Start reading Salt Water Blood
Read an extract of Salt Water Blood by Manuia Heinrich.
My name held a secret.
As the story went, Moana-sea claimed me when I was in my mother’s belly. Her waves whispered to my parents, convincing them to name me after her. Moemoana – ocean dream.
But not all dreams end well.
Everyone except me was staring at Moana from the beach of the Reef Resort & Spa, Vaeaga’s luxury hotel. Tourists had travelled from all over to stay in thatch-roofed bungalows and admire the sea. It was obvious why: Moana glittered like the finest sapphires, her wave crests dipped in gold. As she ebbed and flowed gently, she lulled them into quietude . . .
Because they couldn’t hear her thoughts.
Unlike me.
The thoughts would randomly pop into my head, like now: More tears and hunger await the girl with the ukulele; her mother won’t stop gambling their lives away.
Pursing my lips, I did what I knew how to do best: I put my headphones on. Music blasted in my ears, drowning out her voice.
Better.
Despite myself, my eyes flickered to the girl. Her cheeks were sunken, her fingers stiff from playing the ukulele for passing tourists. I walked towards the doors of the main foyer of the resort.
Without stopping, I fished the money for my and my brother’s lunch from my purse and dropped it in the girl’s upturned hat.
I, too, had a selfish mother.
Later, I stood in a corner of the foyer and tapped a finger on my thigh to the beat of an Imagine Dragons song as I waited for my boss.
Tourists lined up before the Bureau des Informations. Teenagers, many of them my former classmates from Vaeaga High, queued outside the conference room. A note on the door read UN Youth Speech Audition.
I spotted Fara and lost my rhythm. Though she was one of the quietest people I knew, her colours shouted – long pink hair, coral leggings, the resort’s blue polo shirt. Not long ago, I would’ve gone to her and joked that Barbie called to have her ponytail back. Now I stayed where I was, pretended I didn’t see her. Same as last week, when we’d received our high school diplomas and barely exchanged a nod.
I looked down at my phone.
I could tell you what sixty-three times seventeen was, or how oceans produced half of the world’s oxygen, but not why Fara started ghosting me four months ago, until we practically became strangers.
One thousand and seventy-one, by the way.
A hand waved in front of my face.
A grey-haired man and a woman wrapped in beach towels and reeking of sunscreen stood in front of me. Tourists, probably guests of the resort.
I pulled my headphones down reluctantly.
The woman eyed my uniform and name tag reading Moemoana Auri and asked, ‘Do you work here, mademoiselle?’
‘Yes.
’For the past year, I’d worked at Reef’s wildlife park, feeding the animals and cleaning the tank pumps on weekends. This morning was my last shift. I was about to hand my key card over to my boss.
‘Hallelujah,’ she breathed, opening a brochure to a map of the island. ‘Tell me, what’s the best place to, you know’ – she lowered her voice – ‘receive signs?’
I suppressed an eye roll. Vaeaga wasn’t a crystal ball. It was our fenua, our island. Moana was its blood, and feti'a, the stars, our guides in the map-sky.
‘I’m sure the Bureau des Informations can help you,’ I said. ‘It’s right over’ – I froze as I saw Temanea speaking with Fara near the conference room, and finished more quietly – ‘right over there.’
Temanea Yung had been in my biology, maths, French, and social studies classes last year – he had been pretty much everywhere for my whole life. He was obsessed with sanitising lotion, had this maddening habit of turning every pencil into a toothpick, and was convinced he could beat me in maths every year of school. In other words, he was delusional. Usually, he wore the same work uniform as me – still, he always looked clean, even after his shifts – but now he was in jeans and a short-sleeved shirt.
Of course he’d audition for the UN speech. He wouldn’t miss a competition.
‘Non, merci,’ the woman said, pulling my attention back to her. ‘We were in the queue before, and it’s not moving. Tell me, would you recommend Irina’s Bakery?’
The pastries and retia cakes at Irina’s were to die for, but you never knew when you’d get one with unpredictable effects, like making you cry or reveal things you’d rather keep hidden. I was pretty sure that wasn’t the kind of sign she and her husband were after.
‘I . . . uh, wouldn’t, no,’ I said.
Across the room, Fara laughed at something Temanea said, and he grinned at her.
The lady lifted her map and tapped a finger on the resort. Building it had caused our town, Oipa, to swell around it like a tumour in just a few years. Now there was a huge market beside the quay, and new cafés and shops had invaded Vā, the main street, dressing it up with bricks and tropical palms. She traced the coastline of Matuku on the west, where I lived, her finger following a winding road towards the centre of the island and its hill chain before stopping on the highest peak, coloured blue on the map. ‘Is it true there’s a magical forest here?’ she asked.
I pursed my lips. I didn’t like that word, ‘magical’. Aru, the forest she was asking about, was like the ocean: alive. According to legends, it could return what you had loved and lost. But no one who had gone into the blue-hazed jungle had come out in decades. Aru was a maze where people had to confront their past, their mistakes. Rumour had it that the task was so hard that they always got stuck inside.
‘Don’t go there,’ I said firmly, hoping she’d listen.
Despite signs warning people not to enter Aru, the occasional tourist did – and never returned.
I lifted my head and found Temanea’s eyes on me. His gaze flicked to the tourists, then back to me, meaning Feeling social today? I clutched my phone and channelled a Get lost with a raised eyebrow. One side of his mouth tilted up, revealing his dimple.
Oblivious, Fara kept speaking to him, her pink hair wrapped around her finger.
‘Do you like Yung, then?’ Beach Towel Lady asked.
‘What? No, I don’t like him!’ I bit out before realising she was asking about the grocery shop Temanea’s parents owned, not him. The couple exchanged a glance, and heat rose to my cheeks. ‘I mean, let me see.’ I considered the map, even though I knew Vaeaga like the back of my hand and could walk to Yung’s in my sleep.
Partial extract from Salt Water Blood by Manuia Heinrich, available November 17.
Salt Water Blood
by Manuia Heinrich
A teen fights to clear her brother of a murder charge by embracing her gift of hearing the sea's prophetic thoughts in this young adult speculative thriller.
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