The Word Is...

Tasi watched Martin’s gym shoes fly through the cold city air, tied together like dancers holding hands.

Martin was going to throw them again, up toward the telephone lines along the street, Tasi just knew it. He wished they would just walk home to their apartment building.

“You could lose ’em,” Tasi said.

Malo.”

“You be quiet, boy,” Martin said as he swung his shoes again.

Back home on the island, on Samoa, things were different. Nobody cared here—not even your best friend. City people acted as if they didn’t even need each other.

Martin’s shoes made black and white patterns, spinning in a big hoop. Tasi knew Martin’s mama didn’t have extra money for new gym shoes.

The shoes sailed into the air, up by the palm tree in front of the Palm Apartments, dancing away. Then they wrapped perfectly around the top of a streetlight.

“What—?” Martin said, with his eyes all big and his voice getting squeaky.

The shoes swung to a stop. Martin kicked the pole that held up the streetlight.

Tasi’s mom and auntie wouldn’t be home till after dark. He stood in their apartment, looking through the window at the cold streets. People pushed past one another. Cars honked.

“People here,” he said to the glass in the window, “they don’t get it.” Back home the word was aiga (ah-inga). They say aiga means family, but that isn’t all. It means making the people around you number one.

He thought about Martin and what Martin’s mama would say. He remembered those shoes on the post and that one leaning palm tree.

Back home there were niu trees—they looked about the same as palm trees here but they grew coconuts. Everybody worked together to make houses, roofs, mats—all from parts of the niu tree. They even got together to eat the coconuts. Island people did everything together.

But here? All those people walking all alone, so fast, with their heads down, and that poor tree out there with no coconuts.

The sun set brown and dirty behind the big buildings. Tasi stood in his baggy shorts and bare feet, just under that palm tree. He shivered, but who could climb in jeans and shoes? He held his lavalava in his hands.

“Li’o,” he whispered, twisting the fabric as if he were wringing out a dish towel.

“Milo,” he said, tying it in a circle. It was good to hear the right words.

He looped one end of the twisted lavalava around each foot. It was a thick tree, so he had to hold close.

“Somebody’s gotta...”

Inch.

“...do something good...”

Inch.

“...in this unfriendly place,” he said on his way up. A car stereo’s deep foom foom blared out over the traffic noise.

Inch. Inch.

Yellow streetlights glinted off the top of a city bus. There were no stars.

Inch. Inch.

The climb got easier where the tree leaned over. The trunk was rough, but that was OK. The word is malo. He was doing a good job in a gloomy place. Would anybody else here do that?

Inch. Inch.

Just a few moves to go. Little reflector triangles on Martin’s shoes glittered in the streetlights’ glare.

A yell came from below. “No!” It was somebody’s mama.

She flapped her arms around at the cars going by. Brakes screeched. Doors slammed.

Inch. Inch.

Two moves to go.

“Hey!” came a deep voice. “Hang tight, son.” From up so high the man looked like a little head in the middle of a black hole.

“Help him!” somebody’s mama called. Now there were more people, all looking up.

One move to go. All the shouting people were a long way down—a very long way down.

The head in the black hole shouted up, “Don’t get scared, son!” Tasi’s leg started to jiggle.

That wiggling leg would just have to cool it. Tasi gave a shove.

A dozen people below sucked in their breath.

“I can’t watch!” someone said.

Tasi held tight with one hand. With the other he reached out to the closest shoe. Tug, tug. He pulled that shoe down as the other went up. Once it popped over the post, he let go and the shoes dropped.

Everybody screamed.

“Calm down.” It was the Black Hole Man.

“It’s just his shoes.”

Slide, push, slide. Tasi headed down. “Careful!”

“Oh, man!” His feet touched the ground. “Praise the Lord.” Somebody’s mama wrapped fleshy arms around him and started crying. She smelled like vanilla.

She let go and a circle of people were looking right at him. Two of them were wiping their eyes.

“Let’s get you home, son.” That was the Black Hole Man. He was as big as Uncle Seni, but wearing a suit. He handed over Martin’s shoes.

Then the Black Hole Man put his big hand on Tasi’s shoulder, and the whole bunch of them walked him all the way home.

Cars and buses roared and honked, and there weren’t any stars. Still, as Tasi told them about Martin’s shoes and aiga, they all listened. They kept walking with him. Maybe this city wasn’t so gloomy after all.

When they reached his apartment building, Tasi looked up at them all.

“The word is malo,” he said. “It means good job and thanks, all at once.”

The Black Hole Man nodded his head, “Well, son,” he said, looking at the shoes slung over Tasi’s shoulder. “

 

By: C.S.Perryess