Shadows Deepen

by Mirren Hogan

  Wrapping the towel around himself, he dried and pulled on clean clothes. He felt much more himself.

  Makani came in shortly after. “E-ticket’s in your email. We leave at around five, okay?” She didn’t quite meet his gaze, as she started stripping and unknotting her hair. “My brother’s coming in a couple hours, though. He’s gotta figure out what to do, with everyone wanting to leave. Most of the other workers ran off.”

  Flynn snorted. “I can’t say I blame them. I hope they come back pretty quickly, or your brother will be screwed.” He sighed deeply. If they hadn’t come here in the first place, this never would have happened. But they had and there was nothing either of them could say which would change that.

  “I feel bad for leaving now.” He leaned against the wall. “But for the sake of everyone’s lives, which are ultimately more important than coffee, we have to.” Well something in life had to be more important than coffee.

  “Sam already put the ad up. This is the Big Island—the jobless rate will ensure he can find a new crew fast.” She turned on the shower and started rinsing off the layers of blood, grime, and guts. She kept her mouth closed, as filthy water sheeted down from her hair before she started to shampoo the dark mass.

  He nodded and watched her, without really paying much attention. “Are we staying around until your brother gets here?”

  “Why?” She had to spit soap from her mouth, “Still trying to avoid meeting my family?”

  He didn’t reply. He had nothing against any of them. They had to be better than his. Besides, anyone who loved her must be worth meeting. As long as they didn’t ask if she was pregnant.

  She rinsed the soap out and swiped water out of her eyes. “I think we should give him the low-down, that something was seen on the farm, so we were watching the perimeter. Got into an accident, had to walk back to the main house. That’s when we found Manny and his wife.”

  He nodded. “We should explain where we took off to as well. Would he believe we were chasing a murderer?” At least it was the truth.

  “We can tell him we went off, to get away from the craziness.” She shut the water off and started wringing out her hair. “Sam would just think it’s me being me. I’m the flighty little sister, remember?” Makani toweled off and looked toward the mirror at the fresh bruises and cuts coming up on her face. Flynn wished he could soothe the pain they must bring, but he had plenty of his own.

  “We can tell him I overturned the bike on the way back,” she added. “He won’t notice that it’s in better shape than we are.”

  He nodded. “That works. The flighty sister and the flaky haole. Why wouldn’t we take off after finding people dead? As long as they don’t think we did it.”

  She agreed with that. Being falsely arrested wouldn’t be funny. Nothing about this was funny. Manny had been a good man and both welcoming and generous toward them.

  “That’s the idea. I mean, Asa probably told everyone about what happened with your family.” She pulled clean clothes on, and started brushing her hair out. “Hey, Flynn—were you serious, about sticking around? At least, about not wanting to go back to Sydney?”

  A day ago, the answer would have been an immediate “yes.” Now, he hesitated. Compared to this idyllic island, Sydney would be peaceful and predictable. And he was even starting to miss his family. As the youngest, he’d always had people looking out for him. It had chafed after a while. But now—

  “I want to be wherever you are,” he replied evasively.

  That made Makani stop in her tracks. She looked him over, took a deep breath, and nodded. “Okay.” Grabbing their things, she started out the door. “I’ll cook. Maybe we can scrounge something decent together before my brother gets here.” She didn’t look back, as she made her way back to their little hut.

  He grabbed his dirty clothes and followed. Although his eyes found her rear, his mind was on her question. And her offer to cook. “When do you ever cook?” he asked teasingly.

  “When I feel like it. Just enjoy it while you can.” Makani opened the door to their little place and threw her things on the floor beside their bed. She carefully tipped out the pot they’d left the day before, and threw the chicken in the trash. Getting a clean pan from under the counter, she busied herself with picking through what Flynn had bought the day prior, but her industry held none of the usual verve that was distinctly Makani’s way.

  He tossed his dirty clothes into a bag and tied a knot in the handles. Ordinarily he’d wash them, but they had no time to dry if they were flying out in a few hours.

  “What time is the flight?” he called out, flopping down onto the couch and wincing as all of his injuries protested.

