"Oh Te'," I said, reaching between the poles and pulling her close to me as the last of the tribesmen stepped away from my completed cage. "I love you more than you'll ever know. I just don't see how—"
Seeing that my enclosure was now fully secured, Te's father stormed up the path and grabbed her arm, pulling her away from me.
"Alu mai te ai!" he shouted, glaring angrily at me.
As he dragged Teuila kicking and screaming back to their hut, Manaia locked eyes with me and sniggered a lopsided grin. I collapsed my body against the webbing of my enclosure and began sobbing, knowing I'd never have another chance to run away with my island girl.
29
After Teuila left, one of the tribesmen planted himself in front of my cage and stared at me impassively, while the rest of the village resumed their usual activities. Every now and then, some small children ran past my enclosure, pointing at me and giggling. Most of the men had retired to their huts to get some rest, but the women were busy moving about the courtyard with handfuls of provisions, preparing for the big celebration later this evening. I glanced in the direction of Te's hut and noticed her grandmother shaving some taro root on the porch, trying not to look at me. Her hut was surrounded on each side by a guardsman holding a spear. Inside, the dwelling was quiet and still, and I wondered if Teuila had been tied up again to prevent her escape.
So that's how it's going to be, I thought. The chief is going out of his way to keep the two of us separated and confined.
I looked at my guard and shook my head. I felt more exposed than ever with my bare breasts on display for everyone to see, like some kind of hooker standing behind the glass in Amsterdam's Red-Light District. I crossed my arms over my chest and sat down in the sand, and before long fell asleep from sheer exhaustion.
A few hours later I woke to the sound of chatter and noticed some tribesmen erecting a long trellis-shaped structure in the middle of the square. A band of women followed closely behind, decorating the lattice with garlands of flowers. My skin felt hot from the overhead sun beating down through the open bars of my cage, and I pressed my fingers against my flesh realizing I was beginning to burn. I picked up some sand from the base of my pit and tried to coat my body with it, but it just fell off my skin like dry confetti. Peering up at the sun, I estimated it was around noon, and I wondered how these people expected a pale white woman to survive all day long, exposed in the tropical sun. It had also been almost thirty-six hours since I'd had anything to eat, and I clutched my stomach from the gnawing feeling in my gut.
Te's father disappeared into their hut, then a few minutes later he came out carrying a few bowls and some folded objects. He spoke with Nona and pointed in my direction. Nona placed some items in one of the bowls, then she took the materials from his hand and began walking toward me. Upon reaching my cage, she bent down and slid one of the bowls through the narrow hole at the bottom of the enclosure.
When I saw that it was filled with fresh fruit and vegetables, I picked it up and gobbled it down like I'd never seen food before. Nona nodded toward me and passed a hollowed-out coconut shell filled with water through the bars and I emptied it in three gulps. As my stomach began to settle, I looked at her and smiled, placing my palms together and bowing to thank her for her act of kindness. Even though I knew she couldn't speak English, I hoped she'd be able to share some news about Te'.
"How is Teuila?" I said, pointing toward her shack. I swiveled my wrists together in a shackled motion. "Is she tied up?"
"Eh le lelei," she nodded, recognizing her granddaughter's name. Then she placed her hands over her heart and spread her palms in my direction. "Na te misia oe."
I choked up understanding her meaning and swallowed hard, knowing that Te' was thinking of me. I looked at the other materials she'd placed on the ground outside my cage and recognized some woven mats similar to the ones Te' and I had made to line the floor of our treehouse.
"Are those for me?" I asked, motioning to the mats.
She nodded then said something to my guard, and he unfurled the mats and threw them over the top of my cage like two long table runners, one on each side. Nona straightened the leafy curtains until they extended all the way down to the base of my enclosure, then she slid one of the drapes aside so we could see each other.
"Mai le Teuila," she said, pointing to my newly created canopy.
I returned Nona's gesture, placing my hands over my chest and extending them toward her in gratitude.
"Thank you."
