To be honest, the place makes her a little nervous all those complicated cubicles snaking around each other like a labyrinth. She likes situations where she knows which direction to run if she has to. But everything is quiet. It looks like the place hasnt been opened at all in twenty years or more. They stroll from room to room, standing in front of the artwork. Some of them are just patches of colour on canvas and these are the ones Maury likes, his eyes filling up with the colour, the thick textures of the paint.

She finds him, palm flat against one of the canvases as though feeling it for heat.

No touching, Maury.

She pulls his thick arm down.

This is art, Maury. You just cant touch it like that. These things have gotta last a million years so people in the future know about us. So they can look and see what we knew about beauty.

He looks at her with those flat distant eyes of his, then he looks back at the painting.

Now you and me, we aint connoisseurs of nothin. Most of these we may not understand because they werent painted for the likes of us. But sooner or later someones gonna come along who knows how to read these things and itll be like a message from another civilization. Thats how it works, you see? Thats how people talk to each other across time. It puts you on a wonder, doesnt it?

In another room, she finds a painting that just looks like a bunch of trees, like a forest or something, but then she notices a little bitty cabin in the distance, just barely visible between the trunks of the trees. The light in the painting is something she cant describe. It looks like night-time where we are standing, but it looks like daytime in the distance where the cabin is. She stares at the cabin for a long time, her mind filled up with the shape of it, the peacefulness of it. It looks like a place she would like to go if she knew how to get there.

She pulls her eyes away from it. She knows if she looks at the painting too long it will make her sad about the way things are.

In the gift shop she finds something for Maury a ballpoint pen with a horse and carriage inside that moves back and forth when you tilt it.

Look at this magic pen I got for you, she says and tilts it in front of his eyes so he can see. His eyes focus deep, like he would like to put himself on the carriage inside that pen.

Go on, she says, handing it to him. You can keep it. Its a present. Who knows, maybe today is your birthday.

*