Chapter 8: The Question Behind the Bloodied Knuckles
Finn stayed close enough that his pajama sleeve brushed my hand whenever he moved. He had stopped trembling, but he still watched the kitchen doorway as if another sound might come through it. I kept the lights low and guided him toward the breakfast table without touching him more than necessary. Predictable movement mattered now. A chair leg against the floor could become a warning. The refrigerator motor could become a threat.
Victor stood on the other side of the marble island.
His charcoal jacket was rumpled at one shoulder, and the white shirt beneath it had a dark crease near the collar. The bruise along his jaw had spread into a dull violet shape. His knuckles were swollen and bloodied, one split open across the ridge. He held his injured hand close to his body, not tenderly, but as if he did not want it examined.
The chipped coffee mug sat near the far edge of the island. I saw it between us, its old fracture running down the side. Neither of us touched it.
Finn’s attention moved from Victor’s hand to my face. I set a glass of water on the table and pulled out the nearest chair. He climbed into it slowly, keeping his shoulders raised. I stayed beside him while Victor remained standing.
The kitchen clock showed a little after the time the house had first broken open with Finn’s cry. I had lost track of the minutes during the nightmare and the second scare, but the clock had not. Its red numbers continued to mark the morning in clean, indifferent intervals.
Victor looked toward the hallway. His eyes settled on the stairs, then on the closed front door. He seemed to be measuring the house rather than listening to it. When I followed his gaze, I noticed the disruption that had escaped me before: one of the entry lights was on, though the switches near the kitchen were dark. The front door was locked. A narrow strip of dampness marked the threshold, as if something wet had been carried in and then gone unnoticed.
Victor saw me looking.
He moved first. With his uninjured hand, he reached past the island and turned off the entry light. The kitchen became flatter and dimmer. Then he checked the front lock, pressing the handle once, hard enough to make the metal click.
He did not explain the blood.
I watched him return to the island. The sleeve over his injured hand had been pushed back, but there was no bandage, no towel, no attempt to clean the cuts. A faint red mark crossed the white cuff. The blood looked fresh in one place and dried in another. That difference bothered me. It suggested time had passed in more than one direction.
Finn shifted in the chair when the lock clicked. I placed my palm on the table where he could see it, not on him. His breathing steadied by degrees.
Victor opened a cabinet, took out a clean glass, and filled it. He did not drink. He set it down beside the mug, leaving the distance between them untouched.
I considered asking what had happened. The question formed clearly and stopped there. I had no witness, no sound, no fact beyond what stood in front of me. An accusation would give him an easier story than the truth: that I was frightened, overstepping, and inventing danger.
So I looked instead.
There were no broken dishes. No overturned chairs. No visible damage to the kitchen or hall. The wet mark at the threshold had begun to dry, but Victor’s shoes were nearly clean. One sole carried a pale smear that did not match the dark stone floor. His jacket smelled faintly of rain and something metallic. He kept his body angled away from Finn, yet every few seconds his eyes returned to the boy.
The absence of an answer became its own pressure.
I took the small notepad from the drawer where I kept the household schedule. Finn’s routine was written across several pages in my handwriting: meals, rest, quiet activities, the sounds that unsettled him. I opened to a blank sheet and recorded the time, the second trigger, Victor’s condition, the wet threshold, and the entry light.
Victor noticed the pen.
His gaze sharpened, but he did not stop me. He only closed his injured hand into a fist, reopening the cuts along his knuckles.
May you like
I wrote one final line beneath the others: I do not know what happened before he arrived.
Then I closed the pad and kept it beside Finn’s water, visible but untouched.
