The lunch line twisted through the cafeteria like a lazy river, slow and clogged and impossible to fight. Nobody cut. Nobody could. You just floated forward with the rest of the school, tray by tray, sneaker by sneaker, under fluorescent lights that made everyone look a little too awake.
Dayton joined the line without hesitation.
She didn’t tuck Ezra away. She didn’t hide him like contraband. Her grip stayed the same as it had been since the office and the hallway and the alcove: one palm beneath him, thumb resting lightly across his legs, a living bar across the front of his body so a bump wouldn’t send him pitching forward.
Secure, without saying secure.
Ezra hadn’t spoken since their talk in the corner. That, in itself, was a kind of progress. Silence wasn’t peace, but it meant he was thinking instead of snapping. It meant he was learning where the edges were.
Still, Dayton could feel the tension in him through her skin. His posture stayed too rigid, spine too straight, like he believed one wrong shift would crack him in half. Like he was trying to hold onto dignity by holding his body still.
Dayton didn’t correct him yet.
Not here. Not while the line crawled and eyes were everywhere and the lunchroom’s noise had teeth.
The line inched forward.
Around them, students made room in the way teenagers did when they didn’t want to admit they were making room. It wasn’t dramatic. Nobody stepped fully aside like a movie. They just… drifted. A shoulder angled away. A backpack moved to the other side. A group stopped talking for half a second as Dayton passed and then started again in a new, quieter register.
Dayton didn’t have to hear the words to know what they were. They were carved into the glances, the raised brows, the double-takes that snapped back to Ezra and then away like a hot stove.
“That’s Rhys, right?”
“Yeah. On her hand.”
“She actually got him? No way…”
“She must’ve paid a fortune.”
“SEA did it, you idiot.”
“Still… that’s crazy.”
Dayton kept her face neutral. Her shoulders squared. She stared at the back of the kid in front of her like the wall in front of her was the only thing that existed. Not avoidance. Just control.
Ezra didn’t have that luxury.
He heard everything.
His name moved through the air like it belonged to other people now, like it was a rumor you could pass around for fun. Sometimes it was his last name, clipped and casual. Sometimes it was “him.” Sometimes it was nothing but a pause, the sudden silence that followed when someone realized he could hear them.
He tried not to turn his head toward every voice. He tried not to show that he was listening.
But the awareness radiating off him was impossible to hide. Dayton could feel it, the tiny shifts of his weight, his head angling toward each whisper like a compass. He was absorbing the cafeteria the way he used to absorb a classroom, scanning for threats, trying to figure out where he stood in the hierarchy.
Except now he stood in the middle of Dayton Harris’s palm.
A girl ahead of Dayton, younger, turned around and stared too long. Wide eyes. Unfiltered curiosity. The kind that didn’t yet know how to pretend.
Dayton met her gaze once. Cool and still.
Not angry. Not friendly.
Just… boundary.
The girl blinked and turned back around so fast she nearly bumped the kid in front of her. Suddenly, she was intensely interested in the cracks in the tile.
Ezra watched that little exchange and felt his stomach twist.
That had been his move, once. The teacher stare. The “I see you, stop” stare. The look that made kids shrink without him raising his voice.
Now Dayton had it.
And he was the thing she was protecting with it.
The line reached the tray station. Dayton slid her free hand forward, grabbed a green plastic tray, and tucked it under her arm. Her grip on Ezra shifted by millimeters, practiced now: his feet stayed planted, her thumb stayed braced across his legs. A careful re-balance so he wouldn’t wobble when her body moved.
He hated how competent she’d become at holding him. Hated it the same way you hated a lock that fit too perfectly.
The cafeteria worker looked up. Her eyes dropped immediately to Ezra.
The worker’s face changed into that tired adult mask. The one that tried to be neutral and kind and normal all at once.
“Pizza or chicken fingers?” she asked.
“Chicken,” Dayton said. “Extra dipping sauce.”
The worker nodded and slid chicken fingers onto Dayton’s tray, then added two little sauce cups with a glance that suggested she was doing it out of routine compassion rather than obedience. Her gaze flicked to Ezra again, lingering for a half-second too long.
Ezra stiffened.
