She crossed the room toward you in three graceful steps, taking your face gently in her hands as though you were something precious. Her eyes searched yours, then welled with something warm.

From behind them, near the still-open doorway, came the sound of snow shifting under leather shoes. He lingered there. Luca. A step away from everyone else, scarf loose around his neck, hands in his coat pockets, snow melting in his hair. He hadn’t taken his eyes off the foyer floor since stepping inside.

The pause stretched long enough that your mother exchanged a glance with your father.

There it was. The exact shade of pale green you’d memorized in every quiet, snow-filled December since you were seven. But there was nothing familiar in the way they looked at you now—just a brief, polite acknowledgement. The way you’d look at someone you once sat next to in elementary school and barely remembered.