Illumine Her by Sieni A.M. Page A

promptly swatted him across the arm and brought an end to their little charade.
    Sera laughed out loud.
    “Anyway, enough about work. What were you saying before?” Alana asked.
    Sera shook her head. “You mean before you spaced out on me?” she asked in mock annoyance. Alana shot her a grin.
    “I was saying that I’m planning to come visit you soon,” Sera answered.
    Alana’s eyes widened. “Are you serious? When?”
    Sera beamed in return. “I just need to finalize a few things with the boss, but first semester break is coming up, and I want to come to Samoa for it. I miss you, girlie!”
    Alana remembered that prior to leaving Fiji, Sera secured a part-time job at the university’s sister branch in the Solomon Islands working in the psychology department. She was no doubt giving those students a run for their money.
    “My sister’s getting married over the school holidays. Do you want to come to a big, fat Samoan wedding?” Alana asked.
    “Oooh, how’s bridezilla?”
    Alana smiled. “She’s assigned a ton of things for me to take care of, so if you come we can work on it together.”
    “Dresses, shoes, and flowers, oh my. How can I resist?”
    “Well, so far all I’m seeing is stress, stress, and more stress. But with you here, it’ll be a big relief.”
    “Wait up...” Sera held up her palm. “Doesn’t she have a strict guest list?”
    “Sera, it’s a Samoan wedding. That means wedding invitations are only meant to set the theme colors. It doesn’t matter that there will only be two names on that invite because ten more will show up. That’s why we’re having it at a large hall.”
    Sera grinned. “Okay, count me in then. I’ll be there.”
    Alana smiled at her best friend and then wished her a good night.
    After she clicked off Skype, Alana padded down the hall to grab a drink from the kitchen. It was close to eleven and soft light filtered through from her mother’s bedroom.
    “Mama? You’re still up?” she asked, poking her head in the door.
    Perlita was propped up against the headboard of the bed, picture albums spread around her. Alana recognized them immediately and took a deep breath. She went in and lay beside her, stretching her legs under the covers. Pulling her into her side, her mother sighed. She pointed to a picture of David, Malia, and Alana taken at a country fair in the States.
    “I remember David kept stepping in that goat poop,” Alana mused. “We came back from that trip with more cavities from all that cotton candy.”
    Perlita flipped the page. “Look at this one,” she said, tapping a picture of them as kids riding on their father’s back.
    Alana smiled sadly. Another had them building a sand castle fort at the beach. “I miss him so much,” she whispered.
    “We have some beautiful memories of him now though,” her mother spoke softly.
    Alana suddenly noticed a picture of David when he was seventeen. For his birthday, he received a new hair razor and decided to give himself a buzz cut. Unfortunately, when the razor got stuck and stopped working, he only succeeded to shave off the top half making him look ultimately like a bald clown. Perlita glanced at the photo and began chuckling quietly. Alana smiled and then joined her mother in suppressed laughter.
    “What are you two laughing about?” David asked, peering through the doorway.
    “At you,” Alana forced out, unable to contain her giggles.
    David joined them on the bed and snatched the picture away from her. “Oh man, how did you get this?” he groaned.
    “You were frantically trying to fix the situation, running around so stressed that you didn’t even notice,” Alana said.
    “And you had that school speech competition to go to the next night,” Perlita added with a smile.
    “Well, I’m glad to see you both find it so funny. I’m going to go take this and burn it somewhere,” David got up and walked to the door. “I’ll leave you two sosos to reminisce.” He left the room with the