Aloha, page 66
Before he knew it, he looked up and saw he had arrived at the park on Ozone Ave in Santa Monica, just a couple of blocks from the house. On a Monday afternoon, the place had a small spattering of young kids, their parents or babysitters, and a noisy half-dozen dogs rambling around the area fenced off just for them.
And there, under the large red arch that tethered the swings, he saw Hope.
His heart screeched to a stop. So did his feet. Unable to process seeing her here unexpectedly, he ducked behind a tree.
God, he was such an asshole. Why had he hidden? He should turn. Walk away.
No, he’d tried that already and it had been a massive mistake.
Still, she did not want to see him. She’d made that perfectly clear. But he hadn’t come back to Los Angeles to leave old wounds untended to.
He had to talk to her.
He was stepping out toward the sandy area beneath the arches when he saw that Hope hadn’t shown up alone. Mel had been chasing a couple of toddlers with a bright orange bubble gun, squealing with glee along with her pint-sized prey. Hope looked up from pushing another child on the swing when she caught sight of her sister’s antics and burst into laughter.
The sight punched him in the gut. It was one thing to see her when she was filled with rage and pain, but it was entirely something else to see her standing in the sunlight, her skin dappled with sunlight and her smile bright with uninhibited happiness.
How could he take this moment away?
The choice was taken out of his hands when she looked out and their eyes locked.
As predicted, her smile dropped into a frown.
Part of him wanted to retreat, but his stronger urge was to march forward and prove he wasn’t afraid to finally face what he’d done to her. But he also didn’t want to be a bully. She’d asked him to leave her alone, which was why he couldn’t believe it when she gestured for Mel, who’d also noticed him, to stay put and started walking toward him on her own.
As she came around the swinging children, her expression hardened.
“Are you following me?” she asked.
“No,” he replied, his hands up in a sign of surrender. “I went to visit the Kaponos and took a walk around the neighborhood. They didn’t say a word about you being here.”
She pressed her lips together as if to contain the first words she’d wanted to say. He probably shouldn’t have noticed how soft and luscious her lips looked or give himself permission to remember the taste of those lips on his, but he couldn’t help himself.
This was why he hadn’t come home. This is why he’d broken up with her over Facetime. His attraction to her muddled his brain, causing the blood to rush around his veins like white water rapids.
That, and because he was a jerk.
“They don’t know we’re here,” she said. “Mel has to drop off some ukulele strings she ordered online for Ben and when we passed by the park and saw the swings, we decided to stop. It wasn’t planned.”
“Maybe it was kismet,” he said.
“Maybe it was bad luck,” she countered.
Her tone was clipped, but she didn’t move. Did this mean she wanted to talk to him? Hope had never been shy with her opinions, criticisms or praise, as she’d proved Friday night. She could leave, but something was making her stay.
Maybe it was just curiosity, but at this point, he’d take what he could get.
He’d blindsided her at the restaurant and she’d reacted with justifiable anger. But though he’d surprised her by showing up here, this time, at least she’d known he was in town. And she wasn’t trapped by customers or obligations. They were out in the sunshine at a familiar place.
Their place.
How many times had they snuck out of the Kapono’s home after midnight to stroll to this park and jump on the swings? How many nights had they kissed under the trees, out of the sight of the streetlights so the neighbors who might call the police, or worse, call the Kaponos, wouldn’t see? They’d come here after dates to finish off their In-and-Out chocolate shakes. They’d often come here to toss frisbees or footballs with Mel and the other fosters.
When he’d finally decided to ask her to marry him, this is where he’d done it. God, he’d forgotten. How could he have forgotten? He’d placed a cheap ring he’d bought off of a vendor at Ventura Beach on her finger, promising to get her something better as soon as he could afford it.
She’d said she didn’t care about fancy jewelry. He still wanted something better. Not just a big diamond, but he wanted to offer her a better life than either of them had ever expected when they’d been just lost, overlooked, unwanted kids.
