Inhale

by J.J. Richardson

Copyright 2023

My precious Lily married me only after I promised to take her to Tanneuni on our honeymoon.  Returning to that island north of Fiji had been her dream since her father took her there when she was twelve.  How she’d been so enthusiastic about people and life for as long as I’d known her, and yet think only of that island, I never understood until the day we arrived at Tanneuni.

      Walking down the steps of the commuter plane, we carried only our backpacks because she wanted to travel light.  She had told me the island was small enough to see everything on bicycles.

      We rode north on rented bicycles alongside the oceanside road on the eastern side of the island between tall, green palm trees and white-sand beaches.  It was an untouched world.  We passed coral outcroppings and black cliffs that dropped into the churning blue and white sea.

      An occasional paved or dirt road turned inland, and here or there, a car or small truck passed us in either direction.  Our destination was the small town of Nadeloi on the island’s western side, where we had made our hotel reservation.

      I wanted to slow down and look closer at the small wooden homes and buildings that huddled against the western mountains, but Lily rode ahead of me and wouldn’t stop.  It seemed her only interest was getting to Nadeloi.  This troubled me because I’d never seen her act like this.

      “Keep up with me,” she yelled back without turning around, her blond hair following her.

      The distance between us kept increasing as the morning wore on.  My knee began to hurt from my fall at work.  I thought it had healed, but I had an increasingly difficult time keeping up with her.

      The land, unaffected by the modern world, provided no sound except for the birds and the sea waves.  The ocean and the green, western mountains were striking.  I wanted to appreciate them, but kept falling behind Lily.

      Before arriving in Tanneuni, she had always been patient with me and generous with her time with her math students.  She would make them homemade cookies when they practiced their lessons and even give them short piano performances.

      I thought she would get tired on that rented bicycle ahead of me.

      But then it happened.  I lost sight of her.

      My hand began to cramp as I tried to steady my knee.  Something passed between the cars far ahead of me.  It was a motorcyclist heading westward.  That was when I noticed a pass through the mountains to the island’s western side.  A shortcut to Nadeloi!  Lily must have taken it.

      Still rubbing my leg, I turned westward on the dirt road.  I couldn’t believe she’d do such a thing to me on our honeymoon.  How could she not know I’d feel bad and be worried about her?  I rode on dirt roads between the island’s small wooden houses, built with curious interwoven wooden joints.  The humble homes appeared sturdy enough, even though they were built atop thatched trusses to keep them off the ground.

      I wish Lily could have seen them with me.  I tried my best to believe that nothing bad had happened to her.

      Children stopped playing and chasing each other and watched me as I peddled past them.  I saw a shop worker at a small store with wooden-planked walls, selling fruits and vegetables.

      “Good morning,” I said to the shopworker as I got off the bike.  With her dark skin and curly hair, she looked like one of the Melanesian people Lily had shown me in photos.  She set down the papayas she was unpacking and stood up straight, seemingly touched that I had come to visit her shop.

      “Which road takes me to the pass over the mountains?” I asked.

      Her smile left her.

      “The road to Nadeloi,” I said.  “How do I get to it?”

      She turned her back to me and returned to her work.  I considered asking her again when she said, “Don’t go there.”

      She shook her head as if I had disappointed her terribly.  The Melanesian children down the street still stood and stared at me.  I didn’t want to offend her.  Maybe she was tired of rude tourists asking questions.

      “Why?” I asked.

      She kept her back to me.  “No one comes back from Nadeloi,” she said to me, raising her hand and pointing to her head, “not how they were.”

      “My wife is ahead of me,” I said.  “Have you seen anyone else come by?”

      “No.”  She shook her head again and faced me.  “I am sorry for her.”

      “Where’s the road through the mountains?” I asked.

      “It is closed,” she said.

      “Why?”  I didn’t wish to upset her.  I assumed she knew more about the island than I did, so there must have been a reason.  “Why is it closed?”

