Disclaimers: I don't own HL or any of the related characters. I do own my
characters. As far as I know Hawaii State University at Hilo, is a
fictional school as intended as such, any infringement is coincidental.
Hilo Village is based on Hilton Waikoloa Village in Hilo, Hawaii, where my family and I stayed this summer and it's where I got the idea to set the story in Hawaii. Aquatic Adventure is based on Dolphin Quest which is located within Waikoloa Village. All concepts were borrowed without permission.
AN: I did a bit of research of Polynesian names while in Hawaii (they had these fun key chains with your name on one side and your Polynesian name on the other!) so I could use them in my story. I will throw in pronunciation the first time a new name comes up.
Also a 'comp card' is a card employees and owners can use to get a discount at their business. Comp stands for complementary and is used to refer to products or discount given at the expense of the business. But since Richie owns the establishment he gets everything for free.
CHAPTER TWO
"Kemi [Keh-Me], wait up!" Richie called, jogging to slightly to catch up with her.
"Hey, Likeke [Lee-Keh-Keh]. I was just looking for you." She smiled at him, stepping to the side of the walkway so they could talk without blocking other students on the way to class.
"How is he doing?"
"Who?"
Richie rolled his eyes. "TG. Who else? How was he when you left?"
"Cured. His cold seems to be gone. We let him out to swim with the other dolphins this morning." She started to walk toward her class.
"I bet he was happy. He hates being in the pen."
"Yeah, he was."
They walked the rest of the way to Kemi's class in silence. As they made their way through the halls, Richie laced his fingers with hers and saw her smile faintly out of the corner of his eye. They stopped outside her classroom.
"I guess I'd better get to work," he said reluctantly letting her hand go. "I've been putting off some paperwork and the boss is on my back to get it done."
"Are you gonna be there tonight?" Kemi asked.
"Yeah, I thought I'd get in some time with TG this afternoon, too, so I'll be there for a while."
"I have some work I need to do, too. You want to get dinner afterward?"
"Sure."
. . . . . .
"Knock, knock," Kemi stuck her head over the small divider wall that separated her and Richie's cubicles. "You ready?"
Richie nodded as he closed the folder with TG's medical information. "All done." He grabbed his bag and slipped his sandals back on. "Where do you want to go?" They walked around the corner to their boss' office. "Where do you want to go?"
"I've been craving Visillini's for months," Kemi confessed.
"You want to eat in The Village?"
The Hilo Village, called simply The Village by employees, housed eight restaurants. Italian, Japanese, French, Mexican and Polynesian were all choices for the guests staying at the resort.
"I like it and you're the only one I know who can afford it."
By Richie's standards, Visillini's wasn't very expensive. But the prices were aimed at tourists so the prices were higher than the restaurants in town. But since Richie had spent so much time living off Duncan's pocketbook, he had become accustom to eating at higher end restaurants. That and Richie now owned The Hilo Village. It was one of the most popular resorts in Hawaii, had been used by several TV shows for their Hawaii episodes, been photographed for numerous magazines and named in the Top Ten World Destinations. It was very safe to say Richie was well off financially. He owned a small house that he rented to himself and five other students at Hawaii State. He had two jobs at the Village and worked at the Polynesian Cultural Center for a couple months in the summer. Money was no issue for Richie Ryan.
"How do you know I can afford it?" Richie asked as they boarded the tram that would take them across the resort property.
The resort spanned roughly six thousand acres on the coast. The rooms, restaurants and gift shops all faced the ocean, forming a u-shape around ten interlocking swimming pools and Aquatic Adventure (where Richie worked as a dolphin trainer when he wasn't life guarding). In order to get across the property, there was a tram that came by every seven minutes or a boat that ran on a track in a little river that came by every eleven minutes.
"I see you eat at The Village all the time," Kemi told him with a smile as the doors closed. "But if it's too expensive...we can go somewhere else."
"It's okay with me. But what makes you think I'm gonna pay for it all?" he teased.
"Because you're too old fashioned for your own good and always pay for any girl at the table that isn't with her boyfriend," she smiled at him.
"Am I really that transparent?"
"You're just delightfully old fashioned," she smiled at him.
"As long as it's delightful."
The tram stopped just outside Visillini's and they got off. They had to wait for a while to get a table because they hit Visillini's at their rush hour and both Richie and Kemi were starving by the time they were seated and served.
. . . . . .
"I miss Kansas, but I live it here," Kemi babbled as they munched on garlic bread and waited for the main course to arrive.
