They wavered on the first attempt, a slight tremor that once would have stopped him altogether, but Henry did not flinch. He pressed on and finished with a quiet exhale.
“It stayed,” he whispered.
Something tightened low in Marcus’s chest. “It did.”
Henry looked up, eyes bright, hopeful, carrying the fierce need for approval he rarely asked for outright.
“I want to play it for Miss Edgewood tomorrow,” he said. “But only if it stays overnight. Sometimes it leaves.”
“It won’t,” Marcus said. “Not tonight.”
Satisfied, Henry climbed onto his bed and pulled the blanket to his chin. Marcus dimmed the lamp but left the small night candle burning, the compromise they had reached weeks ago.
“Papa,” Henry said as Marcus turned away.
“Yes?”
“Miss Edgewood looked… different today.”
Marcus paused.
“She didn’t smile right.”
His breath stilled.
“Is it because of the man in the street?” Henry asked.
Marcus crossed the room again and sat on the edge of the bed. Henry watched him with that unnerving childhood perception that slipped past what adults tried to hide.
“Yes,” Marcus said quietly. “In part.”
Henry drew the woolen dog close. “You walked loud today,” he said. “The house heard you.”
Marcus swallowed.
Children named truths adults tried to avoid.
“I suppose,” Marcus said after a moment, “that I remembered something today.”
“What?” Henry whispered.
“That sometimes,” Marcus said, “when something is worth protecting, quiet is no longer enough.”
Henry nodded, the logic simple and solid to him.
“We keep Miss Edgewood safe,” he said. “Right?”
Marcus’s breath caught. The innocence. The certainty.
“Yes,” he said. “We do.”
Henry yawned, his eyes already drifting. “And she likes when you come,” he murmured into the woolen dog’s ear. “She smiled different.”
Heat rose in Marcus’s throat. Not desire. Not fear. Something older and deeper.
“I don’t know about that,” he said softly.
Henry was already half-asleep. “I saw it.”
