I sneak a quick look at her left arm but all I can make out are the words addicted and poison.
“Shoot,” Dixie says suddenly while looking at her cell phone in her hand. “I forgot. Crap. Can you just drop me at home?”
I turn the truck around and hop on a back road I know will be a shortcut. “Sure.”
“I’m so sorry. I hope I don’t make you late for work.”
“It’s fine. I don’t think the place will burn down without me.”
She laughs softly and the sound warms my chest. “I have this one kid . . . he doesn’t seem to like playing piano much but he shows up without fail. Barely talks, just kind of wanders over to the house. Reminds me of someone else I used to know.”
A warning bell goes off in my head but I’m not sure why.
“I checked around and his name is Liam Andrews but I don’t know much about him. I think he lives near you and I’m hoping he’s not crossing the interstate by himself. Can’t seem to find out much about his family.”
“Andrews, you say?” There is only one Andrews near me.
No, please, please do not let her be even remotely associated with Carl fucking Andrews.
“Yeah, why? You know him?”
My foot presses harder on the accelerator.
“Gavin!”
“Dixie,” I begin slowly, working hard to keep my voice even. “I am trying not to get worked up and or lose my temper while operating a motor vehicle. But you absolutely cannot have anything to do with Carl Andrews or his kid. Ever.”
“Um, well, I’m not sure Liam is his kid for certain. He’s just constantly angry. I was going to talk to you about him because he kind of reminds me of you.”
I’m mildy offended. “I’m not constantly angry.” She gives me a look that says she’s calling bullshit so I shrug. “Not constantly.”
“Okay, maybe I phrased that wrong.” She frowns and I can see from side-eying her that she’s thinking extremely hard and choosing her words carefully. “It’s like he’s struggling to . . . find . . . something. A reason to be afraid or upset or violent, or I don’t know. He’s just a really angry kid and he’s only seven years old. What is there to be angry about at seven?”
My grip tightens on the steering wheel and I watch my knuckles turn white.
“If Carl Andrews is his dad, trust me, kid has plenty to be angry about.”
Carl is the owner of the local crack house, the one my mom has been spending her time in lately. He was with her in the bar the other night and he and I are not on good terms at the moment. I know I am heading into something bad, I can feel it in my gut, but all I can think of is getting him away from Dixie and keeping him the hell away from her. And then the troubling thought tugging the edges of the blanket of rage currently covering my mind.
He got custody of that kid? How in the hell could anyone give that disgusting fucking animal a kid?
“ . . . drum lessons?”
I only catch the last part of whatever she’s saying because that’s the thing about actual fits of rage, they sort of block out all your other senses.
“What?”
Dixie sighs and holds on to the dashboard as I take a curve a little faster than I should. “I was asking if you’d be willing to give Liam drum lessons. He has a lot of anger and it seems to help you, playing, so I thought it might help him.”
“It does help me. But I’m not exactly kid friendly. You know this.”
She scoffs at me. “How do you know? Have you ever hung out with any kids?”
I contemplate this, desperate to focus on something other than the thought of Carl alone with Dixie in her house. “No. I guess not.”
“Then you don’t know, do you? You could totally be kid friendly. But even if you aren’t, this kid doesn’t respond well to friendly anyways.”
“No?”
She looks so sad for a moment I almost pull the truck over.