"No," he says. "Wolves don't hunt kids. And these wolves are behind strong fences. Everyone's safe."
The girl considers this seriously. "But Ashley says he ate Little Red Riding Hood. And I'm wearing a red jacket."
Reid's expression doesn't change. "Ashley's thinking of a different wolf. That one's fictional. These ones are real, whichmeans they follow real rules." A pause. "Real rule number one: they don't eat people in red jackets."
A beat.
"Or any other colour."
The girl absorbs this with great seriousness. Then she spins and launches herself back into the group. "Ashley, you were being silly."
I open my hand.
The pen cap drops onto the counter. The mark it left in my palm is red and precise, a small crescent pressed into the skin. I look at it. Then I close my fingers softly and let my hand drop to my side.
Something has moved. I don't know exactly what Reid did or how it crossed the distance between us but it did. The fist in my chest has loosened one degree. Not gone. One degree.
I look up and he's watching me. That steady, unhurried attention that asks nothing back.
He leans in close. "Are you okay?"
I reach out and close my hand around his bicep. The muscle under my fingers is solid and warm and I squeeze once and nod.
He straightens. Turns to the room.
"Okay." His voice carries without being raised. The children settle with a speed that surprises me. "Before we go anywhere. Three rules." He holds up fingers. "No running near the enclosures. No screaming. Stay behind the railings at all times." He looks at them steadily. "They're not dogs. They're wild animals. We watch them quietly. Everyone understand?"
A ragged chorus ofyesandyeahand one solemn nod from the girl in the red jacket.
Reid looks at me briefly. "I'm sorry. I forgot this was today." He tilts his head toward the hallway. "My office is just through there. You can wait there if you want. They'll be gone in about forty-five minutes."
I look at the children. The teacher is gathering them at the door, counting again, the patient and practised count of someone who has done this many times and still loves it. A small boy is studying the wall map. Two girls are whispering behind their hands, eyes wide, already thrilled by something.
The ache in my chest shifts and makes room for something else to sit alongside it.
"I'll come," I say. "I can help."
The children are quieter than I expect once we're outside. Something about the enclosures does it. The scale of the fencing, the way the trees go tall and close around the path. They cluster together and move in a group and Reid walks at the front and I walk at the back with the teacher and watch him.
He stops at the first enclosure and explains what they're looking at, why the animals are here, injured or orphaned, unable to survive in the wild on their own. He explains what wolves eat and how a pack operates and what happens to an ecosystem when the apex predator is removed, and he does all of it in language that is simple without being small, and the children ask questions and he answers every one directly.
A boy asks why wolves can't just live with people like dogs.
Reid thinks about it for a moment. "Dogs chose to live with people a long time ago. Wolves chose not to."
The boy nods. Done.
I watch Reid with a child who won't go near the fence. A small girl near the back, hanging slightly behind the group, watching the enclosure from a distance that feels safe to her. Reid doesn't call her forward. He doesn't wave her over or crouch down or do any of the things that would make his attention a pressure. He just moves to stand near her and talks about what the wolf inside is doing right now. Matter-of-fact. Specific details. What the pacing means. Where the animal is looking. Until the girl takes one small step forward on her own.
Then it's over. The children file back to the bus, and the teacher shakes Reid's hand and thanks me and counts heads one final time at the door. The bus engine turns over. The voices thin and then disappear down the drive.
I stand in the parking lot.
The cold is clean after the rain, the air washed out and sharp. I look up.
The sky has changed completely. The grey is gone. What's left is blue, a deep clear blue that goes up further than seems possible, and the light in it is the specific light that only comes after the rain. I stand in it with my face up and I feel the morning moving through me. The pen cap. The girl in the red jacket. Reid on one knee on the reception floor. The wolves. The children. All of it at once, moving through me in a single wave, and I let it move without trying to stop it.
Reid comes to stand beside me. His hand finds mine.
