The Hula Hula Boys in Headless Ticket to Hawai’i

A Story from the Warren Zevon-iverse

A long time ago, I was going to co-edit an anthology of stories inspired by the songs of Warren Zevon with another fan of his music. A third writer had the same idea as we did, and I stepped down and let the other two have it, if I could contribute a story. They didn’t like my story, and sometimes that’s how the story goes. I loved writing it, and David Cranmer at Beat to a Pulp loved it too, and a writer I respect keeps telling me it’s his favorite of mine, so I’ve decided to share it here. You don’t need to know the songs of Warren Zevon to enjoy it, but be aware that it exists in a fantasy world of the early ‘80s where gorillas can steal your BMW, and headless Thompson gunners seek revenge without relent… (London Werewolves might hang out at Trader Vic’s, but they are one of the few Zevonesque characters who don’t appear here… but ne certainly could.)

The Hula Hula Boys in Headless Ticket to Hawai’i

by Thomas Pluck

I. That Sonofabitch Van Owen

Ha'ina 'ia mai ana ka puana:

     —Traditional Hawaiian legends begin, “and so the story is told:”

He was sitting in the Gun Room Cocktail Lounge of the Maui Hana hotel, watching the sun glare across the peak of Haleakalā as the ice cubes calved in his empty glass of gin, when he heard the report of small arms in the distance. Muffled as it was by the drumbeats of the Polynesian band warming up for the nightly luau, the tourists did not recognize the distinct patter of the Thompson M1928A1 submachine gun, but he did. Its music had been a leitmotif during the most formative era of his life.

The lounge reminded Van Owen of his salad days as a mercenary in Africa, with its ceiling racks of colonial-era rifles and moldy taxidermy boar head decor. It was open to the elements, with a view of the island of Hawai’i in the endless ocean to his left, and the lush jungle hanging over the dormant volcano of Haleakalā like a cape to his right.

Not a terrible a place to die.

He had hopped a ride to Maui on a rickety seaplane running heroin from the Philippines and paid his way with a brick of China White he’d lifted off dealers in Manila after splattering them against the wall with the tool of his trade, the weapon he’d mastered alongside his fellow Thompson gunners in the Congo War. The tommy gun was heavy and unwieldy, the brutal and blustery weapon of a more civilized age. Ten pounds of iron and wood—twelve with two magazines jungle-taped top to bottom like French prostitutes on a naughty postcard—it was only accurate to fifty yards, and required a steel nerve to get in range and beat its tattoo of slaughter upon the enemy.

Van Owen and his comrades were such men.

And he had betrayed the best of them. Now, the song of their beloved weapon haunted him as he fled the globe in search of peace. He thought the remote Pacific isles would be far enough to keep the curse at bay, and it had for a long time—long enough to tan his milky Danish hide into worn, ruddy leather—but the familiar rat-a-tat-tat between the rhythmic crashes of the never-ending surf meant his idyll had come to an end.

His pursuer was blind, but relentless. Van Owen had bested him once, but he knew if they met again that he would be slain.

There was no reasoning with the dead.

II. The Hula Hula Boys

Ha'ina 'ia mai ana ka puana…

     —Traditional Hawaiian folk songs: “and so the story goes…”

“I’m sorry, sir.” The bellboy smirked. “Got no idea where your wife is.”

Cyril Smollen sniffed and peeled a twenty from his money clip.

The bellboy’s eyes rolled towards the beach with all the subtlety of a vaudeville pantomime. He snatched the bill from Cyril’s hand and strutted away in his monkey suit before he could be harangued further.