The office smells like paper and something burnt.
Not smoke—nothing fresh enough for that. It's older. Stale. Like something overheated and forgotten, left to sit until the damage became permanent. The smell clings to the walls, the furniture, the air itself. Ira wonders briefly if it ever leaves, or if it just settles into people the way rules do.
She sits with her hands folded in her lap, fingers pressed together hard enough that the skin whitens. Her feet dangle above the floor, shoes hovering uselessly, swinging once before she stills them. The chair is too big. The desk is too wide. The room is designed for adults who don't shift or shrink or need reminders about where to put their bodies.
Across from her, a man flips through a file without looking at her.
The sound of paper moving is slow. Deliberate. He turns one page. Then another. Lets the silence stretch long enough to make it uncomfortable. Ira knows this tactic. She doesn't fill it.
"You spoke out of turn," he says finally.
"I answered," Ira says. Her voice comes out steady. Controlled. "You asked."
He looks up then. Not sharply. Slowly. Like he's lifting something heavy and wants to be sure it's worth the effort. His eyes move over her face, pause at her posture, the way her hands are held too carefully.
"You contradicted your mother."
Ira presses her fingers together harder. Her mind flashes—glass table, sunlight reflectin
g too brightly, her mother's smile still in place while something underneath it tightened, thinned, became sharp.
"She was wrong," Ira says.
The man doesn't respond immediately. He lowers his gaze and writes something down instead. The pen scratches lightly, a thin sound that feels louder than it should.
Permanent.
"Your family expects cooperation," he says after a moment. "Not… commentary."
Ira nods. She's learned when nodding costs less than arguing. Learned when words only make things heavier.
"Until they cool down," he continues, closing the file, "you'll remain here."
Here.
The word is gentle in his mouth. Temporary. Almost kind.
Ira slides off the chair when dismissed. The movement is quick, practiced. She doesn't look back. The room feels like it might pull her in again if she does.
The corridor outside is cooler. Quieter. It smells faintly of polish and old paint. Her footsteps echo too much, so she adjusts her pace until they don't.
That's when she sees him.
The boy stands outside another office, positioned carefully to one side of the door. Back straight. Chin lowered. Eyes fixed on a spot on the floor that looks like it's been studied before. His hands are clasped behind him, fingers locked together like he's holding himself in place.
A woman exits the office behind him, irritation sharp in the way she moves. "He refuses to answer," she mutters to no one in particular. "Won't even defend himself."
The door closes again.
The boy doesn't move.
Ira slows. Stops a few steps away. Watches.
Time stretches. The corridor hums faintly. Somewhere far off, a door opens and closes. The office door stays shut.
Finally, she speaks—very softly, testing the space with her voice, see-if-it's-allowed soft.
"Did you do something bad?"
He doesn't look at her. "No."
"Then why—"
"They don't like when I don't react," he says.
"To what?" she asks.
He shrugs, barely perceptible. "To them."
The door opens. A man steps out, already turning away, as if the boy is an object that's already been categorized.
"He'll stay longer," the man says to a woman farther down the hall. "Family requested minimal contact until behavior improves."
"What behavior?" the woman asks.
The man pauses. Just long enough to feel intentional. "Exactly."
They walk away.
The boy exhales once. Slow. Controlled. Like he's been holding that breath since before today.
"They sent you too?" he asks.
She nods. "For talking."
He considers that. "They sent me for not."
They walk back together. No rush. No one tells them to hurry.
The shared room feels smaller than before, like it remembers things. Ira sits on the bed and swings her legs once before stopping herself.
"My house is very quiet," she says after a while. "Big. Empty. Everyone's polite."
He listens. The way he always does—without interrupting, without looking away.
"They don't shout," she continues. "They just… stop listening when they're unhappy." She presses her thumb into her palm. "It feels worse than yelling."
He nods. He understands that kind of quiet.
"My house," he says, "is loud."
She looks at him.
"Not with noise," he clarifies. "With rules."
He picks at the seam of the mattress. "If you break one, they notice you. If you don't break any, they forget you exist." He pauses. "Both are dangerous."
She lets that settle.
"So you try to be invisible," she says.
He doesn't deny it.
"And I try to be impossible to ignore," she adds.
Their eyes meet.
Neither of them smiles.
"They put us here," Ira says slowly, "because we don't fit where we come from."
"Yes," he says.
Outside, a bell rings. Distant. Hollow.
Ira lies back on the bed, staring at the ceiling. The hum returns.
"This place," she murmurs, "is supposed to teach us something."
He sits on his bed, shoulders relaxing just a fraction. "What not to be."
She turns her head. "Or what to survive."
He thinks about that
.
Then, without looking at her, he shifts his bed a few inches closer to hers. The metal legs scrape softly. Not touching. Just closer.
She notices. Says nothing.
That night, when voices rise somewhere down the hall, Ira speaks once. Quiet. About nothing important.
And when footsteps approach, she stops—mid-sentence.
The boy doesn't tell her to.
He just stays.
That is when they both understand it.
They aren't here to be fixed.
They are here to learn how to last.