Walt waited by the door while the two O'Malley's stared one another down, braced for...something.  He wasn't sure what.   He'd glady help Ephraim out in a fight, but that wasn't exactly what he was looking to do with his Sunday. When Eph lowered his wand Walt let out a breath he didn't know he had been holding.  His book was still over on the sofa arm, but he went instead to the kitchen table, turning the chair backward before he sat down on it.  What was it about company that made a person feel like they couldn't do anything in their own house?

"Right, boy? Yer dad probably pops by a lot, don 'e?”

Walt's gaze darkened.  It had been almost exactly a month since Blain had dropped the bomb that Walt's mother's death was connected to Blain's own kidnapping and turned and walked out of his life.  Walt wasn't anxious to admit it, but being abandoned at eighteen still hurt.  It was one thing to know his father wasn't around because he didn't know he existed.  It was another thing entirely for the aforementioned father to know him and walk away anyway.  Instead of answering Walt just pointed to his ( technically good) ear shrugged and mouthed some words like he had no idea what Mr. O'Malley was talking about.


"Oh! There's my book." He said, standing quite suddenly, as if he'd just spotted the tome.  He steadied himself almost imperceptibly on the back of the chair before spinning it accidentally on purpose in Eph's direction.  "Don't mind, do you Mr. O'Malley?"  He leaned over the other man to grab the book, intentionally careless but still tensed to run, and sat now on the arm of the sofa furthest away from the older man.