Page 90 of Big Island Neighbors
“Caught him!” Kai straightened up and held a gecko up towards Prince.
“Let me see!” Prince began making his way down through the branches of the tree.
Kai spotted Emma and said, “Mom, look!”
The gold dust day gecko was bright green with yellow speckles all down its back. It had bright orange stripes on its face, with cerulean blue markings above its eyes and on its long toes. As Emma bent to look, it nervously licked one black eyeball.
“Don’t hold on to him too long,” she said.
“Just until Prince sees. ‘Io, you want to see?”
“It’s just a gecko,” his cousin told him. “There are like a million of them.”
“Well, yeah. But look at the colors!”
Prince landed on the ground with athumpand straightened up next to Kai. “Wow!”
Kai held the colorful creature on display for another moment before releasing it back onto a branch of the tree.
“Your mom said there was a pond?” ‘Io prompted.
“Yeah, with frog spawn!” Prince put in.
Kai looked at his cousin. “Want to see?”
‘Io shrugged, deliberately casual. “Sure, I guess.”
Emma stood watching for a bit while the boys played at the edge of the pond. Within minutes, the older boy’s too-cool attitude had fallen away. He was a true kid again,woahing over the frog spawn and looking under leaves for the baby turtle.
“How are they doing?” Mahina asked as she came to stand with Emma.
“They’re good. They’re happy.”
“Good.” She put a hand on Emma’s back and gently steered her towards the house. “Then you come eat with us.”
“Okay.” Emma cast one last look over her shoulder at the smiling boys as she followed Mahina back up through the orchard.
“John would be thrilled to see what good care you’ve taken of this place. I know it was no small thing to get the orchard looking like this after the jungle almost took over.”
“It was a joy and a privilege,” she said honestly.
“Adam would be so proud of you.” Mahina wrapped an arm around her shoulders and squeezed.
“Thank you.” Two months ago, a comment like that would have made her sob. Now she was still able to speak past the burn in her throat. “I wish he could be here.”
“We all do.”
“I wish we’d moved here while John was still alive. I wish Adam had just left that awful job. I wish… so many things, Auntie. But he wanted to stay in California to be close to his mom, and I had my family there too. And then when his mom was gone, he was so invested in that stupid fire station. And I just… things could have been so different.”
“But they’re beautiful now,” Mahina said softly, “even if there are pieces missing.”
Emma looked up at the family gathered on thelanai, talking and laughing over plates of homegrown food. She looked at Mahina and squeezed her hand.
“You’re right. We just have to make the most of what we have.”
“And we have so much.”
“We do.” With gratitude in her heart, she walked up the steps to take her place at the table.
