Chapter 9 - Solomon
Gavin O’Connor never visited Fiji. The cursed water surrounding those islands claimed the lives of his parents, his younger brother, future sister-in-law, and niece or nephew. If he woke up one day and read that a tsunami or volcano had sent Fiji the way of Atlantis, he wouldn’t have minded. It represented nothing but pain to him. No remains of his family members were ever recovered.
Gavin tried to keep busy to distract himself from his loss. He poured himself first into his career at the bank and then into his time at the gym. Working out twice a week prior to the loss of his family turned into four and five times and then to twice a day, five or six days every week. He drifted away from friends and his remaining extended family. He poured his fury into the gym.
When lifting weights and running were no longer adequate outlets for the swirling emotions he couldn’t deal with, he turned to combat sports. First boxing, then karate, and from there he moved on to judo. It was through judo, nine years after the darkness descended over him, that the clouds began to let sunshine filter through.
After taking judo for three years under an older Japanese teacher, Sensei Shinji, Gavin started teaching the younger students. He found that working with children brought him the closest thing to happiness that he’d felt since he got the awful news from Fiji so many years ago. Watching their frustration turn to joy when they mastered a new technique, or when they used the tools he gave them to beat a bigger or more experienced opponent, warmed places in his heart that had been frozen solid.
He still worked with Sensei Shinji on his own, and was on the fast track to his black belt. His work at the dojo was pro bono, as he made plenty of money through his day job, and he requested that Shinji use what he’d pay him to instead fund classes for kids who couldn’t afford to attend or take a martial art otherwise.
Gavin had moved on from the tragedy to build something resembling a life, and he even joined the fledgling social media world in order to better connect with his students and their families as they moved up in the judo world and began attending tournaments.
It was in his hotel room at a tournament in Chicago in the summer of 2007 that he flipped open his laptop to find a mysterious Facebook message awaiting him:
Hello, Mister Gavin O’Connor. I hope I’m not bothering you. I also hope that you’re the person I’m looking for. My name is Solomon Jack Kano. I live in Fiji, I’m 13 years old. I think my father was your brother. If any of this sounds familiar to you, I would like to talk to you about my father. I never met him but I want to know about him. Thank you. As we say here in my country, bula!
Gavin O’Connor’s heart about burst out of his chest. Tears stung his eyes. How was this possible?
He clicked on the picture attached to the message and saw a boy, maybe a teenager, with long, dark hair and a square jaw, tan skin and blue eyes, which seemed out of place. There was fire in those eyes, an intensity that belied his years. He recognized it. The same flame he once saw in Jack’s eyes.
It couldn’t be. Gavin was assured that there were no survivors of the accident that claimed his brother, including his fiancée. Had he been lied to? He had to know. But at the same time, it could all be some sort of sick joke. Or an attempt to extort money. As much as he wanted to reply, he couldn’t be sure.
He looked over the profile, which listed “Solomon” as 18, although his pictures were clearly of someone younger.
Solomon rarely smiled, although he seemed to be leading an active, busy life. There were images of him swimming and surfing, playing rugby, hanging out with friends, all the normal things Gavin imagined a boy growing up in the islands might do.
Gavin slept fitfully that night and when he gave up trying to get any decent rest, at just before five in the morning, he fired off a reply to the surprise message he’d received the night before.
Solomon – I’m very surprised to hear from you. Jack O’Connor was my brother, yes. If you’re really his son, I’d love to talk to you, to meet you.
My brother died in a boat accident in a storm a long time ago. It was my understanding that no one on the boat survived. I’ve attached my e-mail address. Please understand that this is coming completely out of the blue for me. Do you have any sort of proof that you’re related to my brother? Or an adult, a guardian who can vouch for you? I look forward to hearing more from you.
– Gavin O’Connor
The tournament went well for Gavin’s students, despite his distracted coaching. He checked his e-mail that evening at the hotel and was disappointed to have heard nothing back from Fiji. The team returned home and several days passed with nothing new. He began to forget the Facebook exchanges and assume they were some sort of hoax.