      “Because no one goes that way,” she said.

      The woman was determined on the matter.

      “Okay,” I said.  The longer I stood there, the further Lily would get ahead of me.  “Thank you for speaking with me.”

      I returned to the ocean road from where I had come and resumed my course around the perimeter of the island to its western side, wondering if everyone on the island felt the same about Nadeloi.  I would have asked other adults, but I didn’t see any.

      The buildings became farther apart until there were none.  At the north end of the island, I found myself alone on the road between the mountains and the ocean.  Where was my Lily, and what happened to her?

      I made my way down the island's western side.

When I began to fear I was lost, I saw ahead of me a ferry docked at a pier jutting from the shoreline.  Tucked against the foot of the green mountains was a group of oriental buildings with colorful walls and tiled roofs.  A bus from the ornate buildings crossed the road before me on its way to the ferry.

      I pedaled up the inclined road toward the buildings until I reached the parking lot.  A row of bike racks faced the buildings.  All the bicycles on the island looked the same, so I couldn’t tell if one of them was Lily’s.  Our hotel staff would tell me if Lily had checked in.

      I left my bike with the others and walked between the buildings.  Lily couldn’t have found a more exotic place for us.  The air smelled sweet.   And somehow, I felt relaxed.  My knee had stopped hurting, and even my worries about Lily began to fade.  She would be here somewhere.

      My crew back home would have liked to hear about Nadeloi and its ornate buildings, which weren’t just structures but works of art, surrounded by meticulous landscaping and plants trimmed into the shapes of people and animals.  I would have brought my cell phone or camera, but Lily told me they weren’t allowed in Nadeloi.

      In one of the buildings, I found an elderly Asian worker dressed in black standing behind a counter.  I asked, “Where is the Yoi Otoko Hotel?”

      He left to speak with a female worker who was also dressed in black.  They spoke in a language I didn’t understand.  He returned and then gestured with his hand to his right.

      I went as directed past a red-tiled-roofed building to a dark-wood single-story hotel.  An intricately carved sign in front of it read, “Hotel Yoi Otoko.”

      As I entered the foyer, I saw bright red and yellow wooden framing holding flowering plants.  Water from a fountain in the middle of the room rolled over rounded stones.

      A woman at the front desk smiled broadly and said, “Welcome.”

      “I’m Kyle Robinson,” I told the woman.  “My wife and I have a room reserved for two nights.  Did she check in ahead of me?”  I showed the woman my identification.

      “Let me see,” she said, looking at her monitor and working her keyboard.  “Yes, she has, Mr. Robinson.  She made the required payment.  Your room number is 102.”  The woman gave me an electronic passkey and said, “That room is one of my favorites.”  She smiled and motioned with her hand.

      I glanced in the suggested direction but asked, “What does Nadeloi mean?”

      “It is the iTaukei name for a plant that grows in this area.  It lives nowhere else in the world.  I believe your wife went into our dining room.”

      “Thank you,” I said.

      I passed through a sculpted doorway and into the hotel’s restaurant.  Guests seated at polished wooden tables ate their meals.  None of them was Lily, but her backpack was on a table next to the back windows.  The dishes she used during her meal were still on the table.

      I sat at the table and looked through her things, trying to keep from getting upset with her.  I had never known Lily to be so thoughtless.  Yet, for some reason, I felt comforted, which puzzled me as much as her behavior did.

      A smiling Asian woman dressed in black approached me.  I saw no native Melanesians in the town, which seemed odd to me.

      “Welcome,” she said.  “May I get you something to drink?”

      “I’m looking for my wife, who ate here.  Do you remember her?  These are her things.”

      The woman motioned toward the doors at the back of the dining room.

      Through the windows, I saw a grassy courtyard.  Positioned in the middle of the courtyard were six glass rooms.

      She withdrew her paper pad, tore off the top piece, and placed it on the table.

      I read the woman’s notations.  “Was this her order?”

      “Yes, sir.”

