Author's Note: We don't see much of Simon and River before the episode Safe, and yet while they seem fairly integrated with the crew then, the previous episodes show them definitely more apart. This story is a set of five oneshots set during the episode Serenity, and is the prequel to a longer story examining how River and Simon start to fit in with the crew.

Simon had never liked the living room, the place where, to all formal traditions, life happened casually. It never really did. The life that happened there was bound by the protective covers on the furniture and the security camera in the upper right corner, and ended promptly at eight o’clock. Whenever he had to be there, Simon always sat where his back would be to that invading camera. But it never seemed to matter, because River loved that room, and so he would end up everywhere in it.

As far as he could tell, the fashionable lines of every piece in that room, and the harmonically coordinated hues, symbols of order to the extreme in Simon’s mind, gave River free range of imagination and wonder. She didn’t like his bedroom at all, and any time she came in was spent in mostly silence. Which was why he was there now, typing quickly as his thoughts spilled out to the waiting keys: so that it would be quiet.

Too quiet, perhaps. Down the hall he did not hear small footsteps, but he did hear the plodding of larger ones and a “Slow down, child!”. It was not loud, but in the silence of his room Simon heard everything around him. Several key clicks later, and the sound of water made him look up again, only to shake his dark head and lean back down. He had to get this right; a twelve year old didn’t have a chance, they had said, but he needed this, needed to know that he could accomplish something if he put his mind to it.

A wailing shriek pierced his eardrums, just finally accustomed to the deafening silence, and there was a “River!” and a pattering of feet before his door was flung open and River flew into his arms.

“River?” he queried, putting a