“Were you listening to my private conversation?” I asked, my voice rising. I stomped toward him. “I’m appalled!”
He wiped his hands on his shirt, leaving black marks. “Ok, sure, be appalled. You were talking loud, directly into the house.”
“You shouldn’t have listened,” I answered. He shook his head and mumbled something that I didn’t catch, but I got the strong feeling that it wasn’t anything flattering. “What was that?” I asked sharply.
“I’m reminding myself that you’re the granddaughter of the woman who owns this house,” he answered.
“And?” I demanded.
“And it wouldn’t be great for my employment if I told you what’s on my mind.”
“I wouldn’t get you fired.” Because 1) my grandmother wouldn’t listen to me, but 2) just, no. I wouldn’t do that to someone.
“Sure. I’ll have the refrigerator done in about another hour and you can get your food. The smell will be gone. I have to go over to Hualalai to check on a leak in another property so when I’m done with this, I’ll go. I’ll be back tomorrow to work on the rest of your list.”
I shrugged. “Just make sure it gets done.” I left to go take a shower, now that I had said I was going out, and heard him mutter one word for sure: bitch.
Whatever. Why would I care what some Hawaiian handyman thought of me? I put my hand on my mouth and pushed, hard, so my lip would stop trembling. What was wrong with me? I wished that I knew.
I watched the sun light up the sky the next morning, pink and peach and yellow, while I huddled in a chair on the lanai. The day got brighter, but I felt so exhausted that I didn’t want to move. After I had gone grocery shopping the day before, filling my cart with tropical fruit, I went out for a run in the afternoon on the beach and nearly died of the heat. Then I had swum back and forth, back and forth through the waves until I could barely move my arms and legs. It still hadn’t been enough to make me sleep last night. I watched the ocean rolling quietly under the gentle morning sun and let it calm me down. Despite the problems with the house, despite everything, I was glad that I had come here, to the Big Island.
Until I heard the crash inside. Great, the rude handyman was back. I had found my grandmother’s contract with Naupaka Property Management in her meticulous files in her office. He was right: he was allowed access to the house at any time without prior notice unless she was in residence and I, unfortunately, had been the one who had given him the list of things to do. I sighed angrily, then when something else crashed, I jumped up and went down to the beach to swim again.
As I dove into the waves, I thought about staying forever in Hawaii. When we had come here as kids, I had practically never taken off my bikini. I could do the same thing, just wander around in my bathing suit and slippers, what they called flip flops here, for the rest of my life. Until my grandmother got mad that I was still in her house or wanted to make one of her infrequent visits with her six cats. I imagined myself never going back to California.
I stood and looked in through the doors when I got back up to the house and watched the man mess with some cans of paint. “Morning,” he told me when he looked up.
I squeezed salt water out of my hair. “Yes, it is,” I answered, then felt a little ashamed of myself. “Good morning.”
He banged the cans together as he picked them up and walked toward the bedroom. Whatever. After a while outside, I wandered back in again, kind of curious about what he was up to. It smelled like fresh paint and maybe something else, varnish or something. He seemed to be doing things, at least. It felt strange that I didn’t have anything to do myself, that I wasn’t at my office or worrying about work I was missing because I wasn’t there. I thought that maybe I should read, or learn some type of handicraft. What did people do when they were alone? I checked on the handyman then peeled and sliced a few mangoes, leaving a plate of fruit outside of the bedroom in case anyone else wanted it and eating some of the yellow chunks on a chaise lounge by the pool. My phone was underneath the chair, where I couldn’t see it.
I was so tired that my body kind of hurt. It had been a while since I had been able to sleep at night. So I closed my eyes and watched images run through my mind.
“Fuck!” When I woke up a few hours later, I could already tell that things were not good. The sun had shifted and was now right overhead, beating down on where I had flipped onto my stomach. Sweat poured off me and heat seemed to pulse out of my back. I wasn’t exactly fair-skinned, but I could burn if I got too much sun. And despite my mom’s reminders, I hadn’t applied any sunscreen. I rolled carefully to my side and, gasping with the sudden tightness of my skin, walked over and eased myself into the pool. The water would soothe this away.
