The Girl at the Center of the World

by Austin Aslan

  She turns back to the three of us and points the gun at Keali`i. “Okay, talk. Start making sense. You drawing us into a trap?”

  “You gotta trust us,” Keali`i says.

  “Trust went overboard with the lights, smartass. What’s going on here?”

  “Just what I said.” I step forward. “We’re just…high schoolers. No tricks. We have a dive light that works. We went diving for lobsters. A bunch of jerks tried to steal everything. We got away.”

  “Kids? Being shot at?” the bald man says from the tiller. “This stinks.”

  “Maybe you’re smelling this.” Keali`i lobs one of the bags at the bald guy’s feet. He dances backward, studying the bulging, moving bag.

  Tami takes off her wet suit, turning it inside out as it rolls down her legs. The cut above her knee looks really bad. Blood is flowing freely out of it. I put my hands to my mouth and stifle a moan.

  “Rachel, take the helm,” the man says. She scrambles and grabs the tiller, her gun locked on Keali`i. The man dashes belowdecks.

  Keali`i shakes his head. “Get that outta my face.”

  Rachel ignores him.

  “Hang in there, Tami,” I say. I kneel beside her and squeeze her hand. “You did it. You got us over here. We’re safe.”

  Tami starts laughing. I join her. “Where’s the shooter?” she asks.

  “God,” says Keali`i. “Shark burger? I don’t think he went in after us. Did he?”

  I glance at the breakwater. No one.

  Rachel says, “I’m starting to believe you guys.” I study her. Her features are wrinkled, and her short, wavy hair is gray. Her hands are bony, and her skin is loose and blotched. Her eyes are everywhere.

  “I’m Leilani,” I say, reaching out a hand to her.

  “Rachel,” she says. She takes my hand.

  “Arizona?” I ask.

  She laughs dryly, nods. “Long story.”

  “What’s the mainland like?” I ask.

  She sighs. “Longer story. About as bad as here, I bet, given our welcome.”

  The man emerges from below, a medical tackle box in his hands. He wears glasses with circular rims. He’s broad-shouldered beneath his buttoned shirt. A weight-lifting Gandhi. His eyes and his bright face are disarming, but I wouldn’t dare make a sudden move around him. His nice shirt is a Tommy Bahama, new.

  He kneels beside Tami. “You lucked out tonight. I’m a doctor. You’re going to be okay. I want you to relax. This is all going to work out.” He presses a cloth into Tami’s thigh. “Hold it there.” Blood smears his shirt; he doesn’t care.

  We pass the edge of the breakwater and turn out to sea. The water’s much choppier. I sit down on the port bench, bracing for a rough ride.

  “Marcus, we need a plan,” Rachel says. “Where are we supposed to supply up? We can’t just keep going. What are we going to do with them?”

  One of the slippahs at Rachel’s feet has found the opening at the top of the bag. She reaches down and shoves it back in. “Damn, those look good,” she mutters.

  “Never would have worked,” Keali`i says. “I’ve seen dozens of yachts confiscated. Owners walked the plank. Sometimes outright shot in the head. You guys would have been done for if we hadn’t come along.”

  Marcus finishes cleaning Tami’s gash. He puts down fresh gauze and tapes the cut shut. “That’ll only hold if you don’t move,” he tells her. “I’m going to have to clean it out. At least you didn’t tear a major artery.”

  Rachel says to Keali`i, “I sailed into Hilo fifteen years ago. There was no moon. Figured we had a shot of parking and trading. Then the Rorschach just lit up like a city.”

  “Rorschach? You mean Emerald Orchid,” I say.

  She shrugs. “That’s the beauty. Call it how you see it.”

  “You’d be surprised how I see it,” I say.

  “Darling, very little surprises me anymore.”

  Tami and Keali`i and I share a knowing look.

  “Where are you headed?” I ask.

  “Classified,” Marcus says.

  “I need to know,” I answer roughly. “Are you heading up the island chain? ’Cause you’re not going to find more supplies on Maui, or O`ahu. Everyone’s coming this way. Are you looking for two weeks’ worth of supplies or two months’ worth?”

  Rachel and Marcus stare me down. I’m holding my breath.

  Marcus finally says, “Australia.”

  “My sister was in Sydney when everything happened,” Rachel says. “We…Well, we have no other ideas. Spent months trying to figure out what to do.”

