My Kind of Town
Where’s the senator?
>>Honolulu Soap Co.
Lily Ah Sun waited for her father rather more nervously than she would have liked. Her fate, her career, the rest of her life lay in what he was about to tell her. Either he liked her proposal and she would soon assume control of the Honolulu Soap Co. or he would tell her she wasn't worthy.Overhead, Lily heard a jetliner on its final approach to the airport. You live with airport sounds on Democrat Street. An approach from Diamond Head is not the usual direction. The wind must have changed
And it had, in ways that Lily could not yet imagine.
>>Cartwright Field
If nothing else, HPD solo bike Officer Quinn Ah Sun was relieved to have some crowd control help when the Sheriff's car pulled up. Deputy Sheriff Dash Kaneshiro jumped out."Where's the senator?"
"Not in the car," Quinn said.
They watched as paramedics pulled a stretcher bearing the young local woman, nude and bleeding, from the overturned car, and press photographers jostled for position. The medics covered all of her except her bloody face with a sheet and strapped her onto a stretcher.
"She was alone," Quinn added.
Kaneshiro and Quinn knelt to check inside the car. Touching nothing, they noted a red plastic bong pipe, a lighter, smashed sun glasses and a shattered glass bottle of Cuervo Gold tequila lying in a pool of blood and tequila on the roof. They saw her striped black-and-chartreuse string bikini in the back and a black see-through pareau. But there was no other clothing, no purse, no wallet. No ID. The mystery girl.
For a sheriff, Quinn thought, Kaneshiro asked a pretty good question:
Where, indeed, is the senator?
>>Honolulu Soap Co. parking lot
The first time Mickey saw a book or a crayon was when the social worker registered him for kindergarten at Waikiki Elementary -- a year late. Strict as the teachers were, they were still the nicest people he had ever met. But then every day he went home and was told he was stupid and to blame for every one of his parents' problems in life. He heard "I hate you" every night the way some kids hear "Sleep tight." The best teacher couldn't overcome that.Mickey turned out exactly the way his parents had raised him. He knew how to express hatred. And the thought of expressing it excited him.
Putting the faded gray sedan into gear, he smiled darkly to himself because now he knew where the local babe who drove the teal Beamer worked and where she lived.
Don Chapman is editor of MidWeek.
His serialized novel runs daily in the Star-Bulletin.
He can be emailed at dchapman@midweek.com