“So what you tink, den?” I asked.
“I wouldn’t tink anyting, but den I found two hundred dollas in her purse.”
I bit my bottom lip and felt Koa’s eyes on me. “How’d she get dat?”
“I don’t know, maybe she get one shuga daddy. What you tink, Ken?”
I kept my eyes focused through the windshield.“Nah, Kahala would neva fuck around on you. She not crazy.”
Ikaika leaned toward the front and rested his forearms on the backs of the seats. “Yeah, she would. Fuckin’ Koa treats her like shit. Her shuga daddy probably treat her nice, give her money, and he probably get one dick twice da size of Koa’s.”
Kaika’s laughing was interrupted by an elbow to the forehead. Koa was trying to climb over his seat to get to Kaika. His ass hit my shoulder and the Pathfinder swerved to the side of the road. “Koa, get your ass back in da front,” I yelled.“You goin’ get us all killed.”
Koa sat back down. “You shut up fo’ da rest of da trip,” he told Kaika.
Kaika sulked in the back. “So, what happened?” I asked Koa.
“What you mean, what happened?”
“Wit’ Kahala.”
“Oh. Me and her got into one big fight. She left wit’ da kids. I tink she went to my parents’ house. Ah, fuck ‘um arready.”
When we got to the Sandy Beach, Kaika stayed in the Pathfinder and drank beers while Koa and I paddled out. I had to paddle slow because Koa was slow and out of shape. When we passed the shorebreak and got to the second set of breakers, I heard Koa huffing and puffing. When he tried to duck underneath the first set, the small two-foot wave knocked him off his board. I shook my head and paddled past the breakers. I looked out toward the horizon and thought about seeing Cheryl the day before. It was funny, I hadn’t felt any attraction. I was just thankful that I hadn’t hooked up with her in high school and pulled a Koa and Kahala. I would’ve fucked up her life. But why didn’t she tempt me? Maybe because her position as a new upper-class attorney kind of made her the enemy. Maybe it was because I was so hung up on Claudia. I didn’t know why I was asking myself these things. I should’ve been glad that there wasn’t an attraction between me and Cheryl. My life was complicated enough.
Instead of thinking about it anymore, my mind turned to the prospect of work the next day. I sighed just as a wave knocked me off my surfboard. When my head emerged from the water, I looked back at Koa and Kaika. I thought about Freddie, and saw, instead of my friend and his brother, two blue cats treading water. I wondered if I was the one that had gotten away.
Over the next several months Claudia’s belly grew. And with it grew her unhappiness. I wasn’t having a good time of it myself. She was big and she hated it. She didn’t glow, she glowered. She seemed to feel tied down by her growing belly, like it kept her from doing all the things she wanted to do. It seemed like roots grew from her stomach, roots which drove downward and wrapped themselves around the huge rocks under the Ka‘a‘awa soil. She spent some of her days reading the classifieds, looking for jobs in the field of art. She spent other days staring at the television screen, seeing worlds which were not hers. She spend every day pissing constantly. I think the nights were even worse for her. Every so often, she’d get this really bad, cramp-like feeling. Sometimes it would come when she’d simply roll over. She’d try to bear the pain as best she could. But the worst part about the nights for her was that the doctor told her, a woman who had spent all of her life sleeping on her back, to sleep on her left side. The doctor had told her that sleeping on her back would put pressure on the vein which gave the baby oxygen. He told her that the baby was pushing her organs to the right side of her body, so sleeping on the right side put pressure on these organs. She couldn’t move, she couldn’t sleep. Through these months I think the only thing that made her happy was that Kahala had ended up leaving Koa. She had moved out with the kids and was staying at Koa’s parents’ house. Claudia felt like she had made a contribution. But besides that, she wasn’t liking her situation. What made matters worse was that she and my father weren’t getting along.
After about a week the politeness which two strangers share had passed, my father started in on her. Most of it was jokes, but sometimes it sounded like my father was dead serious. Some of it was about her weight, or how much she ate. He said things like, “Eh, no eat da whole refrigerator, ah. I scared that when I go work, I goin’ come back and da whole house goin’ be gone.”
