THEN
The half shell of the charred kukui nut was hard to hold and scrape at the same time. Koa cupped the black shell in her palm and dug the char out carefully with the tip of a salvaged butter knife, capturing the soot in a clean mayonnaise jar held between her bare thighs. A little smaller than an opihi, those tasty reef-clinging limpets, this was still easier to grasp than those were with their razor edges and snail excretions.
She’d been burning the shells all morning around the fire, lined up inside the ring of stones. Their smell, heavy and rank, clung to her skin and hair as the dye she made from it soon would; at least until she could have her first bath.
Finished removing the soot powder, she screwed the mayonnaise jar’s lid on, frowning at the rust already breaking through the paint. Nothing metal lasted long here; the air…
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