“Don't move,” your mother assures them as she wheels you to an adjacent table. She wears a grimly cheerful Let's make the best of it expression. “We're fine right here.”
        I pick up my cup and plate and join the two of you. Your blue eyes take in my sudden presence, then drift upward toward the dappled morning light bending through the tall Cook pines.
        “How can you eat all that?” your mother asks, staring at the remains of the loco moco.
        I shrug. “I'm starving.”

        . . . number 25 leads the Badgers in goal production with five this year . . .

        In Fargo the characters turn to television—soap operas, talk shows, sports—to escape the grinding realities of their lives. On Lana`i we go to the beach.
        “She doesn't like it here,” your mother observes as she offers you her breast in the shade of the big kiawe tree near the edge of the blue-green water. “It's too hot.”
        She's right: I can see your pink cheeks sweat from the heat as you suckle her breast. Our house up in Lana`i City sits about 1,500 feet above sea level, amid a planted forest of Cook pines at the base of the mountain, and has the feel of a cabin in a cool mountain village. Down here on Hulopo`e Beach, the tropical sun bears down on the golden sand, which returns the heat with a vengeance, even in the shade. If you happen to go to sleep, your mother will slip you into the tiny blue nylon tent resting right here on the weathered picnic table, and unzip the side flaps so the trade winds can waft through the screens and keep you tolerably cool.
        A greater problem is time. Despite my attempt to merge the professional with the personal, our days are still divided. Your mother and I have made the following deal: Mornings for interviews, afternoons for the family, and evenings (whenever your mother and I can manage it) for ourselves. Though of course you are never out of earshot.
        Michael and Daniel are playing on the edge of the water, building sand forts and splashing around in the low, lapping surf. Daniel is ecstatic because Michael is sticking close to him, including him in his play. Daniel skips and bounds around the sand fort, like the elf he was born to be. Seeing Daniel happily involved in something, anything at all, gives your mother and me a tiny thrill, a rush of hope.
        I turn my attention to the bay. About a hundred yards out, over by the southern, rockier side, David is perched on a body board. The waves are bigger, ride-able there. Scattered around David, half a dozen chocolate brown local kids float on their own sleeker, slimmer surf boards, watching the ocean behind them breathe. They know when and how to catch the waves; David is simply trying to imitate them.

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