Nope, not at all. This wasn’t helping. I tried to lower myself to submerge my burning back but had to stop. My teeth chattered and the water felt like ice. I maneuvered myself across the shallow end to the steps, moving my arms and legs as little as possible, and stiffly climbed out, standing dripping on the pavers. No towels out here, and I realized I had left the doors open as I felt the blast of air conditioning pouring out into the lanai when I went inside to find one.
There were clinking sounds coming from the kitchen again, the room I had to pass to get to the master bedroom and lie on my stomach and never move, ever for the rest of my life. I didn’t even want to see what my back looked like and I didn’t want the property management guy to see, either. I walked quietly, but he stood up from behind the kitchen island when I got near. Sweet.
“The disposal needs some parts that I’ll have to order. Or maybe a new unit. I need to check with Mrs. Wolfe for approval before I do anything,” he announced flatly. He didn’t even look at me. “I’ll be back tomorrow to do the second coat of paint and work more on the furniture.”
“Great. Goodbye.” I waited for him to bend back down, but he just stood there, staring into the sink. So I swiveled on one heel and moved stiffly toward the bedroom, doing a robot walk that didn’t shift around too much of my upper body or force me to bend my knees. The backs of those felt like they had been painted in acid.
“Did you fall asleep in the sun?” the guy called as I went through the living room.
I didn’t bother to answer him as I eased myself face-down on the bed. Heat was pulsing through my body, my head pounding along with it, and then, in the corner of my mind, I realized that I was starving, also. Oh well. It wouldn’t kill me to miss a meal or two, especially when I wasn’t exercising as much. Back in San Francisco, I’d have done at least an hour of cardio…
But I wasn’t going to think about San Francisco. No, I was going to focus on the fact that my body was currently an inch away from bursting into flames. I reached backwards and tried to untie my bikini top without touching my skin. My fingers scrabbled at the strings and the nylon scratched over my back, feeling like barbed wire. I swore. A lot.
“Scarlett Wolfe.”
I jumped in the bed because I hadn’t heard him come in. “Yes?” I asked, trying to sound distant and uninterested.
“You’re really burned. You know, in Hawaii, the sun is very strong. We’re in the Tropics, closer to the Equator.”
“Oh?” Fuck off. “How fascinating. The Equator?”
“That’s an imaginary line that goes around the middle of the Earth.” It sounded like he was a little amused. “It’s not a good idea to lay out for hours, baking yourself.”
“You don’t say.” So now he had seen me naked, and also cooked like a barbecued shrimp. But what did I care what this moron thought? “Don’t forget about the drawer that’s sticking,” I directed him. My face still buried in the comforter, I raised one finger to point in the direction of the nightstand.
“Hm,” he grunted. I heard the sound of a small crash and the lamp rattled on the little table. “Seems to be working fine, now.”
“Great. Goodbye,” I repeated.
He left, I was pretty sure, although I could barely hear him walking. I contemplate
d if I had ever heard of anyone dying of sunburn, because I thought I might.
Then the quiet footsteps returned. “Here. Your grandmother’s nurse asked the gardeners to grow an aloe plant, just in case.” Something cool trickled on my red-hot back and I jumped in the bed again.
“What are you doing?” I demanded.
“I broke open a leaf and I’m putting aloe on your sunburn,” he said slowly, as if I was the moron in this situation. Well, I was, actually, the moron in this situation, but he didn’t have to act like it. Who the hell was he, anyway?
“I’m Nate,” he said, as if he was reading my mind. “I don’t usually rub strange women without introducing myself.”
I opened my mouth to shoot something back at him, but then gentle fingers ran across my skin, smoothing out the thick fluid from the plant. It felt better almost immediately and I couldn’t help the grateful sigh. He didn’t say another word as he covered my back and the backs of my arms. When he worked down to my thighs, I tried to move away from his hands. “I’ll do that,” I announced.