"You know, I've known you for nearly a year and had no idea you were from Kansas," Richie mused. "You look so Hawaiian and the name and everything... I just assumed." The two had spent nearly every day together since they had met, but had never discussed their personal lives.
"Kansas born and raised. My roommate in the dorms officially changed my name to Kemi my first night here."
"So what's your real name?"
"Jamie."
"Oh. You learn something new everyday."
"What about you? Where are you from?" she asked.
"Here, originally. Well, not Hilo, but Hawaii. Just outside of Kawaihae [Kah-WahE-Haheh], actually. But I grew up on the mainland."
"Really?" she asked. "Why would anyone leave here?"
'Story time,' Richie thought. "My folks died when I was four. My uncle moved me and my sisters to a boarding school."
"That sucks!"
"It wasn't that bad. But I did move back as soon as I graduated."
"I bet your sisters did, too."
"No, they met boys, got married and stayed mainland. I bet I'm the only Noel in the state."
"You know, that's not very Hawaiian. You don't look remotely Hawaiian," Kemi pointed out.
Richie chuckled. "My dad was French. He and my mom met in France while my grandfather was stationed there in the army. When they got married they moved here because my mom wanted to."
"My parents grew up together in Kansas; I'm pure Kansas."
"I'm half American, half French and all Hawaiian...though I look Swedish," he finished with a laugh.
"Albino Polynesian," Kemi grinned at him.
"You should see people's faces when they go to the Polynesian Cultural Center when I'm working. I almost get more questions about that then about the fire dancing," he laughed.
"I forgot you were a fire dancer. Is it hard?"
"Not really."
The food came and they chatted more about their upbringings until Richie successfully changed the topic; any immortal avoids talking about a fabricated past too much. Luckily TG was a topic both readily embraced.
They were TG's co-trainers. They had bonded over the small dolphin. While Richie had spent a little less than a year as TG's only trainer and was completely devoted to him, he was more than happy to share the responsibility with another person.
Richie had spent months of sleepless nights bottle feeding the dolphin when its mother rejected him after his birth. He held a deep bond with the animal and had even named him after himself. TG was the smallest of the dolphins in the pod and was constantly reminded that he was the lowest on the totem poll. The older male dolphins had scared the younger one whenever they thought he was forgetting his position. Richie couldn't help but understand the calf's situation, as he had felt picked on by stronger and more experienced immortals many times in his life. He found himself comforting the small dolphin and calling him 'tough guy' whenever another dolphin had hurt him. He then decided to call him TG instead of picking a Polynesian name as he had originally intended.
Kemi had gotten into the training program a year later and assigned to TG as well. While their relationship had started out strictly professional, Richie was getting the feeling that wasn't so true anymore. Since Heather's rejection, he had been very reluctant to get back into dating. He had found things to distract himself with: work, training, looking at schools, the stock market, buying the Hilo Village and he had even gotten into gymnastics. Kemi was the first girl to spark his interest as a girlfriend as opposed to a casual date. When the bill came he didn't even look at it before sliding his comp card into the bill folder and looked at Kemi, his cheeks beginning to burn.
"I don't suppose you'd want to do this as a more official occasion, would you?" he asked.
"Official as in..."
"A date. You know, a couple that hangs out together at a preset time and date?"
Kemi giggled. "Are you asking me out?"
"That was the general idea. Are you going to answer me or leave me hanging?"
"I just think it's cute that you're so insecure."
"Cute enough for you to say yes?"
Richie smiled. "Friday good? Say...seven ish?"
Kemi smiled. "Sounds great."
. . . . . .
"Hey, Rick," Clayton, one of Richie's housemates, greeted as Richie entered the kitchen from the garage.
"Sup, man?"
"You have a visitor in the living room...and he's cute."
Richie rolled his eyes and grinned. "I'm taken and I don't think your boyfriend would be too happy to hear you say that."
"Are you kidding me? Jeff is in there flirting!"
"Who is it?" Richie asked grinning.
"I don't know. Tall, dark hair, great eyes...kinda old, though."
"Huh," he grunted as he left the kitchen for the living room. "Alex, what are you doing here?" he asked in surprise. He had noticed a different Watcher tailing him for the last month.
"We need to talk," Alex said in a tone the left no room for question.
"Sure... Jeff, you mind?" he hinted.
"Right." Jeff left the room and closed the door behind him.
Richie sat in the chair across from Alex. "I thought you had been reassigned. I noticed some lady following me."
"She was filling in while I went home on personal business."
