February was a long, slow burn. The storms would roll in by late afternoon—bruise-purple clouds that split the sky with lightning and dumped rain so hard the gutters sang. Then, as quickly as they came, they vanished, leaving the world steaming and a double rainbow over the tin roofs of the suburb.
“Obviously,” Leo grinned.
The summer months for Australia—December, January, and February—arrived not with a whisper, but with a shimmering, cicada-drunk roar. summer months for australia
For Leo, a thirteen-year-old who measured his life in cricket overs and the depth of the tide, the first true sign wasn’t the calendar. It was the mangoes. Overnight, the supermarket bins overflowed with the sweet, golden-red fruit, and the kitchen counter became a sticky battlefield of juice and ambition. February was a long, slow burn