  “Ummm . . . about five-ish. Plenty of time to get grilled by my brother, and pack up. I’ll just . . . I dunno. See if my brother can help us get the truck, if no one got it yet.” She moved her knife slowly, chopping veggies and throwing them into a pan with sesame oil and oyster sauce. Instead of rice, she had bread out.

  “That smells good.” He closed his eyes. “You know, I forgot about the truck. That seems like days ago. That was not my finest driving. Lucky the truck is tough. It must run in your family.” He chuckled. “I’ve never met anyone who could take on all those monsters and still be standing. Look at me.” He opened his eyes and spread his arms, gesturing at the couch beneath him. “I’m sitting!”

  “If I were you, I’d close my eyes for a few seconds longer.” She added more veggies into her pan and started to stir fry the lot, adding soy sauce and pepper. “You’re gonna need sleep to recover.”

  “I need to eat first. I might miss the flight because I could sleep for a week. Can we put the world on pause for a while? You and I can hide out here, just the two of us, until we’re ready.”

  “That’s why we came here, remember? Look how that plan turned out.” She stirred the pan, and threw bread into the toaster. “It was good while it lasted, though. Wasn’t it?”

  He opened his eyes again and smiled. “The best time in my life.”

  “Mine too,” she replied. She could happily have gone on like that forever. She didn’t remember ever having been so content. She’d known it had to end eventually, but she’d hoped it wouldn’t be so soon.

  “Maybe we finished the monsters off, though,” he said.

  “Maybe. We’re not going to stick around to find out.” Makani turned the burners off and started sliding her stir fry onto plates. She left the chopsticks from the cooking on hers and put a fork on Flynn’s. Putting the toast on top of both, she grabbed beers from the fridge and set everything on the ancient coffee table.

  “Maybe we can come back some day.” He sat up and swung his legs around facing the table. “I don’t think I’ve ever had stir fry with toast.” That didn’t stop him from eating it. It was an interesting combination of flavors, but quite edible. They’d almost finished when a knock on the door made them both jump.

  “Easy. It’s just Sam.” Makani half-smiled and got up, wiping crumbs from her lap. Opening the door, a rather large, imposing figure obscured the light. “Hey, Bro.”

  “Jesus H., what the hell happened to you?” Sam Lau was the second oldest of Makani’s siblings. Powerfully built, tall, and threatening, he was the most intimidating of the boys. He was six-foot- four, with broad shoulders and a shaved head, the kind of person one would expect to see in a wrestling match or a dark alley. Luckily, Sam was also the most laid back, but that wasn’t saying much. All of her brothers were type-A personalities in some way. That’s why he’d bought the coffee farm from the original owner when he retired, for an incredibly good price.

  “Nice to see you, too. Come in, this is gonna take a while. Flynn, this is my brother Sam. Sam, this is Flynn. He’s been staying with me.” She gestured from one man to the next, and grabbed another beer from the fridge, popping it and handing it to her sibling.

  Flynn pushed himself to his feet. Even standing, he was a good four inches shorter and half as wide. “Hi.” He he
ld out his hand.

  “Hey, howzzit? Nice to meet you.” Sam gave Flynn’s hand a firm shake, the kind that didn’t quite crush bone, but asserted dominance. “I figured you’d be a punk covered in tattoos, and shit.” He looked pointedly at Makani, who flipped the bird at her older sibling.

  “Shut up, Sam. Don’t be a dick.” She sat on the coffee table, kindly leaving the couch open for the men to sit down. “So, you got the police reports, and stuff? Read everything?”

  Flynn sat on the far side of the couch from Sam, rubbing his right hand inconspicuously with his left. “Who do they think did it?” he asked.

  “I dunno . . . there was a prison break at Hilo Community Correctional. And there was a murder, up the coast toward Kohala. Nasty shit, the girl was ripped apart, like Jack the Ripper’s victims.” Sam leaned back and sipped the beer, nodding approvingly at the green bottle.

  “Anyway, cops are on it. They’re running prints, , everyone is accounted for, even you two.” He pointed a finger at each of them, “By the way, you can thank the other workers for placing you guys away from the scene. Because the cops were about to start looking for you. Your prints were on the door.”