One morning before work, he checked his e-mail and found a new message from [email protected].
Dear Uncle Gavin,
It’s me, Solomon. I am your nephew, but I don’t know how to prove it. I have a scan of a picture. I know the quality isn’t the best, it’s from an old article I found in the library. I had to make a copy of it and then scan the copy.
Gavin clicked on the link at the bottom of the e-mail and a grainy black and white picture emerged. It was two people in a hospital room, a man lying in bed and a woman sitting next to him. They were both smiling. She was beautiful, and her part of the picture slightly more clear than the man in bed, but he had a bandaged, elevated leg and what looked like an Ohio State tank top on. The article described a shark attack and although the caption was nearly illegible, he could make out “-erican” and “Jac- “.
The picture was Jack. And, he guessed, Karalaini. Seeing his brother again twisted Gavin’s face into an ugly, sobbing mask, but it proved nothing. Anybody could print that picture. He read on.
I live in a small village in the Mamanuca Islands. I grew up here with my family and until I turned 13 last month I had no idea anything was different about me. On that birthday, my mom and dad and my two grandparents who are alive sat me down to have a talk. The people who I thought were my mom and dad, who were mom and dad my whole life, told me a story. They told me that they were actually my aunt and her husband. That my aunt was my mom’s older sister. She and her husband adopted me and raised me because my mom and dad had been killed in a storm.
Gavin had to get up and walk away for a moment. He had a lump in his throat the size of a grapefruit. Could any of this be true? He chugged a bottle of water and paced in his living room.
He noticed the screensaver flickering on his laptop, so he sat back down and continued reading.
They told me that my dad was American, which makes me kailoma, that’s our word for mixed-race Fijian.
They showed me pictures of my mom and told me that she was rescued from the ocean after the storm but she was barely alive. The fishermen who found her had to do an emergency operation to get me out. They said your mom and dad were here too and one of my uncles and that they all died.
My grandfather told me that they were all so upset and so sad and everything was so crazy that they just kept me and decided not to tell me anything until I turned 13. I got really mad and ran away for a day. I ran and ran and just slept on the beach. My whole world turned upside down. But I knew my family loved me and how sad they would be to lose me so I came back.
They told me all about my mom. I have pictures and stories and everything but I don’t know anything about my dad just his name and just that picture I sent you. Oh and that he was bitten by a shark. But that’s it.
I’m pretty good with the computer so I found a story from an American newspaper from when my dad died and it said he had a brother and gave your name. I hoped you would have a Facebook and I searched for you and I found you. It made me really happy to find you.
Can you tell me about my dad? And about my family in America? I would love so much to visit America. I see it on tv and movies but I don’t know anybody who has been there except to Hawaii. I want to see New York and all the big cities. It looks so cool. I don’t really know about Cincinnati. I hope you write back to me.
-Solomon
Gavin sat, dumbstruck, and read the entire message twice more. Could a baby really have survived the storm?
The father of one of his students, Rebecca Wright, was an attorney. He’d call Scott Wright that afternoon and run the entire story by him, see if it rang true or threw up any red flags, before replying to Solomon.
The conversation with Scott Wright did little to illuminate the situation, as his specialty was real estate law, but he did assure Gavin that he didn’t think he could possibly be on the hook legally for any money. He encouraged him to follow his heart, to proceed with caution, but that there was no reason not to pursue some sort of a relationship with his “nephew.”
It took Gavin several hours after class that evening to compose his response to Solomon. He had a million stories to tell, about Jack, about Solomon’s late American grandparents, about life in America. He had a few pictures of his brother that he scanned and attached to the message, both from when he was a young boy and a more recent one taken at the last Christmas they shared.
Solomon-
Your story has really surprised me and touched me. To find out I have a nephew living on the other side of the world fills me with excitement, but also with sadness that it took this long to find out! When my parents and my brother died, it really left me alone. I’m a bit jealous that you had so much family to take care of you, but of course I’m so happy you did. I have just one grandparent left, on my mom’s side. She lives in Chicago. My dad had one brother, but he’s also passed away.
