Leia sighed. Maybe he had a point. The kids loved to come. She dug in her purse for her key. “Here. Just don’t let them mess up my stuff.” Lifting her hand, she walked away before he could say anything that made her regret giving him the key.
She found her car in the lot and drove to her parents’ house. Her mother’s car, a Buick Park Avenue that had replaced the Lexus her mother loved, was parked in the driveway. Leia pulled her Neon behind her mother’s car and shut off the engine. Lights shone through the sweeping expanse of windows that looked out on the water. Though they’d had to downsize the house and move off the beach after Makua lost his job, her mother had insisted on still living where she could see the water. Ingrid would notice the lights of her car and wonder why she wasn’t coming in, but Leia couldn’t seem to force herself to move. The encounter would be about as pleasant as a meeting with a hungry tiger shark.
A shadow moved, then lingered at the window. She’d been spotted. She had to go in now. The door was unlocked, as usual, so she opened it and stepped inside. Though the house was a step down from the mansion on the beach her parents had sold a year ago, this house still didn’t have the homey feel of the cottage in the jungle where Leia and her sister had grown up. She walked through the tiled hallway, past walls that matched the color of the floors. Her mother preferred the stark look of bare walls. Minimalist, she called it. Cold and unwelcoming, Leia dubbed it. She found her mother in the living room. Done in shades of gray, the room always made Leia shiver, even with all the lamps shining. The room’s furniture had no sloping, comfortable lines, just sharp, boxy edges that looked stiff and uninviting.
Her mother put down the magazine she was reading, a crisp copy of Architectural Digest. She narrowed her eyes. “I was beginning to think you weren’t coming in.”
Leia glanced around. “Where’s Eva?”
“I sent her to bed early. She didn’t come right home from work today. Let me tell your father you’re here. He’s still in the shop.” Ingrid rose in a graceful motion and went to the intercom on the wall. “Akoni, Leia is here.”
Leia’s father’s voice blared back through the speakers. “I’ll be right there.” Leia warmed at the pleasure in her father’s voice. She needed him here. He would be her support, even if he wasn’t sure what the right course of action should be.
“Want some mango tea?”
Leia shook her head. “Later. I haven’t eaten yet.” She heard her father’s heavy tread in the hall and tried not to show her relief. Sometimes when she looked at her mother, she felt the same way she did when she was praying—unworthy, and hopeless of making any-one proud. The difference was that she knew God loved her in spite of her failings. She wasn’t so sure about her mother. Malia said Ingrid wasn’t capable of love. Maybe she was right, though Ingrid showed love in other ways. The car parked outside was a gift from her mother, and the boat she used had been bought with her mother’s money. Leia had accepted it all, so what did that make her?
“Makua.” Leia went to hug her father. At nearly six feet tall to his five feet nine, she towered over him just as her mother did. But he was bulky, and his massive arms squashed her to his barrel chest. She inhaled the scent of him: a mixture of wood dust, coconut, and spicy cologne. He made her feel safe and protected. He’d give his life for her, and she knew it.
“Where have you been? You’ve been neglecting your old man.”
She kissed his cheek, then wiped away the ‘ohi’a dust that had transferred from his whiskers to her nose. Since his dishonor, he’d taken up building sleds for the ancient Hawaiian sport of he’e holua, or lava sledding. The sport wasn’t popular yet, but he believed it would be. She’d watched a competition once, but the men racing down a hardened lava slope at breakneck speed on something that looked like a ladder lashed together with coconut fiber terrified her. She kept imagining what they’d look like if they fell onto the lava at that speed. Leia thought he buried himself in the woodshop to avoid facing the censure among the islanders.
“I’ve been a bad daughter.” She released him and stepped back. “I spent the night with Candace last night. She had a little too much to drink.”
“You’re a perfect daughter.” He started to sit on the pale gray damask armchair, then intercepted a pointed glance from his wife directed at his dirty clothing. Selecting a wooden rocker he’d built instead, he leaned back and propped one leg on the other.
“Candace was drinking?” Her mother’s voice was stiff with dis-approval. “I thought she was pregnant.”
“She is. I scolded her this morning and gave her some homeopathics to counteract the hangover. She promised not to do it again. She’s hurting.”
“That’s no excuse. She increases her chances of giving birth to a child with a birth defect. I hope you, of all people, impressed on her the importance of abstaining.”