That night at the Black Dog I lay awake listening to the water lapping against the bottom of the rocky embankment, in that rhythm older than time, when for sure gods and goddesses had ruled these islands. I slipped back to that one-horse town I’d grown up in, a place I rarely allow my mind to visit.
I finally dozed off and woke with the dawn. It was the habit of a lifetime, this early rising, formed during my days taking the early shifts at the factory, before I married the boss. I wondered what had seemed so strange to me about the sounds of the night and then realized there were no manmade sounds: no tires whining against the tarmac at high speed, no planes overhead. I could get used to this, I thought. Maybe it was time for a little place in the country or at the shore.
Geoff and I went down early to breakfast, to be met by Patsy or whatever her name was. We were both jet-lagged and dying for a cup of coffee, but first we had to listen to some interminable story about how the other day she’d spotted a “baby shark.”
“There have been so many sharks lately,” she informed us, although she seemed for some reason to be looking at me. “Attacks, people being killed.”
“Probably from overfishing,” said Geoff. “They have to travel farther to find prey.”
She nodded. “We have destroyed the ocean,” she pronounced. “Sharks have been sent by the old gods as a warning.”
With that she turned to retrieve the coffeepot from the service hutch between the dining room and the kitchen, treating us to her obverse side, which was nearly identical to her front, and again shrouded in denim; she was like one of those perfectly round Russian dolls that tucked neatly one inside the other, this one costumed by L.L. Bean. I wondered, disinterestedly, if this narrative was her idea of romance, an attempt to flirt with my husband. Clearly she liked Geoff. Clearly she saw me as some kind of rival for his affections. Her love was unrequited, for sure, unless Geoff had developed some denim fetish I didn’t know about.
My eyes wandered over the room’s decor, which basically looked like a vast, haphazard accumulation of vaguely nautical souvenirs, most of it blue and white to match the walls, rugs, and curtains. Some of it looked like it might have been gifted over the years — would anyone buy so many lighthouse-based lamps for themselves? If so, thought I, the owners needed some new friends.
I looked out the window to where a sliver of the swimming pool gleamed invitingly in the distance. Geoff followed my gaze.
“Time for a dip before we head out?” he said.
She answered for me.
“Sure, go ahead. It’s much warmer today, and the pool’s heated. Checkout’s whenever you want this afternoon. We’re not very busy.”
Which was like saying Death Valley didn’t get much rain.
I said, “You know what? Let’s just push on. We can take some coffee with us. Do you think you could refill our thermos before we leave?” I smiled at Miss Management, who nodded with that weird, barely disguised hostility she seemed to reserve just for me.
“What a nice idea,” said Geoff. “I wonder if we could trouble you for some sandwiches to take with us? Just add whatever you like to the bill.”
This was the flip side of Geoff He knew she would do it and only add a few dollars to the bill, if that, but he got to play the generous big shot. He got the smile she had not bothered to waste on me.
Geoff should have run for office.
I wasn’t planning to do it in shark-infested waters, if that’s what you’re thinking. Especially not with a shark-free infinity pool waiting, ready to tip Geoff over the edge into, well, infinity. But I just knew that demented woman would be everywhere I didn’t want her to be, watching us. Watching me. Fly/ointment.
I had thought to do it at Koki Beach, south of Hana, which I remembered from our earlier visit. It was another surfer-dude hangout, but every guidebook warned against swimming there because of the rip currents. Sadly, the surfers were out in force for some reason, even in off-season, and although they were occupied with catching their waves, I didn’t dare chance it. Over Geoff’s protests, we moved on.
“Too risky” I said.
And so we ended up taking the hairpin turns to ’Ohe’o Gulch. As I’d hoped, it was deserted in the early morning. This was the place of the Seven Sacred Pools. It is dangerously windy there, and anything could happen. People have died in rock slides. They’ve also been hit with debris when they swam directly beneath a fall. Really, I was spoiled for choice, but Geoff wanted to go swimming below one of the waterfalls, and who was I to stifle an ambition like that? I put up a token argument.
“At least have some coffee first, before it gets cold.”
After so many months of planning, it all happened fast, and despite the last-minute change of means — I had been thinking of a push off the top of a waterfall — it went well.
The way you fast-forward through the parts of a film you’ve seen before, I’d rehearsed this part so often in my mind, allowing for (nearly) every contingency, that the moments just flew by. Geoff sipped his coffee as we sat sheltered from the wind at a picnic table, and then he announced he was feeling tired for some reason and thought a swim might revive him. He stripped down to his swim trunks and trundled off, down to where the waterfall came to its glorious conclusion. Meanwhile, I washed out the thermos before ditching it in the stream. I watched as the water carried it over the fall.
I was listening closely when Geoff cried out. There were people at a distance, too far away to hear, and the steady drizzle of rain meant no one could see us clearly either. I watched my step going down — those rock slides — and reaching the bottom, I saw he was already taking in water. I saw a piece of driftwood and stooped to retrieve it. It might come in handy.
The dog appeared from nowhere, called by instinct and a noble nature to help where he could. I watched, incredulous, as Akea plunged in, paddling towards Geoff, who after a few spluttering resurfacings sank rapidly towards the bottom.
Throwing aside the driftwood, I leaped in too, and made a grab for the dog. I’ve told you I love animals, particularly dogs, and the thought of Akea drowning in this hopeless cause made me lose all sense of proportion. His arthritis kept him from all but the feeblest attempts at staying afloat, but on he swam towards Geoff. I guess even dogs have adrenaline surges. There was no hope he could save Geoff, but he was determined to try. To die trying. And he wouldn’t let me near him. How do animals always know?
Of course I realized Akea hadn’t got there under his own steam. That stupid woman must have followed us.
And there she was, coming too fast for safety down the path beside the waterfall, the soles of her feet slapping like gunshots against her flip-flops.
I yelled, “He’s drowned — I think — heart attack. Help me get the dog.”
From a lip of rock over the water, she hit the water in a perfect cannonball, her denim skirt billowing out behind her. She could see Geoff was beyond saving. But the exhausted dog allowed her to drag him to the shallow end of the pool, where she commanded him to stay. He looked like that was the hardest command he’d ever had to follow, but he obeyed. Meanwhile I tried to collect Geoff. She joined me, each of us taking one arm, and we swam, hauling his dead weight until he was half in, half out of the water.