  “Yeah, well—I was the one who found them. And that was some gross shit. Can you blame me for running off?” Makani snorted and tipped her beer back. “Besides, we came here to get away from this kind of stuff.” Her eyes flicked over to Flynn, before moving back toward her brother.

  Flynn nodded. “You’d expect murders and,” he used Sam’s words, “nasty shit, in the city, not out here. And not people you know.” He shuddered and sipped his own beer. “Are you going to be able to replace him? Them?”

  “I’m gonna have to. But I’ll probably stay here for a little while, get back to running the show. It’s been a few years since I’ve done more than sign the checks and inspect the grounds.” Sam smiled wryly. “Can’t believe Makani was only a teenager when I bought this place. Did she tell you? She’s the menopause baby.”

  “Shut up, Kamuela!” The only time Makani used his Hawaiian name, was when she was pissed off. She kicked her sibling’s foot.

  “You shut up! Ruth-Ann!” Sam pushed her, nearly toppling Makani over the table. She immediately jumped on him and started whacking the side of his head. What she lacked in size, she more than made up for in tenacity.

  Flynn scooted off the couch and out of the way. “I should sell tickets,” he remarked, grinning. “Maybe throw in a bit of mud and another woman—”

  The brother and sister stopped, looked at Flynn, and both glared. Sam easily picked Makani up and threw her on the couch. “Yeah, you missed me. You gonna come home? Mom is wondering if you are. She’s been cleaning Grandma’s house, since you’ve been gone.”

  “What?! Awwww, she never told me that!” Makani huffed and sat back. “I’m going back today. Don’t worry. Any chance you could, I dunno, pick the truck up later?” She looked hopefully at Sam.

  “Why don’t I just drive you guys?” He caught Makani’s look. “Ah, gotcha. Yeah, I can go with someone, later.”

  “And, ummm—” she crossed her arms and bit her lower lip “—you might have to help us flip it back over. We got into an accident last night.”

  “What? Dude, for reals?” He looked at Makani, then over to Flynn. “You let her drive, didn’t you? Manny musta told you not to let her drive!”

  Flynn shrugged. A smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. “What can I say, she overpowered me.” He gave Makani a look of mock innocence.

  “Yeah, Flynn’s a push-over.” She turned to her brother, “So, y’gonna help us, or not? My ribs are still sore, and he can’t do it all on his own. Please, Sam?” She punched him in the arm, and got a shove back for her troubles.

  “Yeah, I guess.” Sam drained off the rest of his bottle, before reaching for Makani’s. “Otherwise, I’m gonna have to flip it myself, aren’t I?”

  ***

  “We going now, before I start working on getting things in order?” Sam stood, and looked out the window toward the large office building where Manny had worked and lived. “Yeah, it’s gonna take a while to get everything running, again. Sure you don’t wanna stay?”

  “We’d love to, but we have things we have to get back to. Maybe we’ll come back some day,” Flynn said. He’d like that, but it might be a long way off yet.

  “If you want me back, I demand a pay raise,” Makani declared. They started on foot back to the field. It wasn’t really that far, even with stiff muscles and sore body parts. Sam kept quiet most of the way, only speaking when he had to note what he wanted to do to the fields he passed. Every so often, Makani glanced at Flynn, but said nothing. She kept looking around, as if trying to memorize the farm before they left. At least they were both able to put one foot in front of the other. They’d come too close to losing this war today. She would have liked to just relax and enjoy the walk, but she couldn’t help looking for manananggal behind every tree and kappa behind the rocks. They couldn’t afford to be complacent, even with all of the legs they’d burnt and eggs they’d smashed.

  They reached the truck and found it still lying on its side. It didn’t look any worse for wear. Flynn walked around to the roof and crouched down, ready to push when Sam got into place.

  “A’ight. One.” Sam leaned his shoulder against the top.

  “Two.” Makani pulled Flynn back, and gave him the international symbol to “shut the hell up, and roll with it.”

  “Three!”

  Sam literally pushed the truck over by himself. Makani had the good sense to grunt and lean against the exposed side, panting gently. “Wow! That sucked! Let’s not turn the truck over ever aga—oh, shit!”

  Under the truck, a manananggal’s body had been crushed.

  Flynn glanced at Makani, eyes wide. “Um—what the hell’s that and how did it get there?” Caught so far off guard, the lie was terrible.

