Freckled Page 2

  It’s almost as good as if he loves me.

  Chapter Two

  A New Baby

  Rocky Point beach house, Mom, me, and Bonny

  Age: 4, Rocky Point, Oahu, March 1969

  “Wake up, Toby. It’s time.” Pop’s voice in my dark bedroom. My eyes open. My little room is lit by an angel night-light, and it shines on Pop’s face. His eyes are hidden in puffy slits, and his breath smells like beer and corn chips from the party where he was. He’s worried, and he thinks it’s not a good time for her to do this after they were already out so late.

  Maybe I do have ESP after all because I know these things.

  “It’s time” means it’s time for the baby to get out of Mom’s tummy. I’m not sure how that’s gonna work. Mom’s explanation about her “pie” being the place the baby comes out just didn’t seem right.

  Pop has already gone back down the darkened hall as I get out of bed in my nightie and go get my suitcase. It’s small, just my size, and printed with pretty flowers. Gigi sent it to me from the Mainland, and Mom and I packed it a week ago so I’d be ready to go to our neighbor Janet’s when the baby comes. I’m excited because I want to see the baby, and now I get to go to Janet’s house, too.

  I was just at Janet’s earlier when Mom and Pop went to the party. She has two cats and a dog, laughs a big laugh, and she takes walks with me along the sandy road behind our houses and never is in too much of a hurry to let me stop and look at something or ask questions. “You’re the smartest, most curious kid ever,” Janet says, like that’s a good thing. I love going to her house.

  She, Mom, Pop, and her husband Dave are about the same age, 26. Janet doesn’t have children of her own yet, but I get the feeling she wants them because she likes playing with me so much. Dave is a big guy with a loud laugh that matches hers, and he’s in the Army and goes to work somewhere every day.

  In the warm dark lit by one yellow streetlight, I’m worried as I hug Mom goodbye before she gets in the van to go get the baby out. She smells funny, of beer and pakalolo and something damp like wet bread, and her belly is giant and hard when I press my face against her, trying to get my arms around her waist.

  “We’ll be home before you know it, with a baby for you to cuddle,” Mom pants, her voice squeaky.

  I’m scared by how she’s acting and smelling. I clamp my arms tighter around her.

  “We have to go.” Pop grabs my hand, peeling me off Mom and tugging me through the dark to Janet’s house, right next to ours. He’s taking big steps and yanking my arm. I can smell fear on him, and it smells dark and funky, like the cheese I dropped next to the stove that got all moldy.

  This isn’t fun anymore. I’m biting my lips not to cry because that will just make Pop mad. We knock on Janet’s door, and there’s a long moment as we stand there in the dark on her porch step. I squeeze Pop’s hand with both of mine, hoping he will pick me up or give me a hug or kiss, but he doesn’t.

  Then the light comes on and Janet’s door opens. She has soft blonde hair that sticks up like a halo and makes me think she’s part angel. Janet’s dog, beside her legs, looks at me with his tongue out like he’s happy. Janet reaches down and sweeps me up, away from Pop. I wrap my arms around her neck and put my face in her angel hair and breathe in her smell of sweat and flower perfume.

  “She’s in labor. Her water broke.” Pop’s already turned away and disappearing as Janet closes the door and carries me inside.

  “Oh, sweetie. You should have just stayed the night with us.”

  Labor? Water broke? It seems like the baby getting out is a bad thing for Mom. I hold on tight to Janet, still trying not to cry as she carries me to the futon they have instead of a couch. She lies down with me when I won’t let go, and we fall asleep that way.

  The next morning, we make pancakes. We pick bananas off the stalk on the tree in her yard. They are short, fat, and super sweet, not like the big bright yellow bananas in the store. “Imported to Hawaii from somewhere else, it’s so sad,” Mom says about those fake bananas.

  Janet lets me peel and slice the bananas and put them in the batter, though I have to use the dull knife. The phone nearby has a round dial with holes in it for making a call, and it rings so loud I drop the spoon. Batter splats on the counter, and I look up scared. Pop always gets mad at loud noises and messes like that, but Janet just says “oops!” and throws a dish towel on it.

