Plate in one hand and coffee mug in the other, she passsed the kitchen table where her computer hummed, and pushed open the screen door. She made her way out onto the lanai, which ran along the front and one side of the small house. The sky was growing lighter as the morning progressed. She walked softly along the wide porch and settled into the threadbare cushions on a wooden deck chair, her legs tucked beneath her, then scooped up the sweet flesh of the papaya fruit with a spoon.
The sea spread out before her. The calls of gulls and the wash of waves against the shore were usually soothing, but this morning the sounds failed to relieve the sense of restlessness that troubled her. She hadn’t slept well, having woken during the dark early hours that had yet to give birth to the dawn. Something was out of balance, and she knew it as surely as she knew the cloudless morning sky would be filled with rain clouds before evening arrived. Just as she had felt the approaching tsunami when she was five years old.
Kali sighed, adjusting her legs beneath her on the cushion. She had just eaten the last of the papaya when her phone rang, harsh and intrusive. Still holding the plate, she went inside and located the phone on the small table next to her sofa. As she lifted the phone, it slipped between her fingers, skittered across the wooden floor, and landed between a ceremonial drum and a spear gifted to her years before by a visiting New Zealand elder. She bent over, careful to avoid knocking over the spear, and retrieved the phone. As she pressed the button to accept the call, the plate fell from her other hand and broke into pieces as it struck the floor. She looked around the small room uneasily.
The voice on the other end of the phone was familiar—the deep, resonant tones of her uncle, Walter. “Aloha, Kali. You okay? Sounds like you’re throwing things around.”
Kali took a deep breath. Walter sounded oddly strained. “Not yet, but it’s still early in the day. What’s up?”
There was a tense pause on the line. “Well, I hate to drag you away from whatever it is you’re not doing, but we’ve got a body down here on the beach. No positive ID yet, but I’m pretty certain it’s Kekipi Smith, Anna Smith’s eldest son. She made a call last night to say he hadn’t come home, and it looks like he drowned down there off the cliffs near Haleakal National Park, probably sometime late yesterday. Surfboard washed up nearby, so it appeared to be an accident.”
Kali frowned, tightening her grip on the phone. “Appeared?”
Walter’s voice was carefully noncommittal. “Well, seemed that way to begin with. But now something’s turned up that doesn’t make any sense.” His voice wavered, but just for a second. “Can you get over here and have a look before we send him off?”
Kali’s eyes darted back to the sea, just visible through the window. A dull malaise fluttered behind the bones of her chest.
Walter spoke into her silence. “I’m not feeling good about this. I’ll explain when you get here, but we’re treating it as a suspicious death. There are elements that put it right in your wheelhouse.”
She closed her eyes and felt a shadow leaping into the darkness.
“Okay. I’m on my way.”
She picked up her keys and headed out into the sunlight. Hilo followed, pushing the screen door open with his nose. He jogged close beside her, his long body bumping against her legs. She reached down with one hand, patted his head briefly, already lost in the story she was about to hear.
