MY MOM AND I HAVE DINNER TOGETHER IN OUR NEW house, at our new table. She has given me a section of the shooting script for tomorrow.
EXT. HUT—DAY
EXTREME CLOSE-UP ON Samantha, deep in concentration. A mosquito lands on her cheek. She flinches, tries to peer down at it, then slaps her face.
RICK
If I could be a bug on that face.
SAMANTHA
Then you’d be dead, idiot.
RICK
Oh. Right.
PAN OUT to the arid land. A Jeep is seen in the distance, driving closer to them, and very recklessly.
RICK
Are we supposed to get in that thing?
SAMANTHA
If you’re afraid of a Jeep, then we’re in for a long ride.
RICK looks her over, unabashedly. She’s wearing a loose, white tank top, damp with sweat. Her legs are golden and glistening.
SAMANTHA
Can I help you with something?
RICK
Actually, I was going to offer to help you with something.
Her eyebrows arch, intrigued.
RICK
Your breasts.
SAMANTHA
Excuse me?
RICK
I’m the breast in the west. I can give you a discount when we get back to the States.
She is disgusted, but he doesn’t notice. He’s serious, and really looking at them now, as if presented with a medical problem.
SAMANTHA
(mumbles)
You’ve got to be kidding me.
RICK
(using hand gestures)
A strong C would suit your frame. I like ’em a little spaced apart, not so uptight, you know, and with the nipples
(more hand gestures to illustrate his thoughts)
pointed diagonally.
SAMANTHA
Just shut up right now.
The Jeep is almost to them.
RICK
What?
SAMANTHA
Just be a bug on my face.
The Jeep pulls up in front of them. They stand and dust themselves off. They are stunned when they see their driver, a GIRL who looks to be about twelve. She is sitting on pillows.
GIRL
Howzit! Welcome to Molokana.
She smiles, revealing a few gold teeth.
GIRL (CONT’D)
Come on already, slowpokes. I got work to do, people to see, eel to eat.
RICK
Did she just say eel?
SAMANTHA
She just said eel.
• • •
I give the script back to my mom. “Can you say ‘nipples’ on TV?”
“I guess we’ll see,” she says. “It’s bad, isn’t it?” She takes a sip of wine. A soft light descends through the trees.
I eat the zucchini that’s fallen out of my burrito. “It’s fun. I like Samantha, and Rick is so awful that he’s kind of awesome. And your legs are golden and glistening.”
“Remember my friend on Lost?” she says.
“Of course. Can you pass the sour cream?”
She passes me the little white bowl. Even when it’s just us, she always plates things in serving dishes.
“She got twenty thousand an episode when it first aired, and then when it became a hit, two hundred and fifty an episode.”
“That’s so cool.”
“This isn’t Lost,” she says, tapping the script. “But here’s to hoping for a back nine for twenty-two episodes!” She raises her glass, then leans in for a messy bite. Back nine is an order from the studios if they like the series, bringing it from thirteen episodes to twenty-two. I raise my glass of water. Here’s to hoping. I look down at the script.
“Of course they made the local girl silly,” I say.
“I know,” she says, with a full mouth. “Just wait—later, Jenkins—the main guy—gets in a fight with the local doctor because the local wants to cure a patient by chanting.”
“That’s so loathsome. But this is so good,” I say, chewing. “Spicy.”
“It’s the chorizo,” she says. “And do you like the sweet potato in it?”
“Love,” I say.
“So,” she says, and I immediately know she’s going to ask about Whitney. She finishes her bite. “How was this afternoon?” She says it casually, as if she hasn’t been dying to ask me this question for hours. “What did Whitney have to say?”
She has a hopeful glimmer in her eye, and this time I know it’s a real question, unlike “How was school?” She wants to know everything.
“Nothing, really,” I say.
“She had to have said something.”
I take my time with my next bite. I shrug my answer. “Not really,” I say.
“Nothing?” She takes a sip of her wine. “God, this wine is good.”
“Nothing that stands out,” I say.
“Well, do you like her?”
“Jeez, Mom, relax.”
“I’m relaxed. Very relaxed. Pass the cream back. My mouth is on fire.”
We continue to eat, bluegrass playing, the sun gone.
“Did you guys make plans to—”
I let my fork clang against my plate. “No, we didn’t make plans!” I yell.
She laughs. She loves riling me up, and I like pretending I’m riled—it’s our little rhythm.
“I think it’s fun, that’s all,” she says. “We both have friends who live by us. Maybe you guys can carpool.”
