2019

"What the hell are you doing here?"

Kaipo sat next to me on the damp curb, surrounded by the pungent odor of smoke and wet grass. Even though it had rained earlier in the day, I couldn't definitively count on it being from the weather since we were sitting outside a bar, so I forced the thought to the back of my mind.

"I came to listen," he answered. "Duh."

"But you don't know him."

He seemed to find that comment amusing. "Are we only allowed to listen if we know him?"

"You have shit timing."

Kaipo looked pointedly down at me. "Considering I saw you bolt out of the room like you were running away from a fire, I'd say I have pretty good timing."

I would too, but I wasn't about to admit that to him.

"He's pretty good."

"Yeah, he is. Really good."

"So, what the hell was that?" he asked, cutting right to the chase.

It was embarrassing to think about it. I didn't know what had come through me. One second I was listening to Nikau perform, the next I felt like the walls were closing in on me on all sides and I had no idea why. That wasn't the first time I had heard that song since my father passed away and it certainly wasn't going to be the last. While we often listened to and sang it together, I couldn't let it go after he died, even though there were many other things that I had.

"Dad and I loved that song."

I had become adept at gauging people's perception of me just by the way they subconsciously managed their microexpressions. For many, they were gut reactions that I tried not to take too seriously, especially if it was for something smaller. Two events stood out amongst the rest as times when I had seen a significant shift in people's perception of me—dropping out of high school to get my GED and my father's death.

There wasn't much to think about when it came to the former, but the latter was what set me off most of the time.

I hated the pity that arose after it happened. It made me feel pathetic. For the longest time, all anyone could ever see when they looked at me was my dead father, and when that was the ghost I was already confronted with each time I looked into the mirror, the last thing I wanted was to see that on all of the living faces that passed me by.

Kaipo was the only person who never treated me any differently after Dad died. He comforted me when I needed it, but he never treated me as if I had a big fragile sticker stuck to my forehead. I was still his friend who acted a little differently but was otherwise the same girl, even though I knew that I wasn't and never would be anymore.

"It was... it was the last song we ever danced to. I've listened to it since but... I don't know. Hearing him sing it tonight just—"

I couldn't explain it. A long time had passed since I had any sort of reaction like that about, well, anything. Even as we sat there, my heart raced so quickly that I was convinced it was the reason why my fingers appeared to be shaking, tiny seismic vibrations. More than usual, I had become hyperaware of the sound of my surroundings—the sound of water trickling from a storm drain, the click of a lighter followed by the inhale of a cigarette, a staggered pair of footsteps fading into the night.

Luckily, Kaipo didn't need me to. We had been friends for long enough that we knew what the other was thinking even when we didn't understand ourselves. There weren't a lot of things I was sure of nowadays, but I always understood that I was lucky to have a friend like Kaipo. Someone who saw me at my worst and still stuck around. I never wanted to take advantage of it, and while I wasn't always as good of a friend as I wished I could be, I thought I did a decent job.

"It's okay," he said quietly enough that his words became one with the wind. I shielded myself from both. "It happens. This kind of thing happens and you don't have to feel bad if it does or worry yourself sick trying to figure out what it means. Especially not when you're with someone in a place that makes you feel vulnerable. Okay?"

"Okay." I nodded. But it wasn't enough. As much as I appreciated the comfort loved ones gave me, sometimes it just wasn't enough, and I had to convince myself to pretend otherwise just to stand steady on my own two feet again. "Can we go to your place?"

"If you want, yeah."

"Okay." I rubbed my arms and exhaled. "Where's your car?"

"Ready to make your great escape already?"

"When am I ever not?"

"Well, I'm drunk and didn't drive here," Kaipo clarified. "So I can order the Uber."

Before he even finished speaking, I had already taken out my phone and pulled up the app. If he was going to let me spend the night and cut his short, the least I could do was pay for the ride. The app told me the driver would be here in five minutes so I lowered the phone and nudged us over to a better spot to wait.

Those five minutes felt like an hour as I wondered about those I had left behind inside the bar. Kanani and Keali'i would probably wait to leave with Anthony who was watching the show from the front near the stage. If Nikau had watched me leave, I didn't even want to think about what his face looked like. Considering he was singing the song for me, it wouldn't have surprised me if he had noticed. Would he have visibly reacted to seeing me bolt out of there? Or would he have been enough of a professional to not let it faze him? If he had noticed, would he have been under the impression that I didn't like what he sang or would he be understanding and, somehow, know it had nothing to do with him? Would he have even cared? Was I just a woman in the crowd who thought she was more important than she was?

...

For a split second every morning when I awoke, I felt completely normal. As if nothing bad had ever happened to me, and like I had never felt like some outsider trying to fit into a world that wanted nothing to do with me.

It was the only time in my life during which I truly felt at peace, and even then it was because I hadn't fully woken up to the rest of the world yet. Crust in the inner corner of my eyes, long hair knotted into tangles, and I could pretend even just for a moment that I was happy. I could take a deep breath, breathing in that fresh salt air, and lay in content.

