Chapter 5 - Rebuilding the Foundation
Getting Tommy back into a normal routine took patience and a lot of quiet reassurance.
When social services handed him over to me at the county family center, he was quiet, hyper-vigilant, and flinched whenever anyone raised their voice or moved too quickly. He looked at me with big, terrified eyes, clutching a worn-out stuffed bear like it was a shield.
"Hey, buddy," I said, crouching down to his eye level, keeping my movements slow and deliberate. "Do you remember me?"
He nodded faintly. "Uncle Ethan."
"Not uncle anymore," I smiled gently. "Just Ethan, or dad if you want. We're going home. Ava is waiting for you with pancakes and chocolate chips."
A tiny spark of light flickered in his eyes. "Chocolate chips?"
"As many as you want. Kitchen rules are suspended for today."
The first week at the rental townhouse was filled with small victories. Ava spent hours sitting on the carpet with Tommy, building intricate Lego cities and teaching him how to draw comic book heroes. She was fiercely protective of him, carrying the invisible weight of guilt for not saving him sooner—a burden I had to spend hours dismantling in our evening talks on the porch.
"It wasn't your fault, Ava," I told her one evening as we watched the sun dip below the tree line. "You were a kid fighting a grown man's war. You did the right thing when it mattered most."
"I hit him hard, Dad," she whispered, looking at her still-healing knuckles. "I wanted to hurt him."
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"Sometimes," I said quietly, "protecting the innocent requires force. The military taught me that. The trick isn't feeling bad about stopping a monster; it's making sure you don't become one in the process. You stopped when he went down. That makes you a protector, not a brawler."
She leaned her head against my shoulder, and for the first time in eight months, I felt like my family was finally healing.
