Author's Note:
Again, mahalo nui loa to Corrupting Power (Devin McTaggert) for graciously permitting me to play around in a corner of his brilliant creation. And mahalo to my fellow Quaranteam Spinoff Authors -- BreakTheBar, AgathonWrites, SilverRyden, RonanJWilkerson, OtterlyMindblowing, The_Licentious_Laureate, 32inch, BronanTheLibrarian, lokisluckwriting, and those working on stories yet to be published. And, again, a special mahalo to BirchesLoveBooks, author of QT: Flyover Country, for his 'Operation: Breadbasket', which got me thinking about how Hawaiʻi could work its way into some early vaccine distribution.
Also, yes, there were a couple of errors in Chapter 1. Apparently, I probably need some remedial math and geography at the Zoolander Center -- but not the one for ants, since I can't fit through the door. Honolulu is about 250 miles northWEST of Hawaiʻi Island, not northeast. And as the quarantine lockdowns started in March, July is only 5 calendar months later. Both of those are totally my screwup -- DMcT and the other QT-spinoff authors gave me a bunch of notes to correct and I swear I thought I'd caught everything.
Finally, a quick question: I've gotten some conflicting feedback regarding the Glossary/explanation of the non-English words. Some folks have suggested that they dislike the non-English words and having a Glossary at the end of a chapter and want the explanation of a word in-line. (My personal feeling on the latter is that it breaks narrative flow, but if enough people want it, maybe I'll look for some lube.) Others have said they can largely figure out or guess at the meaning from context and are happy with the in-depth Glossary at the end. If I could do links, my stories would look like a Terry Pratchett novel with superscripts and footnotes everywhere, but... no can. So... more feedback is needed to help me decide how to handle the explanation of non-English words. Sound off in the comments, or shoot me a message.
Chapter 2
July 10th, 2020
The "cow move" went smoothly -- with the biggest issue being potty breaks for Katherine. During the socially-distanced breaks, the four adults chatted. Evelyn's two classmates (both young women in their early-mid 20s) Kirsten and Heavenlee turned out to be former Agricultural Science classmates of Evelyn's from undergrad.
Pre-pandemic, Kirsten had been working part-time as a large-mammal veterinary assistant, and full-time in the UH-Hilo pre-vet program, although work had dropped off sharply for the former, and become 100% remote for the latter, giving the tall, dirty-blonde girl from Arizona considerable anxiety about whether or not the year's coursework would be acceptable to Veterinary Medicine schools.
After graduating with her B.S. in AgSci, Heavenlee had resumed working full time at her family's papaya farm, which, she proudly related, had not failed to make a harvest or deliver a scheduled order even in the middle of the pandemic, thanks to her mother's exceptionally strict policies around PPE and distancing, "Which even
Tatang
follows, although at the start he rolled his eyes a lot. We've had a few of our harvesters drop out, which always worries Mom for days afterwards, but fortunately, it's never been more than one or two people at a time. But," the petite Filipina girl continued, "we haven't been able to reach any of them to see how they are, if they need any help, or when they're going to be able to come back to work." Her voice trailed off at the end.
Although everyone was standing several feet apart, they each unconsciously took another step away from each other after Heavenlee spoke. Just then, Kat called out, "Daddy! I need help! I have a klingon!" Mal looked to the sky, and the three young women burst out laughing.
Break over, everyone returned to their vehicles. Mal and Kat climbed into the cab of the hauler-tractor, and once Evelyn and her friends had the cattle moving through into the next pasture, Mal shifted the tractor into drive and followed behind. The women on the ATVs continued to chivvy the herd, looping out to head off any diverging cows before they could cause a bifurcation, while Mal wove slowly along behind, bringing up the rear and, once the herd was through a gate and headed for the next, pulling the cleared gate shut behind him. Meanwhile, Kat -- who had quickly grown bored of looking at the cows and pastures -- watched a dizzying array of princess movies on Mal's tablet. Although at one point, he was pretty certain he heard "... wants to be a cat," coming from her headphones when she adjusted them. Kat was leaning against the back wall of the hauler's cab, so he couldn't confirm his suspicion about which movie she was watching, but he fully expected the request for kittens to resume in the near future.
The group stopped for lunch -- again, socially distanced, to everyone's frustration, but especially Kat. The inquisitive little girl wanted to get a good look at what everyone was eating, and stamped her foot and stuck out her lower lip when told she had to stay put on her picnic blanket.
"Do you like papaya, Kat?" Heavenlee asked. "Cause if you're a good girl, and stay on your guys' picnic blanket, I'll send you and your daddy home with a whole bunch of papayas!"
Vibrating with excitement at the bribe of one of her favorite fruits, Kat immediately sat back down and grabbed her sandwich, taking a monster bite. Mal looked over her head toward Heavenlee and mouthed "Thank you," to the young woman.
Heavenlee smiled back and said, "
Aba
, she's so precious, Mal! And her hair is incredible - those Shirley Temple ringlets! I don't know why, but
hapa
girls grow up to be so beautiful! Her mom must be stunning - Asian with curly hair, ah, I'm so jelly!" She twirled a lock of her straight brown hair as she spoke.