      “Two hundred and twenty dollars?”  I glanced up at her.  “For shrimp scampi?”

      “It is very nice here in Nadeloi,” the woman said.

      “She didn’t pay for it?” I asked, rereading the numbers.

      “No, sir.”

      My Lily would never have done this.  How could I have so terribly misunderstood her?  I glanced at the woman again as she stood, looking back at me.  I retrieved a credit card from my wallet.

      She held out her hand.  “Cash only.”

      “Cash?” I asked.  “No one has that much cash.  I certainly don’t.”

      That’s when I remembered Lily telling me that most merchants on Tanneuni accepted only cash.  I thought she meant the native shops around the island, not the businesses within Nadeloi.

      “She didn’t charge it to our room?”

      “No, sir,” she said, shaking her head.  “Cash only.”

      I grunted and rested my elbows on the tabletop, still holding the credit card.  I should have been grateful that my knee no longer hurt.  “Was she distraught about anything?  Was she upset?”

      “She was very happy.  A friendly woman,” she said, smiling.  “Excuse me, sir.”  The woman returned to the kitchen.

      I examined Lily’s things again until the woman returned with a stern-looking man wearing a black suit.  Was he Chinese or Japanese?  She spoke to him in their language.

      “Good afternoon,” the man said to me.  “What is your name?”

      “Kyle Robinson,” I answered.

      “Please, come with me, Mr. Robinson,” he said.

      “Why?”

      With my backpack over my shoulders and Lily’s backpack in my arms, I followed him to the courtyard and to the next building.  He opened the door labeled Office of Island and ushered me into a room with desks, phones, and black-clad employees managing paperwork.

      “Wait here,” he said.  He entered an office at the back and returned with a dark-haired woman who didn’t appear happy to see me.  He said something to her that I didn’t understand, and returned to his restaurant.

      “Please,” the woman said, “come with me, Mr. Robinson.”

      I followed her into her office, and she closed the door behind me.

      “Have a seat, Mr. Robinson.”  She sat behind her desk, which bore a considerable amount of paperwork.  Her office walls had pictures of ocean scenes and photographs of Nadeloi’s buildings.

      “I am Officer Tanaka.  We are proud of our village.  We take care of it and respect it.”

      “I understand,” I said.  “It’s very pretty.”

      “We request that our guests respect it, also.  Your wife must pay for her meal.  Otherwise, she is a thief.”

      “Of course,” I said.  “I’ll find her, and we’ll pay.  I promise.  She’s probably in our hotel room.  I’ll get her.  We’re on our honeymoon.”

      Officer Tanaka smiled.  “Congratulations.”

      “What’s this about not accepting credit cards?” I asked.

      “Our customers enjoy their privacy in Nadeloi,” she said.  “Did you not read our brochures?  It is made very clear.”

      I was embarrassed to recall that Lily had studied them more than I had.

      “Maintaining Nadeloi is expensive,” Officer Tanaka said.  “We do not have slaves.”

      “On my way here, I saw a bus heading from Nadeloi to the dock on the shore.”

      Officer Tanaka looked back at me, tilting her head.  “Sometimes our customers need help getting back to the mainland.  It is a free service.”

      She stood up.  “Will you excuse me?”

      Officer Tanaka left the room, closing her office door behind her.  It felt strange for her to leave me alone in her office.  Surely, I wasn’t her first problem customer.

      I had trusted my Lily’s good nature and let her plan our journey to the island.  It was to be her surprise for me.  But how she had treated me!  I didn’t want to discover she wasn’t all I thought she was.

      On Officer Tanaka’s desk, I saw Lily’s handbag partially covered with paperwork.  In it, I found her passport and wallet, neither of which she would have willingly given up.  Most of the cash we had brought from home was gone.  I put her handbag in my backpack.  The Melanesian woman at the vegetable shop had warned me.  Why weren’t any Melanesians working in Nadeloi?

      Officer Tanaka returned and sat at her desk.

