The Girl at the Center of the World

by Austin Aslan

  The movie ends. Another one starts. A bunch of Manō arrive at the house and pile into the living room. I smell popcorn. I keep talking. I shed ten giant weight belts from my shoulders during our conversation, but I realize toward the end that I haven’t been talking to the priest. I’ve been talking to Tūtū. Akoni’s just a stand-in. I weep, then, and in the silence filled only with frog song and muffled movie music, my friend patiently waits, and I begin to grapple with that vast reach, greater than the chasm between stars, that now separates me from my lost loved ones, who, all at once, feel so incredibly close and yet who remain so infinitely far away.

  Father Akoni and I eventually come back inside. Keali`i and Tami send our Manō visitors off into the backyard to check on the imu. Dad turns off the TV, and those of us in the room can no longer see. Mom uses a flashlight to gather up some of Tūtū’s kukui nuts, and she lights them so that they each dance with flame. Mom and Dad and Kai and Buzz and Marcus and Rachel and Father Akoni and Keali`i and Tami—we all gather around the light, and for a brief moment the old world with its old ways comes rushing back. We hold each other in the silence, in the darkness pushed back by the gentle light, and we are lōkahi.

  One with all creation.

  CHAPTER 26

  Aukina and I reach the coast and turn right, then we follow the 130 to its very end. We’re in his brand-new, antique king cab truck, a thank-you gift from my family to his, presented with a note signed by both my parents:

  Dear `Ohana,

  Thank you so much for loaning your son to us so often in the past six weeks. He has been a world of help. You have no idea. We would like to offer you this working truck and a full tank of gas as a token of our gratitude. We are still in your debt and would be very happy to assist your efforts on your homestead at any time.

  It’s the dead of night. A dim quarter moon lights our way. The little Orchid is in low orbit over the foothills of the Sierra Nevadas in Northern California tonight, like a kitten over a bowl of milk, sipping up the sweetness left over from a nuclear generating station near a small town, Ione, on my crinkly map.

  She’s sparing the lives of a million people, and even as she does I see a lone grid of streets in a Sacramento neighborhood interrupting the dark Earth with a hopeful, soft yellow-orange glow. I clutch my silver pendant and dare a smile in the dark.

  The road that Aukina and I travel used to connect to the Chain of Craters road in Volcanoes National Park, eleven miles away. But it has been covered over with lava for decades. Our way forward on the pavement suddenly ceases at a lava wall, formed years ago by an old flow. There’s a parking lot here. There was always something rather amusing about this dead end, where Pele had swept aside the engineering of us puny mortals, taking back the coast.

  The lot is empty tonight. Aukina and I have the end of the world to ourselves.

  “There used to be whole towns near here,” I say. “Kalapana, Kaimū, and Kaimū Bay. Destroyed by a vent that opened in the eighties. It’s all buried under fifty feet of lava now. All this coastline is new since then. Even when it came that fast, people still had plenny time to get out.”

  “I’ve seen pictures of those towns being slowly covered over. When Pahoa got hit, too. I’ve read about all this my whole life. Seen the flows on TV.”

  “Come on.” I take Aukina’s hand, pull him out onto the edge of the endless lava field. The horizon glows a faint orange. A great plume of steam is cast in orange light where fresh lava meets the sea. We turn our gazes upslope. Amid the great blackness of the volcanic wasteland, high above the pali cliffs of cooled lava that run all along the southern coast, we can see a geyser of orange-black fire, a silent fountain gushing with the Earth’s blood.

  Nearer to us we catch a glimpse of the molten-rock river that pours down the pali cliff onto our low coastal shelf. Just a soundless pattern of firelights against a black Earth and a starry sky. Serene? Humble? Harmless?

  Pele is not as innocent as she seems.

  “Wow,” Aukina says.

  “Welcome to Big Island. Ready to march out there?”

  “Sure!”

  I can’t hold back a laugh. “That’s what they all say.” The Pu`u `Ō`ō vent often erupts and spills lava down these slopes, luring tourists into a devious hike that turns out to be brutal enough to kill people from heatstroke, dehydration, and exposure.

  “What? I’m not nervous. I’m game.”

  “No, it’s not that. It’s farther than it looks.”

  “It’s right there! No sweat!”

  “Well, let’s go, then.”

