At the neighbourhood studio, Bernard was cutting a card mount for a photograph. He still framed pictures in retirement, but that afternoon he read one measurement from the wrong end of the ruler.
The opening came out too small.
He set the rejected mount beside his elbow and reached for another sheet. Across the table, Lina was packing away her paints. She had spent the afternoon drawing the houses opposite and could not decide where the picture should end.
“May I borrow that?” she asked.
Bernard handed her the scrap. Lina held its small rectangular opening towards the window. Most of the street disappeared. Inside the card remained one upstairs window, a green curtain and the edge of a tree.
She moved it left. A chimney entered. She moved it back.
“The first one,” she said.
Bernard stood beside her and held the card steady while she made a quick pencil sketch. When she finished, he lowered it. The whole street returned, including a bicycle neither of them had noticed before.
Lina set the little mount inside her sketchbook. Bernard went back to his photograph and measured the new sheet twice.
At closing time, her sketchbook lay on top of his finished frame. A narrow cream corner showed beneath the cover.