It won't make sense at first, but hopefully, by the end, it will...

Just a girl with a ukulele

I have always counted myself as one of those people who can calmly and rationally accept and deal with whatever life throws at them. I may even have put it on several job applications. Clearly, there were eventualities I never took into a account when I made this self assessment. I obviously never wondered, for example, how I would cope in the event that I was stranded, alone, on a tiny island in the middle of a gigantic tropical storm. Wait, there was something else…oh, yes. In the dark.

Since I saw the tiny light out at sea, I have been rooted to the spot, straining my eyes into the darkness in the hope that I didn't imagine it. There's another crash behind me in the lab, and switching my flashlight on again (I have been trying to conserve the battery, although I'm not altogether sure what constitutes An Emergency any more), I'm just about to go inside when I see the light again. It's closer this time. And moving.

"FIN!" I yell, starting to run down the steps to the beach, "FIN!"

And at that moment, there's a wrenching noise and something hits me on the back of the head. Hard. Stars explode behind my eyes and then…nothing.

"You know what, Fin?" I throw the door to the lab open with a crash, "You were right. That was possibly the best swim yet. And I got lots of excellent samples for us to work on." I leave the plastic vials of water by the door, wring my hair out over the doorstep and grab my shorts and shirt from where I left them on the work bench. I pull them on over my bikini and twist my hair up and out of the way, securing it with a pencil. "Have you eaten yet? I was going to make myself a sandwich before going out this morning but I know your thoughts on eating before swimming. I'm thinking peanut butter and jelly, OK? Fin?"

Fin doesn't answer. I sigh, and head for the stairs to the kitchen.

"So you're applying for which job, exactly?"

It is nine thirty on a beautiful Saturday morning and we are having brunch at our favourite place at our favourite outside table. A long over-due brunch, if you ask me. What with her residency, Gabs hasn't really come up for air in about two months, and so when I spent my seventh weekend in a row marking eighth grade papers on why we shouldn't throw trash in the ocean, I decided that enough was enough. At least, that's where my train of thought began. Yesterday evening, I was just going to make sure that my best friend and I managed to carve some time out of our schedules to actually see each other, and then this morning, I picked up a paper on the way home from my run, and my train of thought…continued.

Mid-mouthful of french toast, I gesture with my knife at the paper lying on the table.

"Hand it over." Gabby pushes her shades on top of her head and reaches for the paper. She folds it down a second later, her eyebrows raised. "Water sampling at the Everglades Alligator Park? Shar, are you serious?"

"Um, no." I lean forward and wave my knife again, this time with more precision. "That one."

"And does this one involve wrestling with alligators too? 'Cause I'm really not..." Gabby's voice trails off as she actually reads the job description, and she looks at me over the paper again, her eyes wide. "Oh."

I nod. "Yeah."

She reads it through again, before looking up with a grin. She knows. "So…basically your ideal job, then?"

"Yep, pretty much." I lean back in my chair, stretch my legs out onto the empty chair next to me and squint up through the branches of the tree overhead. The sun is on my feet and it's dappled on my face and I close my eyes and try to convince myself that just for a second, imagining I'm already there won't jinx this for me.

"Hey Fin, whaddya reckon? I'm getting the hang of it, right?"

It's late afternoon and we've been working hard all day on the samples I collected before breakfast. I'd carry on working – there's so much to learn here – but there's only so long you can spend looking through a microscope before your eyes go all swimmy. That, and I'm getting pretty good at the ukulele. It arrived two weeks ago on the supply boat; a weird-shaped cardboard box bearing a felt penned inscription from my brother Ryan: Shar, put down the microscope and learn Somewhere Over The Rainbow. That's an order. Unloading something off the boat that's not a crate of tinned beans or a sack of rice is pretty insanely exciting, let me tell you, and I've never owned a musical instrument before, which perhaps explains my slightly lame urge to name her. Tiki (of course she's a girl) is aquamarine, with a dolphin-shaped bridge, and just running a finger across her open strings sounds like a song. After nine straight evenings spent on it (not to mention the odd lunch break), I am well on the way to mastering Somewhere Over The Rainbow, and with that success under my belt I have now moved on to Brand New Key. It's sounding pretty good, but I could use someone to sing it with, to be honest. Too bad Fin can't sing.

