How much do you think Ms. Scozzari actually feels love for you? Realistically. Since you did, after all, begin as a gutter child brought to her by her husband.
The question catches him off guard. It's not the type of thing he'd expect from a quick trip outside. He's running to the the corner bodega for a chopped cheese and fries not to have his entire existence questioned but now here he was. Looked down on and belittled. Should he be surprised? Yeah, probably not. Was he? Only a little because it's so random. He supposed he's gotten too comfortable, the love his adoptive parents had for him was something he had only stopped wondering about a few years ago. It had been hard for them all in the beginning. He's a gutter rat, abandoned on the doorstep of a fire station and put into the system until the system let a man play hero but instead he found himself cornered and told he had _such a pretty mouth_. One torn rotator cuff and a broken soul later, he ran as far and hard as he could. No ever came looking. Except Sal. Billy had always had a thing for stray cats. It's only until he's picked up off the street like one he finally gets why. Because he had something in common with them. He's a stray cat. Timid and scared, ready to claw the face off of the next person who looks at them funny but so lonely and touch starved that maybe.. Keeping the claws sheathed would ensure a hot meal and a hug. He got a family instead. So yeah. He knows how much Eve Scozzari loves him. She shows him everyday with the little things. His favorite snacks in the cabinets, his favorite soft drink in the fridge, the books she leaves on his bed, the movies she takes him to see, the way she ruffles his hair and tells him she knows he's hers because where else he got that mess of curls. He doesn't give any of that away though. Those memories, those moments, were his and hers, no outsider trying to tear him down was going to stain them with their hate. So.. He smirks with a tilt of his head, black eyes scanning the stranger up and down. "Might do to ask her yourself. Though after I go home and tell her some punk called me a gutter child.. My dad's gonna come find you first. Sure he'll enlighten you."
