The mall was not far from the museum, a ten minute walk through clean afternoon streets, the kind of walk that required no particular conversation and was better for it.
The city moved around them at its usual indifferent pace, yellow cabs cutting lanes, pedestrians flowing in and out of crosswalks without breaking stride, a food cart on the corner sending the smell of roasted nuts drifting into the cold air.
Guiying had his camera out.
He took a picture of a pigeon sitting on top of a fire hydrant with the composed dignity of something that owned the block.
He took a picture of a flower stall with buckets of ranunculus spilling color onto the pavement, pale pink and white and a deep burnt orange that caught the afternoon light in a way that made his fingers move before his brain had finished deciding.