“Oh my God, Mom, she’s not my friend, and I’m sure she carpools with her actual friends or her brother.”
Some of her friends I can’t believe are in high school. They look like supermodels and act like twenty-year-olds. It’s strange to feel so much younger than people your own age, something I never felt at Storey. I’m in classes with a few of Whitney’s friends, and what surprises me is that some are really quiet and some are really smart. Brooke Breene, for instance. When we sit down in history, she whips on her glasses and takes notes in a plain Moleskine notebook. It made me rearrange my thoughts when I got here. The pretty girls can be the smart girls too.
Mom doesn’t push the carpooling question any further, maybe not wanting to bring attention to the obvious: Whitney has her own friends and doesn’t need any more. No one needs more friends at the end of her junior year.
“Okay,” she says, holding up her hands. “Anyway, Friday they’ve invited us over for dinner. So we can all get to know one another.”
“Fine,” I say.
“Think you’ll be happy here?” she asks. “So far, so good?”
“So far, so okay.” I wonder if life will always be this way—the weight of good things sinking in, creating space that needs to be filled with more. Will I always feel guilty for having enough yet still wanting to tag on additions? Or is it good to keep wanting, because that means you feel worthy of more?
“This is our house, you know,” she says. “You need to feel at home.”
But I can’t. Our house feels like the staff house.
“Give me a chance, then,” I say. “Are you happy? Is this what you want?”
She looks me in the eye while she chews. She makes to speak, then wipes her mouth with her napkin.
“You need some roadside assistance?” I ask.
“What?”
“For your stall.”
She laughs. “I’ll always be happy with you around.”
“I could make maple syrup out of that sap.”
“That wasn’t as funny,” she says.
“Yes it was.” I lightly bang my fist on the table for emphasis.
“I’m just trying to make this work,” she says. “Make our time here work.”
“But we can’t stay at this house the whole time, can we?”
“Until you graduate?” She looks toward the kitchen window, then around at the room. “No, I doubt we would.”
“Good,” I say. “Because it’s weird.”
“It will be less weird,” she says. “We’ll get used to it, and you may really like Whitney, and Will seems like a nice boy.”
Will West does not seem like a nice boy. He’s even more intimidating than his sister. He seems surrounded by a velvet rope—like you’d have to have a certain look to join him. He wears polo shirts and probably hashtags everything with #winning. Still, he is pretty fine. If he talked to me, I’d talk back.
“Yeah, a nice kid who probably guffaws instead of laughs,” I say.
“Oh, come on,” my mom says. “You don’t even know him. Give them a chance.”
“Stop pushing,” I say.
I remember when I was younger, I’d eat quickly, then get up to play piano while my mom finished the rest of her meal, serenading her. I stopped when she started dating a man who’d give me advice after each piece I played. He was the manager of a suit store and acted as if that were the epitome of success. He had a daughter—I was ten and she was thirteen at the time. She talked like a Latina gang member and told poorly constructed lies.
I enjoyed ripping the seams out of them, but hated the way she stood by the lies for so long, blinking her eyes rapidly and moving her head from side to side like the pit bull bobblehead in her father’s leased Hummer. Once, she actually had the gall to think I’d believe that her dad was so rich that for her thirteenth birthday they flew to the Congo on a private jet to party “jungle-style.”
I don’t know what brought me to this memory, maybe the way my mom seems to be forcing the Wests on me, just as they had forced the daughter and me together, two people from incompatible habitats. Except in this case, I feel like the other girl, the lamer, the lesser.
“It’s just that . . . I know you can be abrupt and grumpy, and I just want you to be nice and positive—”
“Oh my God, Mom, stop.”
“Punahou’s a very hard school to get into.” She looks down at her plate, moving her fork around.
“I know, but I got in.”
“They helped us, okay? Eddie helped us. He helped you. Even with a record like yours, it’s almost impossible to transfer this late. He made it happen. And now we’re here, and this is helping too. It’s a good place to be until we know what the show will do.”
“I see,” I say, sitting back. A messy picture gets cleaned up. “So we need them,” I state.
“Fine, Lei, yes.” She puts her fork down and sits back, her face set with confidence. “Yes, we do. We need them.”
Does a short name like Lea really need a nickname? It’s never bothered me until this second. Don’t be lazy! Say my name! A flush travels from my face, then down through my arms.
“So are you saying I wouldn’t have gotten in on my own?” I ask.
“Sweetie,” she says, “I don’t think anyone could get in this late on their own.”