I work at a bank, and that’s my job, but my true love is judo. I have been teaching judo and working with kids for several years now and it’s my favorite thing in the world. I have a few students around your age and some as young as five years old.
Your dad, my brother Jack, was the best brother anybody could ever have. He and I grew up together playing every sport there was to play. He was best at baseball. He was left-handed. His favorite thing to eat was spaghetti, and he would always drive our parents crazy because he’d eat it one noodle at a time.
His best friend, the one who came to Fiji with him, was named Wyatt. Wyatt and Jack traveled all over the place together learning to surf and chasing the biggest waves. They loved the ocean. Wyatt’s parents still live here in Cincinnati, and I bump into them once in a while. The last I heard, Wyatt was living in Hawaii. I’m going to have to track him down and tell him about you.
I hope you like the pictures of your dad that I included. I wish had more. I know he’d have been a great dad and that he’d be very proud of you.
If your family there thinks it would be ok, I’d love for you to visit here. I could pay for it. Maybe if somebody from your family came with you? Let me know. I’m so happy to have a nephew! Oh yeah, before I forget, BULA! Talk to you soon…
-Uncle Gavin
* * *
Gavin tracked Wyatt down through his parents, and when he shared the story of Solomon with him, Wyatt offered to get on the next flight to Fiji to scoop him up and bring him to Ohio. Gavin didn’t think an international kidnapping was the way to go, but he did tell Wyatt that he was going to try to arrange for Solomon to visit him and that Wyatt was more than welcome to come home for a visit whenever the details could be worked out.
That’s how Wyatt and Gavin came to be waiting in international arrivals three weeks later for a flight to land at the Greater Cincinnati Airport from Nadi, Fiji, by way of Auckland, New Zealand, and Houston, Texas.
With layovers, the trip had taken the better part of thirty hours, and Solomon and his aunt, Ruth, staggered off the plane completely spent from their journey.
Gavin and Solomon knew each other from pictures, and their embrace was a tearful one as Wyatt and Ruth shook hands and introduced themselves. Once Gavin finally let go of his nephew, Ruth took the brother of her sister’s fiancé’s face in her hands and stared into his eyes, blinking away tears of her own.
“Gavin, I’m so sorry this reunion is so belated. Our entire family apologizes. Without your brother, without your family, we wouldn’t have Solomon. He has been such a joy, such a blessing to me, to my husband, to all of us. We only wanted to make the most normal life we could for Solomon. Please understand.”
Gavin nodded his head. “The past is the past, Ruth. That baby needed a family. He needed what only you could give him. I don’t blame you a bit. I’m so glad you’re here!”
As tired as Solomon and his aunt were, typical of a thirteen-year-old boy, he was starving.
Being Cincinnati, there was only one place to take him – Uptown Chili.
Gavin and Solomon had, in discussing Jack, covered the topic of food extensively. Solomon’s idea of “American food” was hamburgers and hot dogs, which suited him just fine, but Gavin insisted that Jack’s favorite food, without question, was chili. And not just any chili, it had to be Cincinnati-style chili. When Gavin described eating chili over spaghetti, and smothered with cheese, Solomon thought he must be joking. When he realized Cincinnati chili parlors were a real thing, he knew his first meal in his father’s hometown had to be a 3-way.
Gavin, Ruth, Wyatt, and Solomon piled into a booth at Uptown’s location a few blocks from the University of Cincinnati campus, Solomon’s eyes still wide from the trip across the bridge into downtown Cincinnati from the Kentucky location of the airport. He’d been amazed by the enormous stadiums set hard against the Ohio River, home to the baseball-playing Reds and the NFL’s Bengals. He tried to imagine what it would have been like to sit inside one of those mammoth buildings with his dad to watch a game.
Gavin ordered for his guests, explaining to Ruth what it was she’d be eating; a plate of spaghetti covered with meaty chili with a sweet, chocolatey flavor, and then covered in bright yellow shredded cheese. Whatever culinary reservations she held, she set them aside in the face of Solomon’s enthusiasm.
