"Hey, sweetheart," his adoptive mother calls from the kitchen, her voice warm, practiced and instinctively nurturing. "You're early today!"
He steps inside, forcing his muscles to mimic relaxation. She peers out from behind the doorway, a petite woman with smile lines around her mouth, her hair pinned back in a loose knot. She wipes her hands on a towel as she approaches, eyes scanning him with that soft concern.
"Rough day?" she asks.
"Just… long," he replies.
She places a hand on his arm, gentle and feather-light. The touch feels safe yet startling, as though the nerves beneath his skin fire too readily. He tries not to flinch. He knows she notices every twitch he tries to hide.
"You don't have to talk about it," she says. "Just know we're here."
Donald nods, grateful and guilty all at once. His adoptive father is in the study, assembling what looks like a new bookshelf. He's a tall man, broad shouldered, with an easygoing laugh that fills a room. A former carpenter. A quiet soul. His hands move with patient precision as he measures, re-adjusts, checks angles. He looks up and grins when he sees the boy enter.
"Hey, champ."
Nobody else calls him that except the familiar stranger kneeling to the ground. He isn't sure how to respond to it yet.
"You want to help?" the father asks, gesturing to the half-finished frame. "Could use an extra pair of hands."
Donald hesitates. 'Help?' His mind automatically calculates load-bearing angles, joint weaknesses, the tools required for completion. He can visualize construction and destruction with equal ease, but helping in a normal, wholesome way feels like a code he hasn't decoded yet.
"I can try," he says.
"Trying is all we ask," his father replies, which is both comforting and bewildering.
Donald kneels beside him. The scent of sawdust and varnish rises from the wood. Tools are spread neatly on a cloth, screwdriver, level, mallet. His hand gravitates toward the mallet instinctively. He stops himself. Picks up the screwdriver instead.
They work in silence for a while. Donald's movements are too precise, too efficient. Within minutes he's driven screws perfectly aligned, balancing tension with uncanny accuracy. His father watches him, impressed.
"You've got steady hands," the man remarks.
He freezes at those words. 'Steady hands.'
The phrase isn't innocent. Not to his subconscious. A faint ringing builds behind his ears. His vision flickers. He tries to push it away. To no avail. The memory seizes him like a chokehold.
He is small, too small for the gurney he's strapped to. The leather binds dig into his wrists. A bright white lamp shines directly above. The blonde nurse glides into view, ghostlike in her control and certainty. Her mask hides her mouth but not her intention. She checks her notes. Blue eyes soft as porcelain.
"Manual dexterity tests," she says calmly. "Subject displays remarkable fine-motor stability for his age group."
A metal instrument tray slides beside him with an echoing clatter. Stainless steel, sharp and clinical. She unstraps one of his hands, placing small objects in front of him—blocks, discs, thin needles. He picks each up with mechanical precision. His fingers obey instruction without hesitation, without tremor.
"He adapts quickly," the nurse notes. "Conditioning imprint successful. Increase difficulty."
Another gloved hand enters his vision, someone unseen adjusting restraints, repositioning tools. He feels nothing. He is taught not to.
"Hey...hey!"
His adoptive father's voice snaps him back. A warm hand grips his shoulder gently. "You alright? You drifted there for a minute."
Reality fades in slowly. The study, the living room. The half-built bookshelf. His father looking worried. Donald blinks hard, grounding himself in the scent of wood and dinner, in the grain of the floorboards, in the muted hum of domestic safety.
"Sorry," he says. "Just tired."
His father nods, though concern lines his face. "Maybe take a break. You don't have to push yourself so hard."
'Push?' Pushing was never something he chose, it was something done to him. He sits on the couch while his father continues assembling the shelf. He watches the man's hands. Calloused and steady but imperfect. Human hands. Hands that build homes instead of breaking bodies.
His mother calls them for dinner soon after. The table is already set, a simple meal: soup, bread, grilled vegetables. They bow their heads for a quick, quiet grace. Donald mimics them but feels like an actor in a role he isn't sure he belongs in. As they eat, his mother asks gentle questions about school. Did he make any new friends? Any classes giving him trouble? Anyone giving him a hard time?
Donald answers with half-truths and constructed normalcy. He tries to articulate feelings he doesn't fully understand. Emotions were never part of his training. His mother reaches across the table, brushing a crumb from his cheek with her thumb. He stiffens again, not because he dislikes the touch, but because it feels… dangerous in a different way. Unfamiliar in a way that opens cracks he doesn't know how to fill. His mother misinterprets the tension and withdraws her hand quickly.
"I'm sorry," she murmurs. "I didn't mean to startle him."
"You didn't," he lies.
His father clears his throat, changing the subject. "We were thinking," he begins, "maybe this weekend we could take a small trip. Get out of town. Fresh air, new sights. Might be good for all of us."
Might be good for him. Donald knows that's the subtext. He lowers his gaze to his soup. The idea of open space is less threatening than crowds.
"I'll try," he says, because that's all he ever says.
After dinner he helps clear the table, mimicking their movements with studied precision. His parents keep exchanging quiet looks—worrying looks, careful looks. They don't press him, though. They never do.
Later, in his room, he closes the door and stands in the center as dusk settles outside. His room looks like something out of a magazine spread for normal teenage life—posters, a desk, books chosen for him, clothes folded neatly. His adoptive mother decorated it herself, hoping that it would offer comfort.
It hadn't.
He sits on the edge of the bed and lets his mind drift. His breath slows. His hands curl unconsciously into fists. Another flash. Unwanted. A man in a lab coat stands over him. Not the usual blonde nurse, someone higher-ranking. His voice clinical, without inflection.
"Subject shows promising discipline response. Reinforce obedience cycles tonight."
Hands lift him from the gurney. The air smells of plastic and chemicals. He tries to turn, but he's too slow, too weak. The world shrinks into a tunnel of white and metallic clinks. Someone whispers numbers beside his ear, not comforting words, not a lullaby. Metrics.
"Success," the nurse's voice echoes from somewhere.
Always that word. As if he were a project and not a child. He jerks awake, he hadn't realized he'd drifted off. His breath shudders. He rubs his face with both hands, grounding himself in the now. His room, his lamp, his window. He doesn't cry. He doesn't know how to.
Downstairs, his parents laugh softly, some shared joke over dishes or television. The sound is warm, human and safe. He wants to go to them. He wants to sit with them. To ask for help, to feel the comfort he's offered daily but cannot absorb. But soldiers don't ask for help. Subjects don't express weakness.
And though he does not remember the training, his bones remember the rules. Instead, he sits in silence until the laughter fades into the murmurs of a house settling for the night. He wonders what it means to belong. He wonders if he ever truly will. And as he lies down beneath the quilt his mother chose for him, a color he didn't think to request, he stares at the ceiling and lets the darkness close around him gently.
It is the gentlest darkness he has ever known. He still doesn't know how to rest in it.