  Janet answers the ringing phone and turns to me with a big smile and round blue eyes. “You have a sister! Her name is Bonny.”

  I’m so excited that I clap my hands. I’m going to have a friend to play with all the time, and her name is Bonny! I’m also relieved that Bonny’s not a boy they are naming James Theodore the Third. I still want that name for myself.

  Very late that day, Pop comes to get me so we can go visit Mom and the baby at the hospital. He’s had a nap and a shower and he’s happy, which makes me happy, too.

  Mom must be okay, then.

  We get in the van. “Let’s bring her some daisies,” Pop says. We stop alongside the road next to the pineapple field to pick Mom’s favorite yellow flowers on the way to the hospital in Kahuku. I’m glad I didn’t know the hospital is where Mom went to get the baby out, or I would have worried even more.

  The hospital is a long, low building made out of concrete blocks painted light green, and they won’t let me visit Mom.

  “Visiting hours are over,” the lady behind the counter says, even though I can tell she feels sorry for us, with our daisies and clean faces. I know I look cute because Janet braided my hair and dressed me in my favorite flowered muumuu that comes to my knees, and I’m wearing the Mary Janes that Grandma Gigi gave me, too.

  I can feel my face crumpling up like wet toilet paper. I miss Mom so bad. I need to see her, after how she was acting and smelling weird, and I want to meet my baby sister. I have never cried this whole time. I’ve been brave. But now I can feel a wave of fright and bad feelings rising up from my toes. It’s going to squirt out my eyes and down my chin and all over everybody everywhere because when I feel feelings they are big, strong, noisy, and really annoying to Pop, especially.

  He sees it coming and grabs me up, putting my face against his shoulder, and I swallow down my sobs. The daisies are crushed between us and smell strong and piney as he carries me outside. “Shh. I have an idea. You’re going to get to see her.”

  It’s getting dark by now. I’m still gulping down my feelings as he puts me down and we sneak around the side of the building. Pop seems to know where he’s going, picking his way through long grass under plumeria trees alongside the building, peeking in the louvered windows. He comes to one and lifts me up, so I can see through the slats of glass.

  Mom is lying in a bed, sleeping. Her face is puffy and tired-looking, her chocolate-colored hair is all messy, and her giant tummy is gone.

  I can’t hold back the tears anymore. I cry “Mom!” and the feelings squirt out in a messy flood.

  She wakes up and says “Toby!” and it sounds wonderful, like the first time I ever heard her call my name in happiness, her voice so warm it’s a touch. I’m so relieved she’s okay that I cry harder.

  “Thank God there’s no one else in this room.” Pop’s pulling the glass louvers of the window out of their slats and stacking them on the ground. Inside, Mom turns the little plastic things that hold the screen in place and takes it down, and in just a few minutes I’m inside the room, in her arms. Pop climbs in too, with his armful of daisies.

  I don’t get to see Bonny because she’s sleeping in the nursery and I’m not supposed to be here, but getting into bed beside Mom and pressing my face against her sweet-smelling breasts is more than enough.

  Bonny comes home to live with us the next day and Pop puts a big sign on the door: NO VISITORS.

  “They’re not going to like that,” Mom says, worried. I know who she means by “they.” Janet and Dave, the local ladies at my preschool, and all Mom’s friends want to come by and
bring food and see Bonny.

  “We need time alone to get in a rhythm,” Pop says. “You want to get some sleep, right?”

  It’s always this way. Mom likes other people and Pop doesn’t. He’d rather it was just us on the whole North Shore of Oahu.

  I’m still looking at Bonny, trying to decide if I like having a sister.

  She’s not what I expected. I thought I’d be able to play with her, but instead she’s small and floppy, though Mom says she’s the biggest baby ever born at Kahuku Hospital at almost eleven pounds. She’s holding Bonny in my favorite spot, on her lap with my sister’s head in the crook of her arm, and Bonny’s nursing, getting milk from Mom’s boobs, which is why they’re so big and smell so good.

  Mom squirts some milk into my mouth because I want to taste it, and we all laugh because it sprays my face. The milk is warm and sweet like the canned milk with the red label Mom likes to bake into pudding in the oven. She sprays Pop too, and he acts all silly, putting his hands in the air like it’s a stickup.

