We still have brightness now, but the sun which brings it is blocked behind the clouds. A burning grey-white sky like molten ash that boils your eyes like the sun once did, and it hangs over every day like a tinfoil blanket, baking us into the ground. Dad doesn't talk about the sun unless you ask him, but unlike Mom he'll talk if asked, whereas she'll retreat into that silent place where she lives, behind her eyes, quiet and alone.
"It was very pleasant," he would say and he would smile in that way he had of making you feel like the pleasantness of the thing was in you, the listener, and not in his memory. "We could go on the water then, we weren't afraid of it and the heat from the sun would sort of push down on you, into your bones." If you looked dubious he'd clarify, "It was very pleasant," and smile, just to be sure you knew.
After two weeks of hot UV light, California doesn't seem so golden anymore. It burns my skin and eyes but there's no summer heat, no oozing warmth. I want my furnacy brightness back!
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