knew without a doubt, in that instant, that there was no way I would ever let her put my boy’s child up for someone else to raise. Not when this, you, were the last piece of him I had left. I didn’t know how I was supposed to live without him in this world, and then you were born, and it took one look at you being all ugly and wrinkly—”
I laughed and wiped at my face, not realizing until then that I was full-on crying.
“—and I knew that I was going to have to break the world record for being the oldest man alive because there was no way I would ever let anything happen to you. You gave me life back. You gave me a damn purpose, Lenny. You have been the greatest gift I have ever been given. The greatest joy I will ever have. You were my best friend from the moment those cloudy demon eyes looked at me, like you needed me more than anything or anyone.
“I would fight to the death for you, Len. You were—” He smiled at me before correcting himself. “You are my everything. My soul mate. My best friend. My enemy.”
I laughed again and watched as he blinked at me, eyes glittering even more.
“And with that comment, Peter reminded me of everything I had seen in your face when you’d been born. That I would do anything for you. That you were a supernova. And look at what I’d been doing to you. How could I bottle you up and decide your future for you? How could I tell you what to be? I wanted the world for you. I want the world for you. And that’s why I stopped telling you that this place was yours since then. That’s why I made you get jobs outside of here. That’s why I made you get a degree and I didn’t let you work full-time here until Mo came along.
“Because I wanted to give you a chance to be whoever you wanted to be. Do whatever you wanted to do. All I want, Lenny, is for you to be happy, because that’s what matters to me at the end of the day. That’s what I lose sleep over; that’s what I will always lose sleep over. I want you to be happy in whatever way that is, being yourself the whole time. Do you understand me?”
At some point, the need to gulp in breath was making it hard to breathe. My cheeks were wet. But somehow, someway, I managed to ask him in a voice that was barely intelligible, “But Maio House is our family legacy.”
The old fart rolled his eyes even as he smiled. “Maio House is our family business, Len. You, Mo, you two are our family legacy.”
Oh hell.
Oh bloody hell.
I was so grateful right then that this wasn’t the man who had raised me. That this sweet, nice grandpa wasn’t the one I had grown up knowing.
Because he would have killed me with his sweetness, with his kindness, and I never would have grown up to be the person I was if this was what I’d grown up with.
More fucking tears came out of my eyes as I slowly started to realize what he was trying to tell me. What he was doing. For me. For Mo.
A million times in my life, I had thought that I couldn’t love my grandfather more than I did right then, and every single time that was proved to be a lie. Just like it was in this case. Right then.
And he kept on going.
“I love the gym, loved running it, loved having you there with me all the time. I love Peter being there. But it’s just a business, Len. It’s four walls and some concrete that could disappear in a day, in a flood, in a hurricane or a tornado. It’s a part of me, you, and Peter, but it’s not everything.” He reached up to wipe under his eye with the side of his index finger. “Some people are lucky to find one person in the world to love. Some people are even luckier to find more than one person to love and be loved back. Some don’t find anyone. If you find someone, you don’t let them run away. We love them the way we need to love them. The way they need to be loved. And we don’t give up on that. We don’t throw that kind