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He places the dinosaur beside the chessboard.

“He’s alone,” he says.

“He has the knight.”

“The knight is working.”

I hand him the one-eyed bear.

“No. Bear is at school,” Misha protests.

“We have limited personnel.”

Misha looks around, then carries the dinosaur to the playroom shelf and sets it beside three smaller plastic dinosaurs.

“Family,” he says.

I watch him arrange them shoulder to shoulder.

“You can’t leave one dinosaur alone,” he tells me.

“Why?”

“They get sad.”

“How do you know?”

Misha taps the large dinosaur’s painted eye. “His face.”

The dinosaur has no expression.

I nod anyway. “Then he stays with the others.”

Misha gives me the bear again. “Story.”

He chooses the book with the cave.

I sit against the couch and open it. He settles beside my hip with the yellow car in one hand and the bear beneath his arm.

I read the book.

When I finish, he says, “Again.”

I read it again, this time shortening the description of the forest.

“You missed the birds.”

“The birds have no effect on the plot.”

“They wake the bear.”

“The bear is already awake.”

Misha closes the book with both hands. “Again. Right.”

I wonder what I did right.

From the sitting area, Vera says, “He means read it properly.”