  “I need to take you to my house. My parents can help you. We can set you up. In return, you fix Tami…and one other favor.”

  “Set us up? Meaning, what? What’re you offering?” Rachel looks skeptical. It wasn’t that long ago that I forced her to turn away from land, after all.

  “Food. Water. Tools. Whatever you need. We’ll give it to you. We’ve got a farm. Going to be a lot easier to take what we have than you trying to get it anywhere else on the islands. You’ll have to fight for it. And you don’t want to start for Australia without stocking up. Look, you can get what you need from us…a simple trade.”

  “What’s the other favor?” Marcus asks again.

  “Later,” I say.

  Rachel sighs deeply. “Where’s your house?” she asks.

  “Off of Onomea Bay. One of you has to stay on the boat, take it back out to sea. The doctor can come with us, fix up Tami. If you don’t trust us, keep Keali`i on board.”

  “Ho!” Keali`i exclaims. “Say what?”

  “Shut it,” I say, watching Rachel and Marcus.

  Marcus answers, “How far away is this bay?”

  “Less than an hour. It’s choppy. There’s a hike. You’ll be out for a day.”

  Marcus drifts over to Rachel by the tiller, and they whisper to each other. Keali`i, Tami, and I huddle as well.

  “What’re you on about, Lei?” Keali`i asks.

  “This is our boat. These are the people who will send our message around.”

  “What?” he says. “They’re going to Australia.”

  “Australia has plants waiting to blow.”

  “So? This doesn’t get you anywhere. You need a better solution. You’re the one who told me a world tour by boat is no good.”

  “A lightbulb goes off above your head,” I snap, “let me know. Until then I have to try everything short of messages in bottles. Every day the power stays off, more people suffer, right?”

  “Lei—”

  “Oh, my God,” I bark. I put my hands to my mouth. My heart rattles my rib cage.

  “What? What is it?” Tami asks.

  “Messages,” I say. “A lightbulb. Above my head.”

  Marcus steps over to us. “We’ll do it. Rachel will stay out with the boat.”

  I scarcely hear. My thoughts are racing. Does Grandpa know Morse code?

  “I’ll keep your friend, since you offered,” Rachel says.

  Keali`i scowls.

  Turn off, I tell the Orchid. Again, nothing. Why won’t she respond? If I can turn her on—and then turn her off…I could talk to an entire hemisphere at once.

  “Lei, you okay?” Tami asks.

  “I’m fine. Just…let me concentrate.”

  Turn off. No, that’s not right. That doesn’t mean anything to her. Don’t think words. Just…feel it.

  Dim. Fade. Go dark.

  “Whoa! What the hell?”

  I open my eyes. The resoluteness of night has returned. The Orchid is back to her normal brilliance, but the contrast with a few seconds ago is stark.

  I did it.

  Brighten. Flare.

  The Orchid surges back to brilliance.

  Marcus and Rachel fix their gazes upward, alarmed. Tami and Keali`i stare at me. “Lei. Are you doing that?” whispers Tami.

  I look between her and Keali`i and grin. “Lightbulb.”

  CHAPTER 6

  It’s about five a.m. We t
urn into Onomea Bay and drop anchor where Dad and I parted ways with the sheriff of Hana over three months ago. We’re parked outside the swell, but the waters are rough. My gut swoons as the boat lifts and drops—while simultaneously tilting from side to side—on the rolling ocean.

  Rachel has an inflatable raft at the ready along the forward hatch. Marcus prepares a long towrope and ties one end to the raft, his task aided by the faint light of the Orchid.

  “Thank you for staying,” I say to Keali`i.

  “You could even do some fishing,” Marcus suggests. “You know how to deep-sea fish?”

  “I can catch anything that swims, glides, crawls, squirts, flaps, or slithers.”

  Marcus pats him on the shoulder. “Thank you, Kea…um…”

  “Kay-uh-LEE-ee.”

  “Kay-uh-LEE-ee,” the doctor repeats.

  Marcus and Rachel lower the raft into the water. I descend first. Marcus follows, and we help Tami slip in.

  Keali`i tosses the bags of lobsters down, along with the dive light. “Treat your family to a lobster feast.”