At first she laughed, but soon the laughter faded to indifference, then to retaliation. “Don’t lie,” she’d say, “the only thing you’re scared of is that I might take down your liquor collection with it.”
Soon his laughter faded. After a while, most of their conversations sounded like spiteful insult contests. The worst appeared when my father got on Claudia about being Korean. Every time Claude did something wrong, like burn food or not tighten a faucet enough, my father told her,“Must be da Korean blood.” Sometimes he got her for the haole blood, too. These came when she didn’t wash her dishes or she left a newspaper scattered on a table. “Must be da haole blood,” he’d say.
One Thursday night, about seven months into her pregnancy, they had a real race war. The night started off quiet enough. When I got home from work with my father, Claudia was in the shower and my father looked on the stove and saw that Claude had cooked his favorite, ox tail soup. He tasted it and smiled. I walked to the bedroom happy. It seemed like Claude and my father were not going to get into it tonight. As I was undressing, the phone rang. It was Kahala.
“Hey Ken, it’s Kealii’s first birthday on Saturday. You and Claudia have to come. It’s going to be a huge deal, you know, like graduation. Koa’s dad is putting up the tarp and everything.”
“Sounds great. Ask Uncle James if he needs help.”
“I’ll tell him to call you, but we might be all right. Koa and Ikaika are supposed to help.”
“So you and Koa are talking?”
“No, it’s over. I mean, he’s still the father of my children, so I expect to still see him around, but I think he’s realizing that the marriage is done.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
There was silence. Then she asked, “You know what?”
“What?”
“I’m so glad you came back home. Without you and Claude coming back, I don’t think I would’ve ever left Koa. I saw you guys that night and thought, that’s the way it should be. I almost forgot what a good relationship looked like, but after seeing you guys and talking to Claude, I remembered. It’s best for both me and Koa that we get divorced. He has to get his shit together and I have to take care of these kids. Besides, I’m still young, right? I was feeling ugly for a while, but it’s funny, after leaving that house in Waiahole, I started to feel good about myself again.”
I shook my head. I didn’t want to take responsibility for their break-up. “Well, as long as you’re happy, Kahala.”
“I am. I’m totally happy.”
After I hung up, I changed my clothes and walked out to the living room. I saw Claude and my father sipping on their bowls of ox tail soup, talking and laughing. I smiled, walked into the kitchen, and made myself a bowl.
The race war began after dinner. Claudia, taking her empty bowl to the sink, accidentally dropped it. My father looked up from his plate and said, “Damn yobo.”
Instead of picking up the shards of ceramic, Claude walked back to the table and motioned her head toward the glass case which held my father’s two heirloom swords. Above the swords hung my wrinkled Musashi print. “Why do you still have those swords?” she asked.“The Middle Ages ended centuries ago. Oh yeah, wait. I forgot. The Middle Ages in Japan only ended one century ago.”
He looked up at her. “Yeah, Japan came charging out of da Middle Ages. And one of da first tings dey did was beat da shit out of Korea.”
“Yeah, after the white men showed you guys how to use boats and guns. Without the white people’s help, I doubt Japan could’ve even
built ships that could’ve reached Korea.”
I looked over at the swords and wished that I could grab the smaller one to kill myself with. My father looked at me and pointed to Claudia with his fork. “Listen to her,” he said. “She acting like Christopher Columbus was Korean or someting. Like da fuckin’ Koreans had good boats.”
He looked back at her.“You know, once da Japanese learned how fo’ build da boats, dey built one of da most powerful navies in da world. What da Koreans did? Dey just kissed our asses and made more kim chee.”
I was tired. The construction business exhausted me because I was a “new guy,” and I did a lot of the grunt work. I sighed and tried to ignore them. Claudia sat down. “Yeah,” she said, “look at what’s left of that great empire now. Japan doesn’t even have an army anymore. Either half of Korea could mow Japan down right now.”
“Shit,” my father said, “Japan could buy one fuckin’ army. Das why dey no need one. Fuckin’ Japan could buy Korea. Shit, I tink I could buy Korea. I get about twenty bucks on me right now.”
