Excerpt from Bruddah and the Huli Boys by Phil Slott

Chapter 1

The Huli


Everything dat happens out there is your fault.
Bruddah
 

     “Malia--you seein’ what I’m seein?’

     “I’m seeing it, Bruddah, but I’m not believing it.”

     Bruddah and Malia were standing on the Kawaihae breakwall watching North Kohala’s canoes come in from practice.

     Their binoculars were so coated with sea spray they could barely see as a big wave caught The Kanani from behind.  Roper wanted to go right and ride the wave in, but the stern shot up, the nose shot down and dug in hard before he had a chance.  It just stood up, wind milled over and landed with a huge splat.

     Since Roper was in the six seat, he had a split second to see his crew on vertical hold.  From Kainoa’s back in number five, down to Hooker’s back in number one.

     Roper yelled at Kainoa’s head.

     Kainoa yelled at Kimo’s head.

     Yama yelled at Danny’s head.

     And Danny yelled, but Hooker was under water.

     In the split second they were still vertical, everybody but Hooker dove out to the side.  He held his breath until the summersault was over and came up gasping.

     Back on the breakwall, Bruddah and Malia still couldn’t believe it.

     “He caught dat buggah way too late, Malia!”

     “I’ve never seen an end-o like that!”

     “Wadya ‘spec from a novice?”

     “But, you said his regatta season was good.”

     “Yeah, but regattas got nuthin’ to do wit dos waves.”

     “Ho‘o kahi i ke kai (paddlers are alone at sea).”  

     “Right on, Malia!”

     Officially, Bruddah was the head coach of North Kohala Canoe Club and Malia Kealoa was his assistant.  But as the years went by, they had gone from being a close-knit team to good friends.

     Right now, they could see Roper swimming after the Kanani and punching the water as it blew away.

     “Malia, you still seein’ this?”

     “I see The Kanani floating towards Huli Rock without Roper!”
     “Da Huli Rock?”

     “The one and only!”

     “Hold on, he’s got um now.”

     Bruddah and Malia kept watching as Roper put one hand on the Kanani’s hull and worked his way around to the ama (outrigger) side. They could barely hear him yelling, but they could see his crew push the ama up and flip the boat over.“Dere, now it looks like a canoe again.”

     Once the boat was upright, Bruddah and Malia watched as Roper and Yama held the ama down so the rest of the crew could climb in.

     “It looks like they’re getting back in, Bruddah.”

     “Yeah, da only one I’m worried about is Kimo.”

     “Wait a minute!  He just got one of his fat legs over.”

     “Kimo better watch’em or he’s gonna huli dat boat one more time.”

     “Don’t worry Bruddah, he just fell in the bottom.”

     “Look at da size of dat splash!”

     “Are you saying Kimo’s overweight?”

     “I’m sayin’ he’s got one fat ass.”

     As soon as Kimo landed and Roper climbed back in, the crew untied the plastic bottles and started bailing.  When most of the water was out, the paddles went up and Danny started calling the switches again:

     “H-UT…HO!”

     Getting to shore wasn’t as easy as it looked.  The surf was way up and the rocks were ringed by twenty feet of white foam. As a surfer, Roper knew most sets had nine waves, so he counted and told his crew to go for it during the lull. Since the water is flat between sets, it only took a few strokes to get in synch. When they got to the ramp, Roper looked like the novice of all novices, by coming in head first. The Kanani scraped to a stop on the cement, making Bruddah give Roper his worst evil eye.

     “Hey Roper,” he shouted, “ain’t you got no respect?”

     “Sure I do.”

     “So how come you not backin’ in?”

     “I got here, didn’t I?”

     “Roper, how many times I gotta tell you--you gotta be part a dos waves out dere?”

     “We were part of it, Bruddah.”

     The crew looked down.

     “Yeah, da underwater part.”

     The crew laughed.

     “It wasn’t my fault, Bruddah--the waves...”

     “Look Roper, everything dat happens out there is your fault.”
     The crew nodded.

     “Anyway, Roper, are dese guys okay?”

     “They are now, but that was way too close.”

     They nodded harder.

     “Know why?” 

     “Is this the part where you tell me about waves again?”

     “Somebody betta.”

     Bruddah took a deep breath and gave Roper his no-kidding look.
     “I can teach you to catch waves like dat, all you gotta do is listen to ‘em.”

     “I hear them, Bruddah.”

     “Good, now listen to me.  Dose waves are da only friends you got out dere.  Dey deserve da same respec’ as a member of the family.”

     Danny nodded again.

     “Respect?” Roper asked.

     “Yeah.  You respec’ dem, and dey’ll respec’ you.  ‘Mazing how many guys steer distance same way dey steer regattas.  Dey muscle dere their way ‘gainst da water stedda workin’ wit it.”

     “That’s hard to believe.”

     “You betta believe it, Roper ‘cause you do it too.”

     “But, isn’t that old stuff getting to be bullshit?”

     “Bullshit, Roper?  I’ll give you bullshit!  Your crew has a new name, startin’ right now.  From now on, I’m callin’ you da Huli Boys.”

     “But, Bruddah everybody’ll know in five minutes!”

     “Oh, it won’t take dat long.”

