Strange, um, stuff

>> Kaimuki

Quinn Ah Sun helped Fon Du limp to the ambulance. He still moaned and felt nauseous after Bodhicita Guzman kicked him directly in the groin as he stumbled while trying to pull on a pair of stupid plaid Bermuda shorts.

But there wasn't much the EMS guys could do for him. They did offer an ice bag to limit the swelling, but as treatments go, that's no picnic either.

Besides, his hands were handcuffed behind his back.

Suffering mostly in silence, he refused to answer questions from Detective Leina'ala Smashowicz and her crime-scene team.

"That's fine," the woman known as Smashie since her days as a UH volleyball star said, towering over the 6-foot-2 Fon Du, giving him the glare that had intimidated opposing players. Teammates too, for that matter.

"Tell you what, Mr. Fon Du. Some of the boys in that cell block are sure gonna think you look cute in that lovely pink bathrobe and nothin' on under it but Reeboks. I'm thinking some rough girlie boys from Hotel Street. Maybe we'll bust a couple of 'em just for you."

She looked him up and down, leering as a transvestite hooker might.

It gave him the creeps.

"It was me," she continued, "I'd be asking to talk to Detective Smashie soon as they get you booked. Know what I mean?"

"I think, detective," the second Lama Jey Tsong Khapa said, stepping in, "our friend Fon Du will be a willing conversationalist."

"What makes you so sure of that, your lamaness? And, um, why's your head starting to glow?"

The young lama reached out, touched Fon Du's arm.

"I will visit you in jail," the lama said and Fon Du thought he heard music. "I will visit and we will talk. As I said, I believe there are things I must learn from you. And I think perhaps you, Fon Du, might learn something from me."

"Yes," the Chinese secret police agent said. "I think so too."

His cheek saw its first tear since he was 7.

"When you are able, and your hands are free," the lama said, "do this."

He cupped the fingers of his right hand over the left, thumb tips just touching, the sign of meditation.

"But for now, do it behind your back. And close your eyes."

Fon Du did as instructed.

"Om mani padme hum," the lama chanted softly, letting the last M linger in the universe. "Om mani padme hum ... "

Fon Du followed the lama's lead. "Om mani padme hum ... Om mani padme hum ... " they whispered together in the night, their voices the harmony of brothers.

"Isn't this just the strangest s--- you ever saw?" the detective said.

"Happens all the time with guy, Smashie," Quinn replied. "All the time."