  We begin our slog. Aukina is surprised to see a handful of houses built on top of the hardened lava near the coastal cliff. “How’d these houses survive?”

  “They didn’t,” I explain. “Some owners rebuilt them, right where they used to be. Guess they loved their little piece of heaven that much—even after hell froze it over!”

  There’s no trail, no predetermined way forward. This terrain is never easy. In daylight the heat of the sun attacks you from all directions, from the sky and reflected back up at you from the blacktop under your feet. There are no trees, no bushes, no shade. At night it’s impossible to determine the path of least resistance. The black folds of ropy rock snake and twist in every direction, mixing with the black of night. Every step is a potential ankle breaker. And each bulge and dip builds into large hillocks and troughs; the ground undulates and eddies like erratic ocean waves frozen to stone by Medusa’s gaze. Even with the flashlight our visibility is twenty feet at best. Our feet sometimes punch through the thin crust to an older flow below. We slice up our shins and calves and scrape our palms as we catch our falls or scramble up.

  An hour goes by. The feeble moon is about to set beyond the cliffs, and stars are crisp enough to reach up and touch. The geyser of liquid fire pouring out of Pu`u `Ō`ō adorns the distant slope with all the menace of an electric stove coil. That fountain is probably three stories high, though.

  We rise to a bulbous perch and share a drink of water. The flow toward which we crawl looks the same as it did from the end of the road—a dimly glowing horizon. Aukina despairs. “We’re not any closer!”

  “Told you.”

  “What is this? Six weeks of basic training was less brutal than this.”

  I laugh. “We’re making progress. Keep it up, soldier!”

  He salutes me.

  The moon is gone now, and we’re on the dark side of Mars. Our pace slows. Starlight illuminates the shiny surfaces of the old flows. We try to spare Aukina’s light. We’ll need it once we draw near the active flow, where the ground will be most deceptive. Even the freshest lava develops a cool black shell the instant it hits air. It’s easy to walk out on top of it several yards before realizing your boots are smoldering. Our flashlights have proven oddly dependable lately, but batteries are still precious.

  We can hear the lava, the slow crackling of cooling rock as it oozes outward from the river’s banks. It sounds like loose bits of granite sliding and tumbling down a steep slope—slowly. Like a bulldozer smoothing over a dirt road embedded with boulders. The orange horizon has grown near, and I can even make out the first details of some of the glowing ends of the lava’s creeping, searching fingers.

  “Are we there yet?” Aukina asks cautiously.

  “ ‘Patience, young Padawan.’ ”

  “Don’t start quoting movies on me. Seriously, how long?”

  I smile. “ ‘When will then be now?’ ”

  “ ‘Soon,’ ” he answers.

  We laugh together. I’m not surprised he knows that quote from Spaceballs—one of Dad’s favorite comedies. “I tried quoting a line from that movie to Tami once,” I say. “I told her she had ‘gone to plaid.’ She didn’t get it.”

  “You kidding? I use that line all the time.”

  “Of course you do!” I say. I want to jump in his arms, surprise him, make him catch me. I want to…kiss him.

  He’s marching forward, though.<
br />
  We scramble over the rough landscape for another ten minutes, passing through the blowback of the steam coming off the ocean where the lava’s entering the water. We’re breathing sulfurous fumes, and my throat’s not happy. The sound of crawling rock has grown loud. Orange tentacles ooze with clear detail before us. It’s hot. “We’re here,” I say.

  Aukina sounds disappointed. “What about the lava river?” I can only determine his vaguest outline. But he feels so close.

  I take a deep breath. “Too dangerous. Maybe we can scout out some good views, but we’re asking for trouble if we try to get any closer. Too easy to confuse this fresh stuff with old stuff.”

  “I need a break anyway.” I hear him slip his backpack off, unzip it, fish around for his water bottle.

  We find a smooth, safe patch of high ground and sit cross-legged to watch the slow advancement of lava’s edge, a black blob highlighted by contours of orange neon. I sidle closer.

  Thank God it’s so dark. My mouth is doing that stupid twitch-smile again. I bury my head in my knees, laugh nervously.

  “I want to touch it,” he finally says.

  “Huh?” I whip my head up.

  “I wish I could play with the lava. Looks so interesting.”

