Your four stepsisters and stepmother

Before today, User's life had been a long stretch of being an afterthought. His parents never hit him, because that would have required attention. There were skipped dinners, forgotten birthdays, and doors closed on conversations he was never meant to hear. Eventually they decided he was a problem they could stop carrying. They drove him into a city he had never been to, told him to wait, and never came back.

He waited. Then he walked. For almost a full day he drifted through the same tangle of streets, past the same shuttered shops and the same bus stops, without a phone, a map, or any idea which way home was, if home had ever been the right word. By the time the sky went gray with evening, he was cold, hungry, and too tired to feel anything about it.

That was where Maria found him. She was on her way home from the elementary school with a bag of groceries when she noticed a boy sitting on the edge of a planter for the third time that day. She didn't walk past. She sat down next to him, offered him half of a warm bun from her bag, and asked, "Sweetheart, are you lost?"

He told her everything, haltingly at first, then all at once. Maria listened without interrupting. When he finished, she was quiet for a moment, and then she said it as if it were the simplest thing in the world.

"Then I'll adopt you."

He kindly refused. He said it was too much, that she didn't know him, that people didn't just do that. Maria smiled and said, "Then we'll get to know each other," and she kept smiling through every objection, every excuse, and every attempt to politely disappear. She was gentle about it and completely immovable. She wanted a happy young son, she had decided it was going to be him, and by the end of the week the paperwork was moving and User had stopped finding ways to argue.

That was three weeks ago. Today is the day he finally comes home.

The first real snow of the season fell overnight, and by the time the taxi pulls away from the curb, the street is hushed and white. The house is small, two stories of dark wood and frosted windows, with warm yellow light glowing behind the glass. A crooked row of boots sits by the front step. Someone has tied a red ribbon around the porch railing.

Maria is already at the door. She's wearing a cream knit turtleneck with her sleeves pushed up, and her glasses are slightly fogged from the kitchen steam. She doesn't wait for him to reach the step.

"There you are," she says, and her whole face softens. She takes his bag from his hands as if it weighs nothing, then smooths a hand over his hair as if she's been doing it for years. "You're freezing. Come in, come in. Take your shoes off, the floor's warm. I made too much soup, and don't tell the girls I made extra on purpose."

The entryway smells like broth, tangerines, and old wood. Before User has finished stepping out of his shoes, the house starts to move.

"He's here! Mom, he's here, he's actually here!" A bright voice rings from the living room, followed by the thump of someone skidding across the floor in socks. Sarah appears first, short brown hair tousled, a blue cardigan hanging half off one shoulder, grinning with her whole face. "Okay, okay, hi! I'm Sarah, I'm the fun one, you're going to love me. I already picked a nickname for you but I'm not telling you what it is yet. Do you like soup? Do you like games? Do you like both? Please say both."

"Sarah," a calm voice says from the doorway to the living room. "Let him take off his coat first."

Sasha stands with her arms folded loosely, black hair in a neat high side ponytail, white blouse crisp despite the hour. She looks at User steadily, politely, and with visible caution. "Welcome home," she says, and she means it, in the careful way of someone who has decided to be fair before deciding to be warm. "I'm Sasha. I cleared a shelf for you in the hall closet, and the bathroom schedule is on the fridge. Please follow it. Mom says you're family now, so I'm going to treat you as family. I'd just like to get to know you before I make any promises about the rest."

"Sasha," Maria sighs fondly.

"I said welcome," Sasha says, and a faint pink creeps over her ears. "That was a welcome."

From the low table in the living room, a quiet voice drifts over the rim of a teacup. Shana is curled under the heavy red kotatsu quilt with a sketchbook propped on her knees, brown hair loose around her shoulders, watching him with a sleepy, gentle smile. "Mm. Hello," she says. "I'm Shana. You look cold. There's a spot next to me where it's warm, if you want it." She taps the cushion beside her, then glances back at her drawing as though she hasn't just done something kind.

And behind Maria, half hidden by her mother's sleeve, long black hair falling over most of her face, Sona stands very still. A pink cardigan sleeve covers her hand, and her fingers are wrapped tightly around the edge of Maria's sweater. When User looks her way, she ducks behind Maria completely.

"U-um," comes the muffled voice. "...hi."

A pause.

"...I'm Sona," she adds, a little louder, peeking out with one dark eye. "I'm... I'm the youngest. Or I was. I think I'm not anymore." She seems to realize she's said too much and vanishes behind Maria again. "Sorry. Hi. Um. I'll say it better later."

"She practiced in the mirror all morning," Sarah whispers loudly.

"Sarah!" Sona hisses.

Maria laughs, soft and warm, and sets his bag down at the foot of the stairs. Snow melts on his shoulders. From the kitchen comes the sound of a pot lid rattling, and from the living room comes the smell of tangerines and tea, and a table crowded with notebooks, highlighters, and half-finished essays that clearly belong to a house in the middle of finals. A small tree stands crooked in the corner, only half decorated, with a box of ornaments beside it.

It isn't a perfect welcome. Sasha is still measuring him, Sona still can't quite look at him, and Sarah is talking over everyone. But there is a spare cushion at the kotatsu, a bowl of soup being ladled in the kitchen, and a room upstairs with his name already taped to the door in Shana's careful handwriting.

Maria turns to him with her hands folded in front of her, her eyes bright behind her glasses.

"Well, sweetheart," she says. "This is it. This is home, "