The next morning. Elias stood outside the renovated warehouse-turned-learning hub, his hands in his jacket pockets as a line of apprentices filtered in, some laughing nervously, others quiet with focus. Today wasn’t another lesson, today was their first real assignment.Lana stood beside him, her clipboard tucked beneath one arm. She wore her usual no-nonsense expression, but Elias knew her well enough to sense the pride just behind her eyes.“They’re early,” she noted.“They’re ready,” Elias replied, though his voice carried a weight that betrayed just how seriously he took this.Inside, the space had been transformed into organized chaos. Supply crates were stacked near the back wall—pipes, solar wiring, paint, construction gloves. The apprentices gathered near a central whiteboard where Elise had drawn up the day’s agenda.Elias walked to the front of the group. “This is where it starts,” he said, voice even and steady. “Not in a classroom. Not in theory. But here. Today, you’ll ta

It had been two days since Elias last saw Elise.Not because she was gone—he heard her voice in the hall, caught glimpses of her in meetings, the flash of her braid or the tap of her shoes against the corridor tiles—but they hadn’t spoken. Not really. Not since the argument.He told himself it was space. Told himself silence would give her time to come around. But deep down, Elias knew it was something else. A pause filled with weight. Not resentment, but something more complex—hurt, maybe. Disappointment.He sat alone in the conference room, the one with the frosted glass walls and the chalkboard lists still scrawled from last week’s apprentice review. A half-eaten apple sat by his elbow, untouched for hours.Lana knocked once, then stepped in without waiting.“She’s not angry,” she said, like they were already mid-conversation.“I didn’t ask.”“You didn’t have to.” Lana walked past him, picked up the apple, studied it, then tossed it into the trash. “You look like you’ve been gnawin

The next morning, Grady stepped out. He held two cups of coffee, both steaming. “Didn’t know if you were still a black-coffee man.”Elias accepted the cup with a quiet nod. “I haven’t changed that much.”Grady exhaled through his nose. “Well. That makes one of us.”They stood in silence for a while, sipping.Below them, Lana was speaking to a group of apprentices near the street entrance. Elise was somewhere inside, already buried in notes and planning for next week’s meetings with the district.“I saw Lana give you a look yesterday,” Grady said finally.“She gives a lot of looks,” Elias replied.“This one was something else. Not anger. Not judgment.”Elias raised an eyebrow. “What was it then?”Grady hesitated. “Permission.”Elias turned to him. “You think I’m waiting for that?”“I think… sometimes we all are. Even if we don’t admit it.”The words sat between them like steam rising from their cups. Neither spoke for a moment.Then Elias said, “You came back. That means something. But

The rain came soft and steady that morning, tapping the windows of the Kane household like it didn’t want to wake anyone too roughly. But Elias was already up. He stood in the kitchen, his hand wrapped around a mug he hadn’t sipped from, eyes fixed on nothing in particular. The hum of the refrigerator, the quiet creak of the old floorboards, the murmur of footsteps above—everything was just barely out of sync, like a tune missing its beat.Grady had stayed the night again. That made three in a row, and while no one had explicitly said the word *stay*, no one had told him to leave either. That silence, Elias realized, was the closest thing to acceptance they knew how to give each other.Elise came down the stairs in a thick cardigan, her hair still damp from a rushed shower. She paused when she saw Elias and studied him for a moment before reaching for a plate.“You sleep?” she asked.“A little,” he replied.“That’s more than yesterday.”He didn’t answer. Elise didn’t push. She buttere

From the porch, Lana watched as the white veil lifted slowly, revealing the soft outlines of new rows—plantings the apprentices had worked on last week, now just beginning to peek through the soil. It had taken a long time, but things were growing again.Inside, she heard the clatter of dishes and the dull hum of voices in the kitchen. Drew’s laugh cut through—louder than it had been in months—and Lana found herself smiling before she’d even thought about it.She stepped inside to find Elise elbow-deep in flour, rolling dough across the table with quick, efficient movements. Grady leaned against the counter with a mug of tea, listening as Drew tried to explain a joke that had clearly landed better the first time.“You had to *see* it,” Drew insisted, waving his hands. “It doesn’t work if I just say it.”Grady nodded, amused. “That’s what everyone says when they can’t land the punchline.”Elise glanced up. “He’s still young. His dignity hasn’t hardened yet.”Lana raised an eyebrow. “We