Richie shifted in his seat. "Is everything okay?"
"Big picture, yes. But there is a problem."
"It's Brandon, isn't it?"
"You knew?" Alex demanded.
"Yeah. Me, Mac, Adam, Joe, Amanda...of course we knew. Granted it took me a while to figure it out..."
"And you didn't say anything?"
"You know the rules, I couldn't."
"He worshipped you!"
"And now you know why."
"He knew?" Alex asked.
"Not so much knew as felt something. It's hard to explain."
"So try."
"Alex, that's not important right now," Richie insisted. "Man, he's gotta be what? 18 now?"
"Yeah, a kid."
"Lucky him," Richie mumbled. "How are your parents?"
"They think he's dead."
"How are they taking it?"
"Mom's a mess. Dad seems to be okay."
"What about Courtney?"
Alex shook his head. "She's half of why I stayed so long. She's worse than Mom."
"Then why are you here? Take care of your family."
"I am."
"Brandon?" Richie asked, as the point of the visit became clear.
"He's with Heather and David in Virginia."
"How is he?"
"Confused."
"Don't blame him."
"Richie, you know what I came here to ask."
"Can you take care of him for one more week?"
"Why?"
"My roommates and I were going to go surfing in Maui for Spring Break. I'll stay here and see what I can do for him. That'll give us a little over a week to find a solution. They're leaving Friday morning. Just get Brandon here and I'll take care of everything else."
"Thanks, Richie. I wasn't sure what else to do." Alex stood.
"Not a problem." Richie stood and shook Alex's hand. "If you can't count on your friends, who can you count on?"
"There's something else..."
"Sure, what is it?"
"Brandon may not want to come alone. He doesn't remember you. He's scared as it is."
"I understand," Richie assured him. "However he's comfortable. Just keep it to people who already know."
"Naturally," Alex agreed.
"Just let me handle explaining the details. It may help getting it from someone like him."
"An immortal?"
"A teenage one to boot," he added. "I promise I'll take great care of him."
"Thanks, Richie."
"You know, you're the only person who still calls me that. I kinda miss it."
"It must be hard to change identities."
"Sometimes."
"Well, I better get going. I have reports to make," Alex said after an awkward pause.
"Yeah, flights to book, too. Just tell me when and I'll pick them up."
"Thanks."
Richie walked Alex to the door then went to his room to come up with a plan.
Hilo Village is based on Hilton Waikoloa Village in Hilo, Hawaii, where my family and I stayed this summer and it's where I got the idea to set the story in Hawaii. Aquatic Adventure is based on Dolphin Quest which is located within Waikoloa Village. All concepts were borrowed without permission.
AN: I did a bit of research of Polynesian names while in Hawaii (they had these fun key chains with your name on one side and your Polynesian name on the other!) so I could use them in my story. I will throw in pronunciation the first time a new name comes up.
Also a 'comp card' is a card employees and owners can use to get a discount at their business. Comp stands for complementary and is used to refer to products or discount given at the expense of the business. But since Richie owns the establishment he gets everything for free.
CHAPTER TWO
"Kemi [Keh-Me], wait up!" Richie called, jogging to slightly to catch up with her.
"Hey, Likeke [Lee-Keh-Keh]. I was just looking for you." She smiled at him, stepping to the side of the walkway so they could talk without blocking other students on the way to class.
"How is he doing?"
"Who?"
Richie rolled his eyes. "TG. Who else? How was he when you left?"
"Cured. His cold seems to be gone. We let him out to swim with the other dolphins this morning." She started to walk toward her class.
"I bet he was happy. He hates being in the pen."
"Yeah, he was."
They walked the rest of the way to Kemi's class in silence. As they made their way through the halls, Richie laced his fingers with hers and saw her smile faintly out of the corner of his eye. They stopped outside her classroom.
"I guess I'd better get to work," he said reluctantly letting her hand go. "I've been putting off some paperwork and the boss is on my back to get it done."
"Are you gonna be there tonight?" Kemi asked.
"Yeah, I thought I'd get in some time with TG this afternoon, too, so I'll be there for a while."
"I have some work I need to do, too. You want to get dinner afterward?"
"Sure."
. . . . . .
"Knock, knock," Kemi stuck her head over the small divider wall that separated her and Richie's cubicles. "You ready?"
Richie nodded as he closed the folder with TG's medical information. "All done." He grabbed his bag and slipped his sandals back on. "Where do you want to go?" They walked around the corner to their boss' office. "Where do you want to go?"
