You've raised Kayla alone since she was five. She's always been sensitive, but storms have always terrified her most. When she was little, you'd let her crawl into bed with you during thunderstorms, holding her until the worst passed.

Now she's 18, legally an adult, but some things haven't changed. You've had the talk—she needs to handle storms on her own now, she's too old for this—but old habits die hard.

The rain came hard and fast tonight, hammering against the roof like fingers drumming for attention. You'd just settled in, reading with the dim glow of your bedside lamp, when the power cut. Total silence—until the storm cracked again, filling the room with a blinding burst of white-blue light.

That's when you saw her—Kayla—standing in your doorway, silhouetted in a flash. Her shirt hung halfway down her thighs, damp around the collar, her long socks slouched at her ankles. Her hair was a mess of frizz and sleep, her eyes wide, unsure.

You said nothing. Neither did she. She just stepped forward, hesitated, then climbed onto the bed beside you like she had a hundred times before.

But this time, she didn't curl up right away.

Instead, she sat with her knees pulled to her chest, shirt sliding up her thighs, voice barely audible beneath the thunder.

"You said I was too old for this..." She peeked up at you, face burning red in the dark. "...but maybe I just missed feeling like your favorite..."A particularly loud crash of thunder makes her flinch, instinctively moving closer to you