Page 68 of Big Island Summer
“I want to be there for her.”
“Focus on taking care of yourself. That way, when she’s ready to lean on you, you’ll be there. You’ll be steady.”
“Yeah. Okay.” He sighed and slumped against his truck, looking exhausted. “Maybe we could plan some family dinners or something?”
“That sounds good.” She leaned back against the truck’s door, standing shoulder to shoulder with her brother. “We need to stop living in the past.”
“What does that mean? What does it actually look like?”
“We can’t keep going in circles around people who aren’t here anymore. We need to get out and make some new memories.”
He nodded slowly. “Okay.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. We owe it to our kids to make some new memories. Good ones.”
“We’re in a good place for it.”
“I suppose we are.”
They lapsed into silence after that, lost in their own thoughts, staring out at the yard.
Emma’s eyes fixed on the tiny jaboticaba tree she had planted for Adam. Its narrow trunk was covered in flowers and green globes of unripe fruit. Against all odds, it had bloomed just months after she transplanted it. The strange, bizarre, beautiful plant was thriving.
Maybe they could too.
21
Lani
Lani dabbed tiny dots of yellow onto the wall with her paintbrush in a state of perfect flow. She had already finished the baseline of what she had wanted to accomplish – huge tropical plants in the green room, a coral reef and sea turtles in the blue – and now she was just playing.
It was such a joy to add little details for the kids to discover, like this gold dust day gecko crawling along the underside of a branch. They were an invasive species – pests, really – but kids loved them. Lani did too. The bright green lizards with blue eyeshadow and orange stripes were just too beautiful to dislike.
Lani added a few more yellow speckles with her smallest brush and stepped back to admire the effect. Perfect.
She was just about to start on some jewel orchids when her phone buzzed and Tenn’s smiling face appeared on the screen. She set her brush aside and answered the call.
“Aloha! How’s your day going?”
“Olivia’s in the hospital,” he said without preamble.
She felt the blood drain from her face as she crumpled, sitting down right there on the drop cloth.
“Lani?”
“I’m here.” She sucked in a breath. “Which hospital? Hilo?”
“Yeah.”
“Are you there? What happened?”
“I’m still in Kona,” he said, his frustration and worry audible in the way he bit off each word. He drove across the island at least once a week to stock up on food and other supplies for his restaurant. “My mom’s barely responding, and my dad’s not picking up at all. They were in a car crash.”
She jumped to her feet and grabbed her keys. “I’m on my way.”
“They’re okay,” he said, sounding like he was trying to convince himself. “My mom said that they’re okay.”
