Page 211 of Let Me In

He holds the door open for me.

The morning greets us with bright green woods, a soft breeze, and the sharp, sweet scent of earth warmed by spring.

And I realize I’m not just stepping outside.

I’m stepping into something. Something real. Something good.

Something that feels like a beginning.

The woods feel different today.

Not because the trail has changed—it hasn’t. The pine needles still muffle our steps. The sun still filters down in gold slants through the trees. The breeze still carries birdsong and something green and new.

But I’ve changed.

Or maybe it’s just that I’m not walking alone.

Cal stays close beside me.

Close enough that I feel the brush of his fingers at my lower back every so often. Each time, my body responds before my mind can catch up—leaning in without thinking, drawn to the quiet safety in his touch. It anchors me. Reminds me I'm not alone anymore. He's not pushing. Not guiding.

Just there, a silent reminder.

Every time I veer too far toward the edge of the trail, he’s there.

A touch to my hip.

A quiet, “Easy, little one.”

Every time I pause to watch the way Luca bounds ahead or how Cleo stops to sniff every third tree, he waits.

Never rushes me.

Just watches with that soft kind of patience that makes me feel like there’s nothing I could do that would make him want to be anywhere else.

“You warm enough?” he asks at one point, his hand slipping from my back to brush my arm.

I nod. “Perfect.”

He grunts softly. “You’d tell me if you weren’t?”

I don’t even think.

I just say it.

“Yes, Daddy.”

The words leave my mouth before I can second-guess them—low and steady, but trembling slightly at the edges. They bloom in my chest like warmth after a long freeze. My stomach flutters, but not from nerves. From relief. From the soft, aching clarity of saying something I’ve wanted for so long it feels like breathing.

And the world reacts.

Or maybe it’s just him.

Cal stops walking.

Dead still.

The dogs keep going ahead, oblivious. The breeze keeps moving through the trees. But everything close to me… goes quiet.

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