We shared a smile, but I did catch the look on Keira’s face while she continued to strum—part sadness, part quick pleasure, neither of which lingered long on her face.
Kona didn’t bother Keira as he moved out of the kitchen but I knew he was watching Cass, who had seen the entire exchange, out of the corner of his eye. But then Kona returned to his seat with a beer in his hand and the moment passed. When another cheer sounded from folks watching the game, I laughed, shaking my head at the way Makana rolled her eyes.
“Football,” she grumbled, taking her fingers from the thread to wave her hand as though the idea of the game was stupid.
“That’s right.” She looked up at me long enough to grin. “You like rugby now. I’d almost forgotten.”
“Well, just until competition starts.”
“Of course,” I agreed, beaming a little at how Mack had taken to dance. She was one of the youngest I had on my competition team and she treated the process—the practice, the refinement and the fierce competition - for what it was: damn hard work. “So, once competition gears up you’ll abandon rugby?”
“Well,” she started, leaning forward to whisper, “I can still watch the matches online.”
“That won’t distract you?”
“No way. I can multitask.” Her shrug came easy, and Mack returned my easy grin with one of her own as she continued braiding.
“That is so dumb,” Koa said, leaning on the table as he narrowed his eyes at Mack’s bracelet.
“Shut up, pilau buggah. I don’t say nothing bad about your dumb video games.”
“Because there’s nothing dumb to say. Gaming takes skill.” Koa flicked Makana in the side, laughing when she swung at him.
“Does not.”
“Does.”
“It doesn’t, lolo ass!”
“Hamau!” Kona fussed, shooting Mack and Koa a glare that kept them both quiet.
These two little knuckleheads were a handful, but I’d loved them the second I’d walked into the lake house to help Keira out with watching Koa. He and Mack had gotten bigger, a little nastier to each other at times, but they loved each other.
Still, they were kids and even though I hadn’t been their nanny for a long time, I tended to get in their business and correct them when they needed it. With the game distracting Kona and Keira being in her own world, I thought I’d distract them enough to stop fussing. I helped Mack tie off the bracelet and start another while her big brother watched, immediately bored when his sister began to braid the thread. “Koa, tell me about your trip to Barataria Bay. You catch anything?”
The boy nodded, sitting next to me as he pushed his phone onto the table ignoring it when it vibrated to roll his eyes at his little sister and smile at me. “Makua caught more redfish than I did but I ate more oysters when we went to dinner.”
“Gross,” Mack mumbled, shaking her head at Koa when he growled at her. Boys.
“Anyway?” I offered, resting back to look him in the eye. “You had fun with your dad?” He nodded, grabbing his phone as though he didn’t want to go into details. Keira had mentioned the trip earlier when we arrived in way of explaining why Koa’s normally dark skin was a little pink around his cheeks and nose.
“Kona said he just wanted to spend time with Koa before the end of the season, but I think he’s trying to make up for being an ass Friday at the barbeque,” Keira had told me, the whole time flicking her gaze to Kona who had walked around on the patio, those ever-present buds in ear as he talked on the phone.
“Did it work?” I’d asked, getting only a half-hearted shrug in return. There had been no one with us then, except for Ethan who stood near the fireplace mantel looking at the family pictures lined up on that block of cedar. “Keira,” I’d started, keeping my voice low as we loaded finger sandwiches onto a tray. “What’s going on with you two?”
That had stopped her from pretending to be focused on prepping the snacks for her guests. She looked around the room, moving her head to the right as Kona walked further away from the patio door. “He’s keeping something from me.”
Nothing could be more out of character. Keira and Kona had been inseparable since reconnecting thirteen years ago. A lot of parents came through my studio, most of them begrudgingly. Many of them sniping at each other. Kona and Keira had never been that way. They doted, they snuck off to make out, they embarrassed all three of their children with how they carried on.
Secrets? Not speaking? Bickering? Those were all warnings that I knew had Keira worried.
Ethan had winked at me, started toward us in the kitchen then, but stopped short when Koa stood in front of him talking without taking a breath.
“You have any ideas?” I’d asked Keira, keeping my voice low.
“None that make sense.” She moved the sandwiches to the center of the cutting board, slicing them into halves, then quarters. Not once had she smiled. Not once had Keira given me any indication that she thought of anything other than Kona and their problems as she worked on the sandwiches mindlessly.