The smile on Solomon’s face was wide and bright as the waitress sat his plate down and asked if he needed a bib, which he refused. Gavin laughed and accepted one, telling Solomon he ought to reconsider.
“I’m not a baby!” Solomon protested. “So this is really my dad’s favorite thing to eat?” He asked, twirling his fork through the noodles, coating them with chili.
“Absolutely. I can’t wait for you to try it. If you don’t like it, it’s totally fine. It’s a local thing, not for everybody.”
Wyatt, already on his third forkful, stopped eating long enough to offer his opinion. “Whenever I come home, this is the first place I go to eat. Hawaii is great, but you can’t get Uptown Chili there.” He resumed his inhalation of the remains of the large 3-way on his own plate.
“Wait,” Gavin interceded. “If you want to do it the way Jack… I mean your dad did it, you have to add a layer of oyster crackers underneath the spaghetti.” Gavin helped Solomon lift the piled with his fork and spread a layer of crackers below before adding the same to the other end of the oval plate. “They soak up the sauce at the end,” Gavin explained.
Solomon shrugged his shoulders as he and Ruth counted down to their first taste together. “3-2-1,” they said, in unison, and filled their mouths with the quintessential flavor of Cincinnati.
Ruth twisted her face into a grimace, chewing slowly, but Solomon’s reaction was one of unmistakable glee. A second and third mouthful disappeared before a laughing Wyatt warned him. “Slow down, tiger. Try chewing.”
Gavin looked like a proud poppa, and even Ruth, not a fan of the Mediterranean-spiced dish, was happy to see her erstwhile son so clearly enjoying himself.
“Dad was right; this stuff is good,” exclaimed Solomon between bites.
Gavin smiled, feeling a sense of joy he hadn’t felt in a very long time.
* * *
After their late lunch, Gavin took his guests to their hotel, a few blocks from his walkup near the university. The flight had exhausted them, and they promised to get a good, long sleep to fight off the time change and the jet lag. Ruth had a bowl of soup sent up from room service, since Solomon had finished her 3-way after he ate his own.
“Auntie, do you think they like me?” Solomon asked, his tough veneer giving way to adolescent doubt.
“I think they’re very excited to have met you, yes. Uncle Gavin couldn’t stop staring at you. I think he sees a lot of his brother in you,” Ruth offered.
* * *
Just over a mile away, a similar conversation was taking place in Gavin’s living room. “So, what do you think, dude?”
“I think,” Gavin pondered. “That I miss Jack more than ever. Can you picture him as a dad? I mean that’s his flesh and blood, my flesh and blood too, right down the street. It’s so weird. But so cool. Four days isn’t going to be enough. I have so much I want to tell him, to show him. His life must be so different in Fiji. I can’t even imagine.”
Wyatt rose and hugged his friend on his way out the door. “Did you see the way he walks? Slow and kind of bowlegged, just like Jack.”
“Shut up before you get me crying again. Say hello to your folks for me. I’m taking Solomon and Ruth sightseeing tomorrow, we’ll go by our old house and school and stuff, probably go by the dojo. I know we’ll hit the zoo at some point. Just let me know when you’re available. Be safe.”
* * *
The next day, Gavin picked up his visitors and took them on a tour of Cincinnati, showing them places that would have meant something to Jack. The house the brothers grew up in, churches and schools they attended, that sort of thing.
Solomon was excited, but couldn’t understand how so many people could live so far from the ocean. They crossed the Ohio River at one point as they had the previous day, but the rushing brown water, filled with barges, did little to assuage Solomon’s doubt.
After lunch, they went by the dojo where Gavin taught judo. He’d handed over his classes for a few days to one of his older students Tyler, a brown belt heading into his senior year of high school.
Gavin explained what the young students were working on and showed him around the gym.
“Why aren’t they doing punches or kicks? I thought martial arts were about breaking boards and knocking people out, cool stuff like that,” Solomon queried his uncle.
Gavin shook his head. “Some martial arts are about striking. Karate, Tae Kwan Do. But judo is more about grappling, submitting your opponent. Throws and takedowns. But make no mistake, it’s every bit as dangerous to fight a seasoned judoka as to fight a karate black belt.”
