"Louie?" Huey pushes open the door to their shared bedroom and pokes his head in.

"Huh, wha?" Louie sits up on his bunk, adjusting his hoodie sleeves, and squinting at Huey in the doorway, backlit by the bright hallway light.

"You're missing dinner." Huey explains, suddenly feeling oddly out of place. Like he doesn't belong here. He fidgets with his feathers and scuffs a webbed foot on the hardwood floor. "Um… are you alright?" He asks. He meant to ask if he was going to come down to dinner, but the words just came out different.

There's a long pause before Louie replies. "Yeah! I'm fine. Why wouldn't I be fine? Everything's fine."

Huey's eyes widen. "Oh." Everything was not fine, apparently. And he'd had no idea. Huey scrambles into the room and clambers up onto Louie's bed. "Okay, so you clearly have something going on here." He says, leaning forward. "Wanna talk about it?"

Louie blinks blandly back at him. "Not really."

Huey frowns disapprovingly. "Come on. What's got your feathers in a twist?"

With a heavy sigh, Louie rolls his eyes. "You seriously need to ask?" he demands, sounding frustrated. "We were kidnapped today, Huey. Kidnapped!"

Huey blinks. He hadn't been phased by that. Dewey certainly hadn't been phased by that. It somehow hadn't occurred to either of them that Louie might have still been upset about it. "Everything worked out alright though."

Louie glares at him. "Huey! That doesn't make it okay!" He twists his feathered fingers together anxiously as he speaks. "Atlantis was one thing-"

"Atlantis?" Huey asks, even more confused. What did that have to do with anything?

Louie only seems to grow more frustrated when Huey doesn't get him. They used to understand each other effortlessly. He shouldn't even need to explain himself. "Huey, we were chased by hired assassins. " He deadpans.

Huey draws back slightly, surprised. "Yeah… I guess you're right." He mumbles almost to himself.

"But that was… fine , I guess. Because we were on an adventure, and adventures are supposed to be dangerous. Par for the course, I guess?" He gesticulates weakly before shoving his hands back into his pockets. "But Funso's was… different." He trails off with a mutter.

And Huey suddenly understands.

Neither of them has the right words to say what they mean. Funso's has always been a safe place for them. A magical place. Somewhere where all their mundane problems disappeared. They spent every birthday there for as long as any of them could remember. Uncle Donald would take them there to celebrate when he got a new job, and he would take them there to try to distract them when he lost one. And, when they couldn't afford real food, they could always afford a one dollar hotdog from Funso's.

It was a childhood sanctuary, and it had been invaded.

"I just thought - all this crazy adventure stuff could stay here." Louie waves his hands to the left, "and y'know, our normal lives would stay here." He gestures to the right. "But we can't have that, can we?" He deflates, pulling at the feathers on the backs of his hands.

A silence stretches on, until Huey breaks it with a quiet sigh. He scootches closer to Louie and drops his chin onto his brother's shoulder. "I guess not…"

Louie looks like he still has more to say, but he's run out of steam. He wraps his wings around his knees, rocking back and forth anxiously. It says a lot that he hasn't noticed and stopped himself. "Are you ever jealous of Dewey?" His question comes unexpectedly, and throws Huey for a loop.

"I… what? Why?"

Louie scoffs slightly, looking embarrassed. "Nothing, forget about it."

Huey scooches closer. "No Louie, come on. What do you mean?"

"It's just…" Louie stops rocking abruptly and leans stiffly against his headboard. He pulls his wings inside his sweater so the sleeves flop limply at his sides. "Nothing seems to phase him. He makes friends so easily. He never cared when we had to move schools. Moving here has been like, the coolest thing in the world to him. And it was cool, when it was just supposed to be a visit. But then… the houseboat… and Uncle Donald… and we had to move all our stuff… I don't want Dewey to be anxious. I just don't understand why he isn't."

Huey is looking down at the blankets. He and Louie are shoulder to shoulder, but neither of them is looking at the other. "I'm not jealous of him." He admits. "I don't think I've ever been jealous of either of you. But I do know what you mean."

"Sometimes, I feel like I'm the only one who's not happy." Louie grimaces. "Or at least..." He shrugs. "I dunno."

"You're not happy?" And oh man, Huey looks way too worried. Louie immediately regrets saying anything.

"No, no. It's not like that." He quickly backpedals. "It's just... I guess I've got a lot of feelings I don't have words for yet." He frowns, thinking. "It's nothing bad. I promise. It's just... I really don't know. I don't know what I'm feeling half the time."

Huey gives a weak, shy grin. "Honest Louie, me too. I don't really have words for most feelings. I know I really like labels-" (Louie snorts at the understatement) "but feelings are one of those things I've never been able to organize. They just don't make sense."

Louie grins, and they've found stable ground again. They're back on the same page. "You can say that again."