Izzy glances at me with mild surprise. “Really?”
“My mother used to say if a boy doesn’t eat like a wolf, something’s wrong with him.”
Noah looks up immediately, mouth full. “See? I’m normal.”
Izzy snorts quietly. “You’re something, alright.”
For a few minutes the room is peaceful in a way that almost feels unreal. Noah talking between bites. Izzy laughing at something he says. The quiet clink of cutlery against plates. Itfeels… domestic. The word is strange in my head, but it fits. And I find myself wanting to hold on to the moment longer than I should.
Noah suddenly hops down from his chair. “I gotta get ready for school.”
Izzy and I look at each other at the same time. The look we share is brief, but there’s weight in it.
School.
Routine.
Normal life.
Part of me wants to tell him no. Wants to keep him here where I can see him, where I know exactly who is around him every second.
Izzy sees the thought forming on my face before I say anything.
“He should go,” she says quietly.
“With everything happening?” I ask.
“He’ll be safer there than out and about with us,” she says. “And good luck convincing him to stay inside all day.”
Noah is already halfway down the hall. “I heard that!”
Izzy smiles, but there’s tension around her eyes.
I exhale slowly and reach for my phone. She’s right. Kids need routine, even when the world around them isn’t safe.
“Fine,” I say.
But while Noah disappears to get dressed, my phone is already in my hand.
Increase perimeter around the school. Double eyes.
Leone replies almost immediately.
already done, boss ;)
Good.
The drive to school feels strangely intimate. Izzy sits beside me in the passenger seat while Noah talks from the back like he’s trying to fill every quiet second. He jumps from dinosaursto soccer to a kid named Tyler who apparently cheats at kickball. Izzy laughs quietly and keeps turning around to respond to him, her voice soft and patient in a way that does something unsettling to my chest.
I watch them both through the rearview mirror, my heart swelling in excitement.
This is what a family looks like.
The thought comes with an awareness that I want this. Permanently.
We pull up outside the school. Kids are already running across the playground, backpacks bouncing. Parents stand around chatting near the gate.
Noah unbuckles and leans forward between the seats. “Are you picking me up today?”
