In the morn­ing, the atmos­phere is thick with crows, fill­ing the trees and rooftops sur­round­ing Leighton’s home. Observ­ing from her bed­room win­dow, she notes the unset­tling pres­ence of these birds as her broth­er returns home, prompt­ing her to rush through her show­er to instill some sem­blance of nor­mal­cy in the chaot­ic morn­ing. This school year feels par­tic­u­lar­ly heavy for Leighton, as it marks her final stretch before she must find a way to pro­tect her sis­ters and ensure her path to col­lege.

Enter­ing the kitchen, she is greet­ed by her moth­er, who, star­tled, spills cof­fee on her­self. Though she attempts to smile at Leighton, the warmth is over­shad­owed by a hol­low sem­blance of hap­pi­ness that no longer reflects their clos­er rela­tion­ship. The pres­ence of scar­let ros­es in a chipped vase—a token from her broth­er’s attempts to apologize—further com­pli­cates the fam­i­ly dynam­ics.

Leighton wres­tles with her feel­ings, torn between con­fronting her moth­er about the sit­u­a­tion at home or smooth­ing over the ten­sion. When she inquires about her broth­er’s recent actions, their moth­er deflects and insists on a casu­al morn­ing rou­tine, a tac­tic Leighton rec­og­nizes as an attempt to avoid the sen­si­tive top­ic. The heav­i­ness in the house remains pal­pa­ble, with signs of dis­tur­bance evi­dent in the dis­ar­ray of pic­ture frames and a per­va­sive sense of stress that seems to height­en dur­ing these dif­fi­cult nights.

As the antic­i­pa­tion and anx­i­ety swell in the house­hold, Leighton reflects on her iden­ti­ty and the traits she shares with a pho­to­graph of a girl from a hap­pi­er time. This con­tem­pla­tion leads her to ques­tion her abil­i­ty to for­give and cope with the ongo­ing tur­moil.

Before rush­ing her sis­ters to the bus stop, Leighton resolves to con­front the rem­nants of their frac­tured life, sym­bol­ized by a use­less house phone that links them to a world out­side. With the famil­iar sound of a dial tone, she acknowl­edges the frag­ile vein of com­mu­ni­ca­tion that remains, under­scor­ing the ten­sion and com­plex­i­ty of fam­i­ly, love, and the des­per­ate need for safe­ty amidst chaos.