      “There’s a pretty smell throughout this town,” I asked her.  “What is it?”

      “It is from a plant that grows only here,” she said.  “Do you like it?”

      “It smells nice.”

      “It calms us,” Officer Tanaka said.  “Its energy is all around us.”  She closed her eyes and breathed in deeply through her nose.  “It grows off the shore, feeding on ground coral and dried seaweed.”

      Was I in trouble or not?   “Let me find my wife so we can pay.”

      She opened her eyes.  “Return her to the Yoi Otoko’s restaurant and have her pay for her meal.  If she doesn’t, we will arrest her.  You may now go and find her.”

      I stood and left her office.  An office worker glanced up at me.  She smiled and then returned to her work.

      Back in the courtyard, I walked along the sidewalk that ran along the backs of the buildings that encircled the central grassy area, with the glass rooms in the middle.  Guests walked about the shops, bars, and eateries.  Flowers and wood carvings of fish and wildlife decorated the buildings.  I began to feel at ease again, but I didn’t want peace.  I wanted Lily.

      Beggars sat against the buildings’ walls along the walkways.  They didn’t seem dirty or homeless.

      “Money?” they asked me one at a time as I passed them, their palms held out, their voices weak and needy.

      I returned to the Hotel Yoi Otoko to find our spacious room decorated with oriental plush furnishings and flowers embroidered into the bedspread and couches.  The generous bathroom included a glass shower.

      But Lily wasn’t there.  No note from her, and the light on the room phone didn’t blink.  The bed was undisturbed, and the bathroom was unused.

      On both sides of the bed were small, white machines with long, flexible tubes and nosepieces with straps.  They looked like machines that helped people breathe at night.  Lily must have gotten us a special room.

      I transferred the remaining cash from Lily’s wallet to mine and left our backpacks on the bed.  It didn’t seem right for me to wait for Lily to arrive, and I thought I should have been more upset with her.  Something was happening that I didn’t understand.

      Outside the hotel, I wandered between clean, colorful buildings while becoming increasingly worried about Lily’s whereabouts.  No one else around me appeared to be troubled.  The town was arranged in a circle, with each building facing inward toward the grassy courtyard with the glass rooms.  There were no children in Nadeloi.  Why did Lily’s father take her to such a place?

      I could see into the glass rooms.  They weren’t numbered and didn’t seem to be assigned to anyone.  Each had flowering plants, an oversized red-floral chair, and an end table.  I entered one of the glass rooms and closed its door behind me.  Beside the chair was another one of those small white breathing machines.  A label next to a mechanical slot at the top of the machine said, "Ten Dollars ($10)."

      The sweet smell in the room was more potent than what I had smelled throughout the town.  It relaxed me, which was what I needed, and I somehow began believing everything would be all right.

      Lily must have sat in one of these rooms.  The lady in the restaurant had nearly said so.  Sitting there, I was only doing what she had done.  I withdrew a ten-dollar bill from my wallet.

      It was my only chance to understand what happened to her.  Officer Tanaka would have told me if something terrible had happened to Lily, so why should I have worried?  I inserted the bill into the slot.  The machine’s fan turned on, and a hiss came from the nosepiece at the end of the flexible hose.  I examined the soft plastic before putting it against my nose.

      I inhaled.

      My body fit the chair perfectly.  I couldn’t remember which of my knees had been hurting, which reassured me.

      I began to tremble.  I thought it was because I hadn’t eaten anything that day.  Sweating, I pulled away the nosepiece and leaned forward to grab the room’s door handle.  But changing my position abruptly made me dizzy.  The air in the room began to smell rancid and moldy, an odor that scraped against my nose and throat.  Maybe it was because my sense of smell had improved.  My legs and arms became weak, or perhaps I didn’t want to move.  I considered the possibility that I was stuck in the glass room.  The nosepiece continued to hiss as it lay on my lap.  I wanted it to help me relax, but what I wanted more was to find Lily.

