Chelsea was still a bit dazed from the horrible nightmare she had the night before. She slept intermittently throughout the night and finally gave up sleeping altogether.
Fortunately, the breakfast lounge was open and so she sat there with a plate of eggs benedict and a side of toast with a mimosa in a tall glass. She grew impatient as she looked back and forth at the time on her phone, it was only 9:38 am. She wished that ten 'o clock would just hurry the hell up, for some reason she felt that she had to share her nightmare with Kauhi. Something told her that he would understand, and as if fate were listening to her innermost thoughts, Chelsea looked up and there was Kauhi standing at her table. She was speechless for a second and didn't know what to say, suddenly she stood up and held on to him, a flood of tears came soon afterward and she found herself apologizing. "I'm sorry, this is so embarrassing! I just had a really bad nightmare last night and now you're here and I'm so glad to see you,"
"It's okay," Kauhi did not refuse her embrace but looked deeply into her eyes. "Do you have any plans for today?"
"No," Chelsea replied. "I haven't had a plan since I've been here."
"Come with me then," Kauhi urged her on with a slight smile. "I have something I'd like you to see and on the way, you can tell me about your bad dream, okay?"
"Okay," Chelsea agreed. "I just have to go upstairs and change, I'll be right back. It won't be long."
"Sure," Kauhi replied. "That's my car over there," Kauhi pointed to a gray colored Corvette parked in the driveway. "I'll wait for you."
.............
Twenty minutes later, Kauhi and Chelsea were on the freeway headed toward Kailua, Chelsea was shocked as to how urbanized Honolulu really was. "You were going to tell me about your nightmare?" Kauhi finally asked.
"Oh yeah," Chelsea began. "Oh god, it was so frickin' weird because it was in ancient Hawai'i not like now. I was this Hawaiian woman and it felt like I was somebody important but I was running toward the ocean and there were these women running after me, screaming like they didn't want me to go into the ocean. I didn't listen, I jumped in and this huge shark grabbed me and took me under and then all these other sharks come out of nowhere and just.......oh my god it was so vivid,"
"It's just a dream, there's really nothing to worry about," For a city and county lifeguard, Kauhi seemed to possess a broad knowledge of many things. "The large shark in your dream could represent your past coming back to drag you under even though consciously you've been trying to put it behind you. The other sharks attacking you could be minor responsibilities in life that become bigger and more magnified in your dreams."
"You think that's what it is?" Chelsea asked the question more for herself than of Kauhi.
"Yes, that is what I think," Kauhi confirmed. "It's not written in stone but that is my opinion."
...........
Before they knew it they were driving into Kailua, the car turned left just past Castle hospital and ambled through a back street of a quaint neighborhood where they took a right turn into the parking lot of the local YMCA. A minute later Chelsea found herself following Kauhi to a massive stone structure that took her breath away. The placard told her that the site is a heiau or a temple built by mythical creatures that the Hawaiian call Menehune.
"Signs and history books give you facts and dates but not feelings," Kauhi said as he waved Chelsea over to join him on the bench where he sat. "It can give you a general idea of things but not about the people and who they were and what they felt, how they lived and died. I come here all the time, it's the only thing that's left......."
"Of your past? Like your childhood?" Chelsea asked as she turned to Kauhi and placed her hands on his.
"You could say that," Kauhi nodded. "It's something like that."
Chelsea leaned in to kiss Kauhi but he pulled away and stood up, she was flustered for a second and found herself apologizing. "I'm sorry, I've been so forward.....I was just in the moment and I wanted to help you...."
"You misunderstand Mrs. Mattina, it has nothing to do with you," Kauhi replied. "It has everything to do with me and who I am."
Chelsea was hot now, she'd had enough with formalities, "My name is Chelsea! "
"Your name is shit," the voice came from behind them, it was Paul Calogero. He had a gun pointed at the both of them and quickly edged himself close enough so that he could kill them at a point-blank range if he had to. "Let's the three of us take a walk, head that way toward the high grass."
It was still early and the groundskeepers and cultural practitioners would not arrive for another hour. They took an incline that led to a lower portion of the massive structure, veering off to the right the which led toward the tall grass. "Alright, stop right here. I gotta make this quick but you were a bitch to find Chels! Luckily we got connections in a few places and we were able to follow your credit card purchases. It took a while but it brought us right to you." Paul nodded and smiled at his accomplishment. "You know if you dah stuck around we coulda worked something out with you but the second you ran, that told us you were gonna turn witness against us. Now, look what happened? Right? You're a great piece of ass Chels, I don't see how you ended up with somebody like Clement when you coulda been with me."
