Dance Dance Dance

dinner. We grilled the steak with onions and soy sauce, we tossed a salad, we had miso soup with tofu and scallions. A pleasant supper. Yuki even had half a glass of California wine.

«You're not such a bad cook,» Yuki said.

«No, not true. I just put my heart into it. That's the dif­ference. It's a question of attitude. If you really work at

something, you can do it, up to a point. If you really work at being happy, you can do it, up to a point.»

«But anything more than that, you can't.»

«Anything more than that is luck,» I said.

«You really know how to depress people, don't you? Is that what you call being adult?»

We washed the dishes, then went out walking on Kalakaua Avenue as the lights were blinking on. We cri­ tiqued the merchandise of different offbeat shops, eyed the outfits of the passersby, took a rest stop at the crowded Royal Hawaiian Hotel garden bar. I got my requisite pina colada; Yuki asked for fruit punch. I thought of Dick North and how he would hate the noisy city night. I didn't mind it so much myself.

«What do you think of my mother?» Yuki asked when

our drinks arrived.

«Honestly, I don't know what to think,» I said after a moment. «It takes me a while to consider everything and pass judgment. Afraid I'm not very bright.»

«But she did get you a little mad, right?»

«Oh yeah?»

«It was all over your face,» said Yuki.

«Maybe so,» I said, taking a sip and looking out on the night sea. «I guess I did get a little annoyed.»

«At what?»

«At the total lack of responsibility of the people who should be looking after you. But what's the use? Who am I to get mad? As if it does any good.»

Yuki nibbled at a pretzel from a dish on the table. «I guess nobody knows what to do. They want to do some­thing, but they don't know how.»

«Nobody seems to know how.»

«And you do?»

«I'm waiting for hints to take shape, then I'll know what

action to take.»

Yuki fingered the neck of her T-shirt. «I don't get it,» she said.

«All you have to do is wait,» I explained. «Sit tight and wait for the right moment. Not try to change anything by force, just watch the drift of things. Make an effort to cast a fair eye on everything. If you do that, you just naturally know what to do. But everyone's always too busy. They're too tal­ented, their schedules are too full. They're too interested in themselves to think about what's fair.»

Yuki planted an elbow on the table, then swept the pret­zel crumbs from the tablecloth. A retired couple in matching aloha shirt and muumuu at the next table sipped out of a big, brash tropical drink. They looked so happy. In the torch-lit courtyard, a woman was playing the electric piano. Her singing was less than wonderful, but two or three pairs of hands clapped when her vocal stylings were over. And then Yuki grabbed my pina colada and took a quick sip.

«Yum,» she exclaimed.

«Two votes yum,» I said. «Motion passed.»

Yuki stared at me. «What is with you? I can't figure you out. One minute you're Mister Cool, the next you're bonkers from the toes up.»

«If you're sane, that means you're off your rocker. So don't worry about it,» I replied, then ordered another pina colada from a frighteningly cheerful waitress. She wiggled off, trotted back with the drink, then vanished leaving behind a mile-wide Cheshire grin.

«Okay, so what am I supposed to do?» said Yuki.

«Your mother wants to see more of you,» I said. «I don't know any more than that. She's not my family, and she's as unusual as they come. As I understand her, she wants to get out of the rut of a mother-daughter relationship and become friends with you.»

«Making friends isn't so easy.»

«Agreed,» I said. «Two votes not so easy.»

With both elbows now on the table, Yuki gave me a dubi­ous look.

«And what do you think? About Mama's way of thinking.»

«What I think doesn't matter. The question is, what do you think? You could think it's wishful thinking on her part. Or you could think it's a constructive stance worth consider­ing. It all depends on you. But don't make any rush deci­sions. You should take your time thinking it over.»

Yuki propped her chin up on her hands. There was a loud guffaw from the counter. The pianist launched into «Blue Hawaii.» Heavy breathing to a tinkling of high notes. The night is young and so are we. . .

«We're not doing so well right now,» said Yuki. «Before going to Sapporo was the worst. She was on my case about not going to school. It was real messy. We hardly spoke to each other. I never wanted to see her. That dragged on and on. But then Mama doesn't think like normal people do. She says whatever comes into her head and then she forgets it right after she's said it. She's serious when she says it, but after that she might as well have never said a thing. And then out of nowhere, she wants to play mother again. That's what really pisses me off.»

«But—,» I tried to interrupt.

«But she is interesting. She isn't like anybody else in the world. She may be the pits as a mother and she's really screwed me up, but she is interesting. Not like Papa. I don't really know what to think, though. Now she says she wants to be friends. She's so ... overwhelming, so powerful, and I'm just a kid. Anyone can see that, right? But no-o, not her. Mama says she wants to be friends, but the harder she tries, the more it hurts me. That's how it was in Sapporo. She tried to get close to me, she actually tried. So I started to get closer to her. I tried, honest. But her head's always so full of stuff, she just spaces out. And the next thing I know, she's gone.» Yuki sent her half-nibbled pretzel out over the sand. «Now if that's not loopy, what is? I like Mama. I guess I like her. And I guess I wouldn't mind if we were friends. I just don't want to have everything dumped back on me again like that. I hate that.»

«Everything you say is right,» I said. «Completely under­standable.»

«Not for Mama. She wouldn't understand if you spelled it all out for her.»

«No, I don't think so either.»

The next day dawned with another glorious Hawaiian sunrise. We ate breakfast, then went to the beach in front of the Sheraton. We rented boards and tried to surf. Yuki enjoyed herself so much that afterward we went to a surf shop near the Ala Moana Shopping Center and bought two used boards. The salesclerk asked if we were brother and sis­ter. I said yes. I was glad we didn't look like father and daughter.

At two o'clock we were back on the beach, lazing. Sun­bathing, swimming, napping, listening to the radio and tun­ing out, thumbing through paperbacks, people-watching, listening to the wind in the palms. The sun slowly traveled its prescribed path. When it went down, we returned to our rooms, showered, ate some spaghetti and salad, then we went to see a Spielberg movie. After the movie we took a walk and ended up at the Halekulani poolside bar, where I had a pina colada again and Yuki her usual fruit punch.

A dance band was playing «Frenesi.» An elderly clarinet­ist took a long solo, reminiscent of Artie Shaw, while a dozen retired couples in silks and satins danced around the pool, faces illuminated by the rippling blue light from below. A hallucinatory vision. After how many years, these people had finally made it to Hawaii. They glided gracefully, their steps learned and true. The men moved with their backs straight, chins tucked in, the women with their evening dresses swirling, drawing cheek-to-cheek as the band played «Moon Glow.»

«I'm getting sleepy again,» said Yuki. But this time, she walked back alone. Progress.

Returning to my room, I opened a bottle of wine and watched Clint Eastwood's Hang 'Em High on the tube. By the time I was on my third glass, I was so sleepy I gave up on the whole thing and got ready to knock off. It'd been another perfect Hawaiian day. And it wasn't over yet.

Five minutes after I'd crawled into bed, the doorbell rang. A little before midnight. Terrific. What did Yuki