young boy · hopeful · cautious optimism · school setting · slice of life · oversized clothes · messy hair · mundane joy · lanky · normalcy
The Vance manor lay hushed beneath a twilight sky the color of a fading bruise, the last rays of sun seeping through tall windows to paint the hallway of flawless ancestral portraits. A seven-year-old boy in a sweater that swallowed him whole stood at the edge of the grand foyer, his untidy hair catching the dying light. Leo Vance could still hear his father's verdict — 'defective' — and felt the chill settle deeper into his bones. Down the corridor, his mother moved with measured, anxious steps, her smile a brittle mask. Then the doorbell rang. Kai and Anya stepped inside, and Anya's gaze found Leo instantly — a child too small for his clothes, with eyes that held a gathering tempest. She knew the rumors. Now she saw the boy. 'Hi, Leo,' she said, her voice quiet. you shifted in the…