The Girl at the Center of the World

by Austin Aslan

  Connected. I sense the Orchid. Above the Himalayas.

  “Oh, Mo`opuna,” Grandpa says. He holds me. “My darling,” he says, “I’m worried for you. You’ve got to find pono. Harmony. This is the path forward. You’ve been asked to do so much, but this burden is all of ours. It’s time to let it go, Mo`opuna! Find your path.”

  “I wish I knew how.” I look up at him through blurry eyes.

  “We should all start meditation practices every day. Nurturing the spirit is as important as cultivating the land.”

  I slap a mosquito on my arm. “I’m glad we have someone like Father Akoni around here.” I’m thinking of the priest who helped Dad and me on Moloka`i, who was building such a strong community. He’s two islands up the chain, though; he might as well be in Madagascar.

  Grandpa gently squeezes me. “We’re all in this together, okay? You’re not alone. Your parents and I shoulder these troubles every bit as much as you do. Your Grandma and I are always with you. Her `aumākua is the ao, you know—the cloud. She’s always overhead, white and pure, bringing the cleansing rain.”

  We sit in silence, breathing in the wonderful garland of our jungle-bound yard, and we watch the high clouds change shapes. When I was little, Mom once explained the `aumākua to me as similar to a patronus from the Harry Potter books—a charm of protection that takes the form of an object of nature, usually an animal. I smile at the memory. I know that an `aumākua is also an ancestor, a spirit guide. Sacred.

  “What’s your patronus?” I ask Tūtū.

  “Eh?”

  I laugh. “Your `aumākua? I know: you’ll be an `iliō. A great hunting dog.”

  “Naw. I’d rather be something unique. A house cat, maybe. Friendly, but on my own. Around, but not in the way. Neat, clean, like a good navy officer. Night vision. Claws only when I need them.”

  I laugh again. “Sounds about right.”

  I hear the pop of a firearm, and I flinch. But it’s only Kai. Every time I hear a gunshot, I think of the horrors of O`ahu and Maui. The sheriff of Hana…He was going to kill Dad because Dad shot one of his men. Guns only attract more guns. My palms grow clammy. “You ever going to tell us about you and the sheriff? Why did he spare Dad?”

  “Ah,” Grandpa says. “What happened between me and that moke don’t matter.”

  I glare at him. “What was that about pono?”

  “What’s done is done,” he says.

  CHAPTER 4

  It’s past midnight. The calm waters of Hilo Bay reflect a moonless star field, tinged faintly green by the Emerald Orchid.

  As Tami and I sit on Hilo Bay’s breakwater, a two-mile-long string of boulders and cement that reaches far across the bay, the baby Orchid sets behind the slopes of Mauna Loa. I sit up and watch it sink, its green and purple petals bright against the stars as it slips below the horizon. Its mother rises behind me to the east.

  “Nighty-night, little one,” Tami says beside me.

  Will the baby Orchid ever talk to me as the mother does?

  A wave crashes against the boulders, and my back is showered with salty spray. Tami yelps. I shiver.

  Tsunami rubbish is as thick as stew in the water, bobbing in circles, rarely escaping around the long wall to the open ocean. Yellow city lights once gleamed along this shimmering bay. But Hilo’s hills are as dark as the slopes of Mauna Loa and Mauna Kea, the two volcanoes rising above the city.

  Tami cinches her scrunchie around her curly blond ponytail and fits her arms through her wet suit. We lie back, breathing in the flowery breeze. The roar of a motorcycle accelerates over a distant street, leaving a scar in the silence.

  “You sure we’re not too far?” asks Tami. “We’ve been here an hour.”

  We’re about a mile out. I shrug. “He told me he’d find us. Don’t worry.”

  “I’m not worried. Do I look worried?”

  “You like him, don’t you?”

  Tami stifles a protest.

  “I knew it!” I say.

  “I can’t believe this.”

  “Calm down. I think he likes you, too. He’s good kine.”

  Tami scoffs. “Oh, my God. Yeah, whatevah. He doesn’t even know I exist. He likes you.”

  “No, he doesn’t! Knock it off.”

  Another wave pounds the breakwater, and we’re showered. It dies in the labyrinth below, water sloshing through the spaces between the boulders. Sucking and gurgling. This is crazy. A rogue wave could reach us. We could be swept off balance, fall through these holes, and be dashed to pieces in the world’s deadliest washing machine.

