Ceiba Phillips, 11, couldn’t believe what he saw when he returned to his Southern California neighborhood a month after a wildfire reduced it to rubble.
The ruins of his best friend’s house and his beloved school. His house survived, but the backhouse where his grandparents lived and packed him lunch every morning was reduced to ashes and a silver pool of melted aluminum. His favorite cozy diner, Fox’s, was decimated.
Seeing it in person — after seeing it through photos — brought shock and tears.
