“Okay, here’s your cookie. And I get one for being right. But we have to save them ‘til we’re done looking at the book; we wouldn’t want to get crumbs all over the bluebirds, right?”

　“Right!” He sets the Oreo on the arm of the chair and we begin again at the beginning and page slowly through the birds, so much more alive than the real thing in glass tubes down the hall.

　“Here’s a Great Blue Heron. He’s really big, bigger than a flamingo. Have you ever seen a hummingbird? I saw some today!”

　“Here in the museum?”

　“Uh-huh.”

　“Wait ‘til you see one outside—they’re like tiny helicopters, their wings go so fast you just see a blur....” Turning each page is like making a bed, an enormous expanse of paper slowly rises up and over. Henry stands attentively, waits each time for the new wonder, emits small noises of pleasure for each Sandhill Crane, American Coot, Great Auk, Pileated Woodpecker. When we come to the last plate, Snow Bunting, he leans down and touches the page, delicately stroking the engraving. I look at him, look at the book, remember, this book, this moment, the first book I loved, remember wanting to crawl into it and sleep.

　“You tired?”

　“Uh-huh.”

　“Should we go?” Okay.

　I close Birds of America, return it to its glass home, open it to

　Flamingo, shut the case, lock it. Henry jumps off the chair and eats his Oreo. I return the felt to the desk and push the chair in. Henry turns out the light, and we leave the library.

　We wander, chattering amiably of things that fly and things that slither, and eating our Oreos. Henry tells me about Mom and Dad and Mrs. Kim, who is teaching him to make lasagna, and Brenda, whom I had forgotten about, my best pal when I was little until her family moved to Tampa, Florida, about three months from now. We are standing in front of Bushman, the legendary silverback gorilla, whose stuffed magnificence glowers at us from his little marble stand in a first floor hallway, when Henry cries out, and staggers forward, reaching urgently for me, and I grab him, and he’s gone.