“I’ll pick you up two hours from now in this same spot,” Auntie Bernadette says, then rushes to Kmart. Auntie Bernadette dreams of being locked up all night inside Kmart. She gets the biggest thrill reading Noxzema jars and comparing toothpaste costs per ounce.

“Hafa,” Mary Kelly says.

“Hey,” I reply, watching down the street for Delia’s mother’s pickup. One shared cigarette doesn’t make us friends.

We wait and wait on the hot concrete. “I’m calling Delia,” I say. I walk away to find a pay phone, expecting Mary Kelly to follow, but she stays behind.

Delia answers the phone.

“Where are you, girl?” I ask.

“My mother’s pickup needs a new battery.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“It just happened,” she says. “How was I supposed to know?”

“Well, is Tonya going to pick you up?”

“She was going to ride with me. Her mom left earlier in their car, so I guess we won’t be there.”

“Great!” I say, and hang up.

I could walk away and leave Mary Kelly alone in front of Liberty House. I think about doing that a good long while but change my mind. Maybe she has another cigarette tucked in her sock.

Elvis Lives at the Hard Rock Cafe

“Where is everyone?” Mary Kelly asks.

“Car trouble,” I say, wishing I was with Auntie Bernadette, racing down the aisles chasing after Blue Light Specials.

Mary Kelly and I decide we might as well shop. We weave in and out of the boutiques. Japanese tourists with fat wallets are everywhere, walking from the fancy hotels into the stores. Someone has to buy the expensive clothes and goods the stores carry. It isn’t us and the salespeople know it. They ignore this Chamorro and haole. Their X-ray eyes see right through to our empty pockets.

After admiring all the things we can’t afford, we head over to the Hard Rock Cafe and order a hamburger and fries to share. While we wait, a guy with banana sideburns and sunglasses walks in.

Mary Kelly leans over the table and whispers, “Elvis lives.”

I try to frown, but the man does look like Elvis, so I smile and add, “Elvis lives on Guam and traded his pink Cadillac for a water buffalo.”

Mary Kelly laughs. We take turns naming the famous customers around us. A woman with hair twisted in a tight bun sits in the corner, writing in a notebook.

“Charlotte Brontë,” I say.

Then we both agree Jane Eyre is the best book ever written. We talk about how we’re in love with Mr. Rochester and how we think Jane should have lived in sin with him after she discovered he was married to the loony in the attic.

Our meal arrives. We dab greasy french fries in a pool of ketchup and watch tourists with shopping bags walk along the street. Red trolley cars pass by with more Japanese shoppers.

“Tamun reminds me of Tokyo,” Mary Kelly says. “My parents and I spent a few days in Japan on the way over here. We’re going to Disneyland when we move back to the States. Have you ever been?”