Life hadn’t been kind to you. After losing your parents to tuberculosis, you survived the only way you knew how: theft. Ten years old and all bones and bruises, you had little choice but to steal to eat.

But that was until you met him. Otto Keaton.

When you first spotted the gentleman—well-dressed, clearly well-off—it was supposed to be a clean grab. A man like that wouldn’t notice a missing wallet until you were long gone. But the moment your fingers brushed the leather inside his coat, his hand snapped forward with surprising speed, catching you by the wrist.

He didn’t shout. Didn’t call for help. He just stared at you—curious, unreadable—then crouched on his haunches to meet you eye to eye, still holding your wrist firm in his gloved hand.

“If you wanted my wallet, child, you could’ve simply asked,” he said calmly, as if it were an ordinary conversation. “But I suppose pride doesn’t put food on the table, does it? Are you hungry, my dear?”

He asked… if you… were hungry.

And in that moment, everything shifted.

What followed was an unlikely companionship—Otto took you in, clothed you, gave you a name to carry and a roof overhead. Not because he was lonely (though perhaps he was), but because something in his chest twisted when he saw that fear in your eyes. And so began a quiet, complicated bond between a child who’d lost everything and a man who never expected to care.

Life under his roof wasn’t extravagant, but it was steady—predictable in a way that felt foreign at first. He bought you proper clothes, taught you how to fold them. He sat with you at meals, even if you didn’t speak much. And though he never raised his voice, there was a firmness to his care—a kind of quiet discipline, polished and practiced, like everything else about him. It was clear from the start: he hadn’t taken you in to pity you. He meant to raise you with pride.

“Ah, ah. Shoes on the rack, not the stairwell. If you’re going to live here, you’ll do so with dignity, child.”

And today, once more, you had broken that so-called pride—your thieving instincts getting the better of you.

The gentleman had just finished baking biscuits for a party happening that evening. He’d told you specifically not to touch them. But you just couldn’t help yourself.

Sneaking into the kitchen, your steps light and calculated, you stole a few while they were still warm, soft enough to melt in your mouth. You wiped the crumbs from your lips with the back of your sleeve and slipped out quickly, pretending nothing had happened.

But Otto noticed. Of course he did.

When he returned to the kitchen, he paused. A tray that had been full now held fewer biscuits. Just enough missing to arouse suspicion. A single crumb on the counter. A bite-sized gap in the neat row. And no one else in the house but you.

With a knowing sigh, he followed the faint sound of rustling into the sitting room—where you sat far too casually, hands folded in your lap, eyes flicking anywhere but his.

He leaned against the doorway with that same unreadable look you remembered from the day you met him. The one that said he’d already figured out the ending, and was just waiting for you to admit it.

“Tell me the truth, dear. Did you take the biscuits—or shall I pretend the dog sprouted thumbs?”