Read Online Invasive by Chuck Wendig - Free Book Online

change the world, not participate in its tedium .”
    â€œThanks for driving me,” Hannah says.
    â€œMy name’s Pono,” the driver says. He holds the wheel with one hand and puts his other hand over his shoulder so she can shake it. “You’re lucky. A guest of Mr. Geirsson. He lives here, you know.”
    â€œI know. Up north?”
    â€œNorth Shore. Not far from the Kilauea Lighthouse. It’s beautiful up there. He’s got horses. Garages for these fancy old cars. Little movie theater. Plus a little airfield and a helipad.” She wonders suddenly why she didn’t fly in there. Pono seems to sense her hesitation and adds, “He’s very private. Very private. But it’s beautiful. Really. I haven’t been up that way in a while, but . . . beautiful, just beautiful. He’s even got these toilets imported from Japan. They do everything.” A throaty chuckle in the deep of Pono’s chest. “I’m surprised they don’t give you a handj—” He clears his throat. “Ma’am, I am sorry. That was not appropriate. That’s not appropriate language for a driver. I won’t—I shouldn’t—please don’t tell anybody I said that.”
    She laughs. It’s been a long flight, but the sun is warm, and Martian landscape or no, she’s in Hawaii. “It’s fine, Pono. You live around here?”
    â€œNo, I live in Lihue.” He still seems embarrassed or worried. “How about you? Where are you coming from?”
    â€œThe mainland. Bethesda.”
    â€œOh, good, good.” He turns around like he wants to say something. Then he faces forward. Then he turns around again. “Just a tip? We don’t like it when you call it the ‘mainland.’”
    â€œOh. Now it’s my turn to apologize.”
    â€œIt’s no big deal. It’s just—we’re kama’aina here. This is our mainland, you know? It’s where we’re from.”
    â€œSo, what do you call it? The States?”
    He clucks his tongue. “See, that’s a whole other problem because Hawaii is a state, you know? So it sounds dismissive to call it that. Like we’re somehow not really officially a state.”
    â€œYou don’t want to be a part of the country, but you don’t want to be told you’re not a part of the country?”
    Pono snaps his fingers. “Bingo! You got it.” Another low chuckle. “We Hawaiians are hard to please, huh?”
    â€œBeing hard to please just means you know what you want, and that’s a good thing.” Those words belong to her father, and to hear them coming out of her mouth churns a sudden high tide of guilt in the well of Hannah’s gut. She misses her father, suddenly. Grief to join the guilt, hand in hand, driving off the cliff like Thelma and Louise.
    Outside, the car passes guardrails painted with the unearthly umber dust. Signs of the Hawaii she imagines pop up here and there—more palm trees, purple bougainvillea on the roadside, a blue pickup truck bounding along in front of them loaded down with surfboards and scuba gear. More chickens, too, scratch and peck about.
    â€œWhat’s with all the chickens?” she asks.
    â€œAh. Yeah, yeah, those are the Iniki chickens. Hurricane Iniki came in and wiped out a buncha chicken cages in ’92, set a lot of birds free. They went feral and kept breeding. Invasive species, they say.” He shrugs. “At least they eat the centipedes!” Then Pono says, “Here we go,” and turns the Town Car down a little dirt road, Lokokai, that runs parallel to the rocky shore. Pono gets out.
    At the end of the road sits a small condo building and a gravel lot. “Tomorrow,” Pono says, grunting as he bends over to pull her carry-on out of the trunk, “I’ll pick you up. Bright and early. Ka puka ’ana o ka lā . Sun comes up, I get you to the