"You?" Chelsea scoffed. "All you'll ever be is underboss, number two, never number one. That's why I married Clement, he was a self-made man. He didn't have to GET made because he made the life he gave me by himself!"
Paul swung his right arm in a wide arc and hit Chelsea square on the temple, the last thing she saw before she blacked out was Paul pointing his gun at Kauhi and hearing shots fired and then screaming. When she came to she was laying in her bed in her condo. The bruised handprints were back on her waist and the underside of her arm. With a splitting headache, she managed to navigate to the bathroom and saw a huge bruise on the side of her face. That's when she noticed the note taped to the mirror.
Chelsea,
You now have a second chance at life, take it and start over. Do what I couldn't, do what I can't.
Aloha
Kauhi
............
TYRE PENNSYLVANIA
Don Giordano hated summers in Pennsylvania, it was unbearably hot and so he chose to stay indoors under the comfort of the air conditioning in his office. His phone rang and he could see that it was Paul Calogero. He had to keep his underboss's full name on the caller ID otherwise he couldn' tell which Paul was which because there were so many. The icon on his phone read video call. Maybe Paul wanted to show him the body of Chelsea Mattina just so he could see that the job was done. He pressed the video call icon on the phone and instantly saw his underboss tied and gagged to a chair in the middle of a nice space with a window and white curtains behind him. Don Giordano let out a sigh and leaned back in his chair with the phone in his hand. "Who is this? Whattaya want?"
"Your underboss tells us that he showed up here in Hawai'i to fulfill a contract, but that he failed to show his respects to the proper people," the voice was articulate and sonorous in tone.
"And I take it that you are one of the proper people?" Don Giordano asked in a sing-song voice.
"No, the proper people are aware but they're not going to do anything about it. I can assure you of that." The unusual voice confirmed.
"So what are we going to do, number one? And who the fuck are you number two?" Don Giordano shrugged his shoulders figuring that some kind of deal was going to be worked out.
"Number one," the voice was methodical now, "your underboss disrespected my territory. He tried to commit murder in a place that is very sacred to my people. Number two, he tried to kill someone who also happens to be very sacred. I can't let those two things go, so we're going to have to make an example out of him and you're going to watch."
"Sacred??!!" Don Giordano shrieked. "Sacred my fuckin ass! Fuck you and your sacred fuckin mumbo jumbo! You touch one hair on his head and I'll have my people crawling so far up your fuckin ass you'll wish Don Ho was still alive to pull them out you laulau eating bastard!"
"Watch closely at what's about to happen, and then after, I want you to think about what you just said," the voice wasn't at all rattled by Don Giordano's threats. Suddenly Kauhi stepped into the picture dressed in a traditional Hawaiian malo. He glares at the video for a second and suddenly his mouth becomes a wide open maw of razor-sharp teeth. Don Giordano can see Paul scream and struggle under his gag and bounds but only for a mere second. Kauhi's head is completely transformed into that of a shark and he consumes Paul's entire upper body and tears it away from his lower torso. Guts and entrails are left on the chair and on what is left of Paul's lap. The legs shake furiously as the nerves try to make sense of what just happened, Don Giordano, himself is overcome and he throws up all over his desk and his suit.
"Stephano Giordano, are you still there?" The voice is oddly soothing and very eerie.
"Holy Mary mother of.....what the hell.....Paul....oh fuck Paul..." The old criminal was beside himself, he couldn't speak.
"Leave Chelsea Mattina alone, you never saw her and you don't know her. I don't get involved with what the bosses do here, it's none of my business. But you crossed into my territory and this is your one and only warning." The phone shut off and Don Giordano threw it across the room where it shattered against the wall opposite of where he sat.
............
"Am I truly on the path to redeeming myself?" Kauhi cleaned himself off with a towel, making sure he got all of the bloodstains off. The Hawaiian man in the dark suit sat in a chair near the door and thought deeply about his reply.
"Chelsea Mattina is a start, her subconscious revealed you to her in a dream. Whether she accepts you for who you are in your true form is something you have to prepare yourself for. Are you ready for that?" The Hawaiian man asked.
" I am, I'm ready," Kauhi was confident that he could live with either decision. After all, being a shark god he had an eternity to work on it. "Mahalo Napualawa, it means a lot."
"No thanks needed," replied the Hawaiian man. "Stop being so formal, call me Boy."
............Pau
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