The word surfaces without authorization. I don't say it. But it sits behind my teeth while Kari climbs out of bed wearing nothing but the sheets and a smile that could dismantle every wall I've ever built.
She steals my henley.
Not asks. Not borrows. Steals. Pulls it off the chair where it landed last night, tugs it over her head, pads barefoot into the hallway like she belongs in my clothes the same way she belongs in this house — completely and without apology.
The henley hits her mid-thigh. The sleeves swallow her hands. They slide back down every time she reaches for a mug.
Coffee grounds measured by instinct. Water poured without looking. A quiet "behave" aimed at the percolator when it sputters.
"Stop staring. It's distracting."
"I'm assessing the perimeter."
"The perimeter is in the kitchen now?"
"The perimeter is wherever I say it is."
She turns, two mugs in hand. The smile she gives me isn't the bright sunshine she wears for the neighborhood. Quieter. Unguarded. The kind that only exists when no one's watching — except I'm watching, and she's letting me.
Her fingers brush mine on the handle.
"This is the part where you say something about how last night was a mistake and we need to maintain professional boundaries."
"Is it."
"In every book I've ever read, this is exactly that part. Fair warning — if you do the speech, I'm throwing this coffee at your head. It's the good stuff. Nina's single-origin. That's a significant sacrifice."
"I wasn't going to do the speech."
"Really."
"Really."
Her eyebrows go up. She holds her mug in her hands, studying me with the same meticulous attention she gives crumbling plaster. "Huh."
"Huh."
"I had a whole rebuttal prepared. Now I don't know what to do with it."
"Save it. You'll need it when I do something else stupid."
The laugh is short, warm, startled out of her. She catches it behind her coffee mug. Real joy, unguarded, the kind that only surfaces when she isn't bracing for the other shoe.
This. Her, standing in my shirt in a kitchen that smells like coffee and old wood, laughing like the world outside this room isn't quietly sharpening its teeth.
My jaw ticks once. Force of habit. But I don't move toward the door. Don't check the cameras. Don't manufacture a reason to be somewhere she isn't.
The bird is on the front porch.
I find it during the actual perimeter check — the real one, not the emotional-avoidance version. The morning is cool, the street still quiet.
The sparrow is centered on the welcome mat. Wings spread, fanned out symmetrically, tips angled outward like a display in a museum case. Head turned precisely to the right. Body positioned so it faces the front door.
No blood. No visible trauma. Just a small brown bird, arranged with meticulous care on a mat that reads Welcome to the Foxglove.
Cats leave kills at doorsteps, but cats don't compose them. Cats don't spread wings into symmetrical fans or center their work like a message.
This was placed. Someone stood on this porch — the porch I swept twelve hours ago — and arranged a dead bird with the patience of someone who wanted me to understand that they could.
