Theo let Eli in and moved the notebook away before looking at the records.
He put it on the shelf beside the chair, not out of reach, not open. The cover had bent where Kellan carried it in the field. A dark stain spread from one corner. Eli had spent too long deciding whether to bring it and now understood that bringing a dead man’s things did not entitle him to choose when someone else opened them.
Theo sat with his feet supported and the room’s small care table within reach. His helper had left the evening instructions where he wanted them, not where Eli might rearrange them to feel useful. An appointment card stood beside a list of payments. Treatment still needed time, money, and decisions no victory at the reservoir had made disappear.
“You waited,” Theo said.
“Yes.”
“For the story to get better?”
Eli looked at the unopened notebook. “I couldn’t answer whether he had to die.”
“And now?”