  We’re ready to paddle away, tethered to the sailboat by the towrope. As soon as we’re on shore, Rachel will pull the raft back, haul anchor, and disappear to open sea. She guides the rope out as we navigate the forces of the bay. These waters are infested with tiger sharks; good thing we don’t have to swim.

  My oar hits bottom. Marcus jumps out with Tami in his arms. He carries her to shore and sets her down out of reach of the surf. I trudge forward and sit beside Tami. The raft moves slowly out as Rachel drags it in. My new idea keeps washing over me: Morse code. We should have thought of this three months ago. But I didn’t know the Orchid could flare like that. Even now there are challenges. For one, I’ll need to learn Morse code.

  Dawn is near—I can see the gentle before-glow of the sun deep on the seaward horizon. Tami says, “We should go. The sun’s going to make it humid.”

  I study her leg. Tape covers the gash. Her dressing, changed a few minutes before entering the raft, is nearly soaked through with blood.

  “I’ll walk,” she says. “I’ll be okay. Faster we get there, the faster I can get patched up for real.”

  “I agree,” Marcus says. He picks up his medical kit and loops the strap around his shoulder. He’s changed into expensive quick-dry pants and a nylon hiking shirt. His hiking boots are new.

  I laugh. I’m in a bikini, a wet suit, and surfing booties. I unzip my booties and empty them of water and rocks. Tami wordlessly helps me peel the wet suit off of my legs.

  “I’m going to hide the dive light somewhere,” I say. I don’t want to have it taken away on the road. Too tempting a treasure, even for most honest people. I scramble up the wave-racked rocks beside our landing and stuff the dive light in a dry hole out of the reach of the tide. I roll a large rock of `a`a lava over the top, take a mental snapshot of the hiding spot, and hop back down.

  We march up the slope. Thick vines dangle to the pavement like the beaded entryways in Puna hippie shops. Many of the sharpest bends are partially washed out, the steep embankments overgrown, constricting the road into a narrow pathway.

  We fill, drink, and refill an empty gallon milk carton with water at a trickling stream. Tami heavily favors her leg, and during some of the steeper stretches, she allows us to prop her up with our interlaced arms, and our shoulders. The sun rises, shimmering through the dense canopy in golden splotches, a blazing reflection bouncing off the ocean behind us. The clamor of birds is deafening. None are native to the islands. The mosquitos we brought here on boats from faraway lands killed off the Hawaiian birds.

  I slap at one on my arm. Bad mosquito.

  As I look at the bloody smear on my arm, I realize: humans certainly left a lasting mark. Even if we kill each other off completely, these islands will always bear our legacy.

  We emerge from the jungle, passing into cane fields overshadowed by towering eucalyptus trees. A segment of Highway 19 peeks through the trees at the top.

  Tami’s losing steam. It’s very tiring to help her walk. I hear an approaching vehicle. We retreat into the sugarcane until the car has passed. I’ve driven on this road over the months and seen people hiding from me just like this.

  “We could try to flag down a ride,” Marcus thinks aloud.

  “I wouldn’t bother. No one’s going to waste their gas on us.”

  We hobble across the highway and continue mauka—upslope. Now we’re on a dirt road. We take a breather beneath a giant avocado tree. “How far?” Marcus asks.

  “Two miles to the gate. More to the house. I hope someone’s at the gate.”

  Marcus pulls a glass bottle of Grey Goose vodka out of his medical bag and hands it to Tami. “For you.”

  “Huh?”

  “I’m going to have to irrigate that leg and scrape out the infected tissue as soon as we reach the house. The tissue’s damaged far down. This is my only anesthetic.”

  Tami’s eyes widen. She unscrews the bottle and takes a swig. She screws up her face like a toothless old man and takes another quick drink.

  “It’ll thin your blood, so take ’er easy.”

  “Thanks for sharing,” Tami says.

  Marcus laughs. “Of all the things our boat could have been fully stocked with at the end of the world, liquor was what we had. We were prepared for a relaxed weekend, not an endless odyssey.”

  Tami takes a few more gulps. When we rise to finish our hike, she’s looking a bit ruddy and too cheerful.

  “Don’t forget to hydrate,” Marcus says, passing Tami the milk carton.

  “So, how does a sailboat end up with an Arizona flag on it?” I ask Marcus during our slog, Tami hoisted between us.

  Marcus smiles. “We’re from Arizona. Rachel had a very successful law practice in Scottsdale.”