Claude’s face was turning mean. Tears were welling in her eyes. “Yeah right,” she said, “my mother’s Korean and she could buy this house of yours in a snap. She could buy this house and the ones on both sides of it.”
My father’s face began its transformation. The devil brows began to arch and the eyes began to turn mean. “If your madda so great, why you no live wit’ her? Why you free-loading over hea? Shit, if your madda taught you about birth control...”
I stopped it. “Dad, stop arready. Both you guys, stop. Nuff arready. Shit, I like eat my dinner in peace.”
Claudia stomped to our room. My father let out a quiet laugh. “Fuckin’ Koreans.”
I got up and followed Claude. I heard my father’s voice as I walked away. “Hey, boy, where you going? I neva teach you fo’ be one whipped boy...”
I walked into the room and closed the door behind me. Claudia was sitting on the bed watching her hands shake. I grabbed them. She looked up. “I gotta get out of here, Ken. I can’t live with that prick. Pretty soon I’m going to end up killing him.”
I sat down beside her. “Listen, this is no fuckin’ picnic for me either. But we gotta stay and save money. I told you, once the baby is born and we have enough money, we’re out of here.”
“We should’ve just gone straight to the mainland. We wouldn’t have to deal with this shit on the mainland.”
She was beginning to worry me. She was talking about the mainland like it was some kind of wonderland. Shit, we were going to run into a whole different set of trouble there. I put my arm around Claude. “Pretty soon, pretty soon.” I put my other hand on Claude’s stomach.
She laughed. “You better love this baby, Ken, because it’s the last one I’m having.”
I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t really want to have another baby either, but I didn’t want to tell her that. Then I remembered the phone call I took while Claude was in the shower earlier that night. “Oh, speaking of babies, it’s Kealii’s first birthday this weekend. I forgot to tell you, Kahala called to see if we could make it.”
Claude sighed. “Sounds good. I could use a party. But is Koa going to go?”
“Probably, I mean, it’s his son’s birthday.”
“What about your father? Is he going?”
“I doubt it. He was never one for parties.”
“Yeah, let’s go. Instead of driving to work with your father tomorrow, I’ll drop you off and go shopping for a present in town.”
“Sounds good.”
Claude turned on her left and sighed. Her back was facing me. I heard my father’s loud footsteps pass our closed bedroom door. Claude coughed. I smiled. “So how do you like the country now?” I asked.
“I see it clearly now and I don’t like what I see.”
The next day we ran into the Friday traffic. It seemed every day the Windward side got bigger, but it was funny because everyone I knew was saying they were making less and less money. Claudia and I made our way up Kahekili Highway where the new traffic lights just seemed to cause more traffic. As we neared Kaneohe, the car went over rough patches of new asphalt, the remnants of road construction. As we neared the Pali Highway, I looked toward the mountains and saw the unfinished tunnels of the H3 Freeway. It was a thirty-year construction project whose costs had set U.S. road records. “Hey, why are you taking the Pali?” I asked. “Likelike is faster.”
“I think Pali might be faster, less cars. I don’t know, it’s an experiment. Besides, I like the Pali better, it’s nicer.”
I looked back up at the H3. “What the fuck,” I said. “Kaneohe to Pearl Harbor? What three people have to take the H3 from Kaneohe to Pearl Harbor every morning?”
Claude smiled. “Well, if it’ll take three cars off the road every morning, I’m all for it. Look at this traffic. It’s madness.”
“Yeah, but I figure it’d be better if we got rid of people instead of building more roads.”
Claude sighed. “Well, I’m all for leaving. I don’t think this side of the island exactly creates an ideal atmosphere for child-rearing. I have nightmares of our baby taking one of those swords out of that ridiculous glass case and killing himself. Actually, I have nightmares of me taking one of those swords out and killing myself.”
“Hey, I grew up with those swords around and look how good I turned out.”
She laughed. “Yeah, you’re a real catch. Hey, how did he convince your mother to marry him anyway? Did he drug her or something?”
