me you went jus’ eat, Ken. Fuck, look, your waist mo’ fuckin’ small den mine. You betta eat cause I supposed to be da skinniest one here.You no put some meat on dose bones I goin’ fuckin’ banish you from da house.”

/>   You had to love her. She had six kids and the energy to swear at all of them and their friends on a daily basis. She could call you a “fuckin’ little shit,” and most of the time it was a term of endearment. Both of them, Uncle James and Aunty Kanani, great people. Generous beyond their means, they took me in from time to time. My closeness with the Puanas, especially Koa, was what made it difficult for me to leave the Windward side. It was also part of the reason I always seemed to return.

  Like everyone else in that area of the island’s east coast, I had known who Koa was long before I met him. He went to Waiahole Elementary and was the “bull” of the Windward side. He could kick ass, and he was a great football player.

  I loved football for the reason that many love their favorite sport. I was good at it. Ever since elementary school, no one could run as fast as me. I remember my speed was realized at first in defense, running from the other kids so I wouldn’t get my ass kicked. This running away lasted up until the fourth grade when I finally got caught and had to face my father with a fat lip. They hit me in the nose too, but I was never much of a bleeder.

  “What da fuck happened to you?” he asked, while brooding over a scotch on the rocks on the kitchen table.

  “Somebody hit me.”

  “Did you hit dem back?”

  “No.”

  “Listen.You come home beat up, das o.k. But nex time you come home like dis and I hear you neva fight back... You going have to deal wit’ me instead of dose little fuckin’ punks at school. You see, dis is why I hard on you, even when you was smaller. Life is fuckin’ tough and you gotta be tough, too. So wheneva I seem mean to you, rememba I stay building your character. You tough you no need worry about shit. If you can eat bullets and crap thunder, goin’ show you respect. Your grandfadda taught me da same ting when I was one kid.”

  I didn’t know the first thing about fighting, so I ran. After my father’s threat, however, I knew my tactics had to change. I don’t think my change was motivated purely by the fear of what my father would do to me, but some of the stuff he had said to me was making sense as I turned it over in my mind again and again. I wanted to be tough. I envied the confidence that tough people had. I envied the ability of my father to make me fear him. Also, I think, I began growing weary of fear itself. Even prey get tired of running. It seems when both prey and predator are lost in the chase, both have hearts that beat hard and fast. One beats from fear, the other from hunger. I wanted to feel the beat of hunger. I began to willingly let my father inject me with his syringe-like arms, the ones that cured fear and administered hate. In fact, it may have been at this point in my life when I started administering my own injections.

  I didn’t stop running, though. I’d still run if I sensed someone stalking me. But after a while, I did it more out of fun than fear. In fact, sometimes I’d tease a classmate just so he’d chase me. Eureka, adrenaline. I was slowly getting hooked. My risk-taking in teasing progressed into allowing myself to get caught. I’d take a hit. After taking a few hits, my pain tolerance grew, and I tried my hand at some offense. At first my attacks would come from behind. During recess I would choose my prey, making sure that he was always larger than me, wait until he was at least fifty yards away, and start to sprint full blast at him. With each stride, my heart would pump faster and faster. By the time I was half-way there, I felt hatred toward him. Hate was becoming a light switch which I could easily turn off and on. Right before impact I would thrust my arms out so that my palms slammed into each shoulder blade. Damn, these kids would just fly. I found my horns. One time I did it to an older kid, he fell funny and broke his arm. He cried and cried. Achilles the swift-footed! After a while the other kids stopped fucking with me, and they began calling me, “Kamikaze.” They would say, “Eh, no fuck wit Kamikaze, or he going Pearl Harbor you.”

  I suppose this is when I contracted that dangerous, sometimes fatally cancerous affliction called pride. It spreads and spreads until not even the strongest poisons can kill it. The chicken began growing his comb. Suddenly I was not the whipping boy at school, I was “Kamikaze,” Divine Wind. Even my father noticed the sudden growth of my ego. He liked what he saw. He started paying attention to me, which sucked. Insults to curb my ego and slaps on the back of my head came more regularly than my meals. Sometimes I felt like a dog which had suddenly pulled a neat trick. Like he had ignored me for years, then one day I brought him his slippers, and he was instantaneously amazed at this pet he owned. He’d drag me out fishing on weekends, sometimes pick me up from school. He tried to become a father when I didn’t even really want one anymore. On my twelfth birthday, he bought a medicine ball, a jump rope, wraps, gloves, and a brand new heavy bag, which at first felt like it was filled with steel instead of sand. He began training me in boxing.

