Above them, the familiar, heavy footsteps move from the bathroom to the kitchen. The refrigerator door opens with a hum and a seal of light, then closes. The rattle of a bowl, the clink of a spoon.

The couch cushions sigh as weight settles onto them. A click, and the low murmur of a television fills the room—a narrator’s dramatic voice listing improbable fatalities.

Below, in the absolute dark, three small figures move with practiced silence. Lily leads, her hand trailing along a familiar seam in the wood. Vern follows, a bundled cloth sack in his grip. Behind them, a third Borrower, Rose, keeps watch at the rear, her ears twitching at every shift in sound from above.