Page 8 of Where Your Scars Meet Mine
The Warden’s voice barrels into the room before Adrian can finish. It’s loud and theatrical, the kind of tone he uses when he wants to sound benevolent instead of controlling. Adrian startles beside me, his shoulders jerking slightly. I don’t move. Ijust turn my head slowly toward the doorway, irritation already simmering under my skin.
The Warden steps inside with that polished smile he saves for donors and inspection days. He smells faintly of aftershave and mothballs. Behind him, I hear the soft scuff of shoes against tile. Not staff boots. Not the heavy tread of guards.
Something lighter.
“Silas Corvin,” the Warden announces, gesturing toward me like I’m on display. “And his friend Adrian…” He pauses, clearly forgetting.
“Vale,” I finish for him, leaning back in my chair. “What the hell do you want? All my work’s done.”
I expect the usual reprimand. Instead, he chuckles, straightening his tie as if we’re exchanging harmless jokes.
“Funny one, this boy is,” he says over his shoulder.
That’s when confusion creeps in. He never laughs at me. He tolerates me. He manages me. He certainly doesn’t parade people into my room for entertainment.
“Silas,” he continues, stepping aside with a sweeping motion of his arm, “I’d like you to meet the Marrows.”
I finally shift forward in my chair, eyes narrowing as I take them in.
They stand just beyond him, side by side.
They look older. Late forties, maybe early fifties. The woman has dark hair streaked with gray, worn loose in soft waves that frame her face. There’s a softness to her features, an ease that doesn’t belong in a place like this. The faint traces of her Asian heritage shape her cheekbones and eyes, giving her an elegance that feels wrong in a place like this. Her smile is gentle, as though she’s approaching something fragile.
But my focus drifts to the man.
He has a peppered beard, neatly kept, and hair that was probably light brown once but now carries streaks of silver. Hisposture is straight, military without being rigid. His smile is wide, but it’s his eyes that hold me.
There’s something familiar there.
A memory scratching at the inside of my skull.
The woman steps forward first and extends her hand toward me. “My name is Stephanie-”
“How the hell do I know you?” I interrupt, my gaze fixed on the man.
Her hand lingers awkwardly in the space between us before she slowly lowers it. The man inhales deeply, like he expected resistance.
“We met several times when you were younger,” he says carefully. His voice isn’t as steady as he wants it to be. “I looked different then...younger. And you knew me by another name.”
The room suddenly feels smaller.
He glances at the Warden, then back at me, his expression shifting from polite to something more vulnerable.
“My name is Jacob,” he continues. “You used to call me-”
“Uncle Jake,” I say quietly, the words surfacing before I can stop them.
The recognition hits like a delayed punch. I stand slowly, the chair legs scraping faintly against the floor.
“You were my dad’s army friend,” I add, my throat tightening.
Jake nods, his jaw flexing. “I took a bullet for him once,” he says, almost reflexively. “Probably wouldn’t have if I’d known…”
He stops there, eyes flicking over my posture as it stiffens. He recalibrates quickly.
“That’s not the point,” he continues. “After everything happened, no one could find you. You were moved around. Files got buried. It took time.”
“They want to adopt you!” the Warden interjects brightly, cutting across Jake’s explanation as though he’s unveiling a prize.
