The Islands at the End of the World (11 page)

I’m being gently shaken. Dad is standing over me. It’s still dark, but white lights flicker on and off at regular intervals. The lanai door is wide open, and a gentle breeze soothes my sweaty face. I hear nothing but the ungodly alarm.
A fire alarm?
“Time to go,” he says. “Now!”

I sit up, scrambling up the muddy walls of the dark, murky pit where my mind has crouched. “What time is it? What day?”

“Nearly five o’clock Monday morning.” Dad hands me some clothes. “Come on. The bags are ready. We just have to get down to the car.”

“Is there really a fire?” I pull on the shorts and T-shirt he’s thrust upon me.

“Yes. They’ve been torching things up and down the beach all night.”

What
? “Who?”

“The Anti-Tourist Brigade. Please, hurry!” Dad yanks our phones out of the wall and stuffs them and their chargers into his pockets.

I swing my backpack onto my shoulder and buckle the waistband. The smell of smoke drifts into the room from the lanai.

“Now.”

We dart out of the room, each of us with a backpack and a duffel and tote bags filled with our food. The neighboring door bursts open, and a mother with two boys flees down the hallway. A man shouts after them from the room, “We’re right behind you!” and the door closes.

The lights in the hallway are making me dizzy.

Dad’s reading my mind. “Are you okay with the lights?”

I gasp and freeze in the hallway. Dad bumps into me. “What? What is it?” he asks.

“My pills. Did you pack them? They were in the bathroom.”

Dad grows pale. “Shoot. No!” He turns back to the door and tries to open it. Locked.

“Oh, no,” I mumble.

Dad freezes. He laughs nervously. “I think I left the car keys in there, too.”

He fumbles through his pockets with his good hand while navigating around the hip strap of his pack. He pulls the key card into view and swipes it through the reader on the doorknob. No response. Again. Nothing.

From the room next to ours, a man and another boy emerge into the hallway, rolling two suitcases. They race away into the flashing darkness.

“It’s expired,” Dad says. “We can’t get in.”

Almost without thought, I press my hand against the closing door of the neighboring room. “Do you remember if there’s a connecting door we can break down?”

“Good thinking.” We push into the room.

“Nothing. Dammit.”

The smell of smoke is stronger. A helicopter zooms past the lanai. I gasp. “Wait,” I say. My heart’s pounding as a new idea takes root within my mind.
Calm down
, I think.
You have to stay calm
.

I drop my bags and take off the pack. I walk out onto the lanai, nervous and hopeful.

Dad follows me outside and freezes. “Lei. That’s crazy. Stop.”

I stare at our lanai, my mind strangely focused. The alarm isn’t so bad out here, and I can finally hear myself think. The petals of the Emerald Orchid are brighter than ever, and they bathe the side of the tower in eerie green light. The balconies have high lips, crowned with decorative handrailings. The distance between them is about eight feet. There’s a very thin molding running along the wall, but no one could sidle along
it without falling off. My eyes turn back to the distance between the lips. If I stood up on top of this wall, I could
probably
jump far enough to grab on to the next railing.

Probably
isn’t good enough when you’re a famished epileptic surrounded by flashing lights and you’re twelve stories off the ground in a burning building.

“Lei, come on. It was worth a thought, but it’s no good.”

“I need those meds, Dad. I
need
them.” Several lanai lengths to the right, I can see black smoke billowing out of the fourth- or fifth-floor windows.

“We can look for more, hon. I’m sure we can walk right into nine out of ten pharmacies tonight and—”

“And how will you get to them? Just wander around on foot with all these bags? We need the keys, too!”

“Lei, we’ll find another car. This is crazy. We have to get out of here, now!” He’s either angry or scared, but it all sounds the same.

I’m angry, too. “You’re going to walk up to the first car parked along the curb and flip down the visor and catch a set of keys?”

“Leilani! You can’t jump that gap. I can’t jump that gap. End of argument!”

My idea grows wings. I smile, and when I answer, my tone is relaxed. “We still have the climbing gear?”

Dad nods. “I thought maybe we could trade it.”

I run back into the room and yank what I’ll need out of my pack.

Dad doesn’t protest. He studies the balconies.
I won this
one
, I think, and the thought is followed by a surge of adrenaline. I throw on my harness and run a double figure-eight knot through the loops.

I rush back onto the lanai.

“That fire’s crept up another flight. We—”

“Put this on,” I interrupt. Dad slips into his harness like a pro.

The now-familiar pop of a gunshot startles me.
That was close
. I follow the sound across the gardens to the neighboring hotel tower. A flickering light comes from a window several floors down, followed by rapid gunfire.

Is someone gunning people down?
I turn back to Dad, the question plastered all over my face. He’s staring across the divide with naked shock.

“Dad.”

He shakes himself back to attention. “Quick!” We check each other’s harness straps, and then I hand him the carabiner and the belay device.

“No,” he says. “You’re crazy if you think I’m letting
you
do it.”

“Dad, I can’t belay your weight the way you can belay mine. And your hand’s hurt. How are you going to grab on to the railing with one hand?”

“Leilani.”

“No time, Dad. Just give me plenny slack.”

“Oh, God,” he moans.

I step onto a chair, psyching myself up to stand on the wall.

“Wait!” Dad says. “Loop the rope over the lanai above.”

“Dad, I’ve got this. It’s just like the uneven bars.”

