The first song that came on the playlist was “Lush Life,” sung by the incomparable Ella Fitzgerald. That was followed by “Just One of Those Things” by Oscar Peterson and Louis Armstrong. I didn’t start playing air keyboards, at least with one hand, until “Love for Sale” came on.
The music certainly isn’t island music, but it’s nourishment for my soul. That is the point of music, isn’t it? The songs also blended in nicely with the blue sky and blue ocean one sees while driving down the coast. Before I knew it, I was pulling into my driveway and all the negative thoughts of Guy Livingston and his attorney, Henry Mitchell, had washed away.
I parked inside the garage to keep the sun from melting the car’s black leather seats. When I opened the door to the kitchen, I was greeted by my dog, Maui. He was sitting by the kitchen island, his tail wagging a million miles per hour.
“Hey, Maui. It feels like several months since I’ve seen you,” I said.
In reality, it had been all of four hours.
Maui trotted over to me and did his world-famous tuck and roll. This is basically when he transitions from his happy-you’re-finally-home dance into a position on his back for the expected and demanded belly rub. I kneeled on the kitchen tiles and scratched away.
Maui wasn’t the only thing I noticed when I walked in the house. Those lovely and calming tunes from Oscar Peterson had been replaced by Britney Spears’ music blaring from every room. We have a high-end entertainment system that can play music throughout the house. It’s all controlled with an app on our phones.
I don’t mean to sound disrespectful to Ms. Spears. I’m sure she’s a lovely woman, but the presence of her music in my house told me one thing. Alana was stressed since she only tends to play pop music at that volume when she’s upset.
I found her apparent distress kind of ironic considering that she’d just started a two-week vacation. Her sister, Hani Hu, was due to be married soon, and Hani had asked Alana to take some time off to help her with last-minute details.
You may suspect that I immediately went looking for Alana. I didn’t. We’ve been married for a while and I’ve learned to give her some space during times like this. Instead, I walked over to the refrigerator and grabbed a Negra Modelo, one of my beers of choice. I popped the top and took a long drink.
“Any more of those in there?” Alana asked.
I turned and saw her walking down the stairs. She was dressed in a white tank top and white shorts. The shorts were a little shorter than usual, which showcased those long, tan legs of hers. I couldn’t help but wonder how I’d landed such a hot wife, but that’s usually what I think of when I set eyes upon her.
“There are a few more beers. Want just one or should I hand you two?” I asked.
“Why would I want two?”
“What’s that? I can’t hear you over the loud music.”
“Oh, yeah,” Alana said, and she pulled her phone out of her pocket. She adjusted the volume to a level that didn’t make my head want to explode.
I handed Alana her beer as she walked into the kitchen.
“How did the trial go?” she asked.
“Fine. I’m still in one piece.”
I gave Alana the rundown on the defense attorney’s cross-examination.
“He really accused you of forgetting what was said? Wait. Forget I asked that question. He’s a defense attorney.”
“Sure, but what else was he going to do? His client’s obviously guilty.”
“Sounds like we both had rough mornings,” she said.
At this point, I secretly congratulated myself on predicting Alana’s foul mood. There were very few people who could get her upset. I’m one of them, but I felt pretty confident I wasn’t the offending party in this situation. That left two likely suspects. Hani and Ms. Luana Hu, Alana’s mother. My money was on the mother.
“Hani came by this morning.”
And there went my perfect record of predictions for the day.
“Oh, what did she want?” I asked.
“You know about the party Yuto is throwing.”
I did and I found it rather odd. Hani and Yuto’s wedding was just two weeks away, yet Yuto had decided that he wanted to throw a party for Hani a week before the big event. He’d said that he had a surprise for her. No one knew what that surprise was, though. I certainly didn’t, which had offended me slightly. Why? Because Yuto had asked if we could have the party at our house. You’d think he could have at least let me in on the surprise, but he’d refused.
“What about the party?” I asked.
“Well, Hani came by this morning to talk about the catering.”
“I thought we had that settled. We’re using the same company we used for the last party.”
“That’s what I thought, but apparently Hani wasn’t happy with them,” Alana said.
“That’s a surprise. Everyone seemed to like them.”
“Exactly. She told me that she’s already hired a replacement, but we’re going to lose the deposit I put down on the first one.”
“How much?”
“Five hundred dollars. Can you believe that?”
“I’d just drop it. It’s not worth the argument.”
“It’s five hundred dollars, Poe.”
“I get it.”
“Your problem is you have no sense of money because of how much you’re worth.”
“First of all, we’re worth that much. Your name is on all of those financial accounts. Second, I do know what things are worth, and five hundred bucks is a steal if it keeps your little sister happy.”
“When you put it that way.”
“Was that the only argument? Something tells me there was more to it,” I said.
Alana took a long drink of her beer.
“That good, huh?” I said.
“We argued about Foxx.”
“Let me guess. You told her that she should invite Foxx to the party, and she said no.”
“Well,
