Under the morning sun in Billington's Cove

As The Reading Man awoke on that summer Wednesday, he remembered dreaming of conversations with goldfish.  He must have been under water, for they, plural, swam right up to his face, their mouths opened and closed and they spoke, in English, to him in clear tones unmuffled by water or any assumed lack of familiarity with talking.  What they discussed he could not recall.

With their glowing hues still bright in his interior vision, he opened his eyes to the unaccustomed brightness of a Billington's Cove morning.  As it had some weeks earlier, sun somehow managed to overcome the tradition of fog and damp that made The Cove such a destination for those fleeing the valley heat.  In a shade he knew intimately, stripes and pools of egg yolk yellow inched across his bed, the floor, the walls.  My favorite color, he thought before he took in the significance of this meteorological transformation.  The first warm spell introduced him to communal outdoor movies.  If the tales were true, this one might signal - did he dare to hope? - a town-wide dance.  A dance.

Original art and glowing eggy goodness by Jennifer Bellinger.  Thank you.

He said "thank you" out loud to a universe whose nearest-to-Earth star had altered his vision of the day.  Never one to dawdle when there were places to be, he reached Gloria's as though he was two men, twins perhaps, one who was quicker and more eager than the second, one who believed this was a race he had to win.  He left his imagined, slower self in the dust.

Taking the path to the kitchen door, Mr. Apotienne, at the same time, kept watch on the light-capped sea, coaxing, encouraging it, silently pleading his case for clear skies and off-shore winds.  These were wizardly doings he thought, knowing fully that areas of high pressure and low pressure altered the weather patterns.  It only seemed like magic.

As he stepped onto the small porch, Gloria opened the door.  "What does this signify?" he asked, hands indicating everything within view which had begun to grow toasty as the temperature rose.  "And whatever it brings, will you go with me?"  Gloria, laughing, said she was just about to extend the same invitation to him.  Knowing he'd understand the West Side Story reference, she told him, "There'll be a dance tonight at the gym."  Not a gym, probably a field or cordoned-off street, but a dance all the same.  He was twins again, this time one a sweaty-palmed teen, the other a slightly-less-sweaty palmed man of advanced years but one who was pretty sure he could dance to anything they played.