He relaxes. Slowly. "Good. I told him we weren't going to let him end up back there. That we'd do whatever we had to, to make sure he got to start over somewhere else."

Neal lifts Malcolm's hands to press their knuckles against his own forehead, a little gesture that's starting to become habit when he's upset. "I have to work at it. To keep the things from the asylum from feeling like they're really just mine. If I stop reminding myself, if I stop thinking about it, they just... feel like they've always been there, like they always will be, like they're part of who I am. Not stolen from somebody else."

He makes a tiny, softly amused sound. "And this confirms, by the way, that if I ever am unfortunate enough to meet your father face to face, I'm going to do my best to break his nose."