One evening, as Edward tucked them into bed, Lucas asked, “Why did we find you?”
Edward smiled faintly.
“I think,” he said, “you found your brother first.”
Peter had been the one to see them.
Children, Edward realized, recognize truth faster than adults. They don’t filter it through pride, status, or fear.
He had built skyscrapers that touched the clouds.
But the greatest thing he ever built began on a forgotten street, beside a pile of cardboard and trash.
Family, he finally understood, isn’t defined by what survives.
It’s defined by what you refuse to leave behind.
