“Bravo, Guido,” she said. “I think your problem, Green and Scaly, is that your idea of success is out of step with everyone else’s. We all want to see good things happen for Skeeve, here, but we also like him just the way he is. We’ve got enough faith in his good sense to back him in whatever move he makes in his development . . . without trying to frog-march or trick him up a specific path.”
Aahz not only gave ground before this onslaught of protest, he seemed to shrink in a little on himself.
“I like him too,” he mumbled. “I’ve known him longer than any of you, remember? He’s doing fine, but he could be so much more. How can he choose a path if he can’t see it? All I’m trying to do is set him up to be bigger than I … than we could ever think of being ourselves. What’s wrong with that?”
Despite my irritation at having my life discussed as if I weren’t in the room, I was quite touched, by my friends’ loyal defense of me, and most of all by Aahz.
“You know, partner,” I said softly, “for a minute there, you sounded just like my father. He wanted me to be the best . . . or more specifically, to be better than he was. My mom always tried to tell me that it was because he loved me, but at that time it just sounded like he was always being critical. Maybe she was right . . . I’m more inclined to believe it today than I was then, but then again, I’m older now. If nothing else, I’ve had to try to tell people I love them when the words just won’t come . . . and gotten upset with myself when they couldn’t see it when I tried to show them.