“Don’t lie, you love him.”
“Yeah, I love him to death.”
It was a good question. I really didn’t know how my father had gotten my mother. But I figured behind every bad-tempered old man there was once a young care-free rebel. I mean, even Darth Vader got laid once. I looked back at the H3 and wondered if it was really built on ancient burial grounds like the Hawaiian protestors said it was. I thought this as we headed for the Pali Highway, the place where the most famous Hawaiian battle took place. By the time we got to the battleground, the sun was rising and we were one in a huge row of slowly moving cars.
Claudia dropped me off at Hayashi Construction. Before she left, I leaned into the window. “Pick me up at four?”
“I’ll be here.”
I kissed her on the cheek, walked away, and clocked in. My eight-hour day of pushing wheelbarrows filled with cement and carrying long beams of wood was about to begin. I walked through the gate wondering when I’d actually ever get to hammer or weld something. It was weird to think of hammering as some kind of promotion. It disgusted me.
I walked through the gate and was greeted by my father’s smiling face. We had left before him, and he waited outside to gloat. “What took you guys so long?” he asked.
“We took the Pali.”
“You guys mental or what? Dis place stay by da airport and you guys taking da Pali? Likelike is faster.”
I began walking toward the building and my father followed. “I don’t know,” I said, “Claudia likes the Pali better. Besides, she was thinking that maybe the Pali is faster.”
“You fuckin’ kidding me. She know her miles or what? You two must’ve drove at least five miles more den me. I guess das fuckin’ Korean logic, ah.”
We walked through the door. The other guys were waiting by the time clock in the warehouse, smoking cigarettes and drinking coffee. “Dad, you gotta lay off the Korean shit. It drives her nuts. And when she gets nuts, she makes me nuts. Please Dad, give her a break.”
He smiled. “You know, son, you right. I should watch what I say in my own house.”
Just as I was about to lose it, my father walked up to the rest of the guys, shook their hands, and began telling them how his son got whipped by a Korean swordtail from town. I felt like that same kid who he used to hit over the head with the wooden backscratcher. I wondered how much I was willing to tolerate.
Claude picked me up late at about a quarter after. When I got into the car,
she said, “Sorry, traffic.”
I nodded. “So what’d you do all day?”
“Well, I picked up Kealii’s present. Take a look.” She handed me a Liberty House department store shopping bag. In it was a folded unused box, packing paper and two baby-sized Polo shirts, one blue, the other burgundy.
I sighed. “Jeez, Kealii will grow out of these things in a month. How much did they cost?”
“About thirty dollars.”
“For both?”
“Each.”
I smiled. Crazy bitch, I thought. I put the two shirts back into the bag. “So what else did you do?”
There was a pause. Then she said, “I visited my mom.”
This surprised me. “I thought she disowned you.”
“Actually I’ve been talking to her for a while now. I think she’s sorry about what happened.”
“You don’t even know what happened.”
“She told me.”
“She told you? What’d she say?”
“She said she threatened you to leave me. That she’d have you arrested if you stayed. She said you yelled at her and things got heated. And that after you guys argued you finally left.”
“That’s all?”
“Yeah, that’s about all she told me.”
I looked at her, trying to determine if she knew more. She must’ve known more, considering she saw my bleeding hand and my burnt forearm that night. I wished Koa was with us. He could usually tell when someone was lying. I was tempted to tell her the true story, but then, I didn’t come out looking too good in that version either. I had killed three people. I had been prepared to kill her mother. So I let the subject drop. We drove home with nothing much to say to each other.
Dinner that night was a fiasco. Claudia had refused to eat at the same table with my father and my father refused to apologize for the night before. Claude waited in the room until my father went to sleep, then went to the fridge and got something to eat. Trying to ignore the whole thing, I spent most of the night watching T.V. in the living room. I was tired. I was beginning to realize that my life was becoming the life Koa had described. I was coming home after work and often regretting it. At least tomorrow was Saturday, I thought. I’d go to the party, get drunk with Koa, come home and pass out.
The Tattoo Page 21
