Mama Acorn counted the railings one more time — four now, solid and steady — when Papa Acorn called up from the base of the oak. He wanted to invite neighbors over, he said, to see the safer porch. Her chest tightened. All those bodies, pressing close to the edges she'd just made secure. Papa Acorn was already setting out a pie and a bottle of something amber on a board near the wooden gazebo at the forest edge. He'd drawn a little map on bark showing the way up. Mama Acorn watched from above, her fingers tracing the new gate latch she'd installed just that morning. It would keep Baby Acorn from wandering too close to the edge. But it also meant guests would need to squeeze through, one at a time. She thought of the morning light that came through the bark, the way it painted Gerald's branch in gold before his first creak. She thought of how she knew which planks sang under weight, which knots held strong. This porch wasn't just safe now. It was known. Every inch of it. Mama Acorn unlatched the gate and left it open. She placed a small cushion on the far side of the porch, away from the railings, and set out four of her seed pies in a careful line. The neighbors could come. She would watch them, yes — watch their steps, their turns, the way they leaned. But she would also show them what she'd built. Not just the railings. The care.