  “The lava! Oh. It’s different than it looks, though. Hard as granite, even where it’s oozing. Tap it with your bottle. Not your finger.”

  He rises. He hops down to where the ropy blob is inching forward, shields his face from the heat with his arm, and taps his bottle against the glowing edge. Sounds like he’s knocking metal against stone.

  “I thought it would be gooey! Stick to the bottle or something.”

  “Weird, eh?”

  “Yeah.” He explores the edges for a bit, shines his flashlight on and off of the shadowy surfaces. I’m content to watch, reliving my excitement and wonder as my parents and I made all the same discoveries on our first trip here during an older active flow.

  He returns and sits beside me. “Unreal.”

  “Yeah.”

  “That’s liquid Earth. The center of the world. Rising up, shaping the island as we watch.”

  “Pele’s amazing,” I say. “Isn’t she?”

  “She’s something else.” He studies me.

  We watch the center of the world slowly feel its way, consuming everything in its path.

  “You believe in her?” Aukina asks me. “Pele?”

  “Yes,” I answer. “I believe in the gods, the akua, the `aumākua. Especially Pele. They talk to me. They’ve been quiet lately. Or maybe not. Tūtū would probably say that I haven’t been listening.”

  “I know what you mean. It’s hard, doing this. Starting over. Everything: your home, your family, yourself. You feel like you have the weight of the whole world on your shoulders, and there’s no break. It never stops.”

  I burst into tears, sob. It pours out.

  Aukina holds me, and I fall into his embrace. I steal a glimpse up at him, my vision swimming, and I see him wiping silent tears away from his eyes.

  “Mo’bettah?” he asks after I’ve grown still.

  I nod, clear my eyes, scoot away a few inches. “Yeah. Sorry.”

  “No. It’s good.”

  “I didn’t know that was coming.”

  “We all have it coming, Lei. Gotta get it out. It’ll eat you up.”

  I lean forward, hover, and then kiss him. I pull away, but he draws me back with steady hands on my shoulders. His fingers search my upper arms, my collarbone, find my neck and my cheeks. His touch. His lips. I kiss him, running my hands over his muscular back. I fall into his embrace and melt, sparks trailing along my lips and my face and my neck. The heat feeds a new fire within me that makes every detail of the night more alive.

  Aukina pauses, his breathing heavy, his hands tight. He touches his forehead to mine. Our noses rest against each other. “I…You mean so much to me, Lei.”

  “Yeah. I…You too,” I whisper.

  We kiss gently. Aukina backs off. I’m glad he does. I’m not ready for more. For what could happen. I know better. The world may be on the mend, creeping forward, rebuilding layer by layer, but it’s still no place for a new generation. And I’m too young.

  Someday. Maybe soon. But not now.

  Aukina holds me, and we grow still. We watch the lava creep, the slow turning of the stars, and I trace the intricacies of Aukina’s tattoos with my fingers. The faint glow of orange provides just enough light to—

  “Aukina!” I gasp.

  “What? What is it?”

  “We need to move!” I half laugh, half groan.

  He glances around with a jolt. “Oh, God. Come on.”

  We stand. During our embrace the lava surrounded our high ground. It’s no wonder we were easily fooled. The flow appears the same as the ropy rock beneath us. Black and solid-looking. But we’re only seeing the cool outer shell.

  We’re on an island. I can see the edges of the flow stretching in a full circle around us. I squeeze Aukina’s hand with apprehension. I point with my other arm to a narrow break. “We have to cross it. There.”

  “Is that safe?”

  “I don’t know.” It looks just like the rock we’re on. But our feet could punch through. “We have no choice.”

  “Okay,” he says, focused. “Together.”

  “Yeah.” We squeeze each other’s hands and race over the black surface of oozing lava. The crust holds our weight. With five feet to go, we leap for the shadowy patch of solid ground. We touch down and trot several feet away before slowing.

  “Oh, man,” Aukina pants, “my boots! They melted!” He bounces on one leg, inspecting his raised boot.

  I do the same. The rubber tread sticks to my finger like grease. “Mine too.” I laugh. I wipe my finger on my jeans. “God. That was sooo stupid.”

  “We just walked over hot coals together,” Aukina marvels. “You realize that?”

  “Team-building exercise.”

