2010

"Family discussion in the kitchen when you're pau homework, okay?"

Mom had just barely peeked her head through the doorway when she dropped it on me.

I looked up at her from above the top of my notebook. From where I was lying down, it cut her off so only her eyes were visible. I didn't know why I found it so funny. Maybe my subconscious was aware of something that I wasn't. The part of me that was bored to death over this chemistry homework and entirely over anything to do with junior year, even though I was only in my second quarter of it.

"What about?"

"If I told you now, it would defeat the purpose, wouldn't it?" She said it with a smile that didn't meet her eyes. I could tell. They were practically framed.

I held the notebook higher, shielding the rest of her face again, before lowering the book down to my chest.

"Okay."

"Okay." Mom tapped the doorway once, nodded, and then sealed me back into my cave so I could finish my homework.

Leimomi snuck into my room not long after Mom walked back downstairs.

She was at that age where she not only found everything curious; she found everything worth sneaking around for. I couldn't count on my fingers how many times I had caught her in the past month alone, eavesdropping on someone else's conversation. It was mostly harmless, and she had never been caught listening to something she shouldn't have.

"What do you think they're gonna tell us?" I asked, not bothering to look at her.

My younger sister jumped onto the bed and rolled onto her back so she matched me, albeit much smaller, less weighted by responsibilities, and far more optimistic about the world. It was still bright and new to her, and I found myself envious of the youthful sparkle in her eye. It was kind of depressing to think about how I wasn't that much older than her and had already lost most of what she still had.

"Maybe they're secretly spies and need to tell us because some big bad guy is about to try and get us."

She giggled into her hand. "That's so silly."

"You don't think Dad could kick someone's ass? I bet he could."

"That's a bad word I'm not supposed to say."

"Not yet, at least." I flicked her nose, and she pulled away from me with a laugh. "What's your theory, then?"

Leimomi leaned in close, her voice lowered into a soft whisper. My eyes briefly flicked down to the washable marker stains she wore like jewelry on her hands. The kid thought the name Picasso was so funny that she wanted to be just like him. (Mom and Dad refused to give her paint, so the markers were the second-best thing.)

"I heard them talking a while ago—"

"You don't say."

"—and they mentioned Disneyland. Disneyland, Hoku. What if they're taking all of us to Disneyland?"

I scoffed and tossed the book aside. I didn't have the class again until the following day, so the assignment could wait until tomorrow night for me to finish. And I wasn't likely to get any actual work done with Leimomi here, either.

"We can't afford to go to Disneyland."

"But why not?" she asked. "I saved up so much allowance."

I couldn't fight back the smile. "I don't think it'll be enough, babes."

She frowned.

I pinched her cute, chubby cheeks.

...

I wished it had been about Disneyland.

We should have known it would not be a good thing when we walked into the kitchen and saw the crestfallen faces of our parents. If there was one thing we could always count on, it was seeing their bright, smiling faces while they were in the kitchen. They stuck to it even during the more troubling times in their lives.

Neither of them was smiling when we entered.

Silently, the three of us took our seats. Mom sat with her legs crossed, not looking at either of us, while Dad stood by the stove, hands pressed against the counter so tightly that his knuckles were nearly white. After a few seconds, he took a deep breath and turned around, composing himself in a way I found only he was capable of.

Something about the scene felt fake. As if we were puppets placed inside our living room that wasn't really our living room but something quite similar but still poorly done. Suddenly, the table was too smooth; it could have been plastic for all I knew. The faces in those pictures scattered across the fridge were of strangers who had no connection to my family or me. Even the air had been replaced by something artificial. It clogged my windpipe and left me scratching at my throat as if to offer some reprieve from whatever poison had become its replacement.

I wondered what it would be like to visit Disneyland. Were the tables there made of plastic, wood, or something else? Did the concrete get slippery whenever it was wet? What was it like seeing a character you'd grown up with on the screen suddenly become a "real" person standing in front of you? Did the air smell of buttery popcorn and cotton candy and caramel-dipped apples? Did the excitement of finally getting onto a ride erupt like fireworks in your chest, or did it subside quietly like ripples along the water?

I really fucking wished it had been about Disneyland.

"Leimomi," Mom warned when she wouldn't stop fidgeting. "We need you to sit still for this, alright?"

"Just give me a hint—is it about Disneyland?"

Kanani rolled her eyes. "That's a loaded hint if I've ever heard one."

"What? It could be true!" Leimomi looked at the two of them. "I hope it's about Disneyland..."

He looked so damn tired, more than usual.

I rested a hand on Leimomi's shoulder. "It's not about Disneyland, Lei."

