Read Here Today, Gone to Maui for Free Online Page B

light. Hula music gurgled from two wall-mounted speakers, only partially masking the buzzing from the fluorescent lights overhead. Bamboo-print wallpaper covered the walls, while framed posters advertised catamaran rides, snorkel trips, and luaus. In the middle of the room, a bunch of rattan chairs circled a glass coffee table. A long counter overlooked it all from the back wall.
    The woman behind the counter had a wide, calm face with perfectly square teeth. Her skin was mocha-colored, her shiny black hair pulled back into a braid. She could have been twenty-five or forty-five. Her blue polyester muumuu was at least two sizes too big. Her name tag said MARY.
    “Aloha,” she said when I walked in the door.
    Lacking the Hawaiian words for “this place sucks,” I said “aloha” back and wandered to the counter. There was a rack filled with brochures advertising everything from skyline tours to sunset cruises to bike rides down the volcano.
    The grocery store was a bit far, Mary told me, but there was a convenience store just down the street. As for an Internet café, I’d have to go into Lahaina, which meant waiting until Jimmy returned.
    The road to the convenience store was leafy, narrow, and overrun by rental cars. I jumped into the bushes twice to avoid getting run down. By the time I arrived, I was breathing heavily and sweating profusely. Also, I was starving. It was still morning in Maui, but my stomach hadn’t gotten the memo. Praying I wouldn’t get food poisoning, I bought a chicken teriyaki bowl from a roadside vendor and wolfed it down on the spot.
    This was not the kind of morning I had envisioned when I’d drawn up my itinerary.
    Fortunately, the convenience store had everything I needed, at only two or three times the price I would have paid on the mainland. I bought cereal, milk, orange juice, yogurt, minibananas, a bunch of tropical flowers, a bottle of sunscreen, and a cheap snorkeling set with flippers ( just so we’re clear, by “cheap” I am referring to quality, not price). Packages of homemade baked goods sat on the counter. I chose pineapple-mango scones.
    I barely noticed the condo’s ugliness as I unpacked my groceries and arranged the flowers in a chunky glass vase. Nesting always makes me feel better.
    When I was done, I balanced a scone on a square of paper towel and headed to the office. Mary laughed in delight and said “mahalo,” which means “thank you” in Hawaiian (eighteen hours here, and I was practically fluent). She took a bite and nodded. “Mm—’s good.”
    The door opened, and a couple walked in. They were about my age, maybe a little older, and dressed almost exactly the same, in denim shorts and white logo T-shirts. The woman snagged a whale watch brochure. She had blond hair, stringy at the ends, with about an inch of dark roots.
    Her husband leaned on the counter, his underarm hair tufting out of his sleeveless shirt. He smelled like banana mixed with coconut mixed with car grease. Really, he should have spent the extra two bucks on better suntan lotion. “We got a problem with our air-conditioning,” he said to Mary.
    “What air-conditioning?” she asked.
    “Exactly,” he said.
    She blinked at him. “Excuse me?”
    “The AC,” he said. “Pfft.” He sliced the air with his hand. “Not working.”
    Mary bit her lip. “The units aren’t air-conditioned. Did you try opening the window?”
    He stared at her. “Of course not! I didn’t want to let out the air-conditioning! So you’re telling me—oh, man!” He threw back his head in disgust.
    “I told ya we shoulda stayed at a hotel,” his wife muttered, slipping the whale pamphlet back into the display.
    “We have electric fans,” Mary said. “You want one in your room?”
    “What for?” the guy grumbled. “So we can move the hot air around?”
    Mary kept a pleasant smile on her face.
    “Hair dryer,” the woman prompted under her breath.
    “Oh, yeah,” the guy said. “You got a hair