      Using all my remaining energy, I stood and leaned against the glass wall.  The seagulls and the people in the surrounding buildings had become loud, although I wasn’t sure what was happening around me because my vision had become blurry, and I had also become thirsty.  Whatever that gas was, it was the calming odor I had been smelling ever since I arrived at Nadeloi.

      The town’s buildings were across the grass.  I feared I wouldn’t reach them before falling to the ground.  Asian employees wearing black and walking among the tourists looked terrifying.  They never entered the glass rooms.  Where did these people live, and what was their life like in the tiny town at night, assuming the stores ever closed?

      By some means, I exited the glass room and made it across the grass to our hotel.  I didn’t care if my dining room server saw me again.  I felt my room passkey in my pocket as I walked unevenly.

      Breathing deeply made me feel indestructible.  Or was I defenseless?  Why had I entered the hotel hallway?  I rested against the outside of our closed room door, the cold bronze number 102 against my cheek.  Maybe it was the wrong door, but my passkey opened it.  The room was still untouched.  I realized that the white machines beside the bed had slots to accept money.  I would bring Lily back to our room, and we would enjoy it together.

      It didn’t matter who Lily was anymore because I was becoming a different person.  My memory of her faded, and it hurt to remember anything before Nadeloi.  I sat on the bed and slumped over onto my side.

      A woman came to my mind.  I struggled to imagine her face because I had met her so long ago.  She was the shopworker I had met who warned me about Nadeloi.  What a simple life for her, not to need anything.

      I remembered how Lily used to compliment me on how sensible I was.  But nothing was sensible now.  Or everything was.  Had Lily married me only because I took her to Nadeloi?  My arms and legs tingled, and my feet were numb, making it hard to stand and walk.  But I had to know what she wanted.

      The hallway walls were smooth and cool as I slid along them and pushed myself out through the hotel’s front doors.  The sun was close to the ocean, large and red.

      A pair of officers wearing black approached one of the beggars and asked him to stand.  Neither the officers nor the beggars noticed me.  Perhaps they took the beggars to the bus and drove them to the ferry.

      A group of workers standing between buildings looked out at the ocean.  Lily stood with them.  Was I lighter or heavier?  Lily wore black, and her hair was also black and shorter.  Did she still want me?  Why was she with them?

      My legs lost their strength, so I leaned against the wood-planked wall of the Haiou restaurant.  My fingers felt swollen as I rubbed them together, and the air in my lungs felt thick, making it hard to breathe.  I wanted the machine in the glass room to calm me, and that made me angry because I wanted it more than Lily.

      The employees spoke their language to each other as Lily stood by.  I had done what she expected of me by taking the gas, yet she still abandoned me.  Everyone likes Lily.  I was her subservient follower, with foolish thoughts and undeserving needs.

      Lily didn’t look in need of anything and didn’t seem to recognize me.  Surely, I must have meant more to her than a ride to Tanneuni.  I couldn’t think of any reason I should disturb her, but I approached her anyway because I still deserved to be with her.

      She wasn’t wearing her wedding ring, which made me want to return to our room.  I was just as needy as she was.  On the way to Tanneuni that morning, I remembered when Lily and I needed each other.

      When the others stopped speaking, I said to her, “Lily.”

      On the other side of the parking lot, everything turned a blurry red.  A tall, fiery wall seemed to roll over the ocean road toward us, consuming everything in its path.  Is this what the workers were waiting for?  They didn’t appear afraid or anxious.

      “Help me,” I asked her.

      She stared at the ocean as if she couldn’t or didn’t want to respond.  I had confused her.

      “What’s out there?” I asked her.  I put my arm around her waist and walked her toward the parking lot.

      “Where are you taking me?” she asked, looking down, scowling, taking small steps.

      The workers with her didn’t stop us.  I don’t know why.

      “They’re hurting Nadeloi,” I said.  “Look.”  I faced her toward the red wall ahead of us.  “They’ve come to burn it down,” I said.

