Page 6 of Stowaway Whirlwind
“I’m fine, thanks. It’s just a little hot in here.”
I flash him a grateful smile when he leans over to adjust the air vents, and I’m hit with a blast of A/C. I’m sweating in this hoodie he bought me, but it’s too cozy to take off. I close my eyes, trying to picture what it’ll be like when Dad and I see each other for the first time in eleven years. How happy we’ll be to finally be a family again. And then the first thing I’m going to do after I inevitably bawl like a baby is excuse myself to the bedroom he said he set up for me and sleep for the next twenty-four hours.
Davis clears his throat. “So…your dad and your aunt…What’s the story there?”
My eyes pop open, and the tightness in my middle returns. “Story?”
“Yeah. If you don’t mind my asking, why were you living with your aunt in Nevada?”
“Oh, that story.” It’s not really something I was planning to share with him, especially after he got allhe-man-she-womanabout Colton and Dad and the kind of men slash fathers they are orare not. But we still have many hours to go until we get to the warehouse, and since I can’t sleep, I might as well talk to pass the time. “Promise you won’t judge?”
“Sure,” he agrees slowly, though it doesn’t sound all that convincing. “Hit me.”
“Fine. My mom is out of the picture. She was younger than me when she got pregnant, and I don’t think she was ready to have kids yet. She left before I turned two, so it was just me and my dad until he made some…bad decisions. I went to live with my aunt when I was eight.”
Davis’s knuckles turn white on the steering wheel, and his jaw clenches a few times before he asks with grit in his teeth, “What kind of ‘bad decisions’?”
“You said you wouldn’t judge!” I knew I should have kept my mouth shut.
“Who says I’m judging?”
“Your tone of voice and the fact that you’re about to break the steering wheel off,” I say with a scowl, crossing my arms over my chest.
“Shit.” Davis opens his hands, flexes his long fingers a few times, and relaxes them on the wheel. “Sorry. What kind of ‘bad decisions’?”
I eye him, trying to get a read on his body language. His knuckles have returned to his normal tan color, and he’s not grinding his teeth to nubs anymore, so I tell him the rest, hoping it’ll take my mind off these damn contractions.
“Well, he was…he was addicted to some…illegal substances, and he lost custody of me when he got arrested the last time. That’s why I had to go live with my aunt, who lives—lived—in Nevada.” I brace myself, knowing Davis is probably not going to like that.Not that I care what he does or doesn’t like, I tell myself.
Davis’s whole body is now as locked tight as his knuckles. “Your dad is an addict, and you’re gonna go live with him? Stay with him when you have your baby?”
Crap, I knew it. “Wasan addict, Judgey McJudgerson.Was,” I stress. “He’s not anymore.”
“How do you know that? How do you know you’re not bringing your baby into an even worse situation?”
“Because he told me! We’ve been talking almost every day since my aunt got sick. He’s been clean since he went to prison. And now that he’s out, he’s been going to NA meetings and has to do drug tests as part of his parole. He’s clean and he’s my dad, so I trust him.”
“Goldie, damnit, I—” Davis shakes his head and presses his lips together in a thin line.
I know he’s probably got a lot more he wants to say, but I don’t want to hear it. “I knew I shouldn’t have said anything.” I edge toward the window, choosing to watch the passing landscape of thick, brown woods. Half the trees are missing their leaves, but it’s still wildly beautiful and so different from the desert. Both environments are gorgeous, but these woods are calling me home, back to a time when my class went on a field trip to a state park in elementary school. I didn’t realize how much I’ve missed living in Texas.
Davis sighs heavily but thankfully keeps his mouth shut. The practice contractions are worse now, but concentrating on the trees is better than listening to whatever judgey things he’s got to say, so I focus on them as the miles tick by.
Davis
Goldie intermittently scowls between grimaces, staring out of her window, keeping quiet the last few hours as we get closer to home. I’ve known her for less than twenty-four hours, but itseems I’m really good at pissing her off and being judgmental—both with her piece of shit baby daddy and also her real daddy.
The kicker is that I know several people who have been through recovery and are actually really great people. Hell, most of them have more of their shit together than I do and arehappy, thriving, while I spend the majority of my time alone and miserable on the road. So what the fuck is wrong with me that I’m judging her dad instead of giving him the benefit of the doubt? Is it because it’sherthat he abandoned when she was just a kid? Or am I just a plain and simple judgmental asshole and never had someone point it out before?
“Home sweet home,” I announce as we cross the county line. “Not too much longer ‘til we get to the warehouse.”
Goldie perks up, and her head is on a swivel as she takes in the woods that break to open land with a view of the lake Dad used to take Amanda and me to when we wanted to go fishing as kids. Since it’s winter, there aren’t too many people out on the water, but there are a few riding jet skis with some smaller boats crossing the lake in the distance.
“Wow, this is where you live?”
“Yeah. The humidity is soul-sucking come spring—I don’t know if you remember that—but the land is beautiful. My house is about another ten-minute drive from the warehouse, just before you get to town. I’ve got these same kinds of trees surrounding the property.”
“Have you always lived here?”
