31. Lani

On Kai’s seventh birthday, she found Emma crying in the kitchen at dawn.

When Lani knelt beside her and put a hand on her back, Emma jumped in surprise. She mumbled an apology and wiped at her face with both hands. The skin around her eyes was red and puffy; Lani wondered how long she had been crying there on the floor.

She grabbed a fresh kitchen towel from the drawer, handed it to Emma, and sat down beside her.

Despite their best efforts, the tile floor was filthy. Muddy paw prints and tiny pieces of lava rock, dry bits of grass and the occasional chicken feather, smushed bits of papaya and stray flower petals… it seemed like the whole world got tracked in and out of the kitchen on bare feet every day.

“It’s his first birthday without his dad,” Emma said, as if Lani had any doubt in her mind as to why she’d had a predawn breakdown.

“I know,” Lani said softly.

“I’m trying my best,” she said, and another sob broke through, “but it’s so hard.”

“I know,” she said again, putting a hand on Emma’s back.

Emma leaned into her and sobbed, releasing all the grief of parenting Kai without his father by her side, the pain of watching him turn seven and knowing that the love of her life had only gotten to spend six short years with their son.

There were no words that could relieve that kind of pain. All that Lani could do was sit there beside her and wait for the worst of it to pass.

Eventually, Emma grew quiet. She sat up straight and blew her nose. And she looked at Lani with that strange mixture of pride and grief that came with watching children grow.

“I have a seven year old.”

“I remember when he was a fat little baby.”

Emma laughed even as more tears fell. “He had the biggest cheeks.”

“Now he looks just like his dad.”

“He does.” She wiped her eyes again, then pushed herself up to her feet. “I should go see to the goats.”

“How about a pot of chai?” Lani offered.

“I would love some tea. Thank you.”

“I’m on it.”

The kitchen filled with the warm, spicy smell of chai while dawn came slowly to the island, filtering through a thick layer of clouds.

Kai came stumbling into the kitchen, half asleep and scowling. He glared at Lani, turned around, and went back into the living room. A moment later, Lani heard the crackle of his walkie talkie.

“Mom?”

“Good morning, birthday boy!” Emma’s voice came in through the speaker, bright and only slightly garbled.

“I woke up and you weren’t here.”

“I’ll be there in two shakes.”

He came back in and sat at the kitchen table, looking glum.

“Morning, bud,” Lani said. “Do you want some tea?”

“Sure,” he said with a sigh.

She poured him a cup of chai from the decaf pot and added a heavy splash of goat’s milk. He accepted it with a nod and sat there with two hands on the mug, looking like a tiny businessman steeling himself for another day at the office.

“I want tea too,” Rory whined. Lani had left her sleeping on the couch after carrying her in that morning, and now she walked into the kitchen cradling their orange kitten like a baby.

“Coming right up.” Lani kissed the top of her daughter’s head and went to pour another cup of chai.

When Dio came bounding in through the kitchen door, Kai finally smiled. He took the dog’s head in both hands and pressed their foreheads together.

Dio’s whole body wriggled with the joy of another day, but he kept his front feet firmly planted and his head still, accepting his boy’s greeting.

Emma came in a moment later, and Lani took the milk pail so that she could focus on Kai. She went to hug him and he curled up on her lap, looking so big and so small at the same time.

“Will you sing me the birthday song?” he asked.

Smiling softly, Emma sang:

Today is a birthday, I wonder for whom

I know it’s for someone right here in this room

So look all around you for somebody who

is happy and smiling - my goodness, it’s you!

So happy birthday Kai, from all of us to you.

Happy birthday Kai, from Auntie and Rory too.

We appreciate you, oh we truly do.

So happy birthday, happy birthday, happy birthday to you!

By the end of the song, Kai was beaming.

“That’s not the birthday song,” Rory said, looking confused. “It’s not the English birthday song or the Hawaiian birthday song.”

“It’s our birthday song!” Kai said proudly.

“Did you make it up?”

“I didn’t make it up,” Emma said. “My dad always sang it to us. His parents sang it to him, I think. I don’t know where it came from originally.”

Rory thought about this for a moment and then announced, “I like it. You can sing it to me if you want.”

“You already had your birthday!” Kai said.

“Soon I’ll have another birthday and I’ll be six!”

“Not soon! Not for ages! You just had a birthday!”

“Nuh uh! That was a long time ago already! Before you even went to California!”

“Who wants waffles?” Lani interrupted.

“Me!” Kai jumped up out of Emma’s lap and shot both hands in the air like he was celebrating a goal. “I want waffles!”

