A Little Romance
In response to a question from a fan, this week’s excerpt from Maui Wowee, features a little romance for your author buddy Mike. Well, at least a step in the right direction. Living like a hermit in a hidden rainforest paradise, I didn’t meet a lot of girls. Unless they trimmed pot or went to the same parties. But now and then, I’d hook up with a girl from another scene. That would lead to awkward questions, questions I didn’t wanna deal with. Questions like: “What do you do for a living?” “How come you never invite me to your place?” “Why can’t I get a straight answer from you?” “Are you hiding something?” That didn’t stop me from flirting my brains out with every fox I met, as you’ll see in this week’s excerpt. And with girls like Noelani living in the Islands, can you blame me?
With Mother Nature nurturing our crop in the rainforest, I had plenty of free time. To get away from the constant rain, I’d spend a few days in Kona. While living there, I’d commuted often to the sunny side of Maui for diversion. Seemed ironic. There were two main airlines, Hawaiian and Aloha, and one or two smaller airlines, depending whether the fourth had just gone into or out of business. Of the smaller airlines, and there have been many, Royal Hawaiian was the only long-term survivor. I liked to fly them because the tourists they carried were far fewer and less stuffy.
Also ‘cause Royal Hawaiian’s prop planes flew at lower altitudes than the jets the big boys used—much better for enjoying Hawaii’s amazing scenery. If whales were breaching along the way, the pilot would take the time to spin around them, going lower still. Plus, they had some killer flight attendants. On one of those flights, the lovely Noelani sat her sexy self down next to me. Obviously, she’d noticed my coolness and couldn’t resist. It had only taken a year of clumsy flirtation. So, pretty fast by my standards.
“Howzit, Noelani. Nice of you to join me.”
She smelled like jasmine. I decided jasmine was my favorite smell and told her so. Girls love compliments like that.
“You smell, too,” she said, but forgot to make it sound flattering.
I gave her a mega-watt smile. “So, my charms finally got to you, huh?”
She chuckled, then said, “No, not really. But you left this in the restroom.”
She put something in my hand. I looked down and saw a buffalo head nickel with a coke spoon soldered onto it.
“Jeez, am I that obvious?
“Hell, yes, you’re that obvious. Sometimes you don’t blink for the entire flight.”
“Well, it’s only an hour long.”
She laughed because I was deranged. A little confused, I reached into my pocket, and after digging around, found my own buffalo head nickel coke spoon. Now I had one in each hand. Noelani looked at me, raised her eyebrows, and smiled, no doubt impressed to meet an ambidextrous coke freak. And, unless I was mistaken, a bit more interested. I laughed because I was the opposite of ambidextrous: clumsy with both hands. Plus, until my bartender buddy Shorty gave it to me the night before (oddly enough, he’d found it in the Chuck’s Steak House restroom), I didn’t have one of those spoons. I’d only accepted it from Shorty because I’m polite. When it came to blow, I preferred to tip some into the cap of my little glass bottle and get a decent snort. Those chintzy coke spoons never gave me enough. Know what I mean? They must have made them for pygmies. Or moderate consumers. Who knows? Generous to a fault when horny, I trumped her little gift with my bottle and ended up with Noelani’s phone number. Cocaine sometimes provided the charm my natural appeal did not. Did I let that bother me? Are you kidding?
A week later, after a fun weekend together in Honolulu, Noelani said, “Why don’t I spend next weekend at your place on Maui? I want to see where you live.”
“I live in the rainforest, Noelani. Trust me, you don’t wanna go there.”
“Oh, don’t be silly. I’ve stayed at the Hotel Hana.”
The Hotel Hana was the nicest hotel in Hana. Also, the only hotel in Hana. Nothing fancy, not even televisions, but they made up for it by charging a fortune. With its tiny golf course, mown lawns, and pest control (meaning far fewer cockroaches per room), the grounds were a far cry from Happy Valley.
“Happy Valley is not the Hotel Hana. Tell you what, Noelani, we’ll stay at my buddy Tom’s guest house on the beach. You’ll like it there better.”
“You’re not hiding something, are you?”
Yes, I sure was. Two thousand somethings, but I left that unspoken. Read Maui Wowee to find out what happened to Noelani, the two thousand somethings, and the Happy Valley Hui.
If you haven’t started the Senor Bueno Travel Adventure series yet, grab a Free Copy of Breaking Good and get started.