Ollie had Russ’s exact serious eyes.

He was six and he stood very straight and very still, taking in the house, the door, me, with a watchfulness no six-year-old should have to have, cataloguing exits and dangers out of a habit I did not yet understand.

Josie was three and hid behind his leg, one fist knotted in the back of his shirt, and I understood without being told that this was her normal position, that wherever Ollie was, Josie was attached to the back of his shirt, and that he let her, that he had made himself the fixed thing she held onto.

They did not run to me.