  My wet suit hangs inside out from my waist. I stretch my arms through my dangling sleeves and ask Tami to zip it up from the back. It’s loose these days. She lets me know she’s upset with every jerk of my zipper string.

  “You know,” I say, “there’s word coming out of O`ahu that stranded tourists are being traded as slaves. Put it in perspective.”

  “Don’t start with that, Mom.” Her tone is snarky, not angry. “You wanna head down Guilt Trip Lane, Mrs. Emerald Orchid?”

  “Sure. Another big pop in Russia two days ago. Everyone on the Black Sea is going to live through the month thanks to me. Wanna start there?”

  “No. I want to start with why my phone’s been dead for months.”

  “It works just fine. No one calls you.”

  Tami laughs. “Ain’t that the truth.”

  I tug on my inner kite string to the Orchid, to test the tension. Taut. I stay for the strength of the sweetness, I remind her. It is good to stay.

  She dutifully repeats me: We long for the deep beyond the fires. But we stay. It is good to stay and protect.

  “Lei?” Tami taps my head. “Wake up.”

  “I’ve never once thought about Keali`i,” I tell her.

  “Really?”

  “Honestly. He’s all yours.”

  “All right, then. I’ll have him installed at my place start of business Monday morning.”

  “A boyfriend is the last thing on my mind right now.”

  Tami smiles. “What about Soldier Boy?”

  I roll my eyes. Our code name for the soldier Aukina, the dreamy good looker who helped me and Dad escape from the military camp on O`ahu. But he’s long gone. The military ditched the Hawaiian Islands. “Why do you have to bring him up?”

  We’re silent, and then Tami says, “I hear Aleka’s hāpai.”

  I gasp. “Oh, my God. Poor girl.”

  “Can you imagine having a baby? Now?”

  A physical tremor runs through me. “My parents would flip out if I ever got knocked up. I’m not ever getting hapai. I’m not bringing a kid into this world.”

  Tami seizes my wrist. “Someone’s coming.”

  We scramble down the bay side of the breakwater and crouch into makeshift foxholes. Seawater sloshes against my surfing booties. Under the cover of darkness, I poke up my head and scan the top of the wall.

  I see a lone figure hopping from one boulder to the next, objects tucked under his arms. No flashlight, but he’s scampering with the confidence of a mongoose. The shadowy form is in a wet suit. His hair fans in the gentle breeze. I relax. Keali`i. I offer up my best frog whistle. “Coqui?”

  The figure stops. “Lei?”

  I spring up. “It’s me.”

  “Ho! Why you so far out, eh?”

  I scramble up to the top of the breakwater. “ ’Cause you said to get out this far.”

  “Water’s too deep here. We have to go back a bit.”

  “I wasn’t sure what we’re doing.”

  “It’s a surprise. C’mon. Where’s Tami?”

  She emerges from beneath the nearest concrete jack. “Hey, Kea.”

  “Oh!” he says. “Hey, Tami. Howzit?”

  He has a bulgy mesh bag under one arm and a stack of scuba fins under the other. “Here.” He hands me and Tami a pair of fins each. He guards the bag closely.

  “What are we doing?”

  “You’ll see in a minute.
”

  We follow him back along the breakwater toward shore. It’s very dark, and the green light cast by the Orchid makes the shadows trickier to navigate.

  “This better be good,” I say.

  Keali`i smiles, his teeth white in the starlight. He pulls a waterproof dive light and three sets of snorkels and masks out of the mesh bag.

  Excitement flutters up through me. “Does the light work?” I ask.

  Keali`i kneels with the dive light. He presses it against the boulder and triggers it on and off. The flash of light against the rock blinds me. Tami and I croon. “It works!”

  Keali`i shrugs. “Good as any light I’ve seen. Some flickering, but yeah.”

  “Are we going for lobsters?” Tami asks, coaxing the light out of Keali`i’s hand.

  “Slippahs. We’re slippah diving. Plenny for all. No one’s been out here for months. Gonna be a feast. Careful, don’t shine that up. We’ll have forty booga boogas from Keaukaha out here before we even have our fins on.”

  “With our luck, half them boogas will be Tribe,” I say.

