Prologue
Kai, eight years old
Calm hushed over glossy blue seas as we sailed through open water. With my dad at the helm and me sitting cross-legged in the bow of the boat, I basked in the perfect winds, which were doing most of the work. Unpredictable as it was, the sea was never calm for long.
I called out through the cockpit window, “When will we be home, Daddy?”
His eyes remained straight ahead as he shouted back, his voice fighting against the wind. “We should arrive at the dock tomorrow! Early evening, I’d say!”
I leaned back on my palms and looked up, letting the sun warm my face. This had been one of our longer journeys, round trip from Ko’Olina Harbor in Oahu, Hawaii to Los Angeles, California then back again, with only a short week of rest in between. After the past eighteen days of constant movement, I was looking forward to some normalcy. Sturdy ground. Hawaiian soil. Fresh manapua and poke from the nearest corner store. I was practically salivating in anticipation.
My life was one big adventure, thanks to my father. He believed more heart existed in the ocean than anywhere else on Earth. A home was wherever we chose to make it, but traveling among endless waters with nothing but nature to revel in for days on end—that was his idea of living.
“Sailing is the only universe you’ll ever need,” he told me later that day as he was slacking off the main sheet to relieve pressure on the sail. “You’ll never get closer to nature than being right here, Kai.” He raised his arms and waved them. “Look at us, working with the universe instead of against it. You resist these winds, these waves, you’ll likely pay for it. But”—he lowered the main halyard, and the sail started to come down—“if you’re one with nature, like this…” He continued to take tension off the left downhole before cranking the main halyard back up then replacing the main sheet with the reef line. The sheet puffed as wind filled it with a heavy thwak. He’d just made a smaller sail out of a bigger one to work better with the changing winds. “Then the wind will always be on your side.” He raised his arms and grinned as he admired his handiwork. “See?”
I felt an immediate shift at my feet. What felt a bit unsteady moments before was much smoother, like we were riding with the waves instead of against them, yet we were still controlling our direction.
His kind eyes met mine before he wrapped an arm around my shoulders, squeezing me close. “This will be you one day, Kai. You’ll become the master of the seas and make your old man proud.”
I hoped that was true. My chest felt as if it could burst just from watching him in his element. My father was a man who made me believe anything was possible. He taught me the true value of life through experiences most would never dare to dream. He was a sailor, a circumnavigator. But most importantly, he was my dad.
“Do you think Mom would have enjoyed living on the boat, like we do?” I asked him later that night after we’d shared a pot of macaroni and cheese.
We were sitting opposite each other at our slightly tippy wooden table, playing a game of rummy. His cards were fanned out in front of him as he ran a finger over their top edges, considering his next move. “Who do you think came up with your name, Kai?” He peered at me over his cards, a smile lifting his cheeks.
Kai meant “sea” in Hawaiian. It was apparently a boy’s name, but my parents didn’t care about conventional things like that. They liked the name and the meaning, so there it was: Kai Kalani Ashley.
“Your mother loved to sail. It’s how we met, you know?”
I smiled. “Yes, I know, Daddy.”
I’d heard the story many times—a daring woman and a brave young man who met as they were both sailing solo around the world, straight out of high school. They met somewhere in the middle and followed each other to every port until they reached home—well, Oahu for my mom and the Big Island for my father. Once they arrived at their final destination, they traded their two sailboats for one. They got married shortly after, against my mother’s family’s wishes. I was born seven years later. Four years after that, my mother passed away from a severe case of pneumonia.
“And, yes,” my father continued, “I think she would have loved to live right here with us. She’d be so proud of you, kaikamahine o ke Kai.” Brave daughter of the sea.
“I miss her,” I said, trying to hide my yawn. The truth was I didn’t remember much of her, but I still ached for the woman I’d barely known.
My dad smiled and reached over to wipe a tired tear that had escaped. “It’s time for bed, Kai.”
I nodded and watched as he made up my bed above the dining table. It reminded me of a coffin, the way the rotted panels of wood secured me on all sides. On nights when the boat’s turbulence would wake me from rocking, it served its purpose.
After I climbed in, he pulled the pink unicorn comforter up to my chin and kissed my forehead. I smiled and rested my eyes. “Night, Daddy. I love you.”
“I love you, too, Kai Bear. Sleep well. We’ll be home soon.”
I yawned again, fatigue already taking me under. “But I’m already home, Daddy.”
I awoke to what sounded like a train barreling past. My heart was already pounding so fast that I needed a minute to figure out a storm was rolling through. Wind whistled as rain splattered the deck above. My body tossed left then right, slamming into the walls of my bed as waves thrashed below.
My dad emerged from the aft cabin, his bedroom, at the end of the hall. His hair was standing in odd directions, and his eyes appeared to still be foggy from a deep sleep. I didn’t know what time it was, but by the bright glow of the moon through the starboard porthole, I figured it was close to midnight.
“Kai, are you okay?” He threw a hand out to brace himself against another intense rock of the boat.
“I’m okay, Daddy. It’s rough out there tonight, isn’t it?”
He moved beside my bed and ruffled my hair. “It’s just a little wind, Kai Bear. I’m going up to check on the jib. Go back to sleep.”
I wrapped my arms around my pillow as he climbed the three stairs leading to the deck and let himself out, slamming the door behind himself. That was how my father managed to solo sail everywhere we went. With unyielding confidence. Not even a sudden change in weather could freak him out.
He kept a schedule each night with an alarm by his ear to wake him up every twenty minutes to check on conditions. Most of the time, I never woke to witness his work ethic, but that night, I couldn’t help but think of my father as a superhero.
After another few minutes, exhaustion came over me. I fell in and out of sleep, my mind waking me often, and I hoped to see my father walk back into the galley. But I knew better. Normally, when the weather took a turn like that, he’d stay topside until things settled, sometimes even until morning.
I didn’t know why this time just felt… different.
I counted to three: three increments of twenty minutes, signaled by my father’s preprogrammed alarm, my body growing more alert as time went on. Then my eyes locked on something bright orange hanging on the hook beside the door my father had exited. Fear wrapped its ugly hands around my heart and squeezed. My father had scolded me frequently about wearing my life jacket when above deck. Why isn’t he wearing his?