“I want waffles too!” Rory shouted.

“I get the first one ‘cause it’s my birthday!”

“I have two waffles ready.” She set down a plate in front of each of them.

“Will you cut mine into trains and cars?” Kai asked.

“Sure.”

“I can cut my own waffles,” Rory bragged. “I cut them myself and I’m five.”

Kai glared at her, then looked at Lani. “Give me a knife.”

She bit back a laugh as Emma said, “Want to try that again?”

He sighed. “May I please have a knife?”

She handed out utensils and left the kids to laboriously saw their waffles into pieces while she poured more batter into the waffle maker. Emma stood next to her, leaning against the counter and holding her tea in both hands.

“I didn’t realize you were here last night.”

“I wasn’t,” Lani admitted.

“You came over before dawn?”

“Yeah. I thought you could use some backup today.”

Emma took a shaky breath and smiled. “You’re not wrong.”

“It feels weird, hardly using the ‘ohana that I just fixed up for us.”

“It’s good to have a place of your own, even if you’re not there all the time. I know Tenn loves having you around. How’s he doing, anyway?”

“He’s fine,” she said quickly. “A lot better. He doesn’t need me there. Not really.”

“But he wants you there.” Emma’s eyes were full of understanding – and beneath that, the pain of having lost what Lani now had.

“I just want to be near him,” she admitted. Why did that feel like such a big and scary thing to say? “My whole nervous system settles.”

Emma sighed softly. “That’s how you know he’s the right one.”

“That and a million other–” She cut herself off with a shake of her head as she flipped a waffle out onto a plate. Today wasn’t about her. “Anyway. What needs doing? How can I help?”

“You mean besides coming over at dawn and making us breakfast?”

“Yeah, besides that.”

“We’ve got the whole Pualena Playschool crew coming over at noon. The family too, of course. And we need to go pick Prince up. His grandmother said that he could come, but he needs a ride.”

“I can help with that.”

They spent the morning making food for the party. Kai helped to mix up the banana cupcakes he had requested, then lost interest and went outside to play.

They were just putting the last of the food away when Tenn arrived on foot. Lani walked outside to meet him, but Rory got there first. She stood watching with her hands on her hips as he let himself through the front gate.

“Where’s Livie?” she demanded.

“Her grandma and grandpa wanted to take her out to breakfast,” he replied.

“But what about the birthday party?!”

“They’ll drop her off in time for the party.”

“Are you sure?”

“I’m sure.”

She peered up at him for another moment before chirping, “Okay,” and running off to find Kai and Prince.

People began to arrive quickly after that, families from the playschool and the whole Madeira clan. ‘ōlena and Nate arrived together, which was something that Lani planned to ask her cousin about the moment that she got her alone.

Tenn made himself useful and strung up the pi?ata with his one good arm, dodging her attempts to treat him like an invalid.

Olivia was one of the last kids to arrive. Her friends swept her up and into the action while her grandmother stood at the gate, looking across the yard at Tenn with a pinched expression on her face.

“Sonya, hi!” Lani greeted her. “Would you like to come in for some lunch?”

“He shouldn’t be doing that,” Sonya said as she watched her son tie off one end of the rope he had thrown over a high branch of the ‘ulu tree. “He should be resting his shoulder so that it can heal.”

“I tried telling him.” Lani could feel her voice and smile turn strained, as much as she tried to stay casual and upbeat. “He says he’s tired of resting.”

Sonya’s cold blue eyes settled on her with a bare hmph of acknowledgement.

“Would you like to stay?” Lani asked again.

“I can’t. I have papers to grade.” Sonya seemed on the cusp of saying something else, her gaze flicking between Lani and Tenn, but she held back.

“Okay, well… thanks for dropping Livie.”

She nodded and walked back to her car, leaving Lani feeling stranded and off balance.

Tenn’s mother hated her, she knew it. She blamed her for his injury… and she wasn’t wrong. If it hadn’t been for Lani, that never would have happened. It was a guilt that she still grappled with every day.

He smiled at her across the lawn, and the pain in her chest eased. He was still here. And despite all that had happened, he was happier with her than he would be without her.

Wasn’t that all that mattered in the end?

She walked across the yard and settled into her usual spot, his uninjured arm wrapped around her waist. Surrounded by love and conversation and family, she felt the ghosts of her past begin to ebb away.

It was a new day under the Hawaiian sun with her love by her side – and that was an everyday sort of miracle that she would never take for granted again.