Perry watched the fourth and final video which had been left for him – this one by Araceli alone – immediately prior to departing the hospital for his new apartment and new, or resumed, life.

“You have everything?” Penelope asked him. “I know it isn’t much. But you could watch the video first and then gather what you’re taking, and sign out.”

‘No need, everything’s in here,” he said, lifting up a cloth bag. “Not much, as you said. Just the printouts of what you’ve given me. And the few clothes I acquired here.”

“There’s much more in the apartment,” she said. “Let me turn this on, then.”

Once again she turned the screen toward him.

Araceli was alone, and she looked to be well into her eighties. She was smiling, and alert, but slighter – not surprisingly – than at sixteen.

“I can’t believe I outlived her,” Perry told Penelope.

“Daddy,” his daughter said. She sat straight, with her hands folded in her lap. “It’s me. Araceli. Many years have passed. I know that’s hard to tell, since I look amazing.” Her smile broadened, with a flash of the radiance he’d seen at sixteen.

“I made it into the Twenty-Second Century. And almost through its first decade. I’m sorry that I – we – went so long without recording. We began to worry that it might almost be – cruel to speak of everything you missed. I’m so sorry you weren’t with us. I truly hope you see these.

“Mother passed away at eighty-eight. That was 2071. She had a wonderful life. She kept working with the school system for her entire career. She raised me, then helped with my children. I had three.

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“I became a social worker. I spent my career in schools, and then a hospital.”

She smiled again.

“It’s so – odd to look back on my life. I know what it was, now. I know the story. It went well. I was happy. I met good people, and I fit in well with everyone. And much of that was because of you. Even though you were with me for only ten years, they were the most important ten. You set me up to have a good life. And you were good for Mother, too. Even after you left – there was a stability with us that you had helped establish.

“I hope I passed some of that on to my children. They have done well, themselves, and I have five grandchildren. You should have descendants around, whenever you come back.

“Mother never married again, Daddy. You were her only husband, and I am her – your – only child.

“I came to see you in the hospital several times. They showed me the case. It was . . . not easy to look at you. Mainly because you never changed. Mother said that Dr. Saars-Tomlin believed that the machine might heal you on its own, given enough time, or that medical science might catch up and be able to . . . revive your brain, essentially. But neither of those has happened, yet.

“I’m recording this because I am not sure how much longer I have. Of course I have not been sure of that for a long time. Who is? But lately I’ve been feeling more tired. I’ve had a long, wonderful life, just like Mother.

“I am the last person who . . . remembers you. I find myself being so blunt. I can’t imagine what you’ll have to go through when you return, given all you have been through already.

“You made the news, you know. I wonder if you’ll be able to look up the headlines, when you return. You were working, in a tunnel beneath a pyramid in Mexico. It collapsed. They pulled you out, but not quickly enough. They took you to a hospital in Merida, and then medevaced to Richmond. That’s where mother spoke to Dr. Saars-Tomlin.”

She paused.

“You led quite a life. I hope you live another.”