ADVENTURE JOURNEY EPISODES
by Jeremy Russell

Episode 2: Kauai, Hawaii, Winter 1984

Looking out across the craggy, verdant cliffs of the Napali Coast, Akiko wondered how she could have been born in Hawaii and not braved this expedition before. If it hadn't been for Dave's calm, seductive self-assurance, she might never have come.

After enjoying a particularly stunning viewpoint in silence for some time, she finally allowed him to turn her towards himself. Smiling, she shut her eyes and leaned her head back in a motion of not unpleasant surrender, but as their lips met there was an enormous crash from the sea, as if some Polynesian Poseidon--Tangaroa, perhaps, or one of the other Akua--had taken umbrage.

Startled, Akiko spun out of Dave’s grasp, whipping his face with her long dark ponytail. "What was that?"

"Whale," Dave said, pointing almost straight below them and plucking a stray black strand off his tongue.

A few dozen yards off the coast a huge gray tailfin pulled itself free from the surf. Near it, a black, inflatable Zodiac watercraft filled with tourists, whose presence seemed wholly insignificant, bobbed on the ruffled wake. Dave put his hand on Akiko's shoulder.

"Wouldn't that make a great commercial?" he said, but Akiko was too amazed to respond.

After a moment, he added, "You know who we did get for the ads?" but she was still more interested in the spectacle of the cetacean. "That adventurer dude you mentioned, Hyoichi Yama-what's-his-name."

Akiko let her eyes flicker up a moment. "I've always wanted to meet him."