The engine starts with a sound that can only be described as mechanical bronchitis. Pele shudders, hiccups, and settles into an idle that suggests it’s considering its life choices as she roars to life.
“Buckle up,” Lani advises, and I notice she’s gripping the steering wheel like it might try to escape. “Pele likes to wiggle.”
Ruby and I climb into the back, which smells like a combination of old upholstery, salt air, and what might be the ghost of a thousand takeout meals. The seats are held together with more duct tape, and I’m pretty sure there’s a family of geckos living in the cup holders.
“Let me see that list,” I say, reaching for Melanie’s grocery manifesto like it’s evidence in a crime.
Lani hands it over, and I scan the contents with growing horror.
“What are we feeding these people, gruel? Prison food? Stuff they serve at places where hope goes to die?”
“It may as well be,” Lani says, pulling out of the parking lot with a grinding sound that makes my teeth ache. “Melanie makes the menus and the grocery lists. I just follow orders and try not to poison anyone, which is harder than you’d think with these ingredients.”
“You’re not really buying the supplies for this place at the grocery store, are you?” I ask because the list reads like someone’s idea of a survivalist camping trip where the goal is to survive on the absolute minimum. “Canned beans, white bread, processed cheese, mystery meat that’s probably seen things...”
“Where else would we buy them?” Lani asks, navigatingaround a pothole that could qualify as a small crater or possibly a portal to another dimension.
“Oh, sweet mother of pearl,” Ruby gasps from beside me. “No wonder this place is going under. You’re buying ingredients at tourist trap prices.”
The van hiccups as we turn onto the main road, and I grab the door handle for support because I’m not entirely convinced that we’re going to make it to our destination. Outside, coconut palms sway in the wind, dancing to music only they can hear, and the ocean stretches to the horizon, trying too hard to be perfect, mocking our struggle with its effortless beauty.
“There’s a restaurant supply place on the island called Costco in case you didn’t get the memo,” Ruby continues. “Real ingredients at wholesale prices. We need to get into that place if we want to have a roof over our heads by the end of the month.”
“A roof over YOUR heads,” Lani corrects, steering around a chicken that’s decided the road belongs to it, and all vehicles are just suggestions. “I still live at home with Mama—and my kids live there, too.”
Ruby and I stare at her in stunned silence. And Pele chooses this moment to make a sound like a whale with indigestion.
“Your mother,” I say carefully, “is still...”
“Alive and kicking,” Lani finishes. “Ninety-nine years old and meaner than a wet cat. She runs the house with an iron spoon and makes the best lau lau on the island.”
“How many kids do you have again?” Ruby asks, clearly trying to process this information while also holding onto the door handle because Pele just hit another pothole.
“Three. Ages thirty-five, thirty-one, and twenty-eight. None of them is married, all of them living at home because the renton this island costs more than most people make in a year. And they all have opinions about everything.”
Pele shudders over another pothole, and I swear I hear something important fall off underneath us, clattering away like our chances of making it to the grocery store.
“So basically,” I say, doing the math and feeling my heart hurt for her, “you’re supporting a household of five adults on a resort kitchen salary that’s probably minimum wage.”
“Six if you count my grandson, but he’s only two, so he doesn’t eat much yet. Give him a few years, though.”
Ruby looks like she’s trying to do complex math in her head, too. “Honey, how do you manage that?”
“Very carefully,” Lani says. “And with a lot of rice.”
We’re driving through what can only be described as paradise having a yard sale. Roadside stands selling everything from fresh pineapple to hand-carved tikis line the highway, interspersed with tourist traps that promise authentic island experiences and probably deliver some serious keychain collections.
“So how about we take a quick detour through suspect land before we hit dollar hot dogs and tubs of questionable condiments?” I ask, and both Lani and Ruby quickly agree as Pele takes a sharp U-turn.
“Where exactly are we hunting down Savannah?” I ask, folding Melanie’s pathetic grocery list into a paper airplane because it deserves to be turned into something more functional.
“At the community garden,” Lani says, navigating around another chicken who’s clearly never learned about traffic safety. “She’s running a workshop this afternoon. I think she’s teaching kids how to plant traditional Hawaiian crops or something.”
“Perfect,” Ruby says. “Casual interrogation always works best when you’re surrounded by tiny witnesses and gardening tools that could double as weapons.”
“We’re not interrogating,” I point out, though I’m not entirely sure I believe myself. “We’re just... asking friendly questions about her relationship with our recently deceased guest.”
“While surrounded by tiny witnesses who happen to be armed with shovels and pitchforks,” Ruby adds.
