The Islands at the End of the World (7 page)

“Dad! Dad.”

He squeezes my shoulder. “They’re fine.”

“Yeah, but I want to
know
they’re fine.”

“We’re mauka—high up—away from town. We’ve got a nice garden. We have chickens. Grandpa’s with them.”

“But Tami doesn’t live near us! She doesn’t have a garden! If power’s out on the Big Island, then won’t the tsunami warning system be busted? What about her? What about …?”

“Lei, it’s no good to … speculate. This won’t get us anywhere.”

I’m silent, but I want to scream. Not knowing … not being able to find out. A simple text is all it would take.
Click, click
, send.

Dad plays with the window slats and moodily wipes sweat off his face. After a few minutes, I grumble, “Knock that off.”

“What, is there something in here you’re trying to focus on?” he snaps.

“Yeah: calm,” I spit back.

Dad freezes. “You know what, Lei, I’m the
textbook definition
of calm.”

I burst out laughing. He looks startled, then joins in.

Dad sits down, resting his forehead in his hands. The silence is broken by honking horns and helicopters. Finally, he stands. “I’ll be right back, honey.”

“I’m sorry, Dad. I …”

He strokes my hair. “We need to get home. We should start looking for other ways off this island now, before things—”

“How bad is it out there?”

“I just want to be ahead of the game, that’s all.” And he’s gone.

I stare at a bamboo-framed poster of the Hawaiian Islands on the wall. I try to wrap my head around what Dad said.
Other ways off this island?

Does he mean finding another airport besides Honolulu International?

The main Hawaiian islands stretch away from each other in the shape of a lazy apostrophe. Hawai`i—the Big Island—is the farthest south and east of the chain. It’s bigger than all the other islands put together. I’ve always thought it looks like a giant arrowhead with the “point” facing east. The islands of Maui, Kaho`olawe, Lāna`i, and Moloka`i are a little to the northwest. It’s easy to see how they were a single island in the ancient past. As their volcanoes died and erosion took over, the sea eventually separated them.

O`ahu is next, a ribbon of mountains running through its middle, Honolulu on the western side. It’s about two hundred miles from home, as the crow flies. The next islands are Kaua`i and its little neighbor, Ni`ihau. They’re the tapered end of the apostrophe, way to the west. It’s never really struck me how isolated each island is, or that the State of Hawai`i is so broken up and separated, because airplanes connect the dots.

I bite my lip, wondering.

Other ways
off O`ahu?

Dad returns with Dr. Makani. “How are you feeling, Leilani?” the doctor asks.

I try to smile. “Okay.”

He checks my blood pressure and pulse. He pauses for a moment and then nods to Dad. “I think you guys should both go back to your hotel.”

“What?” I sit upright.

“Go ahead and start your meds again, Leilani. We’re going to call this off. The EKG is broken. I’m trying to make sense of your chart from yesterday. I compared it to your records from Hilo—the pattern is totally different—gibberish. They can’t get the generators to work, and there’s just no point in the two of you roasting in this little room.”

“But what if I—”

Dad interrupts my question. “We talked that over, Lei. If
something happens, I can help you through it just as well as any of the nurses here.”

“Can you tell me: Was I on the real medication or the placebo?”

“It’s a double-blind trial. I don’t know the answer to that, Leilani. But I’m guessing the trial medicine was working. You had episodes so easily the first night off your meds, but then nothing once the trial started the next morning.”

Dad slips a packaged bite stick into his pocket. Tears well up in my eyes. I wipe them away. I pull out my normal pills and take one. Even though I’ve missed six doses, and I’m not out of the woods, it feels like a reprieve.

Dad fills out a bunch of release forms while I put on my clothes. When we walk out, it feels like I’ve gotten time off for good behavior.

The roads seem fine as we drive back into Waikīkī. People got the hint that they’re better off staying at home, I suppose. We search for lunch, but everything is closed. I eat an apple and a granola bar from one of Dad’s bags. I cheer up as we turn onto Ala Moana Boulevard. Dad has been quiet on the drive. I think he’s afraid that I’m mad at him.

“This’ll be good,” I offer.

“I’m sorry, honey.”

