Sunset Sanctuary

by R J Castiglione

  I could trust the police to protect me at the inn. Me being there would turn my whole family into prisoners in their own home.

  A rational person would certainly select one of those options. And if anything, Jeff knew that I was always rational. Perhaps it was time for me to take a risk.

  After we finished checking the truck, we got back in. “So? What do you want to do?”

  “I know it’s not the best thing, and it makes no sense, but I need an escape, even for just a night. Let’s go to the Visitor Center.”

  A few minutes later, we reached the police roadblock, where we explained our destination to one informed, but confused cop. Considering the officer had no authority over us, he waved us on. We turned left off the highway and wound our way up route 365 toward the volcano.

  Less than a minute later, I received an angry call from Officer Lanna.

  “I’m sorry, but for the first time in weeks, he doesn’t know where I am! I know Jeff. Once he figures it out, he’ll be furious. If you’re that worried about us, you can set up another one of your roadblocks on Haleakala Highway or send your police detail up to meet us, but I’m not going back to the inn. I can’t put my family at risk.”

  “Please reconsider, Adam. If you just get to the police station, you can spend the night there. Hell, you can stay over at my house if that’ll make you feel safer.”

  I could tell she was worried, but I was already committed to the irrational decision I made. I really, desperately needed to get away.

  “You’re kind to offer, really. For now, I just need you to find Jeff. You should be able to do that more easily with me out of the way. Promise me you’ll still keep someone at the inn to watch out for my family?”

  “Of course, but I’m going to send one of my officers up there next shift to check on you. I can get someone there this afternoon.”

  “Thank you, Officer Lanna. I’ll see you again tomorrow at the station.”

  “Please stay safe.”

  “I will. Thanks for all your help.”

  I hung up just as we turned the bend onto Haleakala Highway, only forty minutes out from the visitor center, taking into account how Calder mastered each and every bend in the road. The way he braked and accelerated around the turns made me feel as though I was in a cross-country road race, sharing a cockpit with Speed Racer.

  For the first time in a while, Calder seemed to really be enjoying himself. I hadn’t seen him this carefree since the hurricane. I remembered our first chance meeting at the town hall, and how I clung to him as he sped down Honoapiilani Highway on his motorcycle.

  Now, only a few weeks later, he was going so far out of his way to protect me. I knew without him, I wouldn’t have been able to handle everything going on in my life. That left me feeling both happy and sad, but as we raced up the volcano and put Jeff further and further behind us, I just became content, glad to spend the time alone with him.

  16

  Afternoon 27

  We pulled into the completely empty parking lot just before noon. At ten-thousand feet above sea level, I struggled to draw a full breath of air. Once the truck turned off, everything went quiet.

  I paused for a moment, my bag flung over my shoulder, and admired the eerie nature that was Haleakala in the late morning, and appreciated the idea of strolling through the dense cloud layer clinging to the volcano’s peak. I remembered sunrise trips to the summit as a child, lingering with my mother, father, and little sister for hours after the last tour bus left until the martian-like landscape glowing bright red in the morning sun was replaced by thick, dense clouds.

  Calder took my hand and led me to the dark, locked up visitor center. The tiny building stood stalwart atop the crater rim, the outer wall fused into a stone barricade where people could safely lean over and look straight into the crater below. Steep cliffs gave way to rocky slopes that extended to the horizon. I looked forward to the view in the morning; that was, if we woke up in time to climb the remaining one hundred feet up to the outlook.

  He punched in the door code and led me inside the building, through the tiny foyer offering snacks, drinks, and information brochures, and into the much larger back room, adorned with a table, a full-size couch bed, a kitchenette, and a private bathroom.

  My imagination ran away with me as I pictured us living here forever, waking up every morning to the most majestic view on the planet, and filling our days with simple things for a simple life — romance and sweets and POG. If only life were that easy. If only I didn’t need money to get by.

  As I looked out the picture window into the cloudy landscape, Calder eased himself behind me and wrapped his arms around my waist. I shuddered as he kissed my neck, his lips bringing warmth to the cold, gray room.

