The sun set with a hiss as the wave hit the beach. The woman continued up the checkered black and gold tiles of the malecón to the cliffs on the hill. Other people resumed walking too, once the sun had set, like spectators leaving a play. It isn’t just the beauty of the tropical sunset, she thought, the importance of it. In Oakland the sun set into the Pacific each evening and it was the end of another day. When you travel you step back from your own days, from the fragmented imperfect linearity of your time. As when reading a novel, the events and people become allegorical and eternal. The boy whistles on a wall in Mexico. Tess leans her head against a cow. They will keep doing that forever; the sun will just keep on falling into the sea.