Chapter 17
Kay and I were just coming to the end of our session when Gabe came toward us from the direction of the parking lot. He stopped at the fence, a paper cup full of shave ice in his hand.
“There wasn’t a more colorful one, I take it,” Kay said, picking up a ball by the net.
“Rainbow’s the best one,” Gabe replied, happily shoving the wooden spoon into his mouth.
“You’re here early,” I said, looking at my watch. “I wanted to get in a round at the fitness studio.”
“No problem. I’m busy the way it is.” He raised his paper cup. “I had to deliver the pig to Sunny. It wouldn’t have been worth driving all the way back to Haleiwa.”
“The pig?” I asked at the exact same moment Kay asked, “Is he hosting a luau?”
Gabe nodded and explained, “My cousin Sunny has a B and B. Once a month he hosts a luau in his garden for guests, friends, and family.”
“It’s really nice,” Kay remarked.
“You should come,” Gabe suggested spontaneously. His eyes darted to Kay. “Both of you. Sunny would love seeing you again.”
“You’ve been over there before?” I asked Kay in surprise.
“Once.” Something flickered in her eyes for a moment before her expression turned neutral again. “But that was ages ago.”
“Two years ago,” Gabe said, looking at her.
Her eyes shot toward him, and I could read a lot of contradictory things in them. But above all: sadness. Like a veil across her eyes.
“And that’s today?” I asked when the silence had grown too uncomfortable.
Gabe shook his head. “Tomorrow. But the pig has to go into the underground oven today, so that it’ll be done.”
I wrinkled my nose apologetically. “I told Laurie I’d go to a party with her tomorrow.”
“A party?”
“Chip invited us. Griffin Chipman.”
For the second time it grew uncomfortably quiet, and I noticed how tense Gabe’s face had grown.
“How do you know him?” Kay asked, her lips narrowed.
“We met last year at the Laureus Awards, and I just happened to run into him here, of all places. I didn’t know he lived on Oahu.”
Again, my words were met by silence, but this time it only lasted around two seconds before one of Kay’s trainers ran up to us.
“Nainoa just twisted his ankle pretty bad. Could you have a look, Gabe?”
“Of course,” he murmured.
“I asked the others to bring some ice packs,” the trainer continued, “but then I saw you all and thought it wouldn’t hurt to ask you to have a look.”
Gabe nodded. “Absolutely, no problem.”
The trainer vaguely pointed toward one of the courts in back. Gabe handed Kay his shave ice and walked off with him. Unsettled, I watched them go.
“Hope it’s nothing bad.”
“Hmm,” Kay murmured pensively.
But something told me it didn’t have to do with Nainoa’s ankle.
“Umm…about all this. Did I…say the wrong thing?”
She didn’t answer immediately, and when she did, her words were careful. “Griffin Chipman is…a tough subject for Gabe.”
“Because of Millie?”
For a second, she looked surprised, and I decided not to mention that Vince had told me about them.
“That too. But above all because of Keiko.”
“I thought the two were friends.”
“They were. Keiko was Chip’s Jet Ski pilot. He always towed him out into those monster waves.”
I was overcome by an uneasy premonition.
“And it cost him his life.”
“It wasn’t a surfing accident?” I blurted out.
“He was out there with Chip. Despite the storm warnings. But Griffin Chipman doesn’t care about that kind of thing.”
I wondered whether those were her words or Gabe’s.
“I didn’t know that,” I whispered.
“Of course not.” Kay shot me an encouraging glance. “Gabe definitely won’t hold it against you either.”
“That means that Gabe holds Chip responsible for his son’s death?”
She tilted her head indecisively. “I don’t know. But the fact remains that Keiko wouldn’t have been out there if it wasn’t for Chip.”
I lowered my eyes. “The thought must be excruciating for Chip as well.”
“If that’s the case, he sure does his best to hide it.”
I looked back up questioningly.
“I mean, Griffin Chipman is known on the island for exactly two things. His record…and his parties.” All of a sudden she was distracted by something. “Gabe’s on his way back! Thank God, it must not have been anything that bad.”
She was right. Nainoa could keep on playing, Gabe told us shortly thereafter. The tension in his face had disappeared. As if nothing had happened, he took his shave ice back from Kay and spooned some into his mouth.
But it wasn’t as easy for me to move on to the agenda.
What I’d learned about Chip haunted me for hours.
While using the chest press, while Gabe massaged me, while in the shower, and while jogging down the beach and watching the surfers.
I got goose bumps thinking about what it would feel like to be involved in my best friend’s death.
How heavy Chip’s guilt must have weighed on him.
And Keiko must have been experienced enough to be able to assess the risk.
All the same, he’d paid for it with his life.
“You looking for someone?”
I turned around. A few feet away from me Vince was kneeling in the sand, rubbing down his board with a white clump of who-knows-what.
He was wearing a pair of colorfully patterned trunks that I hadn’t seen before.
Maybe that’s why it took me a while to realize that he had asked me the exact same question as in my dream.
“You coming from training?”
Dream Vince had asked almost the same thing, which is why I stared at him dumbfoundedly for a moment before nodding.
“And what have you been up to today?”
My question didn’t just sound awkward, it was embarrassingly superficial. On the other hand, small talk was probably not the worst way to go when standing in front of the guy you’d been having sex dreams about.
“Sanding.” He held up the backs of his hands, which were speckled with paint.
“Cool.” Cool? God, Louisa! “Is that wax?” I muttered quickly, pointing at the lump in his hand.
“Yeah. It gives you more grip.”
“Ah.”
“You ever been surfing?”
I shook my head.
He glanced at his board. “You wanna…give it a try?”
“No,” I replied, a little too roughly. As he seemed a bit offended, I quickly added, “It’s too dangerous.”
“Too dangerous?”
“The risk of injury is too high. For me.”
He frowned. “Surfing’s a pretty low-injury kind of sport. Every now and again you get a cut or…”
“You die.”
It shot out of my mouth like a bullet, and Vince stared at me in shock.
“Sorry. I didn’t mean… I’m a bit…” Instead of finishing my sentence, I focused on the sand.
“Did something happen?”
I looked up. His expression was soft.
“No, not really. I heard about the thing with Keiko today. How he died.”
“I thought you knew about that already.”
“Yeah, I did, but not that Chip—” I broke off and thought about how I wanted to phrase it. “That Chip had been there.”
“Big-wave surfers are never alone out there.” His glance drifted to the ocean. “Keiko was Chip’s tow-in buddy.”
I nodded though I didn’t know much about the term. Kay had talked about Jet Ski pilots, but that probably wasn’t the official designation.
“He towed him out into the big waves with his Jet Ski,” Vince explained, looking at me. “And he knew what the dangers were.”
Was Vince implying that Chip didn’t play any role? That it had been Keiko’s decision to accompany him that day? Both of us fell silent.
“In any event, you don’t have to be afraid. The kind of waves that Chip surfs don’t show up here at Sunset Beach.” He shot me a bright glance before turning back to his board.