  Just to wrap things up, to completely disconnect from the world, I unlocked my phone and shot a text message off to my mother, telling her where I was and apologizing for not meeting her until tomorrow, then tossed it onto the table next to us.

  I faced Calder, standing on the balls of my feet and wrapping my arms around his neck to pull him down into a sweet, sensual kiss. Being this close to him sent chills down my spine, and reminded me of our first kiss in the greenhouse with the storm swirling around us.

  As he peeled my hoodie off, goosebumps formed on my forearms. He took each arm in turn and kissed upward from my wrist to my neck, then reached down and slowly peeled off my shirt.

  With him still dressed and me half-naked, I felt exposed, but I didn’t care. I reached down and yanked his shirt over his head in one awkward, sad motion like I possessed the grace of a manic puppy. Calder laughed as he untangled himself and picked me up with a brute force that was both firm and gentle.

  He carried me to the couch, my thighs hitched over his forearms and sat down, so I was straddling him. I dove in, and we made out with ferocity and desire. The rest of our clothing seemed to discard themselves, scattered throughout the room with complete disregard.

  Calder continued to kiss my neck as I inhaled his pleasant scent, the same smell of earth and sweat and sunscreen like he had spent time gardening on a chilly, cloudless morning. Petrichor—the smell of dust after rain.

  I admired how he paid attention to every inch of my body. Rolling over, so I sat on the couch, he slid down to his knees and took me into his mouth. My back stiffened. My thighs ached from spasm after spasm, his hot breath, and the cold air in the room alternating. Mixing in the thin air at this elevation, I started to feel lightheaded. Just as my body yearned for more oxygen, it also craved more of him.

  Lubricated enough by his saliva, he switched positions until he lay on top of me, bracing his weight with one arm while grabbing both our cocks in his large hand while his hips gyrated and bucked back and forth.

  The variety of his rhythm, his change of grip, and the rubbing and grinding pushed me to the edge. I knew we were both getting close.

  I wrapped my arms around him and locked his lips to mine as he continued to rock back and forth. Moan after moan escaped me until I crossed the threshold and lost control. We both trembled simultaneously as we erupted, covering me from my pelvis to my neck. Our concurrent orgasms lasted well over thirty seconds, a silly, explosive frenzy of springing and trembling and moaning and panting until Calder collapsed into me, both of us gasping for air.

  And, like most men do after sex, we let out our single “that was good” laugh, pleased with ourselves for doing such an excellent job.

  Calder didn’t bother to clean me up right away. He slid sideways onto the couch and spooned me, continuing to kiss my neck and shoulder. Then, when our euphoria passed, he grabbed a roll of paper towels and cleaned us up before settling back down, covering us with a bedspread he claimed from a nearby wardrobe.

  As we lay there, we didn’t say anything. I was glad for that. I didn’t want to talk about the past or the future. I just savored the present, eager to take complete advantage of our little escape from the chaos ten-thousand feet below.

  I didn’
t know when I fell asleep, but when I woke up, Calder wasn’t next to me. Lights were on, and the room was considerably warmer. A generator buzzed and vibrated from outside that powered the lights. The heat came from a wood stove in the corner of the room that doubled as a cooktop. Steam rose from a pot on the stove with two discarded ramen containers sitting empty on the counter.

  The table was cleared and set. My clothes were neatly folded, piled on the coffee table with my phone on top. A clock on the wall read 3 p.m. I had napped for a little over two hours.

  I wondered how Calder managed to set everything up without waking me. More so, my stomach wondered when I was going to eat again. I hadn’t had anything since breakfast, and the smell of boiling noodles and spices egged me on.

  Calder came in from the lobby just in time to stir the noodles before they boiled over. With the finesse of a novice chef, he tried to stir the water, spilling some out the side, cursing as some boiling water splashed onto him.

