Hero of Hawaii (11 page)

O
n my way out to feed Streak in the garage, I heard the quick tap of a horn. I looked up just as Ledward pulled into our driveway.

I filled Streak’s bowl and headed out.

Ledward had put the canvas top up on his old army jeep. The tires and wheel wells were caked with mud.

“Howzit,” he called.

“Hey.”

Ledward got out and grabbed his tool box off the backseat. “Your mama told me you and your friend Willy had a big day.”

“Big
scary
day.”

Scarier for Willy, I thought. I hoped Mom was wrong about him being afraid of the water, like Darci was.

I shuddered. He could have drowned. Me and Streak, too.

Ledward nodded. “I was scared like that once.”

“Really? You got caught in a river, too?”

“Not a river, no.”

“Then what?”

He nodded toward the yard. “Let’s sit.”

We went out onto the grass. It was still wet, but who cared?

Ledward sat with his arms crossed over his knees. He looked out toward the mountains. “Well, let’s see, I guess I was a couple years younger than you are now … eight or nine. I
went hunting with my pops. This was on the Big Island. You been on the Big Island?”

I shook my head. “Only this one.”

“What? You never been off this island?”

“Nope.”

Ledward scratched his head. “You and me got to take care of that, take a trip.”

“Just us?”

“Man trip.”

Cool!

“So what were you scared of?”

“The volcano.”

I looked at him. “What’s so scary about that?”

Everyone knew the volcano had been erupting for around thirty years. It was just part of life on the Big Island. All it did was make the sky smoky.

Ledward chuckled.

“Well, first, I was only a small kid, ah? But second, was the
power
of it. My pops took me down to see that end of the island. The volcano had flowed red hot down the hill toward one old village. Lucky thing they had scientists who study volcanoes, and they predicted the path, ah? So they warned the people and they all got out in time. But that lava came right down on top of their homes and covered them. Poof! The place was gone. All that was left was one stop sign. You go there now, you can still see it. Black lava rock everywhere … with that stop sign sticking out of it.”

“Wow.”

“To this day, I can still see it.”

Why would that be so scary, I wondered? “Just the sign?”

He nodded. “Just the sign, but what it told me at that age was that against nature, you get what you get. Your only defense is to be ready. Not much more you can do.”

He studied the river, still fat with muddy water. “Funny, yeah? That sign in my head all these years.”

“Are you still scared of volcanoes?”

“Naah.”

“Do you think Willy will be scared of the ocean now?”

Ledward turned to me. “Get him back in the water, soon as possible. You don’t want him thinking about it too long.”

I nodded. “Okay.”

“He should learn some ways to get out of trouble.”

For sure, I thought.

We sat in silence.

Ledward nudged me with his elbow. “Your mama said they calling you a hero.”

“That was just Clarence fooling around.” I wasn’t any hero.

We sat watching the river.

“Ledward?”

“Yeah?”

“You know the cables you put on the oars?”

“So you wouldn’t lose them.”

“Yeah. Well … that was real smart. Willy might have … you know, drowned without them. So … so thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

Ledward tapped my knee and stood. “How’s about you hero my tools into the house so we can take a look at that leak.”

I couldn’t help grinning as I picked up the tool box.

L
edward took a quick look at the leak before Mom called everyone to come eat. White Chinese take-out boxes were spread all around the table: beef tomato, beef broccoli, sweet-sour chicken, rice, wooden chopsticks, fortune cookies, and extra boxes of chicken chow mein. Darci’s favorite meal.

I went straight to my fortune cookie:
NOTHING IS EXACTLY AS IT SEEMS
.

What kind of fortune was that?

Darci took a huge helping of chicken chow mein. She could eat all three boxes, if you let her.

“So, is our leak as bad as it looks?” Mom asked.

Ledward had cut the sagging part of the ceiling away so now you could look up through the hole and see the plywood roof.

“Small leak that made a big mess. I get it fixed up soon.”

Mom put her hand on his. “Thank you, Led. You do so much for us.”

“Naah,” he said. “Just regular home maintenance.”

“Regular or not, we’re lucky to have you around.”

Ledward nudged a fortune cookie toward Mom. “Hey, check your fortune. See what it says.”

Mom cracked it open and read it. “ ‘Great riches are in your future.’ ”

Now,
that’s
a fortune, I thought.

“I want that one,” Stella said.

Mom gave it to her. “Take it. I already have great riches.”

Huh? Where?

While we sat around eating Stella’s cupcakes, which she had managed to make after all the excitement, Mom gave Darci a small gift-wrapped box.

“Happy birthday, sweetie.”

Darci tore into it. “Oh, wow, Mom!”

“Stella and I picked it out for you.”

Darci tilted the box toward me.

I peered in at a shiny silver bracelet. “Huh,” I said.

Darci got up and hugged Mom and Stella.

What I’d gotten Darci at the Byodo-In Temple was good, and she’d love it … but it wasn’t the
perfect
present. I needed time to
find something that really meant something. “I’ll give you my present next week at your party,” I said.

Darci put the bracelet on and showed it to Ledward, who nodded. “That looks good on you.”

Oh! I thought.

Yes!

An idea was coming to me.

I jiggled my leg. Yes! Yes!

If I could pull this off…

I couldn’t sit at that table a second longer.

I went into the kitchen for the phone.

“Clarence,” I said. “It’s me, Calvin.”

After dinner, Darci and I were lying on the living room floor watching TV. Mom was in the kitchen cleaning up, and Stella had disappeared into her bedroom.

Ledward was out in the dark backyard shoveling sand and dirt into the ditches the rain had made coming down off our roof in the storm. I could see him through the sliding screen door.

A mass of bugs swirled around the single patio light, bugs that would gladly eat me alive. But for some reason the bugs never bothered Ledward.

I tried to watch TV.

But I couldn’t keep my thoughts from drifting back to the muddy ocean, remembering over and over how scared I’d been when I saw
Willy look at me just before he went under. It made me cringe.

Stop, stop, stop!

Think of … the temple! Yeah, and the giant golden Buddha…
Don’t worry, be happy, everything’s cool
.

“Darci,” Mom called from the kitchen. “Turn the TV down!”

Darci picked up the remote and clicked off the TV. “What time is it?”