Dayton didn’t react. She didn’t smile. She didn’t offer a “this is Mr. Rhys” explanation. She didn’t owe anyone a story.
They moved forward.
Fruit. Chips. Drinks.
Dayton chose like she was assembling a plan, not a lunch. Grapes, a bag of cheddar crisps, bottled iced tea. Nothing messy. Nothing that would spill. Nothing that would require two hands for long.
Then she reached the far end of the line, the corner most kids ignored. A small, cheap little station with a sign that read GUARDIAN SUPPLY: LITTLES in bland black letters, like it was a forgotten rule printed on a wall.
Three compartments under clear lids:
Basic Pellet Blend
Enhanced Fiber
Organic Deluxe
Dayton stopped.
She tapped the lid of the third compartment once with her finger. A quiet, deliberate gesture.
Ezra looked up at her, wary. For a brief second, their eyes met, and he could see she was doing the thing she always did. The thing he’d spent years refusing to acknowledge.
Planning.
Caring, in a way that insisted on being practical.
“I assume you have no allergies,” she said, voice calm, almost clinical.
Ezra’s stomach tightened. The old teacher in him wanted to correct her tone. The new reality in him wanted to survive.
“No,” he murmured. Then, reflexively, the words came out the way the system liked them. The way forms and procedures expected.
“No, Ms. Harris.”
Dayton’s thumb pressed a fraction more firmly across his legs. Not angry. Not pleased. Just… steadying, as if she could feel the shame spike in him.
She opened the compartment and scooped a measured amount of pellets into the tiny feeding container clipped to the side of her tray. The bowl was navy blue, shallow, with rubber traction on the bottom. The kind designed not to tip, even if a Little tried to push it. The kind designed to say you can’t make trouble even if you want to.
Dayton snapped the lid closed.
Ezra watched the pellets settle in the tiny bowl and felt a cold wave of realization wash over him all over again.
Lunch was no longer just lunch.
Lunch was also… him.
By now the cafeteria roar had swallowed most individual conversations, turning them into a single buzzing atmosphere of kids and clatter. But as Dayton passed a table near the drinks station, the sound dropped around it like a curtain.
Three older boys, loud a second ago, went dead quiet. One of them, Connor something, tilted his head like his brain couldn’t decide whether to laugh or stare or be respectful.
Ezra felt the silence the way you felt a temperature shift.
He remembered those boys. Or boys like them. Kids he’d scolded for talking over readings, kids he’d corrected for using their phones, kids he’d called “young man” in that controlled voice.
Now they looked at him like they’d found the world’s weirdest loophole.
It should’ve been humiliating. It was humiliating.
And yet, somewhere under the humiliation, a tiny brutal truth took root.
He didn’t have to handle it.
Dayton did.
Dayton carried the tray. Dayton kept the grip steady. Dayton absorbed the stares like armor. Dayton moved through the lunchroom like she understood the rules now and the rules moved around her.
She was thirteen.
And she was, for the moment, the only steady thing in his entire universe.
They reached the cashier.
Dayton tapped her wristband to the sensor.
A soft beep. A green light.
The screen lit up with bright block letters:
GUARDIAN DISCOUNT APPLIED
The woman behind the counter blinked. Her gaze flicked from the screen to Dayton’s face, then down to Ezra, then back up again as if her brain was trying to categorize what kind of interaction this was supposed to be.
Dayton’s expression didn’t change.
The woman nodded slowly. “Have a good lunch, Ms. Harris.”
“Thank you,” Dayton said, voice even.
Ezra felt his stomach drop at the way the title landed. Ms. Harris. Adult language for a child because the system wanted her to feel official. Responsible. Legitimate.
And because it wanted him to feel… processed.
Dayton stepped past the register and into the seating area. The cafeteria spread out in noisy geometry: tables, benches, clusters of kids in their own social orbits, the hum of people trying to be loud enough to be heard and quiet enough not to get noticed.
Dayton’s eyes swept the room once, fast. She spotted Nicole, Hannah, and Hayden at their usual table by the far window. They were watching her already, heads angled, anticipation tightening them into a little current.
But Dayton didn’t rush toward them.
Not yet.
