Although Skylark wanted to make amends with Hoki, she wasn’t at all thrilled at the prospect of company. Hoki would take hours to negotiate the aisles on her walking sticks. That plus Mum’s little wee lie gave extra meaning to one of Skylark’s favourite badges pinned to her jacket: I Do Not Want To Have A Nice Day.
However, when she and Hoki arrived at the supermarket the old lady wasn’t a bother at all. Instead she placed her walking sticks on top of her shopping cart, put her withered left foot on the bottom rail and, with her good foot, propelled the cart along like a blackbird on silver wheels. Skylark couldn’t stop laughing.
“Did you know you have such a lovely face when you laugh, dear?” Hoki asked. She had always been clever about getting people to open up to her.
Very soon Skylark was telling her about Mum, and about Dad. Eighteen years ago, Brad, Cora’s first husband, had been a Canadian executive assigned to New Zealand to buy into an ailing television company.
“Your father’s Canadian?”
“Yes,” Skylark said. “He’s living in the States now, and I sometimes go up to Los Angeles to see him. He and Mum didn’t last very long. Long enough to have me and then they had different careers. When they separated I stayed with Mum of course. As for Dad —”
Darling Brad. He’d cracked the big time in the television industry. Recently he had married for the fourth time to some tummy-tucked pumped-up television starlet with lots and lots of hair who was appearing in a sci-fi series he was exec-producing. Daddy dearest, swearing undying love in the Chapel of Eternal Love, Las Vegas, to Vonda, Rhonda, Wanda, Sondra or whatever her name was.
“But he does send me a cheque every month and he does love me,” Skylark said.
“So,” Hoki asked hesitantly, “where do you get your Maori blood from?”
“Mum’s real name is Korowai Whiria, but she took on Cora as her television name.”
“Do you know much about your people?”
“No. I don’t think Mum does either. She was adopted at some point when she was a baby. Lost contact with the whanau.”
Hoki squeezed Skylark’s arm. “And your own name? Where does that come from?”
“Skylark? Oh, I’ve always been called that. Mum and Brad thought it would stand me in good stead if ever I became an actor. Skylark has a kind of marquee ring to it. You know, your name up in lights: Pretty Woman Strikes Again, starring Skylark O’Shea.”
Hoki paused to think about what Skylark had said. “Oh dear, who’d want to have people in the television industry as parents!” she said. Which was just what Skylark had thought all her life. “Well, Skylark, it’s just as well you’ve turned out the way you are. It’s lovely and a privilege to know you.”
Their shopping completed, Skylark pushed her trolley into the sunlight. She’d load the back of the wagon, then return to help Hoki with her trolley. She only vaguely took in the fact that the once crowded carpark was now virtually empty. Just the station-wagon and lots of grey asphalt. She unlocked the back door, and didn’t notice the shadows gathering above her. Even if she had, she wouldn’t have worried — just a cloud passing across the sun.
There she is. We’ve got another chance at the chick.
A casual passerby would have assumed that the seabirds gathering above the station-wagon had been attracted by somebody feeding them crumbs of bread. But these birds were silent, feathering the air with menace, their wings whirring like blades.
Then Skylark heard a shout. “Stay where you are, Skylark. Don’t move.”
She looked up, and saw Hoki in the distance. The old woman had left her trolley near the supermarket exit and was advancing across the carpark. Except that the carpark wasn’t grey any longer. Between Skylark and Hoki, the ground was covered with seabirds. Seashags. Black-backed gulls. Terns. Skuas. Hundreds of them.
All of a sudden, the ruler among them, king of all seashags, came flying out of the sun. The other seabirds set up a wild fusillade of cackles and screams, as if acclaiming his arrival. As soon as Hoki saw him, his name hissed from between her lips:
“Kawanatanga.”
The seashag was bigger than the others. When he landed he immediately displayed his supreme position: tail erect, heraldic wings trembling, crest like a crown on his darting head. His top feathers were glossy black with an oily-green sheen. His undersurface was white. He looked at Skylark, his green eyes like a devil’s.
So you are the chick, she of the ancient prophecy.
Kawanatanga’s bill was slightly open, hissing, the sibilants like an evil sigh on the wind. His wings were outstretched, waiting only to get past Skylark’s guard and administer the fast, killing strike through her eyes to her brain.
Hoki stormed across the carpark, black dress flapping like wings, flailing at the birds with her walking sticks. She interposed herself between Kawanatanga and Skylark. Kawanatanga wheezed, whined, writhed and swayed. Arrogant. Elegant. Demonic.
“E Kawanatanga, hoki atu koe ki to waahi,” Hoki called. “Ki a koe he manu moana.”
At her words, Kawanatanga squealed his rage. Hoki raised her walking sticks and advanced. She was seething with anger. “Didn’t you hear me? Go from here, you and your seabird cohorts, and return to your territory. Do not dare to trespass on mine.”
For a moment, Kawanatanga remained where he was, his long neck weaving, ready to strike. Then he stilled, nodded, and lifted.
Today the chick is yours, old hen. Tomorrow she will be mine.
As if of one accord, the other seabirds rose and wheeled away after their leader.
“Aue, Skylark,” Hoki said. “I thought it was enough to warn you away from the beaches and the sea. But I now realise that the seabirds have already begun their incursion into the lands of the manu whenua.”
Hoki’s eyes were glowing.
“From now on, Skylark, you must never be alone. Ever.”
A party was going on at the Tuapa Diner when Skylark and Hoki returned. Cora, of course, was in the middle of it, surrounded by Flora Cornish, Mitch Mahana and a gaggle of Korean sailors who, for some strange reason, were offering Cora wads of dollar notes. Lucas was trying to push them away.
“Hello, kotiro,” Mitch said. He smelt of a thousand fish heads. “How’s the head?”
“You’re the only one to ask,” Skylark answered. “It’s fine. I —”
She was interrupted by a peal of laughter from Cora, who had turned her attention from the Korean sailors to a bespectacled young man who was blushing under her gaze.
“Skylark, honey,” she called. “You must meet Ronnie Shore. He’s from the local college. Ronnie? This is my daughter, Skylark.”
Skylark saw the surprised look on Ronnie’s face.
“I had no idea Cora Edwards was a mother,” he said.
Skylark smiled sweetly. “There is a genetic match.”
Ronnie looked startled. “We’re putting on the musical Bye Bye Birdie at the college this Saturday night,” he explained. “I heard Cora Edwards was in town, so I had this brilliant idea that she might like to join the cast. Your mother has the star quality that will really make the show.”
“Ronnie is working out a specialty number for me to do,” Cora said. “We start rehearsing tomorrow, don’t we Ronnie.”
“I just can’t believe my luck,” Ronnie gushed, as if Cora was Gwyneth Paltrow rather than an ex-TV weather girl.
Skylark saw that Lucas was trying to get back into the action.
“The drinks are on me,” he said loudly. He might be just a mechanic and a bit of a rough diamond, but he wasn’t about to let some other suitor, even if he was a high school teacher, spoil his patch.