"Mom," My coffee arrives and I wedge my phone between my ear and my shoulder so I can make a start on it with my croissant before they both get cold. I won't be having another breakfast like this for a while and nothing is going to stand in the way of me enjoying it. Not even my mother phoning to register her dismay at my 'sudden decision to disappear off the face of the planet'. "Mom, I told you this would be part of the job when I applied for it nine months ago, it's one of the reasons I wanted it so much. I'm based at the Institute of Marine Biology in Maui, but staff here also man a research outpost on the Malahini Atoll." I spread apricot jam on a piece of croissant and chew it as my mother talks. "Yes Mom, way out in the middle of the ocean...two months out of every year…yes, mainly on my own…well, I see your point, but seeing as I've been an Aquatic Conservator and Researcher since I moved out to Maui five months ago, I was thinking I might try and squeeze in some aquatic conservation and research while I'm out there...I'm not sure what this has to do with anything but no, I'm not seeing anyone right now...no, Ben and I went our separate ways in January...I finished with him, actually...yeah, I know he was a very successful lawyer but he was also a colossal jerk...no, I'm not depressed about it, Mom, and that's not why I'm doing this…Yes, I know you don't get this, I know you...oh Mom," I lean back in my chair and cast a searching glance at the ceiling, "honestly, didn't you wonder why Ry gave me a Tikki warrior outfit for Christmas?" If this were a movie, the café would have ground to a halt by now, and everyone would be looking at me. As it is, only the guy at the next table – he's vaguely familiar; I think he works at the Institute too – looks up from his laptop and grins. I sigh as my mother runs through a list of the social functions I will be missing if I insist on going through with this 'hair-brained scheme'. I suspect this will not be the last time we have this discussion.

The wind and rain started at five this morning, hammering on the roof like marbles in a saucepan and whipping the ocean up into what might in poetic circles be termed 'a frenzy'. That in itself wouldn't be too much of an issue – it's not like I wasn't expecting the odd storm out here – but the generator and the satellite phone both going on the fritz at the exact same time, yeah, that's more of a problem. Thanking my lucky stars both for the fact that the generator chose to die in daylight and the massively detailed user manual-slash-idiot's guide put together by one of my Atoll predecessors, I was able to get it going again by the early afternoon, the only casualties being my raincoat and shorts which will need some kind of professional cleaning to remove all the grease.

Shedding my coat just inside the lab, I run upstairs to see if by some miracle the satellite phone has decided to start working again, and walk straight into a paper tornado caused by the catch on one of the shutters slipping. It's while I'm leaping round the room like the contestant on a game show in one of those money booths that I hear my mother's voice in my head, listing her objections to my chosen career path, and for the first time, to my absolute disgust, some of them start making sense.

"You know," I yell down the stairs to the lab as I deposit an armful of paper on my desk, "I'm beginning to wonder if Mom didn't have a point, Fin. I know, I know, that's something I never thought I'd have to...FIN?"

As I'm elaborating on the horror that comes with admitting my mother is or might be at least partially right, there's a huge crash from the lab. I drop the papers I'm carrying and dive for the stairs.

I know a lot of people thought I was crazy for wanting this job. Why, they asked themselves (and me, occasionally) would anyone willingly apply for a job knowing that two months out of every year would be spent almost entirely alone on a tiny coral island in the middle of the ocean? Mom thinks I've lost my mind. She regularly forwards me the monthly newsletter of their country club, presumably to show me what I'm missing and keeps me posted about the eligible sons of her friends who make lots of money and would be more than willing to take me 'out of that shack and away from all those microscopes and snorkels'. My teacher friends from my old job were beyond excited for me until I told them that the toilet was likely housed in an outbuilding and that I wouldn't have a Jacuzzi. It seems they had been thinking of visiting me. My brother Ryan is supportive in a slightly amused kind of way that suggests he secretly thinks I might have a tiny screw loose.

Out of everyone, Gabby is the one who gets it best. An insanely busy Paediatric Resident, she has little time for writing newsy letters, but also hates emailing and has compromised by sending me postcards. The most recent one arrived on the supply boat this morning, a picture of the Golden Gate Bridge with a Henry Rollins quote scrawled diagonally across the back of it in her increasingly illegible doctor's handwriting:

Loneliness adds beauty to life. It puts a special burn on sunsets and makes night air smell better.

Lying in my hammock, with the sky still full of pinkish blue light from the recently departed sun, I'm minded to agree.

"So I have a name for you." Taylor looks up from the large table over which we are putting together a presentation on coral erosion for a group of visitors to the Institute the following week.

I frown. "A name?"

Taylor grins. "A guy."

"A guy who can fix the air con in my apartment?" I already know the answer to this question.

"Could do, he's pretty handy. But no. Not exclusively. A guy for you."

I shake my head. "I don't think so."

"Girl, come on! It's been months!"

"Since…" I prompt.

Taylor rolls her eyes. "Since you finished with Ben the Jackass."

"Who…"

"Totally stomped on your heart."

"And after I finally got out of my PJs I…"

"Vowed to never date again."

"And in less than three weeks I will be…"

"Taylor rolls her eyes. "Moving to a desert island for two months."

I nod. "Thank you."

