“I’m working on this application for a grant from The Sandwich Islands Trust, the Clark family foundation. Do you think she has any influence on their decisions? I want to expand our outreach to gay teens on other parts of O’ahu, maybe open a satellite center on the North Shore.”
I shook my head. “From what I know, Terri’s great-aunt runs that foundation, and she’s very conservative. I don’t think gay teens are going to be on the top of her list, but I’ll talk to Terri and let you know what she says.”
I sat in the overstuffed armchair across from Cathy’s desk. I could see kids getting comfortable enough in it to talk to her about their problems. “Sandra’s been trying to find out about one of these horrible organizations that demonstrates against gay marriage,” Cathy said. She pushed her dirty-blonde bangs from her forehead. “Do you know anything about the Church of Adam and Eve?”
Sandra was Cathy’s life partner, a prominent attorney with a downtown firm and the most politically connected lesbian in the Islands. “This mainland minister and his wife relocated to Honolulu about three months ago, to save us from the plague of homosexuals.” She smiled wryly. “They’re very well-financed, and they advertise their prayer meetings all over the place. Sandra hasn’t been able to find any dirt on them-yet.”
“But she thinks there’s something wrong.”
“There has to be, don’t you think, Kimo?” Cathy looked at me, her almond eyes opened wide. “How else can they pretend to be loving Christian people when they have this terrible anti-gay agenda?” She sighed. “They’re having one of their revival meetings tonight. Maybe it’s just the smoke everywhere, and these arsons at gay-owned businesses, but I have a bad feeling.”
SUCH FRIENDLY PEOPLE
As I walked back home, the smoke still hung over Waikiki, and I had the same bad feeling as Cathy. So I decided to check out the Church of Adam and Eve for myself. After a quick dinner of grilled pineapple chicken with sticky rice, I put on the only suit I own, a conservative navy blue, and slicked my short dark hair back with gel. Since my time in the spotlight, people occasionally recognized me on the street, so I put on a pair of horn-rimmed glasses with clear lenses and hoped no one would connect this conservative young businessman with that gay detective in his aloha shirts and Topsiders.
I drove up into the hills of central O’ahu, to a place called the Pupukea Plantation. The atmosphere in the parking lot was festive, like I remembered when I was young and my parents used to drive us out into the country to watch fireworks displays on July fourth. Everybody was so friendly, smiling and shaking hands. Boys and girls played in the grassy aisles and “Onward, Christian Soldiers” poured out of big speakers.
Hundreds of folding chairs had been lined up under the tent, but even so by the time I got there it was standing room only. It was warm, with a buzz of conversation going on around me and the high giddy laughter of little kids. Everybody got a paper flyer with a list of the hymns and the topic of the preacher’s sermon, and an address where you could send donations. An elderly Filipina in a flowered halter dress moved through the aisles, handing out paper fans imprinted with the logo of one of the big car dealers.
The crowd was a cross section of Hawai’i. Young people courteously gave up seats to their elders, and haoles, islanders and Asians smiled at each other and talked about politics and business. Maybe Cathy and Sandra were wrong; the people around me seemed so nice. How could they advocate violence?
The minister and his wife appeared from the sidelines, to rapturous applause. They were both in their early thirties, neatly groomed and overly cheerful, as such religious people often are. He was a little on the pudgy side, but his fleshy face just seemed to hold a smile that much better. She was slim, without much of a figure, obviously the more serious of the two. Both had dark brown hair, though hers had a light curl while his was straight.
The minister led us in the opening prayer, through a couple of hymns and then into his sermon. He began slowly, talking a lot about morality and family values, about the need for a return to spirituality. It all made sense, even to a confirmed non-churchgoer like me. My family was a real polyglot of religions, and we’d gone to a couple of different churches when growing up, never settling on any one. Our parents seemed to feel that as long as we grew up as moral, ethical people it didn’t matter where we worshipped.
Then the minister’s wife stepped up to the podium. She wore a simple shirtwaist dress in a reddish orange color that reminded me of the color of bonfires at the beach. She wore no jewelry other than a wedding ring, and her black pumps were almost old-ladyish.
She began by speaking about their family, extending an invitation to all of us present to join in the love that they shared. “But there are some people who aren’t deserving of our love,” she said, and there was general nodding and agreement among the people around me.
“You know who I’m talking about. Homosexuals. They call themselves gay, to cover up their depravity, but we won’t let them get away with that. There are other names for them, nasty names, but we won’t use them either. We’ll just call them like we see them-homosexuals. Keep the sex right up front there, because that’s what they’re all about, after all. Sex. That’s all they care about. Everything else is just window dressing.”
I started to feel the heat under the tent, regretting having worn my suit. As I pulled at my collar, I glanced around, to see if anyone was looking at me as if they knew who I was. She had that knack, of making you think she was speaking directly to you, and I felt more like an impostor with every word.
I wondered what would happen if someone recognized me. I’d seen crowd mentality at work first hand, when I was a patrolman. All it took was a trigger, and ordinary people would turn into a mob, capable of looting, rioting, and other violence that seemed to lurk unsuspected beneath all of our solid exteriors. I had no doubt this crowd would turn on me, hurt me if they could.
I started to make my way out of the tent, slowly, politely squeezing between people. The sweat dripping down my back got worse as I tried to fold myself up as narrowly as possible. Behind me, I heard the minister’s wife continue. “We need to take action, friends. It’s up to all of us to make this the right kind of world for our families, for our children and grandchildren. It starts with each of us, when we make a commitment in our hearts to accept Jesus, to practice what he preached.”
Then I was spotted. Our eyes met for a moment, and he looked away. My heart did a double back flip, but I knew that my own brother could not be the catalyst who could turn a crowd against me. Or at least I hoped so.
Lui, my eldest brother, stood with his hands on his wife’s shoulders. She hadn’t seen me; her attention was focused on the woman at the podium. It was clear Lui wasn’t going to look at me again, so I continued to the exit, wondering. It was surprising to see him there, but even more so was the way he looked. He wore an aloha shirt, shorts and sandals, and had sunglasses on a chain around his neck.
You have to understand, my brother wears a suit and tie to family luaus. I hadn’t seen him in an aloha shirt since high school, and I hadn’t often seen his bare legs since he reached puberty. He had always been the most precise of the three of us, the most formal, and his business degree and high-paying job seemed to suit his personality.
He was in disguise, I realized, as I made it outside without further incident. Just like me, he didn’t want to be recognized. Lui was the station manager of KVOL, “Your Volcano Alert Station, Erupting News All The Time,” the scrabbling non-network station in Honolulu. KVOL concentrated on the most inflammatory stories, the ones on the dark side of the news. I wondered if he knew something about the Church of Adam and Eve, if he was there for professional reasons.