Andy climbed up barefoot and stripped down to a pair of cut-offs. He had the bucket and a scrub brush. He took the sun screen from a cubbyhole and rubbed it into his arms and legs and his torso and what he could reach of his back. Filling his hand with cream again he dropped the bottle onto the bench then cut the cream into both hands and smeared his palms over Mitchell’s cheeks and temples and across his forehead into his hairline, pushing his hat back. Mitchell watched ahead, steering silently while his nose and the back of his neck and his forearms were rubbed with cream.

"Do you want your sleeves rolled down?"

Mitchell looked into blue reflections on Andy’s sunglasses. "I’m too hot for it."

Andy looked astern and then at Mitchell again. He took the sun screen from the bench and poured more of it into his hand and wiped it onto Mitchell’s neck where his collar was open.

Mitchell felt the heat test his heart. "Is there more of that?"

"Plenty."

"Keep it on us. This is brutal."

"You need sunglasses."

Mitchell nodded, remembering when he could afford those things.

Andy dropped the bucket over the side and filled it. He took it to the foredeck and sat on his heels with the bucket trapped between his knees while he scrubbed the deck. Mitchell glanced at the compass and checked the sails, a headache growing dull behind his eyes. He flopped his hand on the visor to pull it lower and then closed his eyes for some relief.

After scrubbing the foredeck Andy washed down the cabin top and the starboard deck. He refilled the bucket and worked aft, sweat dripping from his face and down his back. His willingness for this kind of work didn’t surprise Mitchell. There was a rightness to it. This was the time to square away and freshen their spirits for whatever lay ahead. Even the sun’s terrible glare seemed in its place, the vastness staggering, illuminated to its farthest reaches. They were in their own world now, on their own planet. Forty feet of it. And it was a good sign Mitchell thought. They were in touch with the health of their environs.

Mitchell drank from the jug and poured water onto his shirt front and on his shoulders, hoping to postpone the inevitable battle against the heat.

"Do you want a spaghetti sandwich?" Andy asked from below, his voice was muffled by the food in his mouth. With both hands on the bread he took a bite then juggled the sandwich to keep the spaghetti from falling out. He wiped the sauce from his hands on his shirt.

Back to normal Mitchell thought. "Give me some fruit. And some vegetables when you get a chance."

Andy took the helm while Mitchell ate. He glanced too often at the compass and the sea’s emptiness, anxious to escape the monotony of steering. Mitchell kept his head down to guard his eyes against the sun reflections. A breeze pressed the wetness from his shirt and soothed his skin before it dried. He took the helm again.

The wind fell off in mid-afternoon. The sails luffed and the sun burned through Mitchell’s shirt. Heat everywhere. Adrift, the sloop rocked in long sea undulations. Andy climbed up from below through the forehatch, he pushed the genoa out beyond the lifeline so any breeze would fill it, but it only luffed again and hung like a great curtain over foredeck.