  “Scottsdale,” I say, trying to picture where that is.

  Marcus chuckles. “It’s a fancy way of saying ‘not Phoenix.’ ”

  Tami takes another drink. Marcus coaxes the bottle out of her hands. “Slow down, kiddo.”

  We walk in silence. I realize that Marcus managed to dodge my question.

  “I don’t get your flag. What’re you doing halfway across the Pacific?”

  “Oh,” he says. “Rachel kept this boat in San Carlos, Mexico, on the Gulf of California, about five hours south of the border.”

  “Is that where you were when the Orchid came?”

  “Rachel was. I was back in Scottsdale.”

  “Wasn’t there a nuclear meltdown out there? Early on?” Father Akoni on Moloka`i had said something about Arizona.

  Marcus studies me.

  “Lei has her own crazy story,” Tami says, breaking the awkward silence. “She was on O`ahu with her dad when the blackout happened. Took them a month to get back. They were stuck in a military camp. Her dad was shot in the shoulder. He was almost executed—by the leader of the Tribe that would’ve taken your boat.”

  “Sounds…scary,” Marcus says.

  “It was,” I say. I’m silent. I don’t want to retell my story, either. Anxiety rises whenever I think about it. But if I share what I went through, he’ll be cornered into telling me what happened in Arizona.

  So I tell Marcus how Dad and I made it from O`ahu back to the Big Island after the blackout. I relive the nightmare as I’m talking, and the boost of adrenaline propels me up the hill. The slowly unfolding chaos in Honolulu. Escaping the burning hotel. Searching endlessly for a way off of O`ahu with no luck. Our time in the military camp, people dying and starving all around us. Our daring escape from the Marine Corps base, and our shoot-out that won us passage to Moloka`i. Our days in the jungle on Maui, fleeing the deputies and the hunting dogs of the sheriff of Hana. I explain my epilepsy. I mention Father Akoni on Moloka`i only briefly, and I don’t mention what happened after we got home.

  “You grew up in a hurry,” Marcus says.

  Tami sniggers unkindly.

  “Tami saw the tsunami firsthand,” I offe
r. “Almost killed her. The water actually reached her. Wave was already coming in when she came through the trees and first noticed the bay was low. She ran so hard and so fast that she just barely beat the wave to its high line. Almost got hit by a delivery truck carried on the wave.”

  “No kidding?” says Marcus.

  Tami hoots. “You know she talks to it,” she says. “She speaks to the Orchid.”

  “Tami, stop it.”

  “No, really,” she continues. “They’re best buddies. Always sharing visions. She’s the reason the Orchid never left.”

  “Tami, you’re drunk.” I laugh dryly. “Knock it off, will ya?”

  “All buss up,” she agrees. She won’t stop, though. “It was going to leave. But Lei made it stay.”

  I pinch Tami’s shoulder hard, furious.

  “Ow!” she screams. She whips away from both of us. “You know what? I don’t need your help. I can walk on my own.”

  God, what a disaster. I glance at Marcus. Sheepishly, he says, “Sorry. I thought this would calm her down. I should have accounted for the humidity. The dehydration.”

  He’s completely dismissed her comments. Good. “Just…no. It’s okay.”

  Tami refuses to let us support her. She stays several paces back, no matter how slow we go.

  When I see the turnoff to our house around a bend in the road, I quicken my pace, leaving the others behind. Grandpa’s in a chair beneath a giant albizia tree. His arms are lazily crisscrossed around a shotgun. A rifle is propped against the tree trunk. Our horse, `Imiloa, grazes several feet behind him. Our guard dogs bark, and he rises.

  “Grandpa, it’s me!” I shout, just in case he’s feeling trigger-happy.

  “Mo`opuna!” He shoulders the shotgun by its strap. “Hush! Hush!” he commands the dogs. “An den? What’re you doing out here, eh? Why the bikini?”

  I laugh. He unlocks the gate and swings it open. The dogs surround me.

  “What you got there?” he asks.

  “Slippahs!” I hold the bags high for him to study. The dogs sniff excitedly.

  He whistles. “Ho! Never seen so much kau kau.”

  “Caught the biggest one myself. See it?”

  “Yeah. Where’d you get that? Why you here?”

  “Long story. Tami’s hurt. We need to get up to the house fast. The guy with her is a doctor from the mainland.”