Instead she held to the edge of the seating area for a moment, letting the flow of students part around her like water around a stone. Ezra remained motionless in her hand, collar catching the cafeteria lights in tiny flashes that felt like a beacon.
His old world had been chalkboards and essays and raised hands. The steady power of being listened to.
Now his world was the rhythmic jingle of a collar charm and the absolute certainty of a teenager’s grip.
Dayton carried him like she’d been doing it her whole life.
Not with pride.
Not with glee.
With right.
And every eye in the lunchroom knew it.
Ezra knew it too.
He felt it in the way she didn’t flinch.
In the way she didn’t hurry.
In the way she held him steady through a storm that used to belong to him.
And somewhere inside him, beneath the anger and the shame and the grief, something else moved, small and unpleasantly clear.
He could hate her for it.
He could fight it.
But in this moment, in this cafeteria, under these lights, with these whispers and these stares…
He was still here because Dayton Harris had decided he would be.
Dayton scaring the girl in front of her with just a look is quite chilling.
It’s very in character, though, Dayton intimidating someone smaller into obedience.
That is the dayton way.
I will say i’m pretty surprised that Dayton doesn’t revel in this, at least not in the way i’d have expected. If she is internally, she’s hiding it really well. It’s a good thing, imo. She and kayla are like the only two gaurdians that I don’t think have been inconsiderate about the situation, like how Sarah and Madison basically just flipped a switch and acted like this is all how it should be and really embraced it, if that makes sense. idk if it’s still the shock from the SEA stuff or not, but it’s a better way to go about it. it’s like letting the little mourn a bit vs just treating it like nothings changed.
Dayton knows she’s under a microscope. I believe her consideration of his feelings is only an act for the observers she knows she has, and once she’s home and it’s just Dayton and Ezra, the real Dayton will appear.
Sara’s approach had elements of trying to distract Jordan from all he’s lost, typically dismissing his emotions and concerns, whereas Dayton’s is more about letting him stew in all he’s lost, start to process it; both could be seen as cruelty or kindness, depending on your views
Madison’s was largely based on giving Cindy a taste of her own medicine, which was deserved
Dayton is a naturally deceitful person, with a habit of lying to and about Littles, but Asuka tends to soften Characters when he focuses on them, as he did with Charity in Whispers of a Former Life, then Evan’s world.
That’s a good point regarding Dayton–and ezra for that matter–being under a microscope. It could end up being that a combination of that and Nicole and Kinsley being involved and Dayton not wanting to betray their trust fosters real change, or at least moves the needle further from her previous ideas.
Kinsley would be unbearable I feel like. As she would be dramatically taller then Ezra now.
She is definately a shit talker.
i love the idea of Kinsley being his go to babysitter lol. talk about a built in show lol.
I was more thinking of along the lines of her keeping dayton honest, though i guess this might end up being our first look into little culture in regards to who’s in charge. I assume Little cities, even though the dynamic between men and woman’s basically swapped, the adult still has authority over the child regardless of size.
I’m very interested in little culture, and the swap in dynamics combined with little differences like multi births, or un planned children going to generitech for money or the man having to clean house while the woman works or tells the guy what to do under guardian supervision. so many stories that can be explored
Correct. Once they become about 15 or it starts to shift more towards the female and then at 18 its fully reversed.
I think with kinsley’s size and attitude she is jumping right to boss girl mode for littles lol
Although she doesnt have that many people she really has to be considerate towards. But so far writing wise i havent had her specifically be nice or mean or out of character.
I wouldnt say I soften them but I have to humanize them. As its easy when they just appear in chapters or a part of a story then go away to make the characters a certain way. But that doesnt work as well when the story is wrote around them as I need to flesh them out and humanize them nad make them actual people which probably does come across as softening.
0) Roosevelt Middle School’s Cafeteria is the same Cafe Alejandra sold Charity in?
1) “Silence wasn’t peace, but it meant he was thinking instead of snapping. It meant he was learning where the edges were.” closer to submission than arguing.
2) “Sometimes it was his last name, clipped and casual” his old last name more like
3) “The “I see you, stop” stare. The look that made kids shrink without him raising his voice. Now Dayton had it.” Definitely not a dynamic change he’d be looking forward to.