     While Roper’s crew groaned, Bruddah went off on a long rant in Hawaiian. The only Hawaiian words Roper knew were the ones he learned on Aloha Airlines, and he wasn’t too happy about adding huli to aloha and mahalo. But, he didn’t need any Hawaiian vocabulary for this conversation.

     “What’re ya waitin’ for, Roper?  Grab some paint an paint Da Huli on dat canoe right now.”

     “Over The Kanani?”

     “No, don’t touch dat. Jus’ paint a large Huli underneath it.  An’ put a large one on da other side too. Okay, while Roper’s doin’dat, da resta you Huli Boys can paint da whole canoe.”
     Roper and his crew rolled their eyeballs all the way to the tool shed. When they started practice, they were one of the best teams in the club, but it only took one wave to fix that.  As soon as they had the unwelcome supplies, their shock turned to anger.

     “Nice huli,” Kainoa said, putting his arm around Roper.

     “Oh, I guess you coulda done better,” Roper said throwing it off.“So why’s Bruddah callin’ us The Huli Boys, Mr. Novice Head?”

     “Da Huli!  Christ, hope nobody never sees dat!”  Kimo said dotting the i on Huli.

     “Everybody’s gonna see it, you asshole!”  Hooker said, stabbing at Kimo’s shirt with his brush.

     “Who you callin’ asshole?  You de only asshole ‘roun here!” Kimo said, parrying Hooker’s brush.

     Dueling brushes caught on.

     “You know, Roper,” Yama said, ducking, “if you’d caught that wave correctly, we’d still be paddling The Kanani.”

     “Well, if Yama was paddling correctly, maybe I would have.”

     “Be that as it may, we’re The Huli Boys now.”

     “Nobody’ has to know that.”

     “Know?  Next week’s West Hawaii Today will probably tell everybody how we got our name. They’ll even refer to us the Huli Boys in the Moloka’i race brochure.”

     “But, Molokai’s not ‘til…”

     “It will be here before you know it.”

     “C’mon, Yama, we’ll be lucky if Bruddah even lets us represent the club.”

     While Roper and Yama were still fuming, Malia came over to make Roper feel better.

     “Are you okay?”

     “Nothing a coupla cold ones couldn’t fix, Malia.”

******

     The other coaches had already left, but Bruddah and Malia never went home until the last boat was on the rack. They were a good team because they coached so differently.

     Bruddah coached by making teams live up to his high standards and getting mad when they weren’t up to them.

     Malia coached calmly and found the time to be sympathetic.

     Bruddah coached with the wisdom of a seventy-year-old.

     Malia coached with the enthusiasm of a thirty-something.

     Bruddah often lapsed into angry diatribes in Hawaiian.

     Malia was fluent in Hawaiian so she softened his diatribes as she translated.

     Bruddah coached by being a cold, distant authority figure.
Malia coached by being warm, close and friendly.

     “You know, Bruddah, it seems to me this club is lucky to have us.”

     “Why’s dat, Malia?”

     “Because together we equal three.”

     “I don’ know about three, but somehow we get it right.”

     They stood in the shade and watched until Roper’s crew hoisted The Huli out of the water, carried it past them and pushed it up on the rack.

     “Looks like dey finally got dat bugger up dere,” Bruddah said.

     “Wanna ride home?”

     “Sure, Bruddah, it’s still too long a walk.”

******

     Roper usually loved his ritual of going home after practice, the sound of his engine warming up, wedging his paddle in the jump seat and vaulting over the door.  He loved the feeling of tight muscles letting go, the damp wind in his face, watching the sun go downand laughing at the same upside-down speed sign.

     But, not tonight.

     Tonight, he forgot his paddle, creaked into his seat, hated the humidity, ignored the sunset and drove off with tight muscles and a cold engine.

     Tonight he didn’t think the upside-down sign was funny at all.

******

     Bruddah and Malia traded tired looks, got in Bruddah’s truck and drove away squinting in the sun.

     “Looks like your seat’s too far up, Malia.”

     “I’m okay, we’re not goin’ that far.”

     Malia was over six feet tall, so even when she pulled her knees in, they were still squashed against the dashboard.  Her height made her ideal to be Bruddah’s assistant coach, since she could see further out in the water than he could.  All in all, she was an attractive Hawaiian lady.  Her big brown eyes, long brown hair and caring expressions provided a welcome relief from Bruddah’s stink-eye.  And even though Malia spoke fluent Hawaiian, her English was perfect. 

     “Weren’t you a little tough on Roper?” she asked.

     “Are you kiddin?  Architects don’t know nuthin’ ‘bout the water.” 

     “He’s learning, Bruddah.”

     “He’ll steer a lot betta when he does.”

     “I told him to love the water as much as it loves him.”

     “Das good, Malia, das real good.”

     As Bruddah slowed down for Hawi, he shook off his coaching thoughts just in time.

     “Here you are.”

     “Thanks, see you tomorrow, Bruddah.”

     As soon as she got out, Bruddah couldn’t help hoping Roper’s crew would have as good a season as he did back in his distance days.  As he turned around and headed for home, he couldn’t help thinking about the endless training sessions and races.  He could even feel the pats on his back.
 

Edited by Kevin Quirk, www.awriterseye.com