"But that's the best part!" Taylor sweeps a pile of papers aside in her excitement. "He works here! He'd totally get it! Plus you could talk about coral and starfish to your heart's content!"

I put a hand on her arm. "Tay, don't think I don't appreciate you thinking of me. I do. I really do. I just think that maybe I need some time on my own, you know? Clear my head."

"Fine." Taylor looks unconvinced. "I'm not done asking, though."

I grin. "I'd be disappointed if you did, Mckessie."

"Sharpay...Shar...hey, Evans!"

I come to with a start to find Maxwell, who I am about to relieve of duty, looking at me like I might have lost my mind. "Oh, hey Max," I say, trying not to look too much as if I have just come out of an atoll-induced trance. Which I totally have. "Sorry. A little spaced from staring at the horizon for so long, I guess."

He grins and gives me a hug. "No sweat, kid, it's exactly the face I wore when I first came out here. Good trip?"

Two hours in the sunshine watching the atoll turn from a fuzzy green dot on the horizon to a fully fledged island paradise. My home for the next two months. I nod. "The best."

"Cool." Max slings an arm round my shoulders. "Let's get our stuff switched around on the boat, and then I'll show you round."

Four hours later, after watching the boat speed back towards the mainland until it no longer looked like a boat, I'm familiarising myself with (and respectfully amending) Max's organisational system for microscope slides when I get the feeling I'm being watched. Sitting back on my heels, I look round and find myself face to tank (so to speak) with a large reef triggerfish.

"Oh," I leave my inventory and turn so I can look at him properly, "I didn't see you earlier. I thought the tank was empty."

He flips his tail derisively.

"Yeah, I know," I nod. "Unobservant, right? Well, this is my first time on the atoll. I guess it'll take a little getting used to. So you're a reef triggerfish, then?" Despite its recent reinstatement as the state fish of Hawaii, this is a species I've not had much to do with since I moved to Maui. I scoot closer to the tank and examine him more closely. "Well, you're very handsome, and that blue stripe is very dashing. And I think I'm right in saying that the fact that you're so colourful means you're happy, which is good."

As if to illustrate this, he performs a speedy lap of his tank.

"You're on your own so I guess that means you're pretty territorial, huh? Well, you're on your own, I'm on my own, I guess we can be lonely together." Lonely together? The utter insanity of what I've just said occurs to me. "Talking to a fish," I mutter, "Mom would have a field day." Vowing to never speak of this to anyone, I get to my feet. "You know what, fishy? I'm sure you won't be offended if I tell you that I have no wish to turn into Tom Hanks circa Castaway, and I'm pretty sure that this might put me well on that road. How about I check Max's manual, find out what you eat and make sure you get it regularly, and let that be the extent of our friendship? There are enough people who already think I've lost my marbles without this getting out."

He seems to understand.

Two hours later, my head full of inventories and the awesome sunset I just watched, I'm half-way up the stairs on my way to bed when I stop.

"'Night, Fin." I say, and smile into the dark.

The storm is over, at least for now. The rain has almost stopped, and the wind has died down, but not before throwing another monumental spanner in the works. Except unlike the satellite phone and generator, this one is going to be harder to fix. The crash I heard from upstairs was one of the lab shutters being blown open hard against the corner of Fin's tank, breaking the filter and sending a large crack running diagonally down one side. Water has started leaking through the crack, not much, but enough. Enough to mean that I'm going to have to re-house Fin in the next 24 hours, and I don't need any of my years of Marine Biology to tell me that he's not going to be happy in my water carrier or washing up bowl, which next to the tank are probably the next biggest things I have.

In the end, I make the decision and act on it before I can change my mind and let the part of my head that may actually have a screw loose have a say in the proceedings. Twenty minutes of preparation later, I am paddling out onto the eerily calm lagoon astride my surfboard with Fin, temporarily housed in my mixing bowl with a lid. When I am far enough out, I undo the bungee cord with which I secured the bowl to my board, remove the lid and slowly lower the bowl into the water.

"So this is it, buddy, this is your new pad. Cool, huh?"

Fin turns slowly, familiarising himself with his infinitely bigger new home, before flipping his tail at me one last time and swimming away.

Back at the lab, I drain Fin's tank, mop the floor and then head upstairs. Nothing is ruined beyond repair, but collecting together all the papers strewn across the floor, I come across Gabby's postcard of the Golden Gate Bridge, ripped from the wall and now lying face up in a puddle of rain water. I pick it up, and dry it off on the sleeve of my sweatshirt to read it, but this time, I'm not sitting outside in the hammock with a sunset painting the sky. This time, I'm standing in my damp bedroom, surrounded by the debris of a tropical storm and completely alone for the first time in almost six weeks having released my best friend (A FISH) back into the ocean, with the sky threatening yet more to come. Brushing tears away impatiently, I fold the postcard and slide it into my pocket, before going to try and fix the satellite phone.