Ignorance often bred a tragic amount of bliss into those who would simply never truly know peace. Pretending that I could blend into the rest of the world, even if I didn't fully believe it, was often the only way I survived, no matter how many times I was convinced I would one day remove myself from the equation.

As soon as that moment passed, it all came rushing back to me.

That moment came sooner rather than later since I had woken up in someone else's bed.

My fingers trailed across the familiar sheets that didn't belong to me. Kaipo and I had countless sleepovers when we were younger, especially when we were in elementary school, so it wasn't like this was completely foreign territory. But it had been a while since I had been her overnight, even on those days when we used each other's bodies for fun.

"Oh, hey, you're awake." Kaipo entered the room, shutting the door quietly behind him. His chest was bare and he wore the same pair of basketball shorts he used for bed since we were in high school, albeit with a few small pukas in it now. "Mom made some breakfast. Said she just picked up more Advil if you need."

Maybe we made use of his parents' liquor cabinet when we got back last night. Maybe we hadn't. The pounding headache I was nursing wouldn't tell.

When he placed a plate of rice (extra furikake), spam, and eggs down on my lap on top of the comforter, I smiled. He sat down, balancing his own plate in his other hand while he used the other to grab the remote and turn on the TV.

"I can't believe you told Aunty I stole her booze," I joked.

"I think the empty bottles in the trash were a giveaway."

"They were actually in the recycling bin, thank you very much."

Kaipo nudged the fork closer to me.

We ate in silence while an old cartoon played out on the screen. I wasn't really sure if I was paying attention to it or knew what was going on because I had seen the episode before. Maybe I had seen it in the morning when I used to wake up to get ready for school. I would trek downstairs, make myself some breakfast, and sit in front of the TV before watching the sunrise. Cartoons were always a must, or the occasional Fresh Prince of Bel-Air rerun.

"So, are we going to talk about last night now?" he asked once I lowered my empty plate onto the carpet, out of the way. It would have been foolish to expect to get out of this slumber party without confronting the reason I was here in the first place, but I had still held out hope for that slim chance anyway. "Or we can tackle the bigger picture thing."

"What bigger picture thing?"

He shrugged. "I don't know exactly, but I'm sure there is one. You don't just run out of a bar like that without one. And I know you like to come to me to escape all of that confrontation, but at some point, I think I have to stop enabling it."

"You make it sound so dramatic," I scoffed.

"If you don't tell anyone what it is, we're going to have to assume that it could be." When I didn't respond right away, or even after a couple of minutes, he carried on. "Listen, I'm not a therapist or anything. Maybe I've been going about this all wrong all the years. Maybe I should listen to you and trust that it isn't a big deal. But sometimes... I wonder if just being there is enough. You know, watching you avoid confronting what's bothering you and helping you look the other way. I feel like as a friend I should be doing more to help you."

"You do help."

"But how?" He wouldn't look at me anymore, his eyes cast down to his bedspread. "How do I help beyond just providing the getaway car?"

"You... you listen to me when I need someone—"

"You don't talk, Hoku," he interrupted. "You talk but you don't talk. You avoid talking and think everyone will forget about it long enough to take the bait. And we do. But how much longer can I do that and still feel like I'm actually being your friend?"

I picked at my cuticles and watched them redden with each scratch. Most times, I didn't feel anything. Maybe I had become too numb to it. Other days, I kept going even when I did feel it, like someone was scraping nails against my bones. Truthfully, part of me liked the release once I started bleeding. I knew it was bad. I knew it could damage my nails or fingers permanently. It didn't stop me from doing it.

Kaipo's hand covered mine, pulling them apart and laying them back down on my lap.

It was then I noticed the tears slipping down my cheeks.

"I don't know what I'm doing wrong with life," I admitted. The words nearly got stuck in my throat and I subconsciously scratched at it as if I could peel them out of me. Hang them out to dry and let the world finally see what I've been too afraid to admit for years. My entire life. This feeling has been my entire life, and I wasn't sure how to be anything else. "Whenever I think I'm in a good place, something sets me off and I feel like I've taken twenty steps back. I hate it. I don't even feel like a failure anymore. I don't feel like... anything. I just exist. And I thought it was losing Dad that made me this way but it wasn't. I've been this way for as long as I've breathed. I just want it to stop. I want my heart to stop feeling so fucking heavy all the time and turning every good thing into something bad. I want to stop ruining everything good because I think it's going to end up that way anyway." I rubbed my nose, not even embarrassed by the snot left behind. "It's just a matter of time before you get the hell out of dodge and leave."

His brows furrowed together. "I would never do that."

Then it happened. Kaipo looked at me, all red-eyed and snot-nosed, and saw the pathetic, sad girl that everyone else had seen their entire lives. He saw me for who I was at my worst. And he felt sorry for me.

I guess it was okay after all. I felt sorry for myself, too.