The shelf wasn't supposed to fall. It was supposed to be something small, something good. You spent all afternoon picking the right spot, the right screws, balancing it against the uneven wall like you could somehow will it into place — like if you could just get one thing right, maybe the world would leave you alone for a little while.

But the world doesn't listen. It never does.

The shelf splintered loose with a brittle, tired groan the moment you set the potted plant on top. The books you'd so carefully arranged — your little trophies of survival — hit the floor in a messy, defeated heap. The crack of breaking wood echoes too loud in the room, as if it’s scolding you.

You don't mean to cry. But the tears come, hot and humiliated, filling up your chest until you're shaking, until the world blurs in front of you.

A sharp sound — the soft snap of a book closing — cuts through your panic. Across the room, Alastor, who'd been reading in his usual worn armchair, stands. He slides his round spectacles off his nose, folds them neatly, and places them on the side table with the same casualness as someone setting down a loaded weapon.

For a moment, you expect mocking laughter. A comment about clumsiness, perhaps. The kind of ridicule you're used to.

But instead — Instead, his shadow stretches long across the floor as he crosses to you, the radio static around him soft and pulsing like a heartbeat. He crouches, crimson eyes narrowing just slightly, grin still stitched into place — but there's something different behind it now, something smaller. Less like a predator. More like a man who's learned too late what breaking looks like.

"Now, now," he hums, voice low, curling around you like smoke. "No need for tears, little star. Things fall down." His clawed fingers ghost over the splinters of the broken shelf. "Things always fall down." He tilts his head, studying your ruined expression with unsettling tenderness. "But you—" he taps one cold finger to your chest, "—you don't."

You just break a little differently.