  “Don’t say that!” growls Keali`i.

  Tami hands the light back. “Won’t people be able to see us in the water?”

  Keali`i shrugs. “That’s why we’re so far out. They’d have to be looking right at us to see the glow. The waves hide us, too. We’ll slip right under their noses.”

  I frown. Dad’s shaming me in my mind’s eye, but he’s not shaking a finger at me, he’s waving his arms around. “Danger, Will Robinson!” I push the image away. We’ll be safe. I’d give almost anything to pig out on lobster. “I’ve never been lobster diving.”

  “Easy. You got honu lungs, yeah?” He hands Tami a snorkel set. He hands me a weight belt and puts one on himself. I strap ten pounds of lead onto my hips.

  Weights on an epileptic in the dark ocean strikes me as lōlō, but I follow along.

  “Here, I only got four gloves, but at least we can each have one.”

  “It’s okay. I don’t need one,” I say, offering mine to Tami.

  They both laugh. “What’ll you grab the lobsters with?” Tami asks.

  “What? You…grab them?”

  “These are slippah lobsters,” Keali`i explains. “No claws, but they’re spiny as hell. You have to snatch ’em hard or they’ll slip away with those powerful tails.”

  “Well, let’s go!” I say.

  “After you.” Keali`i extends his arm. The end of his coiled tattoo peeks out beyond the sleeve of his wet suit, just touching his palm.

  Tami and I do awkward dances as we slip fins over our booties. We spit into our snorkel masks, wipe the spit around the lenses, rinse. Hawaiian defogger. I put on my glove and the mask and fall forward into the water.

  I’m suddenly graceful.

  My breathing is exaggerated through my snorkel but relaxed. Salt water seeps into my wet suit, embracing me with a comfortable chill that will warm against my skin.

  I stare into the black. The swell of a wave lifts me. I feel the downward pull of the weights around my waist, but gentle kicking of my fins and the buoyant wet suit keep me light. I could almost space out, drift, floating. Almost.

  “All good?” Keali`i asks from the edge of the rocks.

  I give a thumbs-up. Then I realize it’s too dark for him to see me, so I spit the snorkel out. “Doin’ good! Just…keep a close eye, in case I space out.”

  “Got you covered, Lei,” Tami says. “Let’s have that light.”

  Keali`i dives in, switches on the light, and the world below is illuminated. The light penetrates to the floor twenty feet down. A shaft sweeps from side to side as Keali`i swims about. The bottom is rocky, lava worn into pocked slabs blotched with algae and coral. Fish swim lazily near the bottom: schools of angelfish, wrasses, and larger parrot fish chomping on the rocks. A green sea turtle jerks back under the wall.

  We surface. “Slippahs!” Keali`i calls. “I’ve never seen so many. You look for their eye shine against the light. Otherwise they look just like the rocks.”

  I take the light and paint the seafloor with my brush. A rock sparkles with a pair of small sequins. I freeze the light and squint.

  I take a deep breath, tuck, and dive. My legs kick against air and then meet water. I propel myself downward. Ten feet, then fifteen, the pressure building on my lungs and in my ears, becoming painful. I keep my eyes on the pair of glowing beads. As I draw closer I reach out and touch the slippah’s hard shell. It vanishes. I glance around, but it’s gone. At the surface I spit the mouthpiece out. “It got away.”

  Keali`i smiles. “Here.” He hands me and Tami mesh diving bags.

  Tami says, “The light stuns them. But you have to strike fast and grip them hard around their middle so they don’t dart away.”

  “Go for it.” I hand her the light. “I’ll watch you.”

  As we kick down I hear a noise in the water, a deep sigh that curves in on itself, finally releasing in a high-pitched laugh. A shorter response.

  Humpback whales.

  The song is distant, perhaps beyond the edge of the bay. I’m glad to know they’re there. Life goes on, even for the creatures of the deep. I hope their world is the same as it always was. Maybe life’s even better for them. They’re usually not around this time of year. Maybe the Star Flowers make the plankton easier to find.

  Have the whales seen the coasts of the mainland? What would they report?

