“Mai tai,” I say, from directly in front of her.
She writes it down without looking at me.
Ace catches my attention across the table, and the look on his face is the specific one from the plane when something amused him and he was trying not to show it. North orders drinks and then gestures at me. “Lunch is on us.”
“It’s absolutely not,” I say. “I lost the bet. I’m buying.”
“Your van got ransacked,” Ace says. “You’re not buying lunch.”
“Those are unrelated events.”
“Adelaide—”
“Ace—”
“We’re buying,” Luca states, to the waitress, and then opens the menu and points, saying, “Bring us everything on this section.”
The waitress blinks. “That’s?—”
“A lot, yeah.” He hands the menu back. “It’ll get eaten.”
She writes it all down with an amused expression on her face, and then she’s gone. I stare at Luca. “That’s an absurd amount of food.”
“We surfed all morning, and we’re big men.”
I can’t actually argue with that, so I don’t. I lean back in my chair and let the breeze come off the water, then tip my face toward it for a second. The warm air, the sound of the waves, and the smell of whatever’s coming from the kitchen are calming me down.
“So, how long do you plan to stay in Oahu?” Ace asks.
“Well, I recently quit my job back in LA. Hence, I have no time limit on my vacation, except I may need to get a job so I can stay here for months.” I smile at him pleasantly.
“What did you do for a job?” Luca asks.
“Brand strategist for an advertising agency, so I worked with clients and our creative team. It wasn’t bad except for being a middle person and trying to please everyone.” I grin, remembering how stressful it got at times. Then I did something stupid and started flirting with the big boss of the agency, Daniel. I sigh at my stupidity.
The drinks arrive, and I sip the mai tai right away, the fresh pineapple juice divine. The guys are chatting about some upcoming surfing tournament, Luca and Ace going back andforth about a particular break on the North Shore, while North stares at me.
“You okay?” he asks, low enough that it’s just to me.
“Getting there,” I say truthfully.
He nods, and I appreciate that he doesn’t push me.
The food arrives in stages and then all at once, and the table becomes overflowing. Fish tacos with mango salsa. Battered fish in golden crisp pieces. A kalua pork sandwich, Korean steak street tacos, a cheeseburger, a full rib and chicken plate that takes up a quarter of the table on its own. Fish and chips. A second table appears beside ours to hold the overflow. People around us are absolutely staring, and my face goes warm.
“We might have gone overboard,” I say.
“This is normal,” Luca says, already reaching for the pork sandwich. He points at the fish tacos. “Start there.”
I do, and the dish is genuinely one of the best things I’ve eaten in recent memory, the fish perfectly crisp and the mango cutting through it. I moan at how incredible it tastes, grabbing all of their attention. I grin and wipe my mouth with a napkin, loving how responsive they are.
We eat, and it’s surprisingly easy how the four of us are sitting around a table with too much food and the ocean right there, enjoying the feast. The guys argue about which shaved-ice place on the island is worth the drive and which ones are tourist traps. North tells me about a beach on the east side that nobody goes to because it’s a forty-minute walk from the nearest parking. Luca keeps pushing things toward me without comment—the fish and chips, a second taco, a spoonful of the kimchi from the Korean plate—and I eat all of it because I’m apparently starving and also because turning down food feels rude.
The breeze coming off the water, blows past me and toward the guys, and every few minutes, one of them shifts in his seator goes still for a half second before picking up whatever he was saying. Luca rolls his shoulders once. Ace blinks slowly. North straightens almost imperceptibly and then relaxes again. I don’t know what that’s about, but it’s mildly fascinating.
“The huli huli chicken,” Luca says, pointing his spoon at North like this is a matter of public importance. “Tell her.”
North doesn’t even crack a smile. “Best barbecue chicken on the island. North Shore truck. You smell it before you see it, and once you do, you’re done for.”