  Bonny has white cloth diapers she wears with plastic panties over them, and when she poops it’s yellow and smells like papaya. I’ve already watched how to change her and learned how to swizzle the diaper in the toilet so the poop comes off before putting it in the plastic diaper pail.

  We spend several days holed up in the house alone as a family. I have to be quiet all the time and Mom and Bonny sleep a lot. Finally, I go over to Janet’s on my own, and we bake cookies. “I don’t like having a sister. She’s no fun at all,” I tell Janet.

  “She’ll grow up to be your best friend. Having a sister is really special.” Janet gives me a hug. “You’re lucky to have a sister.”

  I don’t feel lucky. Bonny sleeps in bed with Mom and Pop, where I used to go when I had bad dreams. Pop finally takes the sign down and everybody who sees Bonny says how cute she is, with her green eyes and blonde hair that sticks straight up like a little round chick. All Mom and Pop’s friends just want to hold Bonny, and I have to play by myself and not bug her when she’s sleeping.

  “Why aren’t I enough?” I ask Mom one day, as she’s picking Bonny up from a nap.

  Mom looks at me, and she’s surprised. Her eyes are like a stream with green and gold pebbles at the bottom and green around the edge. I have those same eyes; everyone says so, and it makes me happy when they do because Mom is so pretty.

  “What four-year-old says something like that?” She shakes her head and puts Bonny up against her shoulder and reaches for me with her other arm. “Come here.” I go, and snuggle in my favorite place against her side, the place where Bonny is most days now. “You were so special that we knew we wanted another one,” Mom says, after a long time.

  I suck my thumb and snuggle closer, holding my blankie with the silky edge, and think about that. I’m pretty sure she just said it to make me feel better.

  “She’s much mellower than Toby,” Pop tells Mom. I can hear the relief in his voice. “Our little Bonny Buddha baby. Thank God.”

  I feel bad about not being mellow, but I just can’t help that I’m interested in everything and like to do stuff all the time.

  Gigi and Grandpa Jim, Pop’s parents, visit to meet Bonny. They stay at a condo in Waikiki. Grandpa Jim is as tall as Pop and has a big loud voice, and Gigi always smells like chemical flowers, and her hair is a big reddish helmet that the wind can’t blow. She jangles with gold and her dresses have a waist. Gigi and Grandpa Jim have lots of money and live in California, and they always bring good presents.

  “What kind of place is this to raise a family?” Grandpa booms at Pop. “There are nothing but natives at Toby’s school.” He follows Pop out of the house, lecturing him.

  I frown. I like my school. Miss K, my teacher, thinks I’m smart, and I have lots of friends. Yes, I’m the only kid with red hair and get called “haole girl,” but being smart almost makes up for being white.

  “This house is so cozy,” Gigi says, her hands on her hips as she looks around the tiny front room with its attached kitchen and the windows that look at the sea. “And you have the baby in bed with you?”

  I can tell she means the house is too small and that the baby shouldn’t be sleeping with Mom and Pop. Gigi and Grandpa Jim bought Mom and Pop a little house in La Jolla when they first got married; I was born there six months later. We moved to Oahu when I was two and I’m pretty sure Gigi and Grandpa still have hurt feelings about that.

  Gigi brought me a huge wicker elephant that opens up to hold my clothes when she came this time, and to distract her I give her hugs. “Thank you for the elephant, Gigi.” I sniff her perfume loudly. “You smell so nice.” Everybody else may like Bonny better now, but Gigi still likes me best. She sits down and pulls me onto her lap. Her charm bracelet is loaded with pearls and diamonds and gold. I love her jewelry and wish she’d take it off and let me play Aladdin’s treasure cave with it. “Why do you always smell so good?”

  “Chanel No. 5,” she says. “A lady always wears perfume.”

  Mom snorts. “Natural oils are better for people and the environment.” Mom’s nursing Bonny, sitting on the little futon couch. Gigi doesn’t like Mom nursing and thinks Bonny should have a bottle, which I heard her tell Mom when they arrived. “Your figure,” she says in her fussy voice, without looking at Mom.

  “Breastfeeding is best for the baby,” Mom says.