  Every day after school, he watched as I warmed up with my sit-ups, pull-ups, and push-ups. Then I threw combinations at the heavy bag, and worked with the jump rope and medicine ball. Sometimes when he held the bag for me, he held a wooden back-scratcher in his right hand. When I would drop my left hand, he’d whack me upside the head with it. It almost felt like I was fighting him. I’d pretend that the heavy bag was his body and, gripping the iron bar in each glove tightly, I’d jab and hook with enthusiasm. This idea that he was the bag was my muse. Of course, the bag of sand always protected him, so no matter how hard I hit, he never went down. And no matter how much I watched out for his back-scratcher jab, he’d always get me at least once. It’s surprising the right side of my head isn’t flat from all the nights I spent avoiding the pillow with my left side. I can’t really say that I hated it, though, since with each day my comb grew bigger and bigger. Meanwhile my father would say, “You one fuckin’ natural. I was wrong. You must have Hideyoshi blood.” So by the time I started at King Zoo, I had my own reputation.

  Koa was my brother. In football, when we played for Kahaluu Broncos and in high school, the Castle Knights, he was my primary blocker. Fucking best offensive tackle in the state. I’d just follow in the wake he would create. He’d just mow them down and wait for me to pass him. During games I’d sometimes call him Moses. With him blocking, I always felt safe, like I could run wherever I wanted. All I had to do was follow the big “78” on his jersey, and he’d show me where to go.

  I remember, during practice, sometimes he’d play defensive tackle. As a defensive lineman in a scrimmage, he was my worst enemy. Fucking guy hit so hard, you’d feel your skeleton shake.

  When I think back now, it seems that every time I did something for the first time, he was with me. He taught me how to do most of it. Surf. Dive. Hunt. Gamble at the cock derbies. Smoke weed, smoke rock. Some of the best days of my life.

  I met him in English. The thing about somebody like Koa is, he was born a rascal. A real trouble-maker. I used to tell him that when he came out of the womb he probably played dead just to scare the shit out of his mom and pops. Different from me, born not giving a shit. Loud and funny. Emotional. The only emotions he ever revealed regularly, however, were humor and rage. He was a magnet of excitement, blind to consequence. Immune to self-analysis, guilt, and fear from birth. All id. Unstable. Some people would consider him stupid, but that would be inaccurate. He had wit, he had a sharp mind.

  So there he was in class. Fucker could almost pass as a man already in the seventh grade. He was sitting in the back, yucking it up with some of the other guys. The teacher was trying to explain the myth of Sisyphus to us. Without raising his hand, Koa suddenly spoke. “What a dummy. Shit, I would tell da boss of hell latas fo’ dat.”

  The class laughed. The teacher was silent. Koa swore and got away with it. My first impression was, “What a fuckin’ asshole. Thinks he’s hot shit.” I looked back and his eyes met mine. We shared that moment, that moment when two guys who think they’re hot shit mentally communicate to each other:“What the fuck are you looking at? You better turn your eyes away before I kick your fuckin’ ass.” We were two complete strangers ready to kill each other b
ecause one wouldn’t look away. I was scared shitless, but potent pride can always overcome fear. He smiled this “I don’t believe you have the audacity to keep staring at me you little Japanee shit” smile. I looked away. I had won. A smile like that is a tactical retreat, an attempt to step back with pride intact.

  Of course he tracked me down after school that day. Him and his lackeys. That’s another thing about the stand-off, sometimes you regret backing down so much, the anger snowballs as you dwell on it over and over again. Koa was pissed. The only reason he had backed down was probably because no one had ever challenged him before. Shocked into submission. So there I was at the bus stop, waiting for my “Kaneohe-Circle Island” piece of shit white, yellow, and black city bus. I was reading my book of Greek myths, a book my mother left me, when I glanced off the page and saw them coming from pretty far away. I could’ve run, but refused. The three of them stopped in front of me. Koa, John Makena, and Michael Pacheco.

  John was skinny like me. Dark as hell. He had a sparse patch of hair across his upper lip. Michael was fat, big, but fat. His forearms were covered with hair. Koa was tall, and his body was still laced with baby fat. Mean-looking. I looked at his hands and saw that they were bigger than my father’s. All three of them had their fists clenched. They all looked down on me as I stood in front of the wooden bus stop bench.

  “Hey, what you fucka?” Koa said. “You look at me like dat, you betta be ready fo’ trow down.”

  As I felt my body begin to quiver, I looked him in the eyes. I knew I’d lose badly, but I knew I couldn’t run.

  “What you little fuckin’ Jap,” Mike said, as he grabbed my book and tossed it in the dirt. Confidence oozed out of him.

  It’s funny how I unloaded on that fat fucker Mike. I didn’t say shit. Just sighed, then hooked him in the ribs, then in the head. My father had always made sure I worked on my double left hook. To him it was the most devastating two-punch combination. When you hook the body, the other guy’s hands instinctively drop. Before his hands even reach his gut, the other left lands on the right side of the chin. This leaves the guy defenseless for the overhand right. “Think of your waist as a swivel,” he used to say. “Befo’ you trow your shoulder completely left, get da second hook to da head in quick. Less den one second lata, your waist should snap back fo’ da right. Jus’ make sure you keep your balance.”