“So. What do you think, sweetie? Aloha?” I pantomimed a little hula.
“I guess.”
Not exactly “Yippee!” But she was willing to go.
By noon, thanks to Charlie Hunt’s intervention, the public defender’s office had granted a “compassionate leave” for its very junior first-year researcher. Two weeks. Unpaid.
Fair enough.
After a lunch of tomato soup and tuna sandwiches, Katy and I dug out and organized scuba and snorkeling gear. At least I did. She mostly watched.
I made calls when Katy went home to pack. LaManche had no objection to my two-week absence from the LSJML in Montreal, provided I was reachable by phone. Pete agreed to take Birdie. My neighbor agreed to look after the town house. Tim Larabee, the Mecklenburg County medical examiner, asked that prior to my departure I examine a skull found off Sam Furr Road just north of Charlotte. I promised to do the analysis the following day.
Danny rang around six with flight information. Convinced of the righteousness of his plan, he’d gone ahead and booked a reservation for Katy.
Danny said he’d meet our plane, warned teasingly of a surprise. No amount of cajoling could wangle further information from him. Slightly uneasy, I disconnected.
Thursday night, after wrapping up with the Sam Furr skull, I treated Charlie Hunt to dinner. Partly because I missed him. Partly to thank him for scoring Katy her unearned vacation.
We met at Barrington’s, a tiny bistro buried in a southeast Charlotte retail complex. Unlikely location. Pricey tab. Kick-ass food.
I had the tagliatelle. Charlie had the grouper. For dessert, we shared an order of bread pudding with white chocolate ice cream.
Afterward, leaning on my Mazda, I said
I was tempted. Very tempted.
But not yet.
To Charlie’s dismay, we both went home solo.
Getting to Hawaii from North Carolina is easier now than back in the nineties when I consulted to the CIL. But the trip still takes half your life.
I rose at dawn on Friday and called Katy. She was up, but sounded groggy. Said she couldn’t sleep and had spent all of Thursday and into the wee hours writing about Coop’s death.
My daughter had begun blogging the previous winter. I’d visited her site, ChickWithThoughts.blogpost.com, and been surprised at the eloquence of her posts. And at the serious nature of the subject matter. Topics ranged from presidential politics, to ecoterrorism, to global economics. I’d been astounded at the number of people who read and participated in the discussions.
Flying US Airways from Charlotte via Phoenix, we arrived in Honolulu at two thirty in the afternoon. One gains five hours traveling west, so the outbound leg seemed deceptively painless. But I knew from experience. The return would lay me low.
Though I hadn’t been involved in the official transfer, I was aware of the young man riding below us in the cargo bay. Throughout the journey my thoughts had repeatedly drifted to him. Who was he? What was his story? How had he ended up in Spider Lowery’s grave?
Katy slept through most of the flight. I tried writing reports, gave up. I’m lousy at working on planes. I blame it on altitude. It’s really just lack of discipline.
The movie offerings were approved by censors for both sailors on shore leave and four-year-old Baptists, so I read, alternating between a Hawaiian travel book and a Stephen King novel.
During one of her brief waking periods, I explained the JPAC issue to Katy. No details. The last thing she needed was a reminder of the tragic cost of war. But Katy would be on her own while I was working at the CIL. She’d be curious about where I was and why.
Katy listened without interrupting, a response I found unsettling. Normally my daughter would have posed a thousand questions and offered an equal number of opinions. I understood her listlessness. Though Katy kept it to herself, I’d overheard her rephoning the Coopertons before leaving my house on Thursday. Her side of the conversation indicated another rebuff.
As promised, Danny was waiting in baggage claim, cart at the ready. Upon spotting us, he beamed like a kid who’d just downed a Snickers.
Hugs all around.
While Danny and I collected the luggage, Katy went in search of a john. Danny took the opportunity to query my daughter’s state of mind. I waggled a hand. So-so.
I asked about the remains from Lumberton. He said that Silas Sugarman had delivered the transport container to the Charlotte airport and that it was listed on the manifest of our flight.
I knew the drill. The transport container would be off-loaded and taken to the cargo area, where it would be met by personnel from Borthwick, a local Oahu mortuary. With paperwork completed, the coffin would travel by hearse to Hickam and enter the CIL through a rear door. An accession number would be assigned, and the remains would await processing.
The Avis line moved at the pace of sludge. When I reached the counter, the agent could find no trace of my reservation. After much sighing and head-shaking, a car was finally located, a red Chevrolet Cobalt about the size of my purse.
