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RED AND BLUE LIGHTS pulsed around me.
My first thought was, do angels have red and blue pulsing lights? I had never read about it in the Bible, but then, my Bible knowledge wasn’t very comprehensive.
My second thought was, how could I already be dead? I couldn’t have been down here more than a few hours. I thought I was in better shape than that.
My third thought: I can’t die now. I still have eight more pounds to lose.
I rubbed my eyes and shifted on the lumpy lava rock. It was night, and I had dozed off in a sitting position. I stood up carefully. My throbbing ankle and sore neck assured me I still inhabited my earthly body, for the time being.
“Help!” I yelled, as loud as I could, aiming my voice at the light. “Help! Down here!”
A husky female voice shouted, “Ova hea!”
Then came more voices, and someone switched on a floodlight. Hot white light illuminated the mossy walls and the black trickle of water along the bottom of the tube. A growling engine sound echoed through the space, and a sling contraption dropped down through the skylight, toward me. It stopped a few inches above the wet floor of the lava tube, swaying. I understood what I needed to do. I put my bag over my shoulder, and then climbed into to the sling. My ankle blazed with pain, and my hands were shaking so hard I wasn’t sure I could hold on. (For the record, it was still easier than climbing into a canoe.) The sling rocked alarmingly as it ascended. I squeezed my eyes shut, held on tight, and whispered a little prayer of thanks, over and over.
Strong arms hoisted me onto solid ground. Someone in a firefighter suit (why?) led me out of the jungle to the small back lawn. As my legs buckled underneath me, my mind registered wet grass, but refused to take any further action on the matter. I sat on the damp lawn and stared at nothing in particular. Someone tucked a scratchy blanket around me. Flashing lights and uniformed police officers and people in reflective vests—was all of this for me? Shadowy shapes lurked around the periphery, curious neighbors perhaps. I heard a roaring noise in my ears, as if the Hanakoa River had risen up to the top of the gorge and was about to spill over.
The next thing I knew, I was being bundled into the back of an ambulance. I had never been inside an ambulance before. I wanted to get up and touch all of the shiny equipment, but I was lying down and a thermometer was under my tongue and something was squeezing my upper arm and sitting next to me was a young man in white. Maybe he was an angel? I’d never heard of an angel taking someone’s blood pressure, though.
Then I saw Detective Medeiros standing with Donnie outside the open back doors of the ambulance. They seemed to be talking, and then Medeiros nodded and Donnie climbed into the ambulance with me. Of course, neither of them was up to date on how mad I was at Donnie for convincing Emma to steal my DNA, not to mention how furious I was at Emma for going along with it. But at the moment, it was hard to feel outraged. I was grateful to be alive.
The young man in white prodded my sore ankle while Donnie held my hand tightly.
“How did you know where to find me?” I asked.
“You need to rest.”
“I don’t want to rest. I want to know what happened.”
So Donnie told me.
When I was late to my meeting with Honey Akiona, she phoned Detective Ka`imi Medeiros, demanding to know what secret government holding cell the police had thrown me into. An alarmed Detective Medeiros called Donnie, but Donnie was working the Drive-Inn’s dinner shift and wasn’t answering his phone. So Medeiros hopped into his squad car and drove straight over to Donnie’s Drive-Inn.
With Detective Medeiros at his elbow, Donnie had called Emma Nakamura, and told her I hadn’t shown up for my meeting with my lawyer, and no one knew where I was.
When Emma wasn’t able to reach me, she called Pat, but Pat’s phone reception at home was unreliable, and she couldn’t get through. So Emma drove all the way up the hill to Pat’s house.
At Emma’s urging, Pat checked his phone, and found one—just one—of my photo texts had come through. The one I had taken of the jungle and the sky, right before Leilani Zelenko had shoved me into the lava tube.
Pat was able to extract my location from the GPS information embedded in the photograph. Pat and Emma drove back down the mountain, far enough to get a strong phone signal. They pulled into the empty parking lot of the only business within miles, Atsuka’s Orchid Nursery. From there, Emma called Detective Medeiros back with my coordinates. Detective Medeiros took it from there.
“Thank you, Donnie. I guess I can’t be mad at you now. Since you helped save my life and everything.”
“Mad at me? Why were you mad at me?”
“You had Emma test my DNA against the hair clump. You didn’t believe me when I said it wasn’t my hair.”
“Oh. Of course I believed you, Molly. It’s just...I overreacted. I don’t know what to tell you. I’m very sorry. My actions were inexcusable.”
Donnie’s words sounded strangely familiar. It was probably some weird kind of déjà vu, triggered by my recent ordeal.
“Eh, Uncle,” the white-clad angel interrupted. “Patient’s getting agitated. You gotta rest, Aunty. Try close your eyes.”
Donnie held my hand and said nothing for the rest of the ride down.