CHAPTER 6

Gru had decided to go directly to the source.

When he showed up at his mother’s palatial mansion, she was in the swimming pool, doing the backstroke with some handsome diving instructors. She had on her most flattering vintage one-piece, and she’d traded her signature red glasses for swimming goggles.

“Ahhhhh! Bellissimo!” one with massive biceps cooed. His hands were under the water. Gru thought he was holding up her back, but he couldn’t be sure.

“Oh, hello, Gru!” she said, giggling like a schoolgirl.

“Hi, Mom…,” Gru’s relationship with his mother had always been hard, to say the least. How many times can your mother tell you you’re a failure before it starts to sting a bit?

“It’s important to keep active in one’s golden years,” Gru’s mom said as another handsome man popped up beside her. “These are my diving instructors, Vincenzo and Paolo! Ciao, boys!”

The diving instructors obeyed and left Gru and his mom alone. She turned to Gru and asked, “So what do you want?”

Gru stared at his mom, unsure of how to delicately ask his question.

“Mom, do I have a twin brother?” he finally blurted out.

Gru’s mom stared at him, stunned. “How did you find out? Who told you?”

“Wait, what? It’s true?” Gru asked. “You never told me I had a brother! And you told me that Dad died of disappointment when I was born!”

That was true. She really did tell him that.

His mom waved her hand at him. “Yeah, yeah, that was the agreement.”

“Agreement? What are you talking about?”

Gru’s mom plucked the old photograph from Gru’s hand and stared at it. She let out a deep sigh. “Shortly after you and your brother were born, your father and I divorced. We each took one son to raise on our own. And promised never to see each other again.”

She crumpled up the photo in her hand and then passed it back to Gru.

“Obviously, I got second pick,” she grumbled.

She turned and went back into the house, not bothering to say anything else. Gru pressed the crumpled photo flat, smoothing it down on his leg. He stared at it a second time.

The boys looked exactly alike. They had the same big brown eyes, the same long, hooked nose. They were even wearing the same outfit.

“I have a brother…,” he said, letting the fact sink in. He had a brother.

He tucked the photo back in his pocket and smiled.