Meet Me in Hawaii by Georgia Toffolo (novels for beginners txt) 📕

felt flustered, like they’d been caught out doing something they shouldn’t even though they were just having fun.

‘We’ve come to collect Tara,’ said Charles Davidson.

Both parents paused halfway towards them and coming no further. They looked edgy, her mother’s hands wringing together as she looked to her daughter briefly and then gave a tentative smile to Todd.

He brushed his hands down his top and she could have sworn his cheeks flushed too. Granted, it could have been the pink bouncing off his top… yes, definitely the pink, because they hadn’t been doing anything bad. Nothing at all.

Though they had been messing around when they should have been teaching… and it had been more than just giggles erupting in her belly…

At least only she knew that, though, not even Jonny’s hormonally charged brain could spy it surely. Not that she was going to spare him a glance.

Preoccupied, she almost missed Tara’s ‘So unfair’ muttered under her breath.

She looked across at her and frowned. The girl was already folding in on herself, her arms wrapped tight around her, her head bowed. Malie was transported back in time, over a decade, to Koa’s bedroom, his body so slight in the bed that looked so big, their mother fussing, their father standing back, withdrawn, closed in, and her – she’d been in the corner in that exact same position. Hunched in on herself, blending into the background, not wanting to be noticed.

She shook herself out of it, the past was the past, it had no place in the now. They’d both lost a brother, though, both lived through the grief of their parents, and for Tara… she was still locked in that life.

She headed over to her, leaving Todd to speak to her parents.

‘What’s up?’ she asked, bending forward to lift the girl’s board for her.

Tara sent her parents a death stare. ‘I don’t see why they can’t leave me to travel back with everyone else.’

‘Hey, it’s nice that they have come.’

‘They treat me like I’m a baby.’

‘I don’t think—’

‘No one else has their parents on this trip.’

‘I don’t think that’s quite true.’ Malie could hear Todd chatting to her parents behind them, far enough away that they wouldn’t overhear their daughter’s outburst. ‘I’m sure there are a couple of others here.’

‘Not many.’

‘I think it shows they care.’

She harrumphed and refused to meet Malie’s eye.

‘Don’t you want to show them what you’ve learned today?’

Her shoulders lowered just a little, her eyes coming back to Malie briefly. ‘Maybe.’

‘There should be no maybe about it, come on, let’s go see if they want to watch.’

Tara chewed her lip, her dubious gaze now on her parents.

‘Come on, let’s go ask them to watch and if they love it – which they will – maybe we can ask them about you travelling on the bus with the others.’ Malie offered out her hand and was relieved when Tara finally took it, a small smile lifting the corners of her mouth.

‘So long as you make them say yes… to both!’

Malie laughed and ducked her head low to speak in Tara’s ear. ‘I’ll do my very best, and if I fail, I owe you a trip to the ice cream parlour, my treat!’

‘Just me and you.’

‘Just me and you.’

‘They’d never let you.’

Malie frowned at the girl’s surprisingly sad and fatalistic outlook. ‘I think Mr Masters could charm a yes out of them if I fail…’

She looked up at Todd and realized just how true that was. Already she could see Tara’s parents relaxing into their conversation with him. Was there anyone he couldn’t charm at the drop of a hat?

Well, so long as he doesn’t charm his way into your pants, you’re all good…

Oh. My. God. Why are you even thinking that?

She squeezed Tara’s hand in encouragement. ‘We got this, right?’

‘Right.’

Pants are off limits!

Chapter Seven

‘DO YOU THINK THEY were happy?’

He could hear the concern in Malie’s question as they stood watching the Davidsons climb into their small blue hire car that they’d parked at the edge of the beach. Around them people bustled, kids leaving the beach to grab some dinner, the adults arriving after a day’s work looking to chill in the last hour of sun. Tara turned and gave a little wave which they both returned, their smiles momentarily genuine.

‘Of course they were, they would never have left her with you in the first place if they weren’t.’ He turned to face her. ‘And the joy in Tara’s face when she caught that last wave with Nalu – no parent could fail to feel her happiness too.’

‘But they hardly stayed long.’ She met his eye, her disappointment dampening his own pleasure.

‘They stayed long enough to witness her new-found skills and congratulate her,’ he said, ‘and let’s face it, the minibus came and took the others, so they probably felt they were encroaching.’

‘Encroaching on what?’

He almost said our time, but he’d learned his lesson there. Instead he grinned. ‘My lesson, for starters.’

She didn’t smile, though. She was too busy watching their car drive away.

‘Don’t you think they seemed… I don’t know… deflated about it all. I mean, she stood up on a wave, twice! And all they did was pat her on the back and say well done. There was no excitement, no thrill.’

‘Hey, just because everyone’s not bursting with the buzz of surfing the way you are, doesn’t mean they’re not impressed, and it’s a big deal for them, seeing their daughter conquer a sport that’s far from safe.’

‘This is totally safe – you want unsafe then you should see the surfing up strip!’

‘But they’re risk-averse. Nothing’s safe. You’ve read Tara’s file, you know what happened…’

‘You mean the fire?’ Her words were weighted with sadness.

‘Exactly. I only met them a year ago when things had got to a point that they knew they needed help. I can’t comment on how they were before the fire, maybe they’ve always been this protective but…’

‘But you don’t think it likely?’

‘I can’t imagine what it’s like to lose a