      My mind had left me.  Lily’s eyes, cheeks, and mouth frowned.  She tried to turn back to Nadeloi.  “See,” I said, pointing forward.

      “I don’t want to,” she said, her voice almost inaudible.

      My eyes blurred from the heat.  Lily didn’t resist me despite her pleadings.  Maybe she couldn’t because she had become a child.  Maybe I had become a child, too.

      The red wasn’t from a fire but from the sunset over the ocean.  The sun went below the water and darkened to black.

      No one was out there to stop us, not even Officer Tanaka.  No walls or outposts.  The drug must have been the town’s barrier, overseer, and guardian.

      Lily’s steps became progressively stiff as our distance from Nadeloi increased.

      “Where are we going?” she asked.  “I’m cold.”

      We turned to follow the yellow line down the dark ocean road.  I couldn’t keep anything straight in my head.  Just flashes and swirling emotions that couldn’t settle on anything.  No up or down or in or out, but only the black road with its yellow line.

      “Why are you dressed like them?” I asked Lily as we walked along the road.  “Where’s your ring?”

      “They told me I could wear only the approved clothing,” she answered.  “They said it would be a great honor for me because of my father.”

      “Your father?”  I tried to think, remembering that her father, who had taken her to the island, had passed away years ago.

“Are we dead?” she asked.

      “We’re not dead,” I said.

      She bowed her head and scowled again as if she didn’t understand.

      “You never paid for your meal,” I said.

      She glanced up, startled.  “I didn’t?”

      “But they have all our money now,” I said.  “I think that will cover it.”

      “My father told me Tanneuni had changed his life and would change mine someday,” Lily said.

      “What a terrible thing to tell a child,” I said.  Every part of me was heavy and cold in the dark.

      “After my father’s first visit here, he invested our money in Nadeloi,” Lily said.  “He brought me here to show me his success.”

      “Nadeloi is evil,” I said.  “How many lives has it ruined?”

      “They named our hotel after him,” Lily said.

      I tried to think.  I had forgotten his name, but it came to me after a struggle.  “Your father’s name was Jack Goodman, wasn’t it?”

      “Yoi Okoto in English means good man.”

      My legs gave way, and I sank to the road onto my knees, which sent a sharp pain up and down my right leg.

      Lily steadied me until we lay together on the cold, hard road in the dark.  I wished I could return to the glass room.

      “Look what has become of us,” I said.  “Or were we always like this?”

      Lily looked back toward Nadeloi, which I could no longer see.  I felt the rough pavement against my cheek and tried to remember what existed beyond the yellow line.

      “Why did you bring us here?” I asked.

      “To be with him,” Lily said.

      “Your father wasn’t here today,” I said.  “Why didn’t you warn me about Nateloi?  You’re not healthy, Lily.”

      She lay on her back and gazed up at the stars, frowning.

      She couldn’t have been a bad person.  It was her memory of that drug that drove her to Tanneuni.  She was needy, like me.  But was she needy for me?  I wondered how we could ever be ourselves again.

      “We’re supposed to want each other,” I said.

      “I do want you, Kyle,” she said.  “I do.  I’m sorry.”

      I couldn’t think of anything or anywhere but the dark road beneath us.  I abandoned hope of ever moving again.

      A faint image came to my mind.  I didn’t let it go because it was my last thought, and I had to tell Lily about it before it left me.  Maybe she would remember it for me after I had forgotten it.

      “There’s a woman,” I managed to say.  “I met her on the way here.  She’ll be happy to see you.  She works at a shop that sells fruits and vegetables.  She’ll help us.”

I heard Lily move.  She got up on one elbow.  “Are you sure?”

      “I feel I’m sure,” I said.

      She lay on her back again beside me and said, “I’d like to meet her.”

      “But we must get to her first.”

      “Let’s rest,” she said.  “A little while longer.  Will she like me?”

      “Everyone likes you, Lily.”

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