“Suit yourself.” He stood up off the edge of the bed where he had been kneeling and I carefully raised myself off the comforter. I listened to him across the house in the kitchen as I tried to cover my crispy legs with the aloe juice. He returned a moment later. “Here.” He plunked a big glass of water next to the bed. “Drink up. You’re probably dehydrated, since you almost microwaved yourself out there.”
This time when he left, I heard the front door close. He was actually gone and I was alone. I made myself get all the way up and lock everything, all the windows and doors. I drank the water before I lay down on the couch in my now-sticky bikini and tried to fall asleep.
“Scarlett. Mother fucker.”
“What?” I asked. “Leave me alone, Brooks.”
“Nate. My name is Nate.”
I opened my eyes. I felt like absolute shit.
“I bet you do,” he answered me. Had I said that out loud? “Hang on.”
I fell back asleep, kind of. I hadn’t really moved from the spot on the couch since the day before, except to squeeze more aloe on myself from the pile of pokey leaves I had found on a plate in the kitchen. I was covered in sap.
“Get up.”
I cracked one eye open. “No.”
“Get up.” A hand slapped the bottom of my foot, which was also burned. “Get up and get into the bathtub.”
I was dizzy when I stood and I fell forward, leaning on the arm of the couch on my hands. It didn’t feel like just my skin was burning now. I was just so hot, all through me.
“Stupid mainlander,” he muttered. “Get up,” he repeated. “You’re going into the tub,” he said louder.
I looked over toward the bedrooms then closed my eyes. “No.”
“Yes,” he corrected. He hooked a finger into my bikini bottom and pulled and I jerked upright.
“Get off me!” I stumbled and he put his hand around my arm, but gently.
“Don’t fall on your face. I’m helping you, ok?” He led me down the hall, through the master bedroom and into the bathroom.
I managed to walk in a straight line and sat on the tile edge of the tub that was somehow now brimming with water. I hadn’t noticed that happening. “Why do I have to do this?”
“You have sun poisoning,” he told me. “Can’t you tell that you have a fever? Get in.”
Shivering, I did as ordered. “It’s cold! I want to get out!”
“Don’t whine,” he directed me. “Fuck, you’re a mess.” Pause. “Are you crying?”
Chapter 2
Of course I wasn’t crying, not because of a sunburn. If I was going to cry, it would be because I had fucked up my life. Or maybe because I was a few thousand miles across the ocean from anybody who loved me, and I thought that group had narrowed down to maybe my sister, who clearly loved her own little family more, and my mother, who I had been treating like shit. I wasn’t crying, but I was shaking so hard that my muscles were almost cramping. “I want to get out,” I said again, and started to move in that direction.
He put his hand on my shoulder. “No. Stay in there. Let yourself…hey, relax!”
Because I had started to fight. “Get off me! Let me go!”
“Ok, ok,” he told me, very gently, then started clucking softly, like I was a bird, or an animal to soothe. He left his hand where it was but decreased the pressure. “Stay in the water. What’s my name?”
The question surprised me and made me pause in my struggle. “Uh, Nate.”
“Nathaniel Tor Lange,” he informed me. “What’s your middle name, Scarlett Wolfe?”
“No, I don’t tell anyone.” I stopped trying to get out. I must have been getting used to the temperature in the bath, because it didn’t feel that cold anymore, and I wasn’t trying to push off his hand. I felt the callouses on his palm against my skin. I didn’t mind it.
“Maybe your middle name is Letter? Fever?”
I looked up at him. “Are you trying to be funny?”
“Is it working?” He was actually smiling at me, a grin that turned up just the one side of his mouth. Even in my fevered, sorry state, I appreciated how that brightened his whole face.
“What kind of a name is Tor?”
“Norwegian. My family is originally from Norway.”
I was studying him. He looked so different when he smiled, rather than glowering at me.
“What are you staring at?” The frown had returned.
