"It is," Ryan said. "I will be home tonight. I am not working tomorrow."
"Promise?"
He looked through the glass wall at the control room. "Promise."
"Grandma says we can put the star on the tree without you."
"You can if you want."
"I am waiting."
He smiled despite himself. "Then I had better finish."
When Ryan returned, Claire was standing near the monitors. She had heard only his side of the conversation, but it was enough.
"How much time do you need?" she asked.
Ryan looked toward the validation plan. "Enough to do this right."
Claire nodded. "Then we do it right."
At six, she ordered dinner for the technical team from a small Italian restaurant near the warehouse. She almost asked her assistant to handle it, then stopped herself and called the restaurant personally.
Priya noticed. "Trying to become a normal human being?"
Claire looked at her. "Is it obvious I need practice?"
"A little."
Claire laughed once, surprised by the sound.
The food arrived at 6:45. Ryan ate half a container of pasta standing beside the console while Ben argued with Priya about whether a timestamp discrepancy was rounding error or clock drift.
"Clock drift," Ryan said without looking up.
Ben groaned. "You did not even check."
"The rounding is consistent. The difference is increasing over time."
Ben checked and found he was right.
"That is annoying," Ben said.
"Eventually you will become annoying, too."
At 8:30 Ryan's phone lit up. Sophie's face appeared in a short video from her grandmother's living room. Behind her stood their little Christmas tree with one empty place near the top.
"Dad, Grandma says I could put the star up without you, but I am waiting."
Ryan watched the video twice.
Claire stood several feet away. "How much longer?"
Ryan looked at the test monitors. "One full clean failover and recovery cycle."
Priya checked the schedule. "If nothing breaks, under an hour."
Claire nodded. "Then nothing else gets added tonight. No extra optimization, no nice-to-have tests. Acceptance criteria only."
Ryan looked at her. "Correct."