(Etienne's point of view)
The message sits on the kitchen table like a small, precise thing that hasn't yet decided whether it is threat or trivia. Isobel's phone face-up, screen aglow: We saw you. No punctuation, no sender saved, no context. The words are spare and tidy; their meaning spills outward and fills the quiet.
Etienne folds his hands around the cup of tea Sophie has made for him—too strong, the way Sophie believes strength can translate into readiness—and watches the curl of steam. He has learned to let small rituals act as stabilizers: hold the cup, breathe, name the fact. The message is a fact now. Facts demand work.