“You seem nice when you smile,” I told him. “Before, you were an asshole.”
“The asshole you called eight times in one night, getting ruder every time.”
I didn’t answer.
“I’m not an asshole. I’m the guy who put your rashy ass into the tub.” The smile returned, a little.
“Rashy?” I ran my hands over my legs. I was covered in bumps.
“You’re a mess.” He was looking at my legs too. Abruptly, he stood. “Take something to get your fever down. Drink some more water. I’ll cut more aloe.”
“Are you leaving?” I asked stupidly.
“Are you going to drown in the tub if I do?”
“No,” I answered.
He turned and walked out.
After a while, I started to feel better, at least not boiling from the inside, so I got out of the tub and helped myself to some ibuprofen and anti-itch cream and other items from my grandmother’s cabinet. Then I smeared some more aloe on my legs and where I could reach on my back, and face-planted on the couch again.
∞
A week later, my fever was gone and I was peeling like a snake. Nate—Nathaniel Tor Lange— had been coming in and out and I had seen him now and again, but we were mostly ignoring each other. Except for sometimes I left him cut-up fruit if I had any extra. And sometimes I had questions about what he was working on, or a comment about what he had finished. Other than that, I ignored him, and he certainly had nothing to do with me if he could help it.
I had developed a kind of routine of reading, food shopping for fruit, and exercise, which was helping me get through the days. The nights…not really. Because as much as I was working out, despite all the deep breathing, every time I closed my eyes, my memories took over. The big TV that my grandma used to watch financial news and cat shows had become my best friend after the sun set. They seemed to broadcast a lot of replays of high school sports competitions, and I had developed a detailed knowledge of local girls’ volleyball. They had some real talent in these islands.
When Nate arrived that day, again without knocking, I was dozing outside after a late night of Honolulu-area competition. The middle hitter had been an animal. He didn’t say good morning, or anything else, but I heard the thump of the toolbox on the tile and then some muffled bumps. It wasn’t too much later that I decided to get some pineapple for breakfast.
He was lying on the floor on his back, his head under the sink. His t-shirt had pulled up and I looked at the swath of tan stomach it exposed, wit
h a line of dark hair leading down the middle, in a valley of hard ab muscle. I licked my lips. “Hi,” I said, and my voice came out hoarse. “Good morning.” I hadn’t spoken to anyone yet, not even my mom. She called daily and I had answered twice, then mostly ignored all the questions she lobbed at me from across the Pacific.
“I’m installing a new disposal,” Nate answered instead of a good morning back to me. “The old one was shot and this new one looks like it’s missing a part fresh out of the box.” After a few minutes, he scooted himself out and looked up. “Can I help you with something?”
I had just been standing there, hovering. “No. I’m getting breakfast.”
“Don’t let me stop you.” He stared at me for a minute. “You look somewhat better. Sunburn all gone?”
I nodded. “Um, yeah. The aloe was a good idea.” I bit my lip, thinking.
“Thank you.”
“What?”
“Those are the words you’re looking for. ‘Thank you, Nate, for helping out my burned ass.’” He nodded. “Try it.”
“Thank you,” I mumbled.
“Was that so hard?” His one eyebrow was up. The one over his other eye, where there were scars, didn’t move.
I shook my head. “I was going to say that,” I explained.
“Sure you were.” He slid back under the sink and I waited for another moment, eyes back on his abs. Then I moved around the kitchen, cutting up a pineapple and making coffee.
I cleared my throat. “Do you want some?” I waited as he slid back out. “Hawaiian pineapple.”
“No. No, thank you,” he corrected himself, and I saw a little hint of a smile. “That phrase just rolls off the tongue. You should keep practicing with it. Is that Kona coffee? I only eat and drink local.”
“Uh…”
“I’m kidding.” He stood and went right to the correct cupboard to get a mug, which he held out to me. “The pineapple probably isn’t Hawaiian, either. They don’t grow too many here, not anymore.”
Lovely You Page 2