"My Mommy's hair is straight." Kat took another bite of her sandwich, as the women looked at Mal.
He flushed red and said, "Er, yeah. She gets it from me... When I forget to keep my hair cut short, I get ringlets."
"Why do I get the sense that you're more than a little embarrassed by your hair, Mal?" Kirsten teased.
"Well, let's just say that ringlets on a little kid are adorable to adults -- boy or girl, adults think it's 'precious', right? And when a little girl with ringlets grows up, no big... Ringlets on a little boy? Mortally embarrassing to that former little boy when he and his 10-year old friends find the photos in a closet. Especially when one of those so-called 'friends' sneaks a picture away and their older brother prints dozens of copies and they get plastered all over the Windward side of Oʻahu. I came across one when I was 16, up in Kaʻaʻawa, recently stuck on a telephone pole.
"I was in my 'metal phase' -- or as my dad used to joke-sing, my 'long-haired freaky people' phase." Seeing the confused looks, Mal explained, "there was a song my dad used to sing about signs, and the song starts with the line, 'The sign said, long-haired freaky people need not apply.' I think it was a 'Help Wanted' sign or something; the song was from, like, the 70s, I think.
"Anyway, it had been a few years since I'd seen any of those posters of ringlet-little-Mal, and figured it was just a super embarrassing grade-slash-middle-school event. I had grown my hair long, like mid back, but I always used hair spray to keep it from ringleting. I caught the bus up to Kaʻaʻawa to visit a friend who lived out that way -- there was a concert in Kahuku we were going to go to the following day. I got off the bus, and there at the stop was one of those fu -- er, one of those blasted posters. And it hadn't been there more than a few days." Mal's face twisted at the memory.
"I took it down, well, tore it down, then walked to the previous stop back toward Kahaluʻu. Called my friend from a pay phone, said I was sick and couldn't make it to the show. As soon as I got home, I cut off all my hair. Just couldn't... Seeing that damn poster... It brought back all that grade and middle school embarrassment all over again. I couldn't handle it. I played hooky from school a couple of days -- faking illness so I could stay home and mentally settle down. It sucked feeling like that.
"My folks probably figured something had happened, but they never asked me, nothing more than, 'So you decided to cut your hair short, eh? Need the back of your neck cleaned up a little?' My friends wondered if I'd gotten into some sort of buzz-cut sub-genre. Didn't really go into it either..." Mal trailed off. "Damn. Just realized. That's the first time I've talked about it. But I guess that's also the first time anybody's really ever asked about my hair. Sorry, I guess that was a bit TMI?"
Mal looked up, and then around at the young women, all three of whom had eyes glistening with unshed tears after hearing the story. Katherine piped in, "Daddy, you had long hair once? Like mine? That's so cool!" At that, the adults started laughing, and in the case of the three women, the tears began to spill down their faces.
Evelyn spoke first, "Mal, I'm sorry I can't give 16-year old you a hug, but I want you to know it's taking all my self-control to not break social distancing and give you a hug right now! I know how hard you and Gwen have worked to protect your family, and I won't risk that, but thank you for sharing your story with us, and I'm so sorry you were so lonely for so long!"
Kirsten chimed in, "I hope you'll forgive me for pressing you on it, but thank you for sharing with me! And Evvy's 100% right, I totes want to hug both you and the 16- and 10-year old yous and tell you it'll be okay!"
Heavenlee was quiet, tears streaming down her face. "Hey, H, are you okay," Evelyn asked the Filipina.
"I'm okay, just so much emotion! You're such a good dad, Mal, I can see that from how you've taken care of Kat, and you're such a good person to help Evelyn, and you must be such a good husband to Gwen, and I'm just -- I'm..."
*I'm just a jealous horny bitch,*
she thought to herself.
"I'm okay, just a little overcome by your story, Mal!" Heavenlee wiped the tears from her face and waved her hands in the air to show her friends she was okay.
Mal was a little flustered by their responses -- and that he had just spilled one of his most embarrassing life moments to these women he'd just met. "Well, thank you for the compliments, ladies, but I think, as Katherine has at last finished her 'sammich', that we should, 'roll 'em up, and move 'em out," as the cowpokes say, right, Miss Evelyn?"
The woman snorted, and then laughed, as she and her friends wiped the tears away. "Malcolm Pilchard, you must really want me to start talking about shooting you again - don't you ever use language like that in my presence, you dirt-grubbin', corn-huskin', varmint-cookin', chin-wagglin', slop-sided, colonizing
haole
-boy!" She was smiling and looking right at Mal as she overdramatically insulted and threatened him -- just so everyone, but particularly Kat, knew she wasn't serious.
Heavenlee sighed and finished wiping her face as the fivesome finished gathering up their four separated picnics. As she and Kirsten walked toward their ATVs, the latter girl spoke, "Goddamn, why do the good guys need to be taken already?"
Heavenlee didn't look, but replied, "Not helping, K."
The tall
