My Kind of Town
Don Chapman
>> North Shore Touched by an ...
Cops kept the crowd back as paramedics went to work, forcing water from Chookie Boy Kulolo's lungs. Gathered at Waimea Bay for The Eddie, the crowd that had roared so lustily when Chookie Boy took off on that rogue 45-footer was silent now.
Cops and paramedics seemed not to notice Meg Choy Primitivo -- no easy thing with her figure and that low-cut black swimsuit -- and she was equally oblivious of all around her, focusing only on Chookie Boy and sending him all her strength and hope, gathering them like wildflowers from the cosmos. When at last water stopped gurgling from his lungs the medics strapped on oxygen mask over his face. But still Chookie Boy lay lifeless.
Meg looked down in awe and wonder. He was 6-foot-2, stocky, yet lean and muscled, and just moments ago he'd been streaking down that wave, full of life, in full control, until ... until the wave won. But Meg was not going to let that happen. She leaned in and with a forefinger touched Chookie Boy's left toe -- he was a goofy footer -- and he shook for a moment, as if hit with a jolt of electricity.
Meg didn't notice the sound of a camera motordrive and touched him again, both hands on his foot this time, and he coughed.
"He's breathing!" paramedic Susan Nita said. Then, turning to Meg, "You're coming with us."
So when they loaded Chookie Boy into the ambulance, Meg followed. Again, she didn't notice the sound of the motordrive or notice the photographer, or anything but Chookie.
When Chookie Boy's eyes flickered open, an angel was leaning over him and softly stroking his hand. She had long black hair, perfect skin, appeared to be Chinese, and was wearing a swimsuit that did an inadequate job of holding back their contents. And she was smiling at him. Maybe this was heaven.
But heaven doesn't have sirens, and as Chookie Boy's senses drifted back to him he heard a siren, realized an oxygen mask was on his face, saw the concerned looks of paramedics turning to relief.
He looked up at the angel. "Who...?"
"I'm Meg."
"She saved you," Susan Nita said, "when we couldn't." Then, turning to Meg, "I saw it. You touched him and it was like electricity. How did you do it?"
Meg hadn't thought about it, hadn't even realized yet what she'd done, for she'd been too busy giving Chookie Boy every positive thought and hope she could muster. She shrugged, shook her head. "I ... I don't know."
"However you did it, you have the power to heal."
As Star-Bulletin extreme photographer Johnny B. Goo's photos and eye-witness account would reveal. But that's getting ahead of the story.
Don Chapman is editor of MidWeek.
His serialized novel runs daily in the Star-Bulletin
with weekly summaries on Sunday.
He can be e-mailed at dchapman@midweek.com