"But—"

"Please." It was Dad this time.

What followed wasn't a conversation I ever wanted to be repeated, even though I knew it would happen many times over and in many variations. As if this was something I wanted in the first place. Perhaps focusing on how it made me feel above anything else was a little selfish because I knew I wasn't the one to whom this was happening. I was just a person who loved another whose life had been turned upside down by the way of one diagnosis.

Most of it made little sense to me. (I didn't even want to guess what was going through Leimomi's mind as she took it all in.) (She was probably still stuck on the Disneyland thing.) (Honestly, I would be fine with that if she was.)  I was only a junior in high school, for christ's sake. What the hell did I know beyond algebra and the oboe and swimming for so long that I thought I would never resurface?

I didn't know shit about cancer.

I didn't know shit about cancer or why it had jumped into my father's body.

I didn't know shit about cancer or why it had jumped into my father's body or why I couldn't just run upstairs to grab a Band-Aid and kiss it to make the pain go away.

These four walls surrounding us were closing in on me faster than I could count the seconds ticking by. Silence drenched the air in a thickness I couldn't escape, even as I turned toward the window and watched brown leaves drift slowly onto the ground. I thought to myself huh, does Disneyland have leaves that change colors? Not just green to brown, but green to red to orange to brown. I wasn't even sure if that was the order in which they changed colors. Being stuck on an island in the middle of the ocean ensured I missed out on a lot of simple beauties a lot of the rest of the world experienced. Though, I guess that could be said about the life I lived on our island.

Did finding out about cancer suck this much everywhere else too? Probably. Surely. I couldn't have been the only one who suddenly felt like there was a gaping hole in my chest over hearing three little words. Three little, giant, catastrophic fucking words.

I wasn't fully paying attention. Not because I wanted to be rude or because I didn't care. I didn't have the capacity to pay attention to something so out of the realm of anything I thought I ever knew. It was as if, for those long moments that dragged on and on for eternity, I was a ghost that existed outside of my body, and the closer I tried to get back to it, the further away it became.

Getting anything out of Leimomi was out of the question. Part of me wanted to ask my parents what they were thinking, telling her at the same time as the rest of us, but then I realized there was probably no good time to do something like this. There were dozens of bad times, but never a good time. Just times when it wasn't as bad as others, I supposed.

As any dutiful eldest daughter would, Kanani asked all the questions. And as any good Kanani would, she asked them at a million miles per hour so my parents tried their best to keep up with them. Judging by the look on her face, I didn't believe she understood any of it either, even when our parents attempted to explain it to her, but she was doing her best. She was doing more than I was.

Some kind of throat cancer. That was about all I could absorb.

It was more than I wanted to.

"What does—" When I finally found my voice, it shook. Not quite an earthquake, but the tremor beforehand. A warning that I wasn't far from shattering into pieces. "What does this mean?"

"It means things are going to change around here," Mom answered. Probably to give my dad a break—he was staring at the ground—while we all tried to wrap our heads around this. "Dad is going to need to start treatments. He'll need to take a break from certain responsibilities around the house, which means the rest of us will have to step up to the plate. What I want all of us to remember is that this isn't going to be easy, but as long as we help each other, we'll get through this together."

"But how can you know that?"

She turned to me. "What do you mean?"

"How do you know we'll all get through this together? What are dad's odds?"

They exchanged a tense look that made my skin crawl.

"It's an aggressive type, but we caught it early, so that's better."

"But—"

"God, can you stop asking questions like that?" Kanani scolded, turning to me. "Does it look like Dad wants to talk about it like that? Just let it go."

"How do I let it go, Kanani?"

"By shutting up and listening." She turned back around, crossing her arms. "That's what you always do best, anyway."

"Kanani," Mom warned.

I took one look at Dad; when he didn't return it, I stood up and walked outside.

My entire body shook this time, not just my voice. If I opened my mouth, I was sure no sound would come out. The sand beneath my feet was as sharp as jagged rocks, and I was surprised to not see a trail of blood left behind. It wasn't until I was feet away from the water that my heart finally slowed to a more stable pace, even if I felt anything but stable.

I wasn't sure how much time passed before someone lowered themselves next to me.

"It'll be alright, honey."

I hated to admit it so I didn't relay the thought out loud, but he didn't sound sure of himself. For someone as confident as my father, that was worrying.

"Everything will be alright," he repeated, laying a hand on my shoulder.

I placed my hand above his, closed my eyes, and took a deep breath. After a few seconds of letting his words sink in, hoping I would find a way to believe them even if he didn't fully believe them himself, I scooted close enough to rest my head on his shoulder. His arm found its way around my waist. I never wanted him to let go.