  “ ‘I’m a leaf on the wind,’ ” says Aukina. “ ‘Watch how I soar.’ ”

  “You’re not allowed to quote Serenity around me.”

  Aukina slaps his thigh. “You know that one? You know Firefly?”

  “Of course. I’m pure nerd. My dad made certain of it.”

  Aukina says, “You are by far the coolest chick I’ve ever met, you know that?”

  A flush rises to my neck. I can’t find my voice.

  “Well,” Aukina says, looking around, “we gonna stand here until we have to do that again, or what? I’ve got a day of tree cutting and pickax work ahead of me.”

  “Wait, you’re busy tomorrow?”

  Aukina casts me a very dim smile. “Houses and irrigation ditches don’t build themselves.”

  “Let’s go. This might be even harder on the way back, with melted boots.”

  We start away, and the temperature drops. It’s actually cold out. I forgot this. I shiver, but not because of the air. What we just did was nuts. Never should have happened. And hiking boots don’t grow on trees.

  We press onward with no way to retrace our steps. Our path back will be distinct from the one we took out here. I can tell this will be brutal.

  I could reach out to my little Orchid, pull her west and into a higher orbit. She would dazzle against the horizon, turn the waters green and purple, light our way just enough. But I won’t. She’s here for all of us, not just me. And she’s here against her true nature and desire, lonely, lost. I will keep her for only a few more months, and then she can return to her mother. And if my epilepsy returns then…I guess that’ll be my price. I hope I can pay it. Meanwhile, I try to comfort her, make sure she feels I’m there.

  We are Leilani.

  We are Leilani.

  Be well, little one. I’m with you.

  Dawn is coming. It will get brighter as we go.

  We reach the truck just as the first birds wake. We finish the last of our water. The truck fires up without even a stutter, the jungle before us sudd
enly ablaze in a wide circle of unwavering light. Aukina turns on the radio. We hear only static—but it feels so optimistic to watch him do it.

  My God, I marvel, one of these days he’ll do that and we’ll actually hear music.

  I smile, clutch my pendant.

  “Ready to go home?” Aukina asks.

  “I am home.”

  “K’den. Ready to return to your house?”

  “Yes.” I scoot close and wrap my arms around him. He holds me with one arm and drives down the twilit jungle road with the other.

  The truck skids to a halt. “Look!” Aukina points ahead. He cuts the engine.

  The forested tunnel we’re in is dim. But then I detect movement near the shoulder. A crouched form, waiting. We’re still as statues. It hesitates, then emerges from the trees.

  I hold my breath. The shadowy figure slinks to the middle of the road, stops in the glow of our headlights, turns, and studies us.

  My hand goes to my chest, to the picture of my beloved `aumākua, Grandma in her white wedding dress and Grandpa in his immaculate white navy uniform.

  Find pono, and you’ll find ola. We are each one. Lōkahi. Individual. Matchless. But we are also one. Indivisible.

  Connected with all of creation.

  Before us, the white tiger shifts on its paws. It breaks its gaze, glancing far beyond the trees, and then saunters into the jungle like a whisper.

  The world is so complex, so convoluted, so indecipherable. But there’s always a thread. A kite string. Everything is connected. I’m suddenly certain: We are never alone. And no matter what, we’ll get through this. We’ll figure it out together.

  I squeeze Aukina’s hand, blink back tears, and finally breathe.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Peek behind the curtain at any author, of every novel worth publishing, and you’ll discover a dedicated team. This steadfast reality holds true for The Girl at the Center of the World. I can’t thank my editor and publisher, Wendy Lamb, enough for her crucial and expert guidance, her patience, and her care. This story excels precisely where you helped it along, Wendy. I’m grateful to Dana Carey for all of her additional support, and to other members of the Penguin Random House family involved in the development of this book. Alison Impey, your cover takes my breath away every time I see it. Jillian Vandall, I’m so fortunate to have you as my publicist. Trish Parcell, thank you for your careful design and for the maps. Candy Gianetti, Colleen Fellingham, and Alison Kolani, thank you for the meticulous copy edits and for your attention to every other detail within these covers that magically turns novels into books. Tracy Heydweiller, thank you for your production expertise and care. My gratitude extends to Julie Just, Elena Giovinazzo, Holly McGhee, and the entire team at Pippin Properties.