Sarah Blanchard

Jacob Shigomitsu rubbed a shoulder blade against a rough-barked ʻōhiʻa tree as he worked the kinks out of a lariat and contemplated what to do with his mule. The mule swiveled its enormous furry ears toward Jake and stared back from between the rusty bars of the small pipe-panel corral.
It certainly wasn’t your average mud-gray, slab-sided, undersized Hawaiian scrub mule.

Nine-year-old Liz Walters knew the old playscape was off-limits and had been for years. She hadn’t planned to climb the ladder. This was just going to be a reconnaissance mission.
By mid-afternoon on a Friday in late August, she’d crossed Johnson’s cow pasture and was standing behind the closed-up village school, contemplating the sad condition of its abandoned playground.