His life had been laid out like a roadmap to delinquency and poverty. Even when his parents were alive, they’d spent what little money they had at the local bar or liquor store rather than save a penny for his future.
When they’d died in a wreck, he hadn’t been surprised. He’d been sad–devastated even–but not surprised. Losing his parents, neglectful as they were, to alcohol had been his darkest nightmare come true. Having to go live with his equally neglectful uncle hadn’t changed his view that the only future he could look forward to included jail or an early grave. That’s when he’d run. He figured his future couldn’t be any worse in the California sunshine that it had been in the choking desert heat.
It had ended up being magical, especially when he’d reached sixteen and suddenly, the girl who shared a bedroom across the hall changed from being someone to play videogames with into the woman he’d wanted to kiss. Wanted to love.
Did love.
Then and now.
The flair of her dark blond hair in the breeze taunted him. The hint of her perfume teased his nostrils. But it was her eyes that tore him in two. She was struggling to make her expression passive and unreadable, but everything he needed to see was reflected in the mossy green centers of her irises.
He’d hurt her. Deeply.
“I’m sorry,” he blurted.
The hazel gaze narrowed. “Sorry for what, Tyler?”
“For leaving. For not taking you with me.”
“I couldn’t go,” Hope replied dismissively. “You knew I’d never leave LA. Not for long. Not when my future was here. The restaurant. The family. I couldn’t leave that behind.”
Yes, he’d known, just as they’d accepted that Tyler was not college material and he’d never had the means to even consider expensive culinary schools. The Kaponos had known that Hope had the smarts to get a degree. To him, they’d given all the kitchen experience and hands-on learning they could offer. They’d given her the higher education she’d always aspired to, as well as the responsibility to run Sunsets once she finished school. If he’d stayed, he would have run their kitchen, but he would never have known how to grow their legacy or see the endless possibilities outside their dream.
He’d used what he’d learned at Lu’s side to snag himself an opportunity he never could have imagined as a thirteen-year-old sleeping behind a Dumpster at a church on Wilshire. His flair with traditional Hawaiian cuisine had brought him to Paolo’s attention, but his hunger to be as adventurous in the kitchen as Paolo was in the world of finance was what had made him a success.
But now that he had the success he’d craved, what was left?
He’d fully intended to only do a year jetting around the globe and studying world cuisines before he returned home to Los Angeles to use his expanded knowledge to elevate the food at Sunsets and eventually open a restaurant he could call his own. But working for the high profile investor had been too seductive to limit to one year. Over the past six, he’d cooked for titans of finance, heads of state, Oscar winners and supermodels. He’d picked wild yams from a mountainside in Peru and prepared them over an open fire in a village square under the shadow of Machu Picchu. He’d shopped roadside farmers markets with former line cooks who now had their own shows on the Food Network or Netflix. He’d fished in the Great Barrier Reef and served his catch to a prime minister and her entourage.
He’d done all of those things…at the cost of his once-in-a-lifetime love.
“I’m sorry,” he repeated.
This time, she waved the words away. “Don’t, Tyler. You had a chance to do something amazing. I get why you went. I even understand why you broke things off.” Her eyes narrowed. “Though, you might have considered doing it face to face rather than in a video call.”
He winced at that direct hit. “I was stupid. Young, selfish, cowardly.”
“Yes, you were.” She shrugged, as if that wasn’t the shittiest thing he could have done, though he knew it was. “What I do not understand is why you stayed away so long. Was it just because of me?”
Hope’s eyes remained stoic even while her lips quivered. His fingers itched to cup her chin and smooth away her pain, but he did not have the right.
“No,” he said.
“You’re sure?” she pressed.
He could not lie to her. He’d already broken promises and caused her more anguish than he’d ever intended. He couldn’t compound that with a blatant untruth.
“I couldn’t face you,” he confessed. “I couldn’t face what I’d done to you. What I’d done to us.”