  “Ummm—yeah, I’m just gonna call the . . . ” Sam reached for his phone.

  “No! Don’t!” Makani grabbed the phone and locked it. “Sam . . . we need to talk. Come here.” She grabbed his burly arm and led him away to the far side. As she told him everything, Sam’s eyes grew wide and he blanched under his tan.

  When he finally spoke, it was only to say, “You’ve gotta go home. See your doctors. This is fuckin’ ridiculous.” He started to walk back to the truck.

  “It’s not a person, Sam! C’mon! Look at it! It’s got fuckin’ wings!”

  “That might be—I dunno—a fuckin’ costume! It’s not an animal! You’re delusional! End of story! That’s why we don’t like it when you go off alone! This is why Mom always wants you to check in with someone! This is wh—!”

  His words were cut off with a slap. Makani immediately pulled back, her hands shaking. She seemed to crumble on herself, tears starting to well up in her eyes. “You don’t know! You weren’t there to see everything! Tell him, Flynn! This was real!”

  Flynn stepped between them and put his arm around her. “It’s true. We’ve seen a couple dozen of these things in the last month. And a bunch of other things like it. We didn’t get these injuries in a bike crash, we got them from fighting those things. We’re leaving because we’re hoping they’ll leave as well. And for the record, I was driving the truck. I crashed it because we were trying to shake off a Mo’o.” Now Sam probably thought they were both insane.

  Sam’s dark eyes narrowed at the two people in front of him. “Get some rest, pack your stuff, and go home, Ruth-Ann. Your boyfriend probably needs to talk to his doctor, too.” Sam looked with disdain at Flynn, sizing him up for a fight. “Where you from? Vanuatu? South Africa? New Zealand? Go home, haole!”

  Just when they could really have used a manananggal to jump out at them, it didn’t happen. That figured. Maybe Flynn was going crazy, but he wasn’t stupid enough to take Sam on. Even if he wasn’t injured.

  Makani grabbed his hand and gave it a tug. “Come on, we need to catch our flight anyway.”

&n
bsp; She looked back once at Sam, and gritted her teeth against saying anything else. Turning back, she sighed and held tight to Flynn’s hand. “Why can’t they believe me?”

  “Because the truth is too scary.” He laced his fingers though hers and squeezed. “Emma didn’t believe it either and she saw them for two nights while they held her and Jason and the kids! I’m sorry he treated you like that though. You deserve better.”

  She was glad he was around, or she’d feel very isolated.

  “I love you, Ruth-Ann.” He smiled.

  She stopped in her tracks and looked up at Flynn. It took a moment, but she forced a smile and said, “I love you, too. But don’t call me Ruth-Ann.” She tip-toed and kissed him gently, before brushing her lips against his.

  They made it back to their hut, and Makani closed and locked the door behind them. Wrapping her arms around Flynn, she drew him down for a real kiss, one that was full of wanting and need. “One more time before we have to go. Please?”

  “Since when do you have to ask?” He teased, “And when am I ever going to say no?” He put his arms around her and kissed her deeply.

  CHAPTER 22

  “You got everything?” Makani’s voice was quiet as she finished zipping up her duffel bag. Looking around one more time, she sighed and shoved the bag toward the door with her backpack.

  “Apart from a bit of blood and some skin that I’ve left behind, I do,” Flynn said with a nod. His expression was somber, his exhaustion obvious in the lines on his face. He swung his bag onto his back and grabbed hers. “Truck or bike?”

  “Truck, I guess. Sam’s gonna pick it up, whether he feels like it, or not.” She grabbed her backpack, and started out the door. Gripping the handles of the bike, she rolled it back to the shed and covered it with the tarp, running a loving hand over its shiny red body. “I’ll be back again. One day.” Makani shook her head, as if she didn’t quite believe her own words. Putting the helmets back on the shelf, she turned around and closed the door behind her.

  Walking past the office, she saw her brother at the desk Manny had occupied, working on the computer. She decided not to bother him. He’d be in no mood to talk after the argument they’d had. And he would certainly not be in the mood to see Flynn. Sam was such a racist, even after having been born and raised in an ethnic melting pot.