Shelter

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The boy is standing in the doorway again. He’s smiling, which hardly seems right. A smile means he’s not sick. He didn’t have a bad dream. He didn’t wet the bed. None of the things he usually says when he enters the room uninvited. Kyung nudges his wife, who turns over with a grunt, face-first into her pillow. He sighs and sits up, rubbing the sleep from his eyes.

“What’s wrong?” he asks. “What’s the matter?”

Ethan, still smiling, takes a step forward, holding a remote control in his outstretched palm. “Battery,” he says, pronouncing the word “buttery.”

“You want batteries now?”

He nods. “To watch cartoons.”

The curtains in the bedroom are open. The sky outside, a pale silvery blue. It’s early still. Too early to be thinking about batteries, but Kyung resists the urge to say so out loud. At this hour, he doesn’t trust himself to do it nicely. He kicks off the sheets, grazing Gillian’s leg as he gets out of bed.

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