She scowled. “You didn’t do anything to me and there is no us anymore. You went off to live your best life. I would have been happy for you. I would have cheered you on. I did, if you remember.”
“I know,” he said. “And then I fucked it up by breaking up with you over the phone from across the world. I should have found a way to get back here to see you in person. I didn’t want to hold you to the promises I knew I couldn’t keep. But it was wrong. I messed up and I will be sorry for that for the rest of my life.”
She mulled his confession. Her mouth moved as she considered his apology. Was she biting back what she really wanted to say or just biding her time until she could form all the sharpest barbs?
“Yeah, you messed up, Ty,” she said, using the nickname she hadn’t spoken for years. “But not by breaking up with me. Your biggest mistake was asking me to marry you when we were nineteen-year-old idiots who had no idea what the world had in store for us. And I made it worse by saying yes.”
Her words were classic Hope–honest, self-deprecating and straight to the point.
“We were in love,” he insisted.
“We were kids in love,” she admitted. “I’m not minimizing how I felt about you then. Or even what I still feel now after all this time. But I’ve spent years blaming you for most of it and that’s not fair. In a different time and in a different set of circumstances, we might have worked. But we didn’t. I’m tired of wallowing in that. Aren’t you?”
Tyler took a step back. He thought he’d been prepared for anything and everything she might say to him when he finally apologized, but he hadn’t been ready for this.
The honest, heartfelt words that had come out of her mouth shocked even Hope. She hadn’t planned to voice them; honestly, before this morning, she hadn’t even considered them. They were true, though–she was tired of blaming him and definitely tired of wallowing.
She and Mel had spent the morning catching up, talking about nothing and feasting on burgers and beer from a food truck by the beach before heading over to the house. But they’d also managed to deconstruct more than a little about her feelings for Ty.
Ty. The first and only boy she’d ever kissed under the tree that had shaded the park and still did now.
The only man she’d ever loved.
Even now, after all the time and distance and pain, she was still blindsided by the power of her elemental response to his nearness. His boyish good looks had morphed into manly handsomeness. He was broader, older, devastatingly better.
His blue eyes blazed with surprise and then she spied a hint of the grin she’d always found so disarming, as if he couldn’t believe there was a path to forgiveness for them, even though he’d offered an apology or two. Or three? Or a thousand unspoken ones, judging by his soulful eyes.
She was ready to accept them all.
The truth was, Hope had no more anger or resentment to hold onto. Somehow between Friday and today, it had evaporated into nothing. Perhaps it had dissipated a long time ago and she’d been holding onto the remnants in order to keep herself in an endless holding pattern. That part had not been his fault. She’d made choices, too, and it was time for her to own each and every one.
“Honestly, Hope,” he said, taking a tentative step closer, “I haven’t wallowed in my guilt half as much as I should have. I’ve been avoiding the past by living 100% in the present.”
“That doesn’t sound like a bad thing,” she said.
He shook his head. “It wasn’t necessarily bad, but it was the easy way out. Too easy. I appreciate you cutting me slack, but I don’t want to leave here feeling good about bad decisions. I want to make it up to you.”
“You don’t owe me anything, Ty.”
“Don’t I?”
As much as she wanted to deny him and send him on his way, she couldn’t. Her feelings for him were different now, but they weren’t gone. If they had been, his absence wouldn’t have thrown her into a void of loneliness she hadn’t wanted to pull herself out of and his sudden reappearance wouldn’t have thrown her into an emotional tailspin. Although she hadn’t even realized it until this very moment, the truth was, she’d been waiting for him, just like she would have promised to if he’d given her the chance.
“Can I come by the restaurant tomorrow?” he asked. “Ben and Lu couldn’t stop talking about all you have done at Sunsets and how you saved the restaurant when the pandemic and lockdowns hit. How you and Mel have built a community of locals that fills the place every night.”
Her mouth quirked in a half-grin. She had never been comfortable with over-effusive praise. “We get new business, too. Mel is a master of TikTok.”
He chuckled. “I bet she is.”
