Karsten Knight - Afterglow

A few minutes later Ash was sitting out on the small patio overlooking Kalama’s backyard, which was overgrown and turning a crispy yellow. Hawai‘i was going through something of a dry summer—it had only rained twice in the entirety of Ash’s visit.

These days Ash prayed for rain. Prayed for storms, and lightning, and the roll of thunder. Prayed for echoes from the thunderclouds to remind her that Eve was somewhere out there in the cosmic expanse, watching over her little sister.

Kalama emerged from the house holding a pitcher of iced tea and two glasses. “Is this your first time to Hawai‘i?” she asked Ash as she poured the iced tea.

Ash nodded. “I feel a bit embarrassed that I’m only revisiting my heritage now. My parents adopted me from Tahiti, but from what little I know about my past, my roots also lie here.”

“And does being here stir those roots in you?” Kalama handed her a glass, on which condensation was already starting to form. “Does being here feel like home?”

Ash thought carefully about this, because it was something she’d wondered herself. Walking the beach at night when the libraries and town halls had closed. Climbing Kīlauea, then Haleakalā, up the volcanoes that Pele had given rise to. Standing ankle-deep in the crystalline pool beneath Waimoku Falls, where she’d consummated her love with Colt Halliday two centuries ago. All that, and she’d expected it to stir in her some sense of belonging, something buried in her heart or her memories. “No,” Ash finally answered. “I wanted to, but . . . Honestly, no place feels like home right now. I guess I’m just adrift.”

Kalama gave her an exaggerated mock frown. “I believe that’s a very serious medical condition called being a teenager.”

Ash had come there to pick Kalama’s brain, to find out all about her and what sort of ancestors she and Colt could have given birth to, for better or worse . . . yet, in her easygoing and gently prodding manner, Kalama somehow turned the entire conversation to Ash and her past. Thirty minutes later Ash had spilled a detailed account of life growing up as a Polynesian girl in New York, her volatile relationship with Eve, and her transfer to Blackwood Academy. Even though she was omitting the supernatural elements, and just about everything from the last two months, it felt good to just tell a real story for once.

In fact as Ash waxed on about life in Scarsdale and her parents, she felt this profound sense of relief. While she was happy to be done with cults of evil gods, and bloodthirsty god-hunting millionaires, and especially Colt Halliday, she’d been harboring this secret fear that when all that bad stuff was over, it would be impossible to return to a normal life. More than anything, she feared that living among mortals again would feel boring and trivial by contrast. Sure, she wouldn’t have to endure the harsh agonies of watching her loved ones die violently anymore, but there was an excitement to her life when she was fighting for something, when the fate of the world hung on her shoulders.

It turned out to be just the opposite, however. She had more longing than ever to return to Scarsdale and accept the challenge of resuming her old life. Ash hadn’t had the smoothest childhood. But she’d been so busy running from the ways her upbringing hadn’t fulfilled her that she’d never appreciated the ways that it had.

Ash finally managed to steer the conversation back to Kalama. “Now that I’ve practically vomited up my personal history to you,” Ash said, “do I know you well enough to ask about the baby’s father?”

Kalama gestured to the patio seat next to Ash, and for the first time she noticed the five-by-seven framed picture sitting in the seat. In the picture, a handsome Hawaiian boy in a naval uniform stared out. Even though the photograph was static, Ash got the impression that the boy had the same chipper personality as Kalama and probably had struggled not to smile for the picture.

“Don’t worry, he’s still with us,” Kalama assured Ash when her expression clouded with panic. “He’s just overseas for another eight months. And then alternating years after that,” she admitted grudgingly.

“It must be hard,” Ash said, “living half your life without someone.” Strangely, even though she didn’t want to feel sympathy for him, her mind gravitated to Colt, inheriting all his old memories, then spending two decades away from his beloved.

“Everyone says that.” Kalama stared thoughtfully at the lemon that was floating in her iced tea. “But picture the man you love. Now ask yourself: Would you rather live half your life with him? Or all of it without him, with someone else instead? When you look at it that way, the choice is much easier than you think.”

This time it was Wes’s face that blossomed into Ash’s mind, the image surfacing and then dissolving like a drop of ink in water.

Eventually the conversation wound down, and Ash didn’t want to drag it out—she’d barged her way into the girl’s life as it was. And for better or worse she’d gotten what she’d come for: Something good had come out of her multi-lifetime affair with Colt. Not just Kalama, but the husband who could think lovingly about his wife and child while he was overseas. And the child who would hopefully grow up to find that love too, and the same for all the generations that would follow.

After Kalama had walked Ash out of the house, the two of them shared a hug so tight that Ash almost forgot they were still basically total strangers, despite their shared blood. Where the swell of Kalama’s belly pressed into Ash’s stomach, she felt a crackling electricity—the power of possibility.

“I forgot to ask if you’d picked out any names,” Ash said.

Kalama laughed tersely. “Oh, we’ve got a laundry list of them. But it’s hard to pick something out for a person you’ve never met, you know? We can’t even decide whether we want to choose an English name or something more traditional. My husband’s even pickier than I am.” She shook her head at the space next to her, as though he were standing right by her side, preparing to argue.

Ash cleared her throat. “Well, I’m sort of the outsider in these parts, but I have spent a lot of the last few weeks looking through names and looking up their translations to see what they meant. I came across one girl’s name that made me smile: Ualani.” Ash paused, then added: “It means ‘rain from heaven.’ ”

Kalama’s eyes lit up. She seemed like she was actually considering it. “Ualani . . .,” she repeated. “It’s beautiful. Kind of a funny image though. You always think of heaven as this sunny place with immaculate, island weather.” She shrugged. “But then again, heaven is a very personal thing. I’m sure it rains in someone’s heaven.”

Ash lifted her eyes to the sky, where the beginnings of gray clouds were finally starting to coalesce. “It does in mine,” she said.

Six hours later Ash sat on the beach as the rain hammered down on her. She’d discarded her soaked towel and was resting in the sand, hugging her knees to her chest and staring out at the Pacific. Only a few brave beachgoers remained, mostly surfers who probably figured they were here to get wet regardless. The rest of the tourists had fled when the storm failed to relent after ten minutes.

She’d done what she’d come here to do, and tomorrow she’d return to New York, to try to put her life back together. There were decisions to be made. For starters, should she return to Blackwood Academy in the fall, or give life at Scarsdale High a second chance? But the biggest adjustment was going to be the relationship with her parents.

When they’d woken from their sedated, nightmare-plagued state in the shattered stone lighthouse, Ash had struggled to fabricate a story that would explain how they’d both lost consciousness in Scarsdale and woken up on the California coast thirty-six hours later. In the end she decided the easiest solution was just to tell them the truth.