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“Don’t cry, Tutu!”
She moves to the nearest table and sits weeping. Oh shit. Fucking hell.
“Let me take a look in the kitchen. Alana, sit with Tutu. And get her a water. Shit! Get the dog!”
Kanaka has raced into the room, nose in the air. But Alana moves just as quick. She grabs him by the collar and holds him steady.
I follow Oscar back to the mess. Ice cream, melted ice, and unidentifiable fluids course refrigerator to sink. A foul smell hangs in the air. He speaks low, so nobody else can hear.
“It’s worse than you think, Alek. This mess here isn’t the biggest problem. It’s the tip of the iceberg that already sank the ship. The place is dead. It got sick long before your dad passed and it died with the pandemic.”
“I see it. Let me think.”
I grab the mop from him and he gets to throwing the spoiled food away. But there’s more he wants to say.
“Nani’s manaola dies a little every day too. I know I’ve only been here for five years, but she holds on to your dad’s dream, not hers.”
Taking in his words, I hear my own thoughts.
“The dream has to be reimagined,” I add.
He stops and looks me in the eye.
“An Italian restaurant in this place, with this view? That’s one of the things that went wrong.”
He continues with the job and a new thought.
“And just so you know, my thing is Hawaiian, bruddah. I can cook anything, but I put my soul in our food.”
I know he’s right. His talent is wasted here.
“We need the locals, man. We get them, the tourists will follow. Just saying.”
“I want to have a conversation with my mother,” I say, turning to leave. See what she wants to do. “Then the three of us need to talk. We won’t leave you hanging, Oscar. I will be paying you going forward, until we reopen. If we reopen.”
“Shaka.”
The two fingered wave is his final comment.
I walk back to the dining room and take in the mood. Alana sits at the table silently while Kanaka stares at his human. That thing dogs do when you are sad, he is doing to Mom. Being there as sentry.
“Okay. So let’s talk it out, Mom.”
A breeze blows some of the stink behind me as I pull the chair out and take a seat. Her bloodshot eyes lift to mine.
“Yes. I’m alright now. Tell me what you think.”
“I’m going to be blunt. I know you can take the truth.”
Alana’s eyes are wide, waiting for the bomb I am about to drop on my own mother.
“Go ahead.”
“First off, you need to hear how much I respect you for keeping a restaurant open for this many years. I know, as much as you do, how difficult that is. And I know you and Dad thought it was a great idea…”
“Get to it, son.”
“Okay. You took over an Italian restaurant whose seats were empty long before you signed the papers. There was no Yelp then, but I remember Dad telling me he was going to turn it around.”