I take a bite of the coleslaw, which was once delicious, and now I can barely taste it. I hear a light knock on our door. My mom and I exchange glances. I take a sip of water to wash my anger down. “Come in,” she says.
Before either of us gets up, the door opens slightly and Melanie West steps in or, rather, sticks her head in.
“Hi!” Melanie says, and my mom squeals back, “Hi!”
“I didn’t want to intrude, but—”
“No, no, come in!” my mom says, getting up. I follow, grinning and nodding like a geisha.
“Lea, this is Mrs. West. Melanie.” She gives me that Mom look. The be-well-mannered-so-I-look-good look, and I keep my end of the bargain—I won’t be abrupt or gloomy—though I refuse to squeal.
“Hello,” I say. “Nice to meet you.”
“Oh, I’ve met you before,” she says. “You were just a little girl. Look at you!”
I can’t.
“I’ve heard so much about you!” she says, and her smile reminds me of mine when I’m waiting for someone to hurry up and take the picture. “God, Ali, she looks just like you.” People have said this so many times before, but I just don’t see it. Melanie has on a floor-length, silky dress. Her hair is long, sleek, and thick like a pelt. I keep a smile plastered on my face, even though I know it’s as fake as hers.
“I don’t want to intrude—”
“You’re not intruding at all!” my mom says.
“I just wanted to make sure everything was okay here.”
“Oh my gosh,” my mom says. “Are you kidding me? We feel like we’re on vacation.” My mom gives me another prodding look.
“It’s great,” I say.
“That is so nice of you to say,” she says, as if we’re politely accepting the conditions of an old cabin.
“It’s a funky place, so I just wanted to make sure you knew the ins and outs.” She looks around like she’s checking things off. There’s something intense and searching in her eyes. “I don’t know if you’ve run the dishwasher yet, but there’s a switch under the sink, and if the washer isn’t working, then just flip the switch.”
“Got it,” my mom says. “Thank you so much for everything. The fruit, the wine, the house,” she says laughing. I cringe.
“It’s nothing,” Melanie says and looks up. “The ceiling fans are silly, aren’t they?”
I look up at the fans. They’re like revolving banana leaves.
“They were sort of the trend back in the day.” She gives “back in the day” little air quotes, and I can tell she’s one of those people who probably air quote a lot, and in all the wrong places.
“They’re beautiful,” my mom says.
Melanie’s eyes dart around the room and I wonder if she’s going to comment on every object, every appliance, every cushion.
“Would you like a glass of wine?” my mom says.
Not a second goes by before Melanie says, “I’d love one!” She walks expertly to the kitchen and retrieves a glass from the cupboard over the microwave. “That’s so nice of you.”
“I love this kitchen,” my mom says, walking to the counter with the bottle of wine and filling Melanie’s glass.
“Oh, thanks.” She looks around her kitchen. “Basic, really. I’m so sorry all these things are still in here. We use it as a guest cottage, so whatever you don’t want, just let me know. Robbie’s coming this week to fix the light outside your garage. If you want him to box up anything that you don’t—”
“We’re fine,” my mom says. “Unless we shouldn’t use them—”
“No! Please use everything. I just didn’t want it to get in your way, or if it’s not to your taste.”
“No, it’s all lovely.”
This is so tedious. I look back and forth, back and forth. Can’t they just drink their wine and be quiet?
“We actually ended up keeping a lot of our boxes packed,” my mom says. “We’re leaving them in the garage if that’s okay.”
“If you want, I can have them moved to our storage,” Melanie says.
“Oh no,” my mom says. “Don’t bother. Everything is perfect. Cheers.”
“Cheers!” Melanie says, and they clink glasses and take a sip. “I’m so happy you guys are here!”
“We’re so happy we’re here,” my mom says.
Is this what friendships are like when you’re grown up? Is this what I have to look forward to? My beautiful, fun mother seems like a different person. She’s standing awkwardly too, with her hand holding her elbow.
“I’m going to go do my homework,” I say, even though it’s Saturday.
“I wish Whitney would do the same,” Melanie says, then touches my mom’s arm and launches into a conversation about how her housecleaner can come to the cottage unless my mom has her own. We do not have our own. We are the housecleaner. My mom gives me a look, a kind of good-night nod. I know she’d prefer to be with just me, how we were at the table, making our home.
I walk to my room, running my hand along the white wall. Do Whitney and Will know their dad helped get me into Punahou? Should I care? It’s the way the world works, I guess. No one can do things on their own when it comes to stuff like this. The Wests are probably used to giving favors. They’re probably used to determining someone’s good fortune.