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Honoli‘i Beach Park, Hilo, Hawai‘i

Tuesday, April 29, 2025

Mac got to the beach first. He parked his jeep where he always had in much better times than these, grabbed his gear, and made his way down toward the water. When he felt the sand underneath his feet, he felt, for a moment, as if he were home.

He used to come down here on Akua, the one night in every month when the moon was at its fullest and biggest and brightest and appeared even rounder than usual, the waves dancing in its amazing light, as if the dawn had arrived early.

Tonight, there was just a crescent moon. Mac stood in the sand and took it all in and thought how perfect the world looked from here. The only sounds were the lapping of the waves in front of him and the occasional call of a nightbird. He felt like the last man on earth.

This is what we’re trying to save,he thought. What we have to save.

Beauty like this was as much a force of the natural world as the volcano; it took the breath out of him.

He looked in the direction of the volcano and thought: You cannot have this.

He heard someone behind him making his way through the foliage. Mac turned and saw Lono, this boy who just seemed to keep growing—Mac joked sometimes that he could almost hear Lono growing—carrying two surfboards under his arm.

“I thought you had forgotten me,” Lono said, putting out his hand for a fist bump.

“It would be like forgetting one of my sons,” Mac said.

“Here, I brought you a board, just in case,” Lono said.

They sat down on the boards and looked out at the water, neither one of them speaking, as if they were in church.

And maybe in a way they were.

“It’s gonna be bad, isn’t it?” Lono said finally.

“Worse than bad,” Mac said.

“You think my mom and me should be looking to get off the island?” Lono asked.

He felt the boy’s eyes hard on him. Mac turned and met his eyes.

“I can’t explain this to you in any detail, because I gave my word,” Mac said. “But you have to trust me when I tell you that even if you could find a boat or a plane, it’s too late.”

Lono hesitated, then said, “I do trust you, Mac. With my life.”

So did Jenny and Rick.

“The volcano isn’t the only ticking bomb, is it, Mac man? This is about something inside the White Mountain, isn’t it?”

It was what the natives called Mauna Kea.

“Where did you hear something like that?” Mac asked him.

Lono shrugged. “Some woman, a haole, was at Civil Defense trying to see Mr. Takayama again. She told Dennis’s mom that the army was keeping secrets that could end up wiping out the whole town and that if Mr. Takayama wasn’t going to tell people, she was going to. Something about how she wouldn’t let Mr. Takayama do something to her again.”

Lono looked at Mac. “The haole woman knows things, doesn’t she?”

Mac said, “She only knows what she doesn’t know.”

Lono sighed. It came out of him as sad as a blues note from a horn.

“Heard about Jenny,” Lono said. “And Rick. They were good dudes.”

“Not just good. The best.”

“You okay?”

“Someday, maybe. Just not today, kid.”

Another sigh came out of the boy. Then he said, “I gotta tell you, Mac, it was me got the word out about what was happening at the burial sites.” He paused and then quickly added, “I didn’t mean for there to be trouble.”

Mac smiled. “You sure about that?”

“I maybe wasn’t sad to cause a little bit of pilikia.”

“No matter. General Rivers stopped them in their tracks.”

“I heard.” Now Lono smiled. “That’s a bad, bad man, the general. But in a good way, no matter how much he pisses off people around here.”

“Not just good,” Mac said again. “The best.”

“I’ve got a big mouth,” Lono said.

“You always have.” Mac punched his arm lightly. “But this is your island, not ours.”

The sun was rising. They could see the big morning waves beginning to build in the distance. Without another word, they ran to the water, got on their boards, and paddled out.

Being in the water only made the world more beautiful, Mac thought. The light seemed to be coming from the ocean as well as the sky.

“I don’t have a lot of time,” Mac said.

Lono said, “You’re the one who always told me that you had to make time for the things you love.”

“Then let’s ride, cowboy.”

Mac wondered, briefly, if this might be the last ride for both of them.

A few minutes later they were up on their boards, the two of them maybe fifty yards apart, maybe more, the water as warm as bathwater, both of them catching the first great wave at the same moment.

Mac heard Lono whoop and laugh with joy as they both glided toward the beach.

Mac took in the whole scene, the boy and the water and the morning sky, and thought again: This is what we’re trying to save.