CHAPTER 1

“We, too, lessen and wane, destined to give in and fade away, ebbing while hoping not to evanesce, flagging and withered on the vine.” — Cameron Elias

.1.

When I first met Jimmy he wasn’t breathing. I brought him back to life. No, I'm not some sort of minor god, just the first guy who jumped in the water that night. To be precise, I'm the only guy who jumped in the water. Everyone else around him was too drunk to notice that Jimmy had fallen overboard and was floating, face down, in the Pacific.

It was the summer of 1929, Hawaii dealt with prohibition like everywhere else in the US: locals and tourists drinking themselves numb as if there was no tomorrow. Like I said, it was the summer of '29; they were not completely wrong.

I didn't really know who Jimmy was when I pulled him out of the water and pumped air into his lungs, once all the manual maneuvers had failed, until he started breathing on his own. He was just another guy on vacation looking for a good time. Almost cost him his life. I did what I had to do, what I'd trained to do. I did it before I even thought about doing it. Four summers as a waterman at Waikiki beach can do that to you.

When the ambulance finally took Jimmy away to the hospital he was breathing on his own all right, but still too inebriated to be conscious. Would he make it? I really couldn't say. It wouldn't be the first time that rescue had come too late for one of those wealthy idiots staying at the "Pink Palace of the Pacific" who thought that getting on one of the many “party boats” available to people of means and drinking themselves into oblivion was a sane idea. It wouldn’t have shocked me to learn he hadn’t made it. Not then. It happened. We had to learn to live with it. Mr. Kahanamoku had drilled that into my brain when I had first started volunteering at Waikiki beach: We cannot save everyone; we have to accept that in order to save those who can be saved. Actually, his exact words had been much more poetic: “Do not let the ones you lose pull you under with them. If you carry the dead in your heart, you won’t have the strength to pull the living to the sand.” He also talked of Hā and Kuleana. Being only one-eighth Hawaiian, through one of my mother’s grandmothers, I had grown up thinking of myself as kamaʻāina, a child of the land, but not exactly as hapa-haole. I often felt that Kānaka Maoli was something I could understand but not truly experience. Anyway, I’d done my best. Hopefully, the guy would make it and return to the mainland with a scary story to tell. Mission accomplished. 

The thing is, when I saved Jimmy, I wasn’t even a waterman anymore; I hadn't been one since my senior year at university. It was just dumb luck that I happened to go for a walk on the beach at 3 AM that moonlit night, out of frustration against a page that insisted on remaining ominously blank on my Remington Portable, and actually heard Jimmy fall over. That sound, that splash, was like nothing else. After understanding what had just happened, trying to save him had never been optional.

Taking my clothes off before jumping in the water had not been an option either, so I returned, soaking wet, body still humming with adrenaline, to the tiny bungalow I thought of as my “writing shack” – which my parents still called “grandpa’s old beach hut” – and looked at the typewriter again. The page hadn’t moved, and it was still blank.

Perhaps it was the fact that Jimmy was my age that had rattled me. He was a little taller but lighter, which had made the job of bringing him to shore a tad easier. Nearly drowning doesn't make you look good, but I’d seen him around before, fair hair and sunkissed skin, hiding behind Hollywood shades, trying to surf, failing, but not giving up. Good for him. Less booze might’ve helped him stay on the right side of the board. 

I changed into dry clothes, made myself a cup of coffee, to steady a body that was still reeling from the physical effort, then sat on the lanai as the sun was waking, bringing with it the promise of another perfect summer day. I took a pull from the mug. The coffee was black, bitter, and hot; exactly what I needed. 

The sun came up like a flare over Diamond Head, bright and fierce, a sudden punishment for hangovers. A few hundred yards down the beach, the Royal Hawaiian Hotel stood tall and absurd, its coral-colored walls catching the sunlight like a swollen tropical flower out of place among the palms. Soon, the water stopped being the dark, devouring thing I had entered a few hours ago. Now, under the first true light of day, it was a sheet of liquid gold and bright turquoise. A sea bird swooped low, hunting. The air smelled like salt and flowers and all the things that don't matter when you're floating face down in the dark. 

My thoughts drifted to Jimmy once more, even though at that point I didn't know that was his name. What exactly had made me notice this guy on the beach, only to find him floating face down in the Pacific a couple of nights later? Or had it been the other way round? Did that even make sense? More importantly, could I turn this into a story? 

I glanced back at the typewriter through the screen door. The little monster returned its usual white paper grin. It seemed that, lately, there was nothing else it could offer me.

My typewriter was right. 

The story wasn't on the blank page. 

I was the story.

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