  Tami thrusts her hand toward a rock, pulls it back, and a slipper lobster materializes in her fist, broad, massive tail clenching and releasing in a panicked effort to escape. Ten insectlike legs protrude from beneath its mottled shell, wiggling and searching. Tami guides the strange creature into her mesh bag, slides her arm out of the bag, then cinches it, and we rise. She clicks off the light as we ascend.

  “Got one!” Tami tells Keali`i.

  “Ah, nice!” he says. “We’re going to feast!”

  “Here.” Tami hands me the light. “Don’t hesitate. Snatch ’em up!”

  As I descend, pressure burning against my chest, I study the breakwater wall. The jumble of boulders and concrete jacks extends all the way to the bottom. I feel the surge of the ocean pulling me toward the holes.

  I see a pair of eyes glinting beneath one boulder and stop my descent, go closer to the hole. A slippah is in there, big as a shoe box. It’s twice as big as the one Tami caught.

  I grin.

  The surge presses me against the rim of the hole, and I stiffen my arm to keep from banging against the rock. I focus the light on the giant slippah. The hole goes way back. Careful. Don’t get sucked in.

  One shot. I’m running out of air. The light flickers. I maneuver my head and arms into the hole, shining the light directly into the slippah’s eyes.

  I strike. The spines cut into my fingers. It flaps its tail wildly. I pull it toward me, backpedaling with my fins. The slippah’s in one hand and the light’s in the other. I tuck the light between my legs and whip the bag free of my weight belt. A surge of water dashes me against a boulder. I spit out the snorkel and loosen the drawstring with my teeth. The slippah’s tail spasms as I trap my prey. The surge twists me into another rock, and I bang my shoulder. But I manage to get control and surface.

  “You got one?” Tami asks. “Right on! Let’s see.”

  I hold my bag near the surface as Tami shines the light down on it from within the water. The ocean glows and foams like a Jacuzzi. “Whoa!” Keali`i exclaims. “I never knew they got that big! That’s like four slippahs!”

  For the next hour we trade gear back and forth, filling the bags with lobsters. I had no idea the wall was so full of holes and tunnels that go all the way through to the bay side. The fish and the octopi and the urchins pass through easily. The passageways closer to the surface are also teeming with delicious `opihi—a limpet mollusk that’s been totally stripped from the shore by hungry humans.

  We collect two dozen slippahs, and the bags are full. The light’s off, and we can bar
ely see each other against the black rolling waves. We’re about twenty feet off the breakwater, and we’ve drifted closer to shore.

  “I shoulda brought more bags,” Keali`i says.

  A round of gunfire pierces the night. All three of us yelp. I felt that pistol crack. It came from the breakwater. I whip around. Through the beads of water on my dive mask, I see several figures against the dim green of the night. A flashlight blinds me. I lift a gloved hand to shield my eyes.

  Is this what the slippahs feel as we descend upon them?

  “That was your warning. Hand over the light, whatever you have.”

  “Shit!” Keali`i barks. “Go screw yourselves.”

  Whoa. What is he doing?

  Another shot in the air. I see the figures clearly in the flash of light. They have cloth bands around their left upper arms. Hanamen. There are two other Tribes in the region: the Manō and the Hoku. Only Hanamen wear red bands. Hoku all have star-shaped neck tattoos. Manō lie low, without any identifying marks.

  “Surrender the light, whatever you have. Wet suits, too.”

  “I’ll beat your head in with it,” I hear Keali`i mutter. He shouts, “Sorry, dropped the light. It’s gone.” Tami and I exchange an incredulous glance.

  A shot hits the water. Keali`i is perfectly still.

  “That’s my last warning.”

  “Goddammit.” Keali`i stays where he is. I look toward the flashlight, shielding my eyes. I can’t make any of them out. I study the breakwater, recognize a particular boulder we were beside moments ago. Adrenaline stabs my chest. An idea.

  “Coming!” I shout.

  Tami looks relieved. Keali`i stares at me with daggers for eyes. I can tell he wants to swim out into the open ocean. “Lei, no.”

  “Guys, shut up,” I whisper. I take Keali`i’s hand. “Link together. Take the biggest breath of your life. Straight down to the bottom. Then follow me. Don’t let go.”

  We each draw an enormous breath and dive. I clench Keali`i’s hand, regret what I’ve done. This isn’t going to work! What the hell am I doing?! The water is pitch-black, and I’ve already lost all sense of direction. But there’s no going back.