The California sky turns light blue. I pour myself a bowl of cereal. I’ve always heard grown-ups talking about the sunrise like it’s something magical, so I go to the window to watch, listening to my parents breathing in their sleep, trying not to get milk on the green dress and failing. The colors in the sky change. I thought I’d change too but I don’t. Daddy’s lips are still a little pink with Mom’s lipstick.

* * *

The sea is supposed to be soothing. Maybe I can isolate the sound without seeing it in my mind’s eye. I can pretend it’s the sound of pebbles falling, like those annoying rain sticks that middle-class hippies always have in their houses. Or beaded curtains swaying. Finally I’m falling into sleep listening to the push and pull, the pound and splash, the stupid sea that’s everywhere, the dumb wet thing that’s got me surrounded, and oh God, I’m going to have to take a shower tomorrow, maybe I should just get it over with now, and anyway it’ll be nice to be clean when they get here. I’ll tidy the house, I’ll cook.

Calm down. There’s plenty of time to take care of everything. In this moment, everything’s fine. They promised they’d be back. They have to come. They have to.

You fucking bastards, where are you?

Sea sounds, pull, push, lift-and-drop, blah, blah, blah. Big bully that doesn’t know when to stop, slapping the cliff that holds up my house just because it’s bigger and it can.

Fuck it, it’s too early to sleep. Never mind.

I pull on a T-shirt and some underwear and go downstairs. I remember the newspaper I bought this morning, toss it from my bag onto the couch, and turn on the TV for background noise. It’s much harder to take the news when you’re in a room alone. Wednesday’s paper, but it doesn’t matter. I thought it would bother me, never being able to get the paper the day it comes out. The Swans buy newspapers like history books. They’re not fussed that a few days have passed since the events in them. If they need to know what’s happening right this second, they can watch CNN. On TV there’s one of those reality shows where a pro nanny comes into a troubled family and helps the parents figure out how to keep their horrible kids in line. One of the kids just threw a brick at the nanny. The mom’s crying but the nanny doesn’t flinch.