  I laughed, not because he screwed up but because, for the first time since I met him, I caught him doing something he didn’t really know how to do. But he tried, and that was enough for me. Jeff never tried. Even if I worked at the store until six at night, he expected me to have food ready and waiting for when he got home from happy hour. If there was one take away from my destructive relationship, it was learning how to work a kitchen.

  I put on my clothes, crossed the room, and urged Calder out of the way. “You’ve done enough. Let me.”

  Looking down at the sad state of the packaged ramen, I was glad only for the fact that they were the authentic variety, not the tiny styrofoam cups most college kids nuked in their microwaves.

  Opening the cupboard, I found an unopened stick of pepperoni, a jar of pickled artichoke hearts, and a can of pickled heart of palms. It didn’t take much to rinse the vinegar off the vegetables and add them to the pot, add some chunks of pepperoni, and mix in the spices, the outcome was certainly better than a cup of boiled noodles with spice powder.

  “Thanks,” Calder said as I set two bowls down on the table.

  “Looks like I’ll be doing the cooking from now on?”

  “I don’t know. I can work a grill just fine.”

  I smiled at him as we both slurped down our noodles. I recalled some short relationships I had before Jeff, and how they shared in common what I experienced with Calder now. That quiet awkwardness of two people who know one another well enough to be intimate, but not well enough to be at ease. I didn’t want to sour the mood by saying the wrong thing, making the wrong joke, or putting myself out there first, and I suspected Calder felt the same. His eyes looked at everything in the room but me.

  We weren’t like this after the hurricane when we shared my apartment. We were too exhausted around bedtime to do anything but shower, fool around, and pass out. Now truly alone for the first time, I didn’t know how to be together with just him. Calder’s patience and kindness didn’t make it any easier.

  “What are you thinking?” Calder asked me.

  I finished the last slurp of my noodles, looked up at him, and cleared my throat. “Actually, I was just thinking about how lucky I was to meet someone as kind as you.”

  “That’s sweet. Cheesy, but sw—”

  A loud bang followed by the lights flickering interrupted him. A few more booms caused the generator to shut down. The lights went off for good. The room felt cold and unwelcoming again, like all life and love and goodness were sucked out of it. No more our private sanctuary, the tiny staff room at the top of the volcano, to me, immediately felt like a trap.

  “Adam Frost! Come out! I know you’re in there!”

  While I froze in place, recognizing Jeff’s voice immediately, Calder sprung into action.

  “Enough of this!” he said as he stormed out. I chased after him, pleading with him to just lock the doors, but something took hold of him. I’d never seen him angry before, and I didn’t like it. Anger and rage were Jeff’s domain. Calder was too gentle, too kind.

  I followed him outside and caught my first sight of Jeff in broad daylight. I knew immediately he had snapped. His normally kempt hair and shaven face had grown out. He looked like the total lunatic and sociopath that he proved himself to be, and his arms, face, and clothes were caked in dirt.

  “What the fuck is wrong with you? Why can’t you just leave him alone!” Calder walked toward Jeff, who stood next to Calder’s truck, the tires slashed so we couldn’t escape. In barely enough time for me to blink, Jeff didn’t say a single word. He just raised a gun and discharged a single shot. Next thing I knew, Calder staggered on his feet before he collapsed into a heap, face-first on the ground.

  I let out a guttural scream, laced with rage and fear and malice. It shook me, lasting until my voice cracked. Jeff just smiled, moving Calder’s head around with his foot.

  “Leave him alone!”

  “Please, like I care about this fat fuck.” He kicked Calder in the gut before moving past him, directly toward me. “None of this would have happened if you just came with me that night at the school. But no! You just had to go to the police. You just had to ruin everything!”

  “Ruin everything? You put me in the hospital! You ruined my life in Atlanta, and now you’re ruining my life here!”

  I stepped backward until I was pressed into the stone barrier overlooking the crater. I thought about running inside but didn’t know the punch code.

