My mother often told me, “Don’t sit on Grandpa’s lap.” I never understood why. One day, I didn’t listen to her and sat down anyway. Grandpa smiled, leaned close to my ear, and whispered, “Can you come sleep beside me tonight?”

 

 

I stared at him in confusion.

“What is this?”

Grandpa smiled

“This is what I meant when I asked you to sleep beside me.”

Mom turned away, as though she didn’t want me to see the tears in her eyes.

“But why did it have to be a secret?” I asked.

Grandpa sat down.

“Because your mother wouldn’t have allowed it.”

That was when Mom finally told me what they had been hiding for months.

Grandpa was going to the hospital the next morning.

He needed serious heart surgery.

That was also why Mom had constantly told me not to sit on his lap. A few months earlier, Grandpa had undergone surgery on his leg too, and the doctors had warned him not to put unnecessary pressure on himself.

I looked at Mom.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because I didn’t want you to be scared.”

Grandpa took my hand.

“And I didn’t want to go to the hospital before keeping our promise.”

“What promise?”

He pointed toward the telescope.

When I was five years old, I had once told Grandpa:

“One day, I want to stay awake all night with you and watch shooting stars.”

I had completely forgotten about it.

He hadn’t.

That night, there was going to be a rare meteor shower, and Grandpa had spent months repairing Grandma’s old telescope so he could fulfill my childhood wish before his surgery.