“No, seriously. I’m okay. Calling it off … it just makes this whole mess feel … 
real
.”

“Leilani, can I be honest with you?”

Here it comes. I know he’s been worried, but now it’ll be official. “Things are bad, I know.”

Dad shakes his head. “It’s not that. God, I hope it’s not that. I just think they may get worse before they get better. We need to get out of here.”

There’s a police car at the nearest intersection, but no one is directing cars through the blank lights. Police officers stand in groups every couple of intersections. Most of them look just as purposeless as the few people milling about.

“How are we going to find a flight?” I ask. “Planes aren’t even working.”

“Well, some planes and helicopters are flying. Whatever’s happening to electronics is hit-and-miss. Either way, I’d like to avoid the airport. I looked into the cruise ships that go to Hilo or Kona. There aren’t any at port, they’re all in Mexico or Alaska. Except one—and it capsized off Kaua`i during the tsunami.”

“What?” I freeze. “Is everyone okay?”

“I don’t know.”

“How many people were on board? How far off shore was it?”

“I don’t know. Word of it just reached the island. Maybe the paper will cover it tomorrow.”

I’m silent.
Those poor people
.

“I’m hoping we can charter a helicopter. I’ve been thinking about this. The tour companies—if they aren’t already offering inter-island hops, maybe we can convince them to. Or a boat. Find someone around here who’ll agree to take us to the Big Island.”

“Wait. By
boat
?” I try to imagine sailing from Honolulu
to Hilo. It would take
days
to get home. And the powerful seas are dangerous. “Why? What if flights resume in the next couple days? Our flight would beat us home.”

“Lei, I’ve got to
do
something. It’s only going to get harder as more people try to find a way off this island. We have a chance to get ahead of the game.”

I take a deep breath, reading between the lines. “You’re worried that if we don’t go now, we won’t ever get home, aren’t you?”

Dad won’t say anything.

“Dad, I’m not stupid. You’ve been thinking a lot about this and not telling me anything. You need to bring me in.”

He pauses for a long time, then says, “There are a million people on O`ahu. Ninety-five percent of the food is imported every day. If the planes and boats with the food really have stopped trickling in, well, do the math. Not to mention gas …”

I feel dizzy. “We can all eat pineapples till kingdom come,” I say, trying to joke.

“That’s exactly what we’ll be doing, and I’m guessing it’ll come by sometime next week.” Dad isn’t laughing.

“Next week! There’s not
that
little food.”

“Hon, it’s not about when the food runs out. It’s about when enough people realize that it’s going to.”

* * *

We sit in silence as we cross over a canal into Waikīkī, a boat harbor to our right. Sailboats of every type bob along the marina piers. I try to see us on one of them on the open ocean.

We pull into the garage and park near the lobby stairwell. “Good thing we didn’t rent that electric, ah?” I joke as he shuts off the engine.

“Naw. I bet it would have worked,” he says, but he’s just teasing. “Good thing we didn’t get a gas-guzzling, supercharged, V-8 tourist magnet. Ah?”

“Whatevah. At least we would have looked good running out of gas.”

“I’m just glad we topped it off at Costco. Did you see the lines at the station back there?”

I nod.

In the hotel lobby I learn that the power is on throughout Waikīkī, but the generators will still be required regularly. Crowds surround every wall outlet in an effort to charge endless lines of phones, computers, tablets. The cords of lamps and TVs and coolers are yanked out of the wall. Guests are asked to avoid using the air conditioners and to open their balconies and hallway doors to create a cross breeze on each floor. New signs are posted everywhere, providing instructions and evacuation routes in the event of a tsunami.

Our fancy hotel feels like a Greyhound bus station.
Somebody, please tell me it’s all a dream. Make it all stop
. I pick up my pace.

Families pack around the reception counters. Many are checked-out guests returning from the airport, demanding to be put back in their rooms.

“No one is flying
in
, either,” one lady complains. “You must have vacancies. Just cancel the new reservations. It’s very easy.”

“We’re doing everything we can to sort it out, ma’am. Just be patient. A few of our computers are up, but the records were online, and we’re having to manually arrange …”

My attention shifts to a young husband trying to calm his wife. “… there’s nowhere to plug into, Molly.”