"I've been craving Visillini's for months," Kemi confessed.
"You want to eat in The Village?"
The Hilo Village, called simply The Village by employees, housed eight restaurants. Italian, Japanese, French, Mexican and Polynesian were all choices for the guests staying at the resort.
"I like it and you're the only one I know who can afford it."
By Richie's standards, Visillini's wasn't very expensive. But the prices were aimed at tourists so the prices were higher than the restaurants in town. But since Richie had spent so much time living off Duncan's pocketbook, he had become accustom to eating at higher end restaurants. That and Richie now owned The Hilo Village. It was one of the most popular resorts in Hawaii, had been used by several TV shows for their Hawaii episodes, been photographed for numerous magazines and named in the Top Ten World Destinations. It was very safe to say Richie was well off financially. He owned a small house that he rented to himself and five other students at Hawaii State. He had two jobs at the Village and worked at the Polynesian Cultural Center for a couple months in the summer. Money was no issue for Richie Ryan.
"How do you know I can afford it?" Richie asked as they boarded the tram that would take them across the resort property.
The resort spanned roughly six thousand acres on the coast. The rooms, restaurants and gift shops all faced the ocean, forming a u-shape around ten interlocking swimming pools and Aquatic Adventure (where Richie worked as a dolphin trainer when he wasn't life guarding). In order to get across the property, there was a tram that came by every seven minutes or a boat that ran on a track in a little river that came by every eleven minutes.
"I see you eat at The Village all the time," Kemi told him with a smile as the doors closed. "But if it's too expensive...we can go somewhere else."
"It's okay with me. But what makes you think I'm gonna pay for it all?" he teased.
"Because you're too old fashioned for your own good and always pay for any girl at the table that isn't with her boyfriend," she smiled at him.
"Am I really that transparent?"
"You're just delightfully old fashioned," she smiled at him.
"As long as it's delightful."
The tram stopped just outside Visillini's and they got off. They had to wait for a while to get a table because they hit Visillini's at their rush hour and both Richie and Kemi were starving by the time they were seated and served.
. . . . . .
"I miss Kansas, but I live it here," Kemi babbled as they munched on garlic bread and waited for the main course to arrive.
"You know, I've known you for nearly a year and had no idea you were from Kansas," Richie mused. "You look so Hawaiian and the name and everything... I just assumed." The two had spent nearly every day together since they had met, but had never discussed their personal lives.
"Kansas born and raised. My roommate in the dorms officially changed my name to Kemi my first night here."
"So what's your real name?"
"Jamie."
"Oh. You learn something new everyday."
"What about you? Where are you from?" she asked.
"Here, originally. Well, not Hilo, but Hawaii. Just outside of Kawaihae [Kah-WahE-Haheh], actually. But I grew up on the mainland."
"Really?" she asked. "Why would anyone leave here?"
'Story time,' Richie thought. "My folks died when I was four. My uncle moved me and my sisters to a boarding school."
"That sucks!"
"It wasn't that bad. But I did move back as soon as I graduated."
"I bet your sisters did, too."
"No, they met boys, got married and stayed mainland. I bet I'm the only Noel in the state."
"You know, that's not very Hawaiian. You don't look remotely Hawaiian," Kemi pointed out.
Richie chuckled. "My dad was French. He and my mom met in France while my grandfather was stationed there in the army. When they got married they moved here because my mom wanted to."
"My parents grew up together in Kansas; I'm pure Kansas."
"I'm half American, half French and all Hawaiian...though I look Swedish," he finished with a laugh.
"Albino Polynesian," Kemi grinned at him.
"You should see people's faces when they go to the Polynesian Cultural Center when I'm working. I almost get more questions about that then about the fire dancing," he laughed.
"I forgot you were a fire dancer. Is it hard?"
"Not really."
The food came and they chatted more about their upbringings until Richie successfully changed the topic; any immortal avoids talking about a fabricated past too much. Luckily TG was a topic both readily embraced.
They were TG's co-trainers. They had bonded over the small dolphin. While Richie had spent a little less than a year as TG's only trainer and was completely devoted to him, he was more than happy to share the responsibility with another person.
Richie had spent months of sleepless nights bottle feeding the dolphin when its mother rejected him after his birth. He held a deep bond with the animal and had even named him after himself. TG was the smallest of the dolphins in the pod and was constantly reminded that he was the lowest on the totem poll. The older male dolphins had scared the younger one whenever they thought he was forgetting his position. Richie couldn't help but understand the calf's situation, as he had felt picked on by stronger and more experienced immortals many times in his life. He found himself comforting the small dolphin and calling him 'tough guy' whenever another dolphin had hurt him. He then decided to call him TG instead of picking a Polynesian name as he had originally intended.
