And near Half Moon Bay, just below the town of San Sebastian, the yellow becomes bright orange, in hundreds and hundreds of pumpkins, lying all carelessly across the fields in late October. Much of this spectrum of color is visible from the small enclosed deck that Celeste and Charles (her design, actually) have had built just off their bedroom, where on sunny days they often have breakfast as they observe the view: the hills, fields, and the somnolent, bland blue sea. At the moment, they are discussing a projected party, theirs, with a somewhat odd raison d’être: it is to be a coming-out party, of sorts, for Edward, who has been operated on for an intestinal polyp, “not benign,” as the doctors delicately phrased it, but they also said that “they got it all”; Edward is all right now. (Edward, somewhat to the surprise of Charles and Celeste, found the idea hilarious: “Really? my coming out? I can hardly believe it.” Amid gales of most un-Edward-like laughter.) “Yes, it is somewhat macabre, as a reason for a party,”