By the evening, not only has the storm started up again, but I have also decided that I made a colossal mistake in releasing Fin. Of course, the rational part of my brain tells me that he'd never have survived if I hadn't, and that same part also tells me that a reef triggerfish, however big, would be powerless to save me from anything. Because fish are fish, Sharpay. Jeez. That doesn't stop the part of my brain that others saw when I didn't – the screw loose part – from believing that Fin was somehow protecting me and that by letting him go, I have recklessly endangered my life. Also, that if he were to turn into a human (I am so going to need help if I get out of this alive) he would be totally hot and would fill the gap in my life that until just now, I didn't know was there.

None of this screw-loosery is helped by the fact that in starting up again, the storm has caused the generator to fail for the second time, plunging the lab into near total darkness. On the way back from proving to myself that fixing a large piece of machinery in zero visibility and gale-force winds is entirely beyond my expertise, I'm at the door to the lab when I see a light out at sea, a tiny pin prick that sways and flashes once, twice, before disappearing. Then...nothing. Staring out into the darkness, I ask myself who it is I am looking for and an idea occurs to me, so ridiculous that I dismiss it instantly. The wind whips my wet hair in my face and I jump as a wave crashes high up on the beach. Behind me, I can hear the wind worrying at the shutters over the windows in the lab, the swish of papers I failed to weight down and was unable to save in the dark ticker-taping out of the door. This place has never been so full of the noise of wind and rain and waves, but it's never felt so empty. I feel in the pockets of my shorts for my flashlight and my fingers close round Gabby's postcard, a damp, folded piece of card that right at this moment feels like my only lifeline.

"So we'll expect the supply boat at…right…OK, great. Thanks Max…Yeah, I'll tell her…OK dude, talk to you later."

At first, I'm not sure what woke me up, but that in itself is confusing, because I didn't know you could wake up once you'd died. Then a deep voice filters through my consciousness at the same time as I realise that if I were dead, I probably wouldn't be in this much pain. An experimental shift across what turns out to be my bed proves that I may have sprained an ankle falling down the steps when whatever it was gave me the lump on the back of my head, as well as bruised ribs, a wrenched shoulder and what appears to be a teaspoon of sand behind each eyelid.

"Ow." It's involuntary.

There's a rustle and then, "Oh, hey." The deep voice speak again, and I open my eyes and blink up through all the sand at the blurry face looking down at me. "You're awake."

"Um, yes." I blink again, trying to sit up.

"Woah, hey, easy." A hand on my shoulder. "You took quite a beating last night."

Sitting up slower this time, I manage to properly open my eyes and look at my visitor. "You…" I begin, intelligently, "You were the light on the sea."

He smiles, and I'm suddenly sure that I've seen him before. "That's right. Nearly wrecked her on the reef coming in, but I just made it."

"So you're from the Institute?"

He nods. "We realised that your satellite phone had gone out and so after the storm had blown itself out, I came out to you."

"But it hadn't blown itself out."

"Right," he pulls a face, "or I probably would have brought a better boat. Or someone better at handling her than me. That weather front blew up out of nowhere. Anyway, by the time it had begun again, I was closer to the atoll than the mainland, so I just carried on." He smiles. "And it's probably quite a good thing I did, seeing as I thought that railing had killed you. One minute you were yelling someone's name, and the next, you were in a heap at the bottom of the stairs. Nearly gave me a heart attack."

I grin. "Sorry."

He shakes his head. "Not a problem. All part of the service. Who's Fin, anyway?"

"Fin?" Suddenly, it all comes back to me, but happily, in the way that a bad dream does. Somehow faint and removed. "Oh, no-one. A friend. I was pretty confused last night."

"Understandable." He holds out a hand, and I suddenly realise that he's the guy who smiled at me all those weeks ago in the café when I was wrangling with my Mom. "I'm Troy Bolton, by the way." I shake his hand and he grins. "Taylor's friend."

The information that this incredibly attractive tropical storm battling satellite phone fixer is also the guy that my friend had lined up for me should be the biggest news I have heard in weeks, but in that moment, I am entirely transfixed by the embroidered logo on his blue T-shirt.

"What…" Words fail me, so I point.

He looks down, puzzled for a second, before his face clears. "Oh, right, you were away. Yeah, the Institute changed their logo, and they had new T-shirts made. Neat, huh?"

"Um…" I say, weakly.

He grins, "They're the state fish of Hawaii, you know."

"Uhuh…"

"Not to mention the longest fish name in Hawaiian."

I nod again, but this time I smile. "That's right. They're pretty amazing fish, those Humuhumunukunukuapua'a…"