“I don’t know how much longer we can wait.” The wife holds a toddler in her arms, and she’s almost in tears.

“Just …” Her husband glances around in defeat. He’s holding on to a device connected to a tiny mask by a coiled hose.

“Excuse me,” an older man says. He’s guarding a phone plugged into the wall. “Is that a nebulizer? Do you need to use it?”

The parents nod. The mother says, “Our boy has asthma. He hasn’t had his treatment today.”

“Oh, well, here you go! Why didn’t you say something?” The older man yanks his phone charger from the socket. “Use this.”

We step into the elevator; the door shuts.

I try to imagine
needing
electricity to take my meds. That poor boy.

The elevator jolts but continues rising. I laugh nervously. “You sure this is a good idea?”

“No. But neither is a seizure in the eighth-floor stairwell.”

“Oh.”
Why did he have to bring that up?

Dad and I pack our bags. He occasionally pauses to go out on the lanai, looking out at the sailboats and the yachts in the bay milling about like students in a crowded school hall waiting for the first bell to ring. He’s deep in thought.

I examine the water, looking for signs of the tsunami. There’s debris washed up on the beach, but no obvious destruction. Lucky for Waikīkī that the east side of the island absorbed most of the wave energy. But what if something happens on
this
side?

A few surfers glide back and forth on the gentle waves, and I can feel what it’s like. Cool water. Breeze. Salty taste.

I can find that back on the Big Island, too, without nineteen thousand hotel windows facing me.

I finish zipping my pack, and Dad suggests that we grab one last meal before heading off. I can tell that he’s as reluctant to execute this crazy plan as I am.

“I’m starving, Dad, but we have plenny snacks. We can skip it.”

“Better to eat now.”

Dad and I sit at a cantina near the beachside pools. Both of us face the bay. Any hint of rising waters and we bolt back up to floor twelve.

The surf looks perfect for me. Not too big, not too small, spaced far enough apart to make getting out past the swell easy.

“I should be surfing right now.”

“Lei, please.”

“You got to surf on this trip.”

“Just … order something, will you?”

“Dad, I know I wouldn’t actually be going out there. I just don’t know why you have to get all high and mighty about it.”

“How else am I supposed to react? You’re an epileptic. Your mom and I breathe into paper bags whenever you surf.
Don’t you realize that? I never should have taught you how to do it. I should have known …”

“What?”

“That you’d fall in love with it, just like your old man.”

I cross my arms. “You use the same excuse for not letting me drive. Great.”

“Lei!”

I’m silent, staring out at the waves.

“Come on,” he says kindly. “Let’s eat, okay?”

I open a menu.

There’s a note taped on the inside of the first page:

Dad says, “Order anything you want, Lei. Eat up.”

“Fine, I’ll have two of everything.”

“I’m serious,” he says. “Meals may get scarce before things improve. Good thing we stocked up at Costco.”

At the next table, four men in company polo shirts bark at their waiter for more chips and salsa. The waiter nods at them as he approaches us. A Hawaiian with a battered smile, he musters his best aloha.

Dad says, “Thanks for keeping things running for yet another day. I hope those fellows are tipping you well.”

The waiter smiles. “
Mahalo
, sir.”

Dad says, “We’ll start with your biggest plate of nachos, and a
liliko`i
and mango margarita.”

I order a hearty carnitas meal. We sit back and watch families play in the long string of pools. The kids are having a blast. The parents all look like they’re Bill Murray caught in
Groundhog Day
.

When does a vacation in paradise start to grow old?

Today, apparently.

There are even more yachts anchored in the bay now, like some sort of Pacific fleet of millionaires has arrived to launch a surprise attack on Honolulu. A military helicopter buzzes low on its way toward Pearl Harbor.

“We should try those yachters,” I say.

“Sounds good. I hope we can figure something out without too much hassle.”

The four men are loud enough to overhear.

“That was no presidential bunker. He would have had a room set up to look like the Oval Office, if he were down in some compound. Did you see that curtain? Thrown up to keep us from knowing he was in a cave.”