  “And she’s such a big baby,” Gigi says, like that’s a bad thing.

  “Gigi, come see my shells. I have lots.” I tug Gigi’s hand. Her sparkly rings poke my fingers as I lead her into my room before she and Mom get in an argument. “Let’s go look for more on the beach after.”

  Gigi and I like finding shells on the beach together, and I go with them back to their condo and get to swim in the hotel pool and eat ice cream. Gigi pets my hair and plays with it. My hair is her favorite thing. “Like golden taffy,” she always says, and strokes my head like a puppy.

  Chapter Three

  Being A Hero

  Me and Bonny with Pop's catch of slipper lobsters

  Age: 5, North Shore, Oahu, September 1969

  Pop goes fishing and diving on the reef in front of the house most days when there’s no surf, and he brings his catch in and puts it on the lawn for Bonny and me to play with while he cleans the fish or lobsters.

  We especially like the slipper lobsters. They look like brown reef rocks with tiny, shiny beady black eyes on the ends of flat, scoop-shaped heads, and they flip their tails and scoot backward in the water. Sometimes they can even do it in the grass. They click and bubble but don’t have poky spines like the blue-green ones with the long antennas.

  I always like to touch the fish and know everything I can about them—and everything else too. Mom and Pop believe it’s good to ask questions. “Question authority” is something I’ve heard them talk with their friends about.

  “Questions are how you learn.” Mom calls me “Little Professor” and says I take after her dad, Grandpa Garth, who is a marine biologist, which means he studies the ocean and fish. “He’s coming to work for the University of Hawaii, and you’ll get to meet him someday,” she says, but she doesn’t talk about her parents much—they divorced, married other people and had more kids, aunties who are close to my age. I have lots of aunties and uncles, but I can tell Mom’s sad and maybe a little angry about some things that happened, so we don’t see them much.

  Pop shoots fish with a spear called a “Hawaiian sling” with a long metal pole that goes through a hole in a wooden handle. The spear cocks back using a metal piece and a loop of rubber tubing. Pop made it himself and says he will teach me how to shoot fish when I’m older—but lobsters cannot be shot or trapped. They have to be caught by hand, according to the rules. Pop obeys the rules because he says they are there to help make sure everyone has enough lobsters and fish.

  One day, he leaves Bonny and me outside to play with his catch and goes inside. Bonny is bigger now, crawling around at six months old, and she puts
everything in her mouth.

  “Don’t put the fish in your mouth.” I flop a large pale weke back and forth. Pop told me the weke is a goatfish, and it’s named that because of the long strings beside its mouth like a mustache. We have a kala, which is green and has a horn on its forehead and a wicked blade on its tail, and an uhu, which is also called a parrotfish because it is all the colors of a rainbow from purple to red. Uhu is my favorite to eat because it has big juicy flakes when it’s cooked and not many tiny bones.

  Bonny laughs at me flopping the fish back and forth, and a scale the size of a thumbnail falls off the fish where the spear pierced it. It’s clear and shiny and reminds me of a moonstone. Bonny grabs the scale off the grass and pops it in her mouth.

  “No!” I drop the weke. “Spit that out!” Mom has already told me Bonny could choke from all the stuff she’s always putting in her mouth, and not to let her do that. I grab her fat cheeks in my hands and squeeze them to make her open her mouth, but it’s too late—I see it’s too late by the way Bonny’s green eyes pop open.

  They aren’t really green. They’re bluish-gray, with yellow spots around the black part in the middle. This somehow makes them look green, and I notice this in spite of my fright.

  “Mom! Pop!” I scream.

  Bonny arches her back, pulling her face out of my hands. She opens her mouth, but she can’t breathe. She tries to cry, her mouth wide, her eyes tearful, but nothing is happening—she can’t even make a sound. She throws herself backward onto the ground. Right in front of me she’s turning red, and then white.

  “Mom! Mom! Bonny’s choking!” I scream again, but no one comes from the house. “Help!”

  She’ll die if that fish scale doesn’t come out.

  She starts to flop around, just like one of the dying fish, and her eyes roll back. I grab her like I saw Mom do one time, and I throw her hard over my knees and hit her on the back with both my fists. Wham! Wham!