“If you miss, you could fall out of your harness. I don’t—”

“I won’t miss.”

Dad groans. I wait until he’s sitting on the ground with his feet planted at an angle up against the low wall and the rope doubled through his belay device and choked off with two loops around his good hand, and then I stand up on the edge of the lip, my feet balanced just below the railing. My chest is pounding. My senses are sharp, and I focus on my target like a sniper.

Another round of gunfire. My eyes dart to the chilling flicker of light. A different window.
What are they doing?

Dr. Makani’s voice echoes in my head:
“Seizures can be induced by stress. You need to avoid any adventures …”

Way too late for that
. I glance down and see tongues of flame pushing smoke out of more windows. A coast guard boat in the bay attempts to reach the hotel’s burning facade with its fire hoses, falls short. The ground—I might as well be a mile high.

My pills. I can’t go on like this, and we’re not going anywhere without the keys
.

I look at Dad. He has pulled the rope tight against his right hip, locking the belay device. Ten feet of rope dangle in a loop below me. I’m ready. Dad wears a look of pure agony.

I focus on the handrail eight feet away.
If you were doing this six feet off the ground, you wouldn’t even hesitate. Piece of cake
.

I step up onto the handrail, leaning my weight forward into thin air, and I leap.

My hands latch firmly onto our lanai’s railing as my feet dangle against the wall, desperately seeking purchase.

“Leilani!” Dad shouts. He can’t see me because he’s locked in place on the floor.

“Got it! Don’t move.”

“Thank God.”

More gunfire. I pull up with my arms and shoulders and swing my left leg around enough so that I can jam my foot between the wall and the handrail. The rest is muscle and sheer determination. I pull myself over the edge to solid ground without a hitch.

“I’m in. I did it!”

Dad stands up. From across the gap, he eyes me with terror and triumph and pride.

“Didn’t even need the rope.”

“Go! Now!”

I dart into our dark room, aided by alternating red and white lights, snatch my meds, toiletry kit, and the keys. Gunfire. The alarm buzzing. Hunted. Every muscle begs to flee.

Dad and I meet in the corridor, race down the long hallway to the farthest stairwell, and spiral down toward the lobby, our bags banging after us. As we pass the fifth floor, I hear gunfire behind the stairwell door. I yelp. Dad and I pick up our pace and catch up to a logjam of people trying to pour through the final door into the lobby.

We heave forward, struggling to stay upright with our things. Unseen smoke burns my throat. In the lobby the crowd thins, and we race for the garage. Men near the main
entrance tackle people as if they’re felling stampeding wildebeests. Locals. Tribal tattoos. One tosses a bag of pretzels atop a cart loaded with groceries and toilet paper.

Some sort of gang raid?

We leap across the hallway, fly down the last stairs, and run to our car.

Seconds later we’re dodging other cars. Dad squeezes my hand as the truck ahead of us jumps the curb and speeds across the gardens. We pull forward and flee over the canal.

I silently study the destruction that has taken root in every direction as we slip into the dawn of a new Hawai`i. The glow of morning illuminates the city. Smoke rises like columns holding up the sky. Abandoned cars, shattered and burnt to smoldering shells, are scattered everywhere. Trash bins spill their guts upon streets and sidewalks. Storefronts are cavities of empty racks and shattered glass. All that remains are the postcards and souvenirs lining ABC Store shelves. The beach is empty, and the bay contains only a few coast guard vessels.

“Has it really only been a week?” I marvel.

“We’re all werewolves under a green full moon.”

“It’s going to get much worse.” I try on the words. As unwelcome as they are, they feel right. I’m haunted by the tribal tattoos of those men. Several races—haoles among them—but all locals. Attacking tourists. Attacking me. Almost certainly gangbangers, but still. I shiver and run my hand through my smoky hair.

“Lei.” Dad shakes his head. “You were amazing up there.
I don’t think I could have done it. You’re a hero, you know that?”

I feel my cheeks grow warm.
“Heroine.”
Adrenaline still simmers in my veins. I feel powerful, angry.

One week
.

Right before my eyes, my beautiful islands are changing forever.

And so am I.

The rising sun turns our broken windshield into a hundred glinting shards. The haze has intensified. For the third day since we left Honolulu, we are camped out in our car, slowly weaving south over crowded roads littered with abandoned vehicles.

Because of the reports of tsunami damage to boats moored along the north and east coasts, we’ve focused our attempt to charter a ride south of Honolulu, along a bay called Kaupa Pond. It’s rimmed with houses, each with a dock. There must be a pier along here that will offer us a way off O`ahu. But the only boat traffic beneath the bridge that leads to the open ocean belongs to coast guard patrols, which intercept unofficial ships like sparrow-hungry hawks, commandeer gasoline, and turn sailboats back to shore.

Dad pulls into a strip mall, zigzags across the untidy
parking lot, and stops in front of a busted-out grocery store. “Give it a try. Quick.”

I jump out and trot over to the newspaper vending machines. We’re scavenging for information. But every rack is empty.
How did things unravel so fast?
No news. No food. No medicine. We’ve tried seven different pharmacies in the past forty-eight hours, all ransacked, nobody on duty. I have enough pills to last the month, and a few dozen more back home, but what happens when they run out?

I return to the car and shake my head. We pull back onto the main road.

I glance at our gas needle: down to a third of a tank.

Why are there so many ditched vehicles? Have the cars run out of gas? Or have the drivers run out of steam, tired of circling?