Late evening in the gallery. Outside the windows, the lights of New York City lit up like stars falling to earth. Emily had finished marking up the exhibit when she heard familiar footsteps. Sebastian entered quietly, not disturbing the silence she so appreciated at the end of the day.

- Are you still here? - He asked, taking off his coat.

- Just finished. I couldn't leave without taking another look at the new work.

They approached a painting that had barely arrived from the auction. It showed a nighttime drawbridge overhanging the dark water. On one side of the bridge stood a man in a light-colored cloak, on the other a woman in a long coat. Moonlight hugged their silhouettes. They were reaching for each other - arms outstretched in a desperate effort to connect. But there was a tiny gap between their fingers. A millimeter separating eternity.

- "It's 'Moonlight Bridge,'" Sebastian said, staring at the painting. - It's by Lauren Fairbanks. The artist disappeared right after she painted it. Her fate is a mystery.

Emily turned to him.

- Why did you buy it?

He answered slowly:

- Because I once stood on a bridge like that. And couldn't take a step forward.

They fell silent. Only the hum of the city rolled on behind the glass.

Emily took a step closer, looking at the painting with a soft sadness.

- Why, if these two really love each other," she said almost in a whisper, "does this tiny space between their fingers matter so much? It's just one step. One moment. Why does it seem impossible?

Sebastian did not answer. He continued to stare at the painting as if he were on that bridge himself, on the border of light and darkness. The silence between them hung as thin as the millimeter between the painted hands.

Outside, the hum of the city intensified: glass rang somewhere far away, an ambulance passed by, the wind howled between the houses. The sounds swallowed up the question, and the night itself seemed to shelter it in the folds of its shadows.

Emily lowered her gaze. For the first time, she felt a strange shiver, as if for a moment she'd looked beyond the obvious, to where the answers were not spoken aloud.