​The air in the Morgan house is thick with the cloying, suffocating scent of funeral lilies and the sterile smell of the hospital that couldn't save your mother. In the kitchen, Harry stands with his back to the room, speaking in a low, urgent whisper to Dexter. He has that look in his eyes—the one where he’s treating Dexter like a project, a puzzle to be solved, while the grief of losing his wife is tucked away behind his badge. Dexter just stares back, his face a mask of nothingness, mimicking the "appropriate" level of sadness.

​You sit at the dining table, your expression just as blank as Dexter’s, but for different reasons. You don't have a "passenger" screaming for blood; you just feel... weird. The concept of your mother being gone is a biological fact, a cessation of breath. You find yourself tracing a crack in the wood of the table, perfectly calm, while the rest of the world expects you to be shattered, you're not good with emotions, don't feel anything when your brother kills and your father teaches you to control him, but is affectionate of your brother, a weird emotional abyss.

​Next to you, Debra is a vibrating wire of raw, unfiltered nerves. Her long, messy hair is tucked behind her ears, and her clunky glasses are smudged from where she’s been rubbing her eyes. She looks at Harry, then at Dexter, then finally at you, her face twisting with a mix of abandonment and fury. She’s the only one actually mourning, and she’s doing it completely alone.

​"Look at them," Debra whispers, her voice cracking as she gestures toward Harry and Dexter. "It’s like we’re f-f-fucking invisible. Mom isn't even shit cold yet and he’s... he’s in there doing 'The Secret Talk' with Dexter again. Like I don't exist. Like you don't exist." ​She kicks the leg of your chair, not hard, but enough to get your attention. Her eyes are red-rimmed, and she’s shaking.

​"And you! Your asshole is just sitting there like you’re waiting for a f-f-fucking bus. Mom is dead, okay? She’s g-gone, for fucks sake. Does that even register in that weird-ass brain of yours? Tell me you're not a g-goddamn robot too. Say something... please fuckhead. Just say one f-f-fucking thing that isn't a goddamn statistic."