  Jeff let out a demented chuckle, his eyes blazing and full. He looked like an anime villain. “What life? You had no life! What? Your dead-end job as a shop boy? Dinner with your whore of a mother and that bitch you call a sister? Without me, you’d most likely be sleeping in the streets! You’re worthless. Your whole family is worthless. All of you should be put out of your misery! You’re nothing but a waste of space!”

  He raised his gun and fired toward me, but missed. My heart stopped. I’d never had a gun fired at me before. Hell, aside from the police, I’d never even seen a gun in person before. I moved in the only direction I could, toward the trail leading up to the overlook.

  “Go ahead. Run. I’ll give you a head start,” Jeff said as he reached into his pocket and pulled out some bullets. He flipped the part of the revolver open that held them. I didn’t know what it was called. I didn’t know anything about guns whatsoever. I just knew he was out of ammo, and that meant I had time.

  “No! I’m done running!”

  I charged at him, thinking about nothing more than ending this so I could get help. I needed to save Calder. Reaching for the gun, I grabbed it and yanked it down with all my might, but Jeff was too strong. Although bullets flew everywhere, he was able to yank the gun away from me and drove the grip down directly onto my shoulder, then pushed me to the ground.

  I winced as pain overwhelmed me, then keeled over as Jeff delivered a swift kick to my gut. While he stepped away to pick up the bullets and finish loading the gun, I rose to my feet, only for him to fire a single shot that struck me in the thigh.

  I didn’t know whether it was the shock of his assault or the adrenaline rushing through my body, but I didn’t feel much more than intense pressure. I looked down and saw blood flowing down my pant leg. I closed my eyes, knowing this was the end, but that moment never came. It took every ounce of willpower I had to partially open one eye to find that time had practically stopped. Bullets that were rolling around the ground stood in place. Wisps of smoke from Jeff’s gun lingered in the air, and Jeff’s mouth was wide open as he was stuck shouting out his rage.

  Then I felt her presence behind me. The woman in red. Princess Popoalaea. And I heard drum beat after drum beat, in perfect rhythm with my own pounding heart.

  “We can linger for only a minute,” she whispered in my ear. “It’s up to you to finish this.”

  “But I’m not strong enough,” I said, looking at the raging maniac that was my ex-boyfriend, suspended in time.

  “Yes, you are. I wouldn’t be here if you weren’t. I’m only able to h
elp people who already have the power to save themselves. I’m here to give you the courage I lacked so long ago. You must fight!”

  The flow of time resumed in a way that left me dizzy, and an explosion of red and blue lights appeared behind me, mixing together in a cascade interrupted only by my long, drawn, shadow. In an instant, I felt all my pain disappear. A power grew in me, becoming stronger and stronger as drums beat faster, with more fervor and ferocity, in tune with a Night Marcher’s war chant.

  I couldn’t help but smirk when I realized Jeff could see it all. And he freaked out.

  “What the fuck!?”

  As I stepped forward, with Princess Popoalaea and the Night Marchers at my back, he raised his gun. I should have lost my nerve, but I didn’t. I felt confidence surge through me as I marched among the ranks of the greatest warriors Hawaii had ever known. I was a child of Maui. And I would be damned if an asshole like Jeff Thatcher took that away from me.

  He fired round after round at the nightmarish apparitions. I continued moving forward as I heard them zip by me. Even after he had drained the gun of every bullet, he continued to pull the trigger as if more would magically appear, then he hurled the gun toward them. This only intensified the chant, the words and meaning of it lost to me. I immediately regretted so much that I had lost. Thanks to my father, I was torn away from my homeland, my people, my culture. Thanks to Jeff, I lost all my self-worth. I had completely forgotten what it was to be a part of a proud people with traditions so ancient they were more legend than fact. But with my ancestors at my back, I knew I had power and courage and fortitude enough to fight back. Hundreds of generations of it sprung from the ground, through me, and around me. Jeff could never take that away.

  The marchers picked up the pace to match my sprinting, straight at Jeff. The ground seemed to shake with every footfall. As I got close, I adopted the pose of the warriors at my side. I lowered my shoulder and flung myself into him with all the force I could muster, sending him flying.