The perfume of love (rain-bi)

chapter 16

on the way back to Ocean Wanderer, he said, "if you can persuade your sister to take some time off from shopping when she's ashore, there are one or two things here worth seeing before we move on."

although irked by the dig at hana, she said pleasantly, "really? what are they?"

"just across the street from the library there's the Baldwin house, the home of a missionary and doctor who lived here in the last century." he raked back his breeze-ruffled hair with a careless sweep of lean fingers.

"or if you cross the main highway and go inland, up to the top of Lahainaluna Road, you can see a replica of the first printing press on the island in a small printing museum. there's also a fine view of the town from up there. it would be hot walking up. you'd do better to take the car when it's free. have you a licence?"

she shook her head. "we didn't need a car in seoul. i should learn to drive, i suppose. like typing and knowing how to work a computer, it's a fairly essential skill, isn't it?"

"as you say, it depends where you live, but even i.... living at sea... find my licence useful at times."

young ji had seen them approaching. he was waiting to hand her out of the dinghy. before releasing his hold, he asked, "shall i lay another place for breakfast, captain?"

jihoon said, "i have breakfast in the saloon immediately after my shower. would you care to join me? your sister rarely emerges from her quarters before nine or ten."

perhaps it wasn't meant as a reminder that hana was, at this moment, in bed with a man whose only attraction for her was his extremely large income. but whether or not that was his intention, jihoon's last remark made jenna miserably conscious of her sister's invidious standing aboard the yacht and her own share of obloquy for seeming to go along with hana's behaviour and share in it's benefits.

it was a painful flash of embarrassment which made her say stiffly, "thank you, but I've imposed myself on you quite long enough for one morning. I'll take coffee in my cabin."

no sooner had she hurried away than she began to regret turning down the chance to continue the conversation begun on the dinghy.

he might not have wanted to share his breakfast table with her. like joon the night before, young ji had made it difficult for him not to do the civil thing. but whether or not he found her company a bore, she would have liked talking to him, finding out what made him tick.

tomorrow he probably wouldn't invite her to join him. opportunities never came twice.

he was wrong about hana not putting in an appearance until halfway through the morning. she came on deck early that day. she wanted joon to drop them at the shops at Kapalua on his way to play golf.

had it not been for the fact that everything her sister bought in the two and a half hours she spent shopping was paid for with American dollars she could only have received from joon, jenna would have enjoyed browsing with her.

the twenty or so shops surrounded a landscaped courtyard adjoining the island's best hotel.

most of the things in the shops were in much better taste than the wares on sale in Lahaina, and there was one shop, called Brioni, where jenna would have loved to have unlimited funds.

as well as high fashion clothes, Brioni sold objets d'art. that day there was a display of beautiful iridescent glass vases and ornaments in the area just inside the entrance. but it was when they came to the part of the showroom where the clothes were displayed that, after looking round for a few moments, she knew these garments were 'her'. this was the look she wanted.

the designs were all very simple, and all made from natural fibres.... silk, cotton and linen. the colours were natural... black, white, pale beige and taupe.

the prices struck her, by any standards, as exorbitant. but it didn't matter that the clothes were far out of her reach. she had found her look and could probably achieve the same effect by hunting for inexpensive separates in similar colours and shapes.

hana didn't share her enthusiasm. "in hot climates you need bright colours" she said, as they left the shop.

"not on everyone. we're different types, hana. i haven't your vivid colouring. bright colours extinguish me"

"they wouldn't if you wore more make-up. when that girl at the store did your eyes you looked a different girl."

"i know... not myself at all" jenna said dryly.

"don't try to make me over in your image, hana. it wouldn't work. you take after our mother and I'm more like Aunt minji when she was young."

"yes, and look what happened to her. nobody showed her how to make the best of herself and she got stuck on her shelf and died a wizened old virgin" her sister said scathingly, as if there could be no worse fate.

later, when they were having a salad on the terrace at the Bay Club, a restaurant at the southern end of crescent-shaped Kapalua Bay, from which they could see the outline of corals under the blue-green water, jenna asked, "is joon a widower?"

"divorced. he and his wife hadn't been getting along for years. when all the children were grown-up, they split. she's remarried now. joon says he won't ever remarry. but i may be able to change his mind about that."

jenna waited until an ettentive waiter had refilled their glasses before she said, "have you given up hope of falling in love with a nice man and living the rest of your life with him?"

"jenna, that whole concept is a pipedream for schoolgirl and tired housewives. it doesn't happen in real life. people think they're falling in love, but it's only chemistry. i know what i want out of life... and it isn't a mortgage and two kids and a husband who falls asleep watching television."

"what do you want?"

"nice clothes. places like this" with a gesture ecompassing the restaurant and its spectacular view of a shimmering sea and the haze-veiled outlines of Molokai and Lanai.

"but you won't always be twenty-four. what happens when you're thirty-four... forty-four?"

"I'll worry about my forties when i come to them. i might never get there" hana answered cheerfully.

it wasn't the time or the place to launch another argument with her. jenna felt that the first thing she had to do was to re-establish a strong rapport with her sister. which wasn't going to be easy when they held such divergent views on certain fundamental concepts. but perhaps this conversation over lunch had been a beginning.

later thinking over her sister's remarks during lunch, she found herself wondering if jung jihoon shared the view that love never lasted, and that was why he was still single. perhaps, like joon's, his past included a marriage which hadn't worked out and had ended in divorce.

i must find out from Mrs lee, she thought. and then: what has his past... or future... to do with me?

he's someone i shall never meet again once this trip is over.