4) “And he was the thing she was protecting with it.” it’ll be used against him soon enough.
5) “He hated how competent she’d become at holding him. Hated it the same way you hated a lock that fit too perfectly.” It’s not just holding him, she’s had practice with at least three other Littles, (you could also argue her time with Jordan could be counted as four.)
6) “Dayton didn’t react. She didn’t smile. She didn’t offer a “this is Mr. Rhys” explanation. She didn’t owe anyone a story.” Nothing that they wouldn’t already have heard by now.
7) “cheap little station with a sign that read GUARDIAN SUPPLY: LITTLES in bland black letters, like it was a forgotten rule printed on a wall.” That’s probably not got the best quality of food, but it is a public school cafeteria, and I doubt anyone’s eating gourmet.
8) “No, Ms. Harris.” He broke almost immediately.
9) “The bowl was navy blue, shallow, with rubber traction on the bottom. The kind designed not to tip, even if a Little tried to push it. The kind designed to say you can’t make trouble even if you want to.” Even the feeding apparatus is designed to make him feel small.
10) “his brain couldn’t decide whether to laugh or stare or be respectful.” Oh, the teenager’s dilemma.
11) “She was thirteen. And she was, for the moment, the only steady thing in his entire universe.’ Scary how he now has to rely on the person he’d likely be blaming for his downfall (which was partially her fault, but he’d put more blame on her than actually was)
12) “GUARDIAN DISCOUNT APPLIED” Does she get that on all meals or only if she buys pellets for a Little?
13) “Have a good lunch, Ms. Harris.” so it’s not just Littels that need to call her that?
14) “He could hate her for it. He could fight it” I do hope he hates and fights her infinitely, that she never fully submits to her or embraces his new life.
It’d be like a two-for-one special for consequences. He lives the rest of his days miserable after all he’s done, and Dayton is now permanently saddled with a Little committed to being the opposite of all she ever hoped from her future Little. And he’s a financial burden, she now has to get a job she’d hate just to pay off a Little who hates her.
0) just similar design teams for the checkout area lol. I cant remember if i show a larger shot of the actual cafeteria but there is a whole food court wall section. Its kind a compilation of a few different kits that I put together.
1) Not everyone is an arguer. I do think it would be harder to argue your case at 4 inches tall.
2) Most certainly im sure most people arent aware of the harris change yrt.
3) Any dynamic change that provides Dayton more power is not one he is looking forward too.
4)Most women use it against men in my expierence.
5) Dayton is practiced at this point. Ezra gets the full Dayton experience.
6) When the SEA comes busting in with guns and full armor word probabky gets around that its because of the english teacher quickly.
7) You are most right. Its of the same quality of food that Dayton herself is eating. Which is defintely middle school cafeteria quality.
8) He could be trying to butter her up a bit. Get on her food side now that he is trapped with her.
9) Well it is sized for him though.
10) If its a teenagers dilemma weep in the corner should be an option as well.
11) I think that would be awkward. Although Dayton could argue she did warn him by pointing out the lack of collar wearing and questioning the system that is allowing this. He just didnt listen. Which is understandable as he had no reason to beleive the school was doing it wrong the collar thing was solely on him. that the law.
12) Well now that she has a little officially it would be all meals at the school.
13) Well her name comes up when dayton scans the badge. She was more just performing good customer service.
14) That is definitely your style. I feel like you would be a unruly little.
0) I figured it was a re-use.
1) not everyone arguer, But from what I can tell Ezra and Dayton specifically are.
2) I’d say most people would assume it’s the case since it’s standard.
6) very fast words
7) I’m guessing Preema tech
8) I could see him attempting to manipulate.
9) Scaled for him, bud designed for a toddler or animal
10) yeah, probably, but not in public.
11) Ezra heard too sides and believed the wrong one, it’s hard for me to condemn him trusting teachers he’s potentially known for decades over a student who recently tried to undermine him.
12) so she needed to be an active guardian, not just a licence holder.
13) customer service voice
14) I’d be as good to my guardian as they are to me, lol.
I think the main issue would be; I hold grudges a lot tighter than the littles that have been shown and wouldn’t bite my tounge when pissed at a human.