I watched Emma’s face tighten as she read.
Then Lucas walked into the room.
He’d clearly heard enough.
He stood by the doorway, hands shoved into his sleeves again, shoulders hunched like he’d been caught existing.
“I should go,” he said quietly.
Emma shot up. “What? No.”
Lucas didn’t look at her. He looked at me.
“I didn’t mean to cause this,” he said.
And my chest cracked a little, because there it was again:
The apology.
The instinct to disappear.
The belief that the problem was him, not the hunger.
I stood up slowly, careful not to startle him.
“Lucas,” I said, gentle but firm. “Come sit.”
“I’m fine,” he lied.
“No,” I said, and my voice sharpened without permission. “You’re not fine. And you don’t have to be fine in this house.”
Lucas’s eyes flicked to the phone in Emma’s hand, to the scrolling comments, to the invisible crowd judging him like he was entertainment.
He swallowed. “People are mad.”
“People are always mad,” my husband said from the armchair, surprising all of us. He’d been quiet, watching, thinking. “Sometimes they just need a reason.”
Lucas stared at him.
My husband leaned forward, elbows on knees. “You hungry?”
Lucas froze like it was a trick question.
My husband nodded toward the kitchen. “Because there’s pie left.”
Lucas’s throat bobbed again. “I don’t want to take—”
My husband cut him off, calm but blunt. “It’s already made. The only question is whether we eat it or throw it away.”
Lucas stared at him like he’d never heard someone talk about food like it wasn’t a moral judgment.
Then he whispered, “Pie would be nice.”
Emma exhaled like she’d been holding her breath for hours.
I led Lucas to the kitchen and served him a slice so big it looked ridiculous on the plate.
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