The incident was small enough that no one talked about it afterward.
Ray had been in the yard, tracing shapes in the dirt with a stick while Alice hung laundry nearby. The sun was high but gentle, the air warm without being heavy. It felt—dangerously—normal.
He didn't notice the loose stone until his foot slid.
It wasn't a fall. Not really. Just a sharp loss of balance, a sudden tilt that made his stomach lurch and his heart jump into his throat. His arms flailed, instinctive and clumsy, and for a split second the ground felt far too far away.
Ray caught himself.
Barely.
He froze where he stood, chest heaving, eyes fixed on the uneven ground beneath his feet. The fear arrived late, creeping in after the danger had already passed, leaving his hands shaking and his knees weak.
Alice was there instantly.
"Ray." Her voice was calm, but her hands weren't. They gripped his shoulders, turning him gently, checking him over as if something terrible might reveal itself if she looked hard enough. "Are you hurt?"
He shook his head.
The truth was, he wanted to cry. The fear had bloomed fully now, sharp and overwhelming, pressing tears to the corners of his eyes. It would have been easy to let it out. Easy to reach for her and let the moment swallow him.
But he didn't.
"I'm okay," he said instead.
His voice wavered. Just a little.
Alice searched his face, eyes lingering longer than necessary, before pulling him into a tight embrace anyway. Ray stood still in her arms, breathing in the familiar scent of soap and fabric, letting his heart slow.
She didn't scold him. She didn't fuss after that.
But her hand stayed on his shoulder for the rest of the afternoon.
Ray didn't mention the scare to Reynolds when he came home.
It wasn't a decision he made consciously. The words simply stayed inside him, heavy and unmoving. When Reynolds asked how his day had been, Ray said, "Good," and meant that nothing had broken.
Reynolds studied him for a moment, brow faintly furrowed, then nodded.
"Good," he echoed.
They ate dinner together quietly. Alice talked a little—about the weather, about a neighbor she'd spoken to earlier—filling the space just enough to keep it from feeling empty. Ray listened more than he spoke, watching the way his parents moved, the way they reacted to each other.
He noticed things now.
How Alice paused before speaking sometimes, as if weighing the cost of words. How Reynolds's gaze flicked toward Ray more often than before, sharp and assessing, even when his expression remained neutral.
Ray kept his feet tucked under his chair and didn't swing them.
He didn't reach for anything without asking.
He didn't complain when his food was too hot.
None of it was forced. None of it felt like pretending.
It felt like staying in place.
Later that evening, Alice sat beside Ray on the bed, brushing his hair back with slow, careful strokes. He leaned into the touch without thinking, eyes half-lidded.
"You don't have to be so quiet all the time," she said softly.
Ray opened his eyes. "I'm not quiet."
She smiled, small and tired. "You are."
He considered that.
"I don't want to make things harder," he said after a moment.
The words surprised him as much as they did her.
Alice's hand stilled.
"Oh, Ray," she murmured, pulling him closer, her forehead resting briefly against his. "You don't make anything harder."
He nodded, accepting the answer even if it didn't quite settle the feeling in his chest.
When she left the room, Ray lay back and stared at the ceiling, watching shadows shift as the candlelight outside dimmed. His thoughts drifted, touching on half-formed memories that refused to take shape—something about danger, about loss, about a world that didn't forgive mistakes.
They didn't come with instructions.
Just caution.
Reynolds stood in the doorway later, watching Ray pretend to sleep.
He saw the way Ray's breathing stayed too even, too controlled. The way his hands were folded neatly over his chest instead of flung out carelessly, the way they used to be.
Reynolds said nothing.
He closed the door quietly.
Outside the room, he paused, jaw tightening, a question forming and dissolving before it could find words. Not what Ray would become.
But how much he would have to carry to get there.
That night, Ray dreamed again.
The images were distant this time, muffled, like sounds heard through thick walls. A sense of movement. Of paths branching away from one another. Of doors opening and closing without him.
He didn't chase them.
Instead, he dreamed of the house.
Of light in the windows. Of footsteps in the hall. Of knowing where everyone was without seeing them.
When he woke briefly in the dark, heart thudding but steady, Ray didn't cry out.
He listened.
The house answered.
And reassured by its presence, Ray closed his eyes again—sleeping lightly, carefully—staying exactly where he was.