She wanted to ask more, but he’d already hung up.
When she looked over at Luke, he was sitting up. “Everything okay?”
She told him.
“These guys are obviously going to protest. I just hope it doesn’t get out of hand,” he said.
“I would hate for it to backfire. Cliff has a reputation as being kind of a wild card, but I like him. He’s connected.”
She then called the resort and left a message at the front desk for Josh, saying it was urgent.
When she walked back to her bed, Luke’s eyes followed her every move. They both lay down again and this time she flicked off the lantern. Woody’s call had sobered her and she lay there in the dark hoping she’d be able to sleep. The humming of the damselflies had stopped, but she could hear the soft sounds of Luke breathing and the crinkling of starched sheets. Her mind revisited the day’s events, especially the encounter with Luna, while at the same time being hyperaware of Luke’s presence in the room.
“Good night,” she finally said.
“Sweet dreams.”
Twenty minutes later, she could tell he was still awake by the way he kept flipping from side to side. Would it be so bad to crawl into bed with him and nestle her head in the crook of his neck?
“Minnow?” he whispered.
“Yes?”
“I can’t sleep.”
“Me neither.”
Without another thought—because sometimes thinking really got in the way of living—she went to his bed and lay down facing him, an inch or two away. He kissed her lightly on the nose and pressed his forehead to hers.
“Turn around,” he said, rolling her so her back was to him.
He wrapped an arm around her and pulled her into him. Every surface of their bodies touched and she felt her whole being relax.
“There, better. Now maybe we can sleep,” he said, holding on to her as though he needed this as much as she did.
Something deep and unshakable passed between them. Minnow drifted off within minutes, sure of only one thing: Tomorrow would test her beyond measure.
Journal Entry
From the journal of Minnow Gray
San Francisco, August 24, 1995
This guy on the airplane today told me, “I know your type. You’re one of those outspoken hippies who puts animals and plants ahead of humans and then you think you’re so much more enlightened than everyone else.”
I was rendered mute by his rudeness and then finally said, “You don’t know the first thing about me.”
Chapter 31
The Reckoning
Pono: goodness, uprightness, morality, true condition or nature, virtuous, fair
They left in darkness. Minnow had told Nalu to meet her at the harbor—it would be easier that way. Luke drove the boat and they were hauling ass with Minnow holding on tight. After a while the sky lightened in the east, pale blue slowly spreading until she could just make out the coastline not too far inside of them. All lava. Then two white sand beaches. Five minutes later, they passed the airport as a jet airplane took off above them, steeply ascending and then banking off to the right.
Luke looked at his watch. “We should be there in fifteen minutes or so.” There was no chop on the water and they’d been flying along without a hitch.
Minnow was ready for anything yet had no idea what to expect. She noticed breaths were becoming harder to draw in. She tried to reassure herself that she was okay, that everything would be fine. A ways on, she had to sit down on the cooler to try to catch a breath.