Kemi had gotten into the training program a year later and assigned to TG as well. While their relationship had started out strictly professional, Richie was getting the feeling that wasn't so true anymore. Since Heather's rejection, he had been very reluctant to get back into dating. He had found things to distract himself with: work, training, looking at schools, the stock market, buying the Hilo Village and he had even gotten into gymnastics. Kemi was the first girl to spark his interest as a girlfriend as opposed to a casual date. When the bill came he didn't even look at it before sliding his comp card into the bill folder and looked at Kemi, his cheeks beginning to burn.
"I don't suppose you'd want to do this as a more official occasion, would you?" he asked.
"Official as in..."
"A date. You know, a couple that hangs out together at a preset time and date?"
Kemi giggled. "Are you asking me out?"
"That was the general idea. Are you going to answer me or leave me hanging?"
"I just think it's cute that you're so insecure."
"Cute enough for you to say yes?"
Richie smiled. "Friday good? Say...seven ish?"
Kemi smiled. "Sounds great."
. . . . . .
"Hey, Rick," Clayton, one of Richie's housemates, greeted as Richie entered the kitchen from the garage.
"Sup, man?"
"You have a visitor in the living room...and he's cute."
Richie rolled his eyes and grinned. "I'm taken and I don't think your boyfriend would be too happy to hear you say that."
"Are you kidding me? Jeff is in there flirting!"
"Who is it?" Richie asked grinning.
"I don't know. Tall, dark hair, great eyes...kinda old, though."
"Huh," he grunted as he left the kitchen for the living room. "Alex, what are you doing here?" he asked in surprise. He had noticed a different Watcher tailing him for the last month.
"We need to talk," Alex said in a tone the left no room for question.
"Sure... Jeff, you mind?" he hinted.
"Right." Jeff left the room and closed the door behind him.
Richie sat in the chair across from Alex. "I thought you had been reassigned. I noticed some lady following me."
"She was filling in while I went home on personal business."
Richie shifted in his seat. "Is everything okay?"
"Big picture, yes. But there is a problem."
"It's Brandon, isn't it?"
"You knew?" Alex demanded.
"Yeah. Me, Mac, Adam, Joe, Amanda...of course we knew. Granted it took me a while to figure it out..."
"And you didn't say anything?"
"You know the rules, I couldn't."
"He worshipped you!"
"And now you know why."
"He knew?" Alex asked.
"Not so much knew as felt something. It's hard to explain."
"So try."
"Alex, that's not important right now," Richie insisted. "Man, he's gotta be what? 18 now?"
"Yeah, a kid."
"Lucky him," Richie mumbled. "How are your parents?"
"They think he's dead."
"How are they taking it?"
"Mom's a mess. Dad seems to be okay."
"What about Courtney?"
Alex shook his head. "She's half of why I stayed so long. She's worse than Mom."
"Then why are you here? Take care of your family."
"I am."
"Brandon?" Richie asked, as the point of the visit became clear.
"He's with Heather and David in Virginia."
"How is he?"
"Confused."
"Don't blame him."
"Richie, you know what I came here to ask."
"Can you take care of him for one more week?"
"Why?"
"My roommates and I were going to go surfing in Maui for Spring Break. I'll stay here and see what I can do for him. That'll give us a little over a week to find a solution. They're leaving Friday morning. Just get Brandon here and I'll take care of everything else."
"Thanks, Richie. I wasn't sure what else to do." Alex stood.
"Not a problem." Richie stood and shook Alex's hand. "If you can't count on your friends, who can you count on?"
"There's something else..."
"Sure, what is it?"
"Brandon may not want to come alone. He doesn't remember you. He's scared as it is."
"I understand," Richie assured him. "However he's comfortable. Just keep it to people who already know."
"Naturally," Alex agreed.
"Just let me handle explaining the details. It may help getting it from someone like him."
"An immortal?"
"A teenage one to boot," he added. "I promise I'll take great care of him."
"Thanks, Richie."
"You know, you're the only person who still calls me that. I kinda miss it."
"It must be hard to change identities."
"Sometimes."
"Well, I better get going. I have reports to make," Alex said after an awkward pause.
"Yeah, flights to book, too. Just tell me when and I'll pick them up."
"Thanks."
Richie walked Alex to the door then went to his room to come up with a plan.