He nodded, not liking her dismissal. But Kai’s energy was zapped, and he was exhausted. He waited for Gia to finish the kitchen and move into the now sparsely outfitted guest room. There was only a mattress and box springs on the floor and a few towels left in the bathroom. Gia squeezed his shoulder when she left the living room, a silent good night that he didn’t try to make last longer. It was nearly a half hour before the guest shower kicked off and he heard Gia’s low hum go silent and the light in the guest room click off.
Finally, he was alone. Finally, there was something he could say that he hadn’t been able to get out for a solid week.
Kai stared up at the moon, his bare feet sinking into the damp grass, his gaze wide, open as he stared at the clear sky. Somewhere, he believed, Keeana was there between the stars, maybe floating above them all. Maybe she was part of them, dust and particles that everything was made of. Maybe her soul had descended and left this plane for another one; one that didn’t hurt and tell you how worthless you are. One that didn’t insist that the rich be fed on the backs of the suffering poor. One that didn’t think men like Kai, strong men, athletic men, held greater value than women like Keeana, like his daughter who were clearly smarter, braver than he would ever be.
Maybe out there, his nani Keeana, his very best friend would be free forever. She would soar and fly and see everything there was to see. Maybe she would shift time and space and be born again into another body, another life that would find Kai and Keola again.
But Kai didn’t want to think about maybes. He wanted to apologize.
“Miki, Keeana,” he said, eyes squeezed shut so he could hold her face clearly in his mind. “Forgive me for not saving you. Forgive me for not staying here. Forgive me for not being a better man.”
The weight of the moment became too much, and Kai felt it topple him. The heaviness of her loss and the responsibility that fell solely to him now, the unfairness that his precious pēpē would grow up with fading memories of her strong, beautiful mother seemed too wrong, too unbearable and Kai let that weight bring him down until he was on his knees. Until he looked up, his cheeks wet yet again, as he closed his eyes praying to the woman who had given so much and taken so little from him.
“I’m so sorry…”
He stayed there, face uplifted, body bent to her, wherever she’d gone for hours, it seemed. Maybe it was minutes. Long enough that Kai’s knees hurt him and the drizzle of rain that had begun slowly when he moved out onto the lawn fell heavier, the raindrops stinging him until he jerked against their slaps.
Kai moved, aching all over as he got up, wiping his face free of tears and the increasing rain, but stopped short when he neared the patio, spotting Gia standing in the doorway, her eyes puffy, her cheeks wet, though she hadn’t stepped into the rain.
She knew. She always knew.
When she lifted her arms, calling him to her, Kai moved, collapsing against her, his face on the soft silk of her robe, craving her warmth, her comfort, inhaling that rich, sweet scent that always seemed to surround her.
“Hush,” she told him when he tried to speak and couldn’t manage much more than a rumble of noise. “Come inside.”
She led and Kai followed, feeling buzzed and numbed and bruised by the day, by the circumstance, by what might lie ahead for them all. Gia moved around him, slipping into the back and returning with a mostly dry towel that she used to wrap around his shoulders and his neck, to pat his face dry as she sat in front of him on the coffee table.
He liked the way she touched him. He liked the control in her movements, how each brush of the terrycloth over his face, in his hair was a touch she made to heal, to soothe. When Gia settled the towel over his shoulder, just like he’d done for her when she sprained her ankle, Kai covered her hands with his, making her stare at him, wanting her attention. Needing one look from her that told him he wouldn’t drown in all this pain.