Chapter 4

"David, this isn't what I asked you for," Kristi said, arms crossed, voice sharp enough to cut through the noise of the half-decorated hall. "These kids are coming for the first time in their lives to something that's supposed to feel like home. We need someone who can actually sing for them — not just check boxes."

David winced, already bracing for what was coming next, because he could hear it before he saw it: footsteps approaching too fast, a man's voice rising before he'd even rounded the corner.

This was the day Killian had been building toward for months — the inauguration of a home for children who had never once been told, in any language, that life could be kind to them. And of course, today of all days, everything had unraveled at once. Balloons half-inflated and abandoned. Chairs in the wrong rows. And worst of all, the woman they'd hired for the role of child psychologist and counselor — the one who would sit with these kids on their very first night in a strange new place — hadn't even been given a single page about who Killian was, what this home meant, or why it existed at all.

Killian arrived like weather changing — fast, dark, impossible to ignore. Nothing was ready. Nothing was where it should be. David felt the particular dread of a man standing too close to a storm with nowhere to run.

Killian opened his mouth to ask exactly how this had happened, voice already climbing toward a shout, and then a voice answered him first. Calm. A little unsure of itself, but steady underneath, the way a candle flame holds its shape even in a draft.

"The Lighthouse Home?"

He turned, ready to aim his frustration at whoever had asked. But the moment he saw her, the words simply didn't come. There was something about her — unhurried, clear-eyed, the kind of calm that doesn't ask to be noticed but earns it anyway — that made shouting suddenly feel like the wrong language entirely. He just looked at her. He couldn't help it.

"Hi — are you David?" she asked, words tumbling out before she could stop them, eyes flicking nervously between the two men. "I'm June. I'm so sorry, it took me forever to find the address, and I'm honestly really nervous, I don't even know what to say, no one gave me a brief on anything, I didn't even know who—"

She kept going, the way people do when silence feels more dangerous than rambling, when Killian's expression — still unreadable, still faintly thunderous — made her certain she'd already done something wrong.

Before the nerves could fully take hold of her, Killian asked, almost gently, cutting clean through the spiral:

"You're the vet girl. Right?"

She stopped mid-sentence. "Wait — what?"

"You brought in an injured dog. Palak's clinic."

"Oh — oh. Yeah. Wait." Recognition crossed her face like a light switching on in a room she hadn't expected to walk back into. "You're the guy who wouldn't stop talking to his friend. The doctor. Palak."

"That's the one."

"How is he? The dog, I mean. Is he okay now?" Then, almost in the same breath, like the question had been sitting behind her teeth the whole time: "What are you even doing here?"

Before Killian could answer, David — sensing an opening, and grateful for any excuse to step between them — cleared his throat. "Hi. I'm David."

June blinked at him, then back at Killian, the pieces visibly rearranging themselves behind her eyes. "Wait, so you're—"

"June." Killian extended a hand, something almost like amusement tugging at the corner of his mouth now. "I'm Killian. Killian Murphy."

Her face dropped, color rushing to it all at once. "Killian — oh my god. I am so sorry. I said so many awful things back there, I didn't know, I swear I didn't—"

"It's fine," he said, and meant it, the storm in him having quietly passed without either of them noticing exactly when. "So you're our new child psychologist. Welcome aboard." He paused, glancing toward the chaos still unfolding behind him — balloons, chairs, a day still refusing to assemble itself. "David will walk you through everything. I'll catch up with you later."

He turned to go, already half-swallowed back into the noise of the hall, but June's voice caught him before he'd taken three steps.

"Hey — Killian."

He looked back.

"For what it's worth," she said, a small, crooked smile finally breaking through the nerves, "I think whatever you're building here is going to matter to a lot of kids who've never had anyone build anything for them. So — don't let the balloons win."

Something in his chest shifted, quiet and unannounced, like a window left open just enough to let in air he hadn't realized he needed.

"I'll try not to," he said. "Though I make no promises about the chairs."

"The chairs are a lost cause," she agreed solemnly. "I saw them on my way in. They've already given up."

He smiled — short, surprised, like it had escaped before he'd given it permission. It was the first time all day his face had done anything but frown, and David, watching from a few feet away, would later swear he saw something settle in his oldest friend right then, something that hadn't been there that morning.

"I'll see you in there, June."

"See you in there, Killian Murphy."

She watched him go, and didn't examine too closely why she stayed a second longer than she needed to, just to watch the doors swing shut behind him.

By the time evening came, the balloons had finally cooperated, the chairs had been forgiven, and twelve children walked into The Lighthouse Home for the first time in their lives to find it lit, warm, and waiting for them as if it had always known they were coming. There was singing, eventually, off-key and unrehearsed, led by one of the older boys who refused a microphone and used a spoon instead. There was a cake too large for the room and exactly the right amount of noise — the good kind, the kind a building makes when it finally has people in it who needed it more than anyone else in the world.

By the time the last of the guests had trickled out and the children had been settled into their new beds, the hall had gone quiet in that particular way places do after they've held something important — tired, but pleased with itself, like it knew exactly what it had just witnessed.

June was the last to leave, gathering her bag from a chair near the door, when she found Killian already there, leaning against the frame, watching the empty hall the way a man watches a thing he's still not sure is real.

"You're still here," she said.

"So are you."

"I was just leaving." She hesitated, then didn't, the way people do when the day has worn down whatever usually keeps them careful. "It went well. Better than well, actually."

"It did," he agreed, and something in his voice had softened from the man who'd nearly shouted at her hours earlier, like a fist slowly remembering how to be a hand.

They stood there a moment, the silence between them easier now than it had been at the start of the day, no longer a thing either of them needed to fill.

"Can I ask you something?" June said.

"Depends on the something."

"Why this?" She gestured at the hall, the half-deflated balloons still clinging stubbornly to the ceiling, the framed photo of the first children already hung crookedly by the door. "Most people who can afford to build something like this build it and disappear behind a plaque. You were shouting about chairs three hours ago like the whole thing depended on it."

Killian was quiet for a moment, like he was deciding how much of the answer he actually wanted to give.

"Because nobody built one for me," he said finally. "Not like this. I figured if I had the means to make sure twelve kids didn't grow up the way I did, the least I could do was make sure the chairs were straight when they walked in."

June didn't say anything right away. She just looked at him, really looked, the way she had outside, before either of them knew the other's name, and something passed between them that neither one tried to put words to.

"Well," she said eventually, softer now, "for what it's worth, I think you did good today, Killian Murphy."

"You already said that. About the balloons."

"I'm allowed to say it twice." She slung her bag over her shoulder, moving toward the door, then paused, glancing back at him with the same crooked smile from earlier. "I'll see you around, won't I? I do work here now."

"You do," he said. "Try not to be late next time."

"No promises," she said, and walked out into the night, leaving the door swinging gently behind her — and Killian standing alone in a hall that, for the first time in a long while, didn't feel quite so empty.