Then she picked up the last object on the ground, which looked like a small hollowed out stump. She placed it between her feet and half-squatted over it, nodding and pointing to me. I nodded back, understanding her meaning, then she pushed it through the little hole at the bottom of my cage and rearranged my curtains so that I was almost completely covered.
I placed my hand over my heart again and blew her a kiss, then she walked slowly back in t
he direction of Te's hut. As I watched her walk away, I reached out and rubbed a piece of the leafy matting between my fingers. The strands were still bright green and pliant, like they'd been recently harvested, and the weaving pattern was exactly the same as the one Teuila had shown me days earlier. I leaned my body forward and closed my eyes, breathing in the fresh scent of the pandanus leaves. For a moment, I imagined I could smell Te's scent on them too, and I wondered if she'd had a hand in making them. Either way, I was grateful she'd sent them to me as I sat down in the dark shade of my little hut and finished off the rest of the food Nona had brought me.
At least they're not going to let me starve out here, I thought, grimacing at the makeshift toilet bowl. Looking after my other personal needs is going to be a whole other nightmare. But the shade from my leafy umbrella was already starting to cool the inside of my cage, and I soon fell asleep dreaming of making love to Teuila on the floor of our treehouse.
* * *
I awoke many hours later to the sound of singing and chanting coming from the courtyard. I pulled my curtain aside and saw the villagers seated in long rows on opposite sides of the floral-decorated trellis leading toward a giant bonfire burning in the middle of the square. The flames reflected off the face of Te's father sitting atop his chieftain's chair, flanked by his children sitting squat-legged on the ground beside him. As the tribesmen hopped and skipped around the fire, the women and children sang gleefully at the top of their lungs.
Standing stoically in front of the chief with his arms folded over his chest, Manaia peered expectantly down the path in the direction of the trellis. He wore a long grass skirt like the other tribesmen, but unlike the rest of the bare-breasted warriors, he wore a beaded vest festooned with brightly colored sea shells and an elaborate feathered headdress. Posing like a flamboyant peacock, he looked ridiculously overdressed for the occasion. But with his exaggerated sense of self-importance, it seemed to fit his personality perfectly. I fingered the unicorn-shaped shell that Teuila had reclaimed from the sand of the other village, wishing it were a dagger I could throw at him instead.
But Teuila and her grandmother were still nowhere to be seen. As the singing and dancing slowly increased in pitch and volume, I recognized some movement on the front porch of their cabin. Nona swept the front door mat aside, then Te' stepped out onto the portico looking like an angel from heaven. Wearing a white tapa dress dyed in a pretty floral motif, she wore a long wreath made of frangipani and jasmine around her neck and a crown of orchids atop her head. Her face shimmered in the moonlight, with a greenish-yellow dusting of turmeric powder and flower pollen coating her upper eyelids. I gasped at her beauty as her grandmother took her arm and escorted her down the front steps of their cabin.
As they strode toward the trellis marking the entrance to the reception, Te' glanced in my direction and I slunk back toward the rear of my cage. For some reason, I didn't want her to see me watching her as she prepared to get married. Whether it was from my own sense of dread at losing her once and for all or from some misguided feeling of not wanting to ruin her big day, I lurked in the shadows, closing my eyes listening to the chanting of the wedding participants. But after another minute or so, I couldn't resist the urge to see her one last time, and I pushed my screen aside to see the two of them walking under the trellis toward the fire in the direction of Manaia, who was grinning in front of her father like a Cheshire Cat.
So this is the way they do it here in Anuta, I thought, nodding at the similarities between the Polynesian wedding and those in the West. The groom waits patiently by the altar, while his bride-to-be tantalizes him by slowly walking up the aisle as their loved ones eagerly look on. The only difference was that the mother of the bride, or in this case her grandmother, gives the girl away. Typical male-dominated culture, where the patriarch sits on his high horse as he watches his daughter given away.
The two women walked together through the floral-covered trellis, then Nona disengaged and joined the rest of her family as Teuila approached the raging fire.