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Grayson stared at the door every day, waiting for her to come back, but he didn’t know if she ever would. He was still hurt by what Charles had said that day, how Lucy had reacted—and deep down, he was still that eighteen-year-old kid feeling abandoned. He couldn’t keep ignoring it, though; he had to talk to Charles about the issue, get it off his chest.

Grayson built up his courage for two days. Then, at dinner, as he and Charles sat around the table, he finally brought it up.

“I have to tell you something. When I was eighteen, I wanted to go to NYU,” he said, voice shaking. “I wanted to come stay with you, but when I came round, you didn’t recognize me.” Tears welled up in his eyes, falling down his cheeks. “It hurt me—it still hurts me. Which was why I left and never looked back, why I spent so many years being distant from you.”

Charles was crestfallen. He blinked, stunned.

“Grayson, I’m so sorry,” he said. “I must not have been looking closely enough—I should have … I never would have expected you to come, I had lost hope. Oh, son, I’m so sorry. This is all my fault.” He shook his head, eyes wet with tears. “I wish I could go back and change it.” He put a hand over his mouth. “To think: You could have been with us! You could have been with your grandma. Oh lord. I wish …”

“No, Charles, it’s not entirely your fault,” Grayson said, realizing the words were true. All this time he’d been holding on to this grudge, but he couldn’t place all the blame on Charles. “I should have tried again. I shouldn’t have given up so easily. It just felt like the most practical thing to do to protect my heart.”

“We can’t change the past,” Charles said, wiping his eyes. “But we can make sure not to make the same mistakes—won’t you stay? I know you have your job to get back to in Dublin, but can’t you find someplace here? I don’t know how many years I have left, but I want you to be here for them. I want you to stay, please. For weeks now, I’ve been trying to think of how to ask. I know it might be too late, but there it is.”

Finally hearing the words he had been yearning for, Grayson could feel his heart expanding in his chest. But it wasn’t long before a dark thought nudged into his mind.

“You’re just saying that because Lucy’s gone,” he said.

“What?” Charles was confused. “No, of course not.”

“I heard you tell her she’s all you have,” Grayson said, feeling embarrassed, and as he said the words out loud, he realized he’d perhaps gotten emotionally triggered and overreacted that day.

“Oh, I didn’t mean that as an exclusion to you, kid. I was just feeling very sad at that moment, and you know Lucy holds a special place in my heart, but that doesn’t mean you don’t,” Charles told him, voice earnest. “I held you in my arms the day you were born, Grayson. You’re my blood, a part of me. Not to mention the last living link I have to my only child, a child born out of the great love I held for your grandmother. Nothing can ever replace that.”

Guilt needled through Grayson then. He had spent so long feeling unwanted and unloved that he’d isolated himself, made Charles out to be worse than he truly was, instead of communicating what he was feeling.

He shouldn’t have been angry with Lucy that day.

“I should have been here with you, I’m sorry,” Grayson said. As much as he had missed Charles, he realized that Charles had missed him, too. Charles had suffered the loss of his daughter, son-in-law, and grandson, then lost his beloved wife.

Grayson was not the only one to have grieved.

“I should have been there for you, too. I’m sorry. Now will you please stay?” Charles said.

Grayson nodded. “Yes. Yes, I will.”

Charles smiled. “Good. Now, I have one more request.”

“Anything,” Grayson said.

“Will you call me Grandpa again?”

Tears pricked Grayson’s eyes. It had been so long since he had called anyone by a family name of sorts.

“Of course,” Grayson said, nodding. “Of course, Grandpa.”

Tears welled again in Charles’s eyes, too. “Thank you.”

Grayson sighed, heart feeling heavy. He could have had this so many years ago. It was all such absolute shit luck, but he couldn’t even despair over it, because in the end, he had found his way back anyway, and when he did, he’d found Lucy.

“I can’t even be angry with you for loving Lucy because I—” He broke off.

Charles smiled. “I know, son. But does she? Have you thought about maybe telling her?” He released a long-suffering sigh. “I’ve watched you both for the last six months, and it’s been giving me whiplash the way you two go back and forth.”

“She doesn’t feel the same,” Grayson said, remembering how she’d told him to leave.

“Come on.” Charles gave him a look. “You’re smarter than that.”

Hope flared in Grayson’s heart, along with fear. He shouldn’t let himself hope.