“Yeah, right. If somebody tried to throw me, I’d hit him with these,” Solomon said, balling his fists and throwing several shadow boxing jabs. “Before he ever had a chance to grab me. I know how to fight.”
“Think so?” Gavin asked. “Ruth, is it okay with you if Gavin trains with one of my students for a minute?”
“Promise me he won’t get hurt and you have a deal.”
“He’s tough, he’ll be fine,” Gavin laughed as Solomon’s shadow boxing routine became more complex, hands whipping in and out, jabs slicing through the air in front of his face. “Tyler, can you spare Elliott for a minute?”
Tyler paused his instruction and dismissed a skinny boy with a shaggy mop of blonde hair spilling over his ears. The boy approached Gavin and bowed, first to him, then to his guests.
“Elliott, this is my nephew, Solomon. He’s new to judo. But he tells me he ‘knows how to fight’. Solomon, Elliott is a green belt. He’s twelve. I’ve been working with him for several years. I want you to try to take him down. Or hit him, or however you’d like to fight him. He’s younger and smaller, and he only does judo, right?”
“Uncle, he’s too skinny. I don’t like to hurt people. Let me fight that guy,” Solomon pointed at Tyler, almost five years his senior and clearly larger, more physically mature.
The students Tyler was training had taken seats alongside the mat to watch, and Gavin walked between the two boys, laughing. “Not a good idea, Solomon. Tyler is a very accomplished judoka. Elliott will be a good challenge for you. And you for him. Ready?”
“Have it your way, then. Sorry, bro. Nothing personal,” Solomon apologized in advance and extended a fist, which Elliott bumped.
The two youngsters circled one another, Elliott pawing at Solomon, gauging distance and looking for an opening. Solomon took a boxer’s stance, and Gavin was impressed. Solomon had obviously had some pointers from somebody and he moved fluidly.
Suddenly, before it was obvious that the younger boy had even moved, Elliott slipped inside Solomon’s hands, twisted sideways, and flipped the older boy to the mat, landing atop him and spinning his arm into a painful position.
Gavin patted Elliott on the shoulder and he released the hold. “Solomon, if you want your opponent to let go, tap the mat. Or somewhere on his body. And he’ll break the hold. Okay?”
Pride wounded, Solomon rose and straightened up his clothing. “Yeah, sure. Got it.”
He was back in his stance, this time moving forward aggressively, peppering his younger opponent with punches. Elliott swerved and blocked them, deflecting a looping left hand into an arm lock from which he tugged on Solomon’s shirt and deposited the older boy once more on the mat.
Clearly aggravated, Solomon rose and charged the smaller, lighter Elliott, enveloping him in a bear hug, from which he planned to slam the boy. Elliott, however, had a very different idea. His feet sprawled backward, making it impossible to get a tight grip on him, and Elliott began to spin away. As he escaped, he took hold of Solomon’s wrist, completing the hold just past his elbow, tripping him and following Solomon down with another arm bar.
After the third takedown at the hands of a smaller, younger foe, Solomon was embarrassed and sprang to his feet with his face twisted in a mask of rage. He attacked Elliott with a scream, pushing Gavin to step in, wrapping his nephew up in his arms and lifting him off the floor.
Gavin held the boy until he regained control of his breathing and calmed down, at which point he set him on the floor and instructed the two combatants to shake hands and make peace. Begrudgingly, Solomon followed Gavin’s instruction, and awkwardly returned a bow from Elliott, who then went back to his class with Tyler.
“What’s your opinion of judo now?” Gavin asked.
“Alright, alright, that kid was pretty good, he tricked me a few times,” Solomon answered, punctuating his reply with a roll of his eyes.
“Well, I’d be happy to teach you a few of those ‘tricks’ if you ever want to learn. Judo was created to allow a smaller man to fight on even terms with a bigger opponent. Imagine what you could do with those kinds of skills at your size and strength. Heck, if you wanted it bad enough, and you’re as athletic as I think you are, you could be an Olympian.”