Chapter 3

Stability, Corey was learning, was not the absence of strain. It was the ability to remain when strain appeared. For a long time after coming to live with the Somers family, he had assumed that if things were going well, they would continue to do so only as long as he stayed unobtrusive. That had been his role elsewhere: take up little space, create no ripples, and leave before expectation attached itself. The Somers household unsettled that instinct. They did not seem to require him to vanish in order for things to function.

Still, when tension arose, his first response was the same as ever — to step back, to go quiet, to let others take the weight. The test came in a small way.

Petra eighteen, was newly finished with school, and impatient with being treated as though childhood still clung to her. She had always had a streak of independence that surfaced most strongly when she felt constrained. Aaron admired her intelligence and resolve, but the combination of those qualities with her youth worried him. He tended, under pressure, to reach for rules.

The graduation party was one of those moments. Aaron did not like the idea from the outset. He asked questions — where, who, how long, who would be supervising — and his tone alone made Petra bristle. She answered sharply. Rosemary, watching the exchange, said little at first, letting it play itself out. Permission was eventually given on one condition: a responsible adult would be present. Petra said there would be. It was, as she later admitted, a half-truth she wanted to believe.

There was no adult. By the time Petra realised that, the evening had already shifted beyond her control. Alcohol was plentiful. Drugs were passed casually, as though unremarkable. She had a drink — her first — more out of nerves than defiance. When an older boy, someone she barely knew, began paying her unwanted attention, the situation tipped from uncomfortable into frightening. She slipped outside, hands shaking, and made a call she had never expected to need to make. Corey acted without hesitation.