“How about Wednesday?” she offered. She needed a beat. Time to process. Room to adjust. “We have our huli-huli chicken special on the menu,” she added with a smile, “and a group that does hula kahiko that can’t be seen anywhere else except the islands.”
“That would be great.” He glazed down for an instant and her brain immediately pictured the boy he’d been–the one who’d won her heart.
And that was her cue to leave.
When she turned to walk back to Mel, who’d likely been watching the entire time with a narrowed gaze, she thought she felt the warmth of his hand rising as if to touch her arm. She glanced over her shoulder in time to see him shove his hand into his pocket.
If he had made contact, what would she have done? Bolted or melted into his touch?
She didn’t know and she wasn’t prepared to find out.
The dance troupe that performed at Sunsets did so on Tuesdays, too. She’d pushed him off until Wednesday to buy herself more time. Everything she felt about him had shifted. All her emotions had changed. She needed to sort some of it out without putting him off forever. She had no idea how long he intended to stay. If she asked, she felt as if she would be telling him she wanted him to leave.
She didn’t.
Damn it all, but she didn’t.
“So?” Mel asked the minute they were close enough to talk over the squeals and shouts of the playing children.
She inhaled deeply. “We’re good. He’s coming to the restaurant Wednesday night to see all the updates and watch the show.”
“You’re good?” Mel asked, clearly shocked. “That’s it? Six years of heartbreak and sadness and you’re ‘good’ in one conversation?”
Mel even added the air quotes. Hope knew the proclamation sounded ridiculous, but the fact remained that she no longer wanted to tie herself up in knots over actions and decisions that happened before she and Ty had been old enough to drink.
She shrugged. “You said it yourself this morning. I can’t move on if I hold onto my pain. What happened in the past is the past. It’s time to move forward.”
“With him?” Mel asked, not as incredulous in her tone as Hope expected.
“Don’t be absurd,” Hope said. “He hasn’t seen the whole world yet. He still has his job. He won’t be here long.”
“He told you that?” Mel questioned.
“No,” Hope said. “We didn’t talk that much, but his dreams can’t have changed. He’s always wanted to travel and let the world be his classroom.”
Mel’s expression was doubtful. “You don’t know what his dreams are anymore, Hope, but if you’re wise, you’ll take the time to find out.”
Hope shook her head. “It’s his life. His dreams are his business.”
Mel hooked her arm in hers and led them toward where they’d parked their car. “And your dreams are your business. I just have a feeling you both have aspirations that overlap.”
Hope forced herself to laugh. “You’re crazy.”
“Yes,” Mel instantly agreed. “But that doesn’t make me wrong.”
Hope changed her clothes three times. First, she’d donned the uniform she usually wore, dark pants with a blouse made with the proprietary Sunsets pattern, but in soft greens and browns she’d had made for management. She looked good, she decided after a long perusal in the mirror, but too ordinary. She swapped her top out for one with the pinks and purples Mel preferred, but it washed out her makeup and made her look pale. If she added more blush or brightened her eyeshadow to make it work, she’d look like she was trying too hard.
It was bad enough that she was trying at all.
She wanted to look attractive for Ty. She could spend unnecessary energy trying to convince herself otherwise, but what was the point? Even if he planned to leave Los Angeles again–and she had no reason to believe he wouldn’t–she’d rather him return to his new life remembering her at her best.
At last, she pulled out the dress that the designer from LaHaina had put together as a gift, one she’d been saving for a special occasion. It had hints of the Sunsets design with its wide hibiscus pattern, but it was otherwise unique. No one else at the restaurant had a dress that was short enough to skim her thighs, long, slightly belled sleeves impractical for serving food and a neckline that swooped from shoulder to shoulder, leaving her skin bare. Even the colors were special, a blend of her preferred earth tones with pops of gold and pink. Paired with sandals that would keep her from dropping into the kitchen without risking a code violation, she looked as if she was going on a first date rather than to work.
