Under the Viaduct by H. Anderson (first e reader txt) 📗

ago? Was it the tender protectiveness he showed for Mama C? Was it the ocean-blue of his eyes?

“Yeah. Not because I’m planning to hurt you, but because you don’t know that I’m not going to hurt you. You don’t know me.”

“I’ll take that chance.” What was she thinking? “Where do you want to eat?”

He looked down at his dirty, worn clothes. “I’m not exactly dressed for a restaurant.”

Kaylee bit her lip, thinking. “We can do pick-up and eat in the car where it’s warm.”

He stepped toward her and pulled on his beard. “I haven’t showered in, like, a while. You sure you want that stench in your car?”

“I have an air freshener.” She grinned and shrugged. “Come on. Where do you want to go?”

Watching the endless line of cars parading down the busy street in front of her, Kaylee reached for another fry. “So, you haven’t eaten at a restaurant for who knows how long, and you choose McDonald’s?”

“They have the best fries.”

She couldn’t argue with that logic.

He chewed then swallowed a large bite of his hamburger. “Go ahead and ask me.”

“Ask you what?” She’d been stalling. She had so many questions for him but was afraid of insulting or annoying him. She really didn’t want to rekindle the anger she’d seen from him earlier.

“You know. ‘Why are you homeless?’ ‘You look normal, why don’t you have a job?’ ‘Does your family know where you are?’” He took a long draw of his drink. “That’s what this lunch was all about, wasn’t it? Because you want to ask me some questions?”

Yep. Those were the questions that had been racing through her mind. “Why don’t you just tell me whatever you’re comfortable with, and I’ll ask some follow-up questions. And you can answer the ones you want and ignore the ones you don’t want to answer.”

“Okay.” He wiped ketchup off his beard with a napkin. “Don’t you need to take notes or something?”

She peeked in the back seat. She hadn’t brought her backpack with her. “I have a pretty good memory—as long as I write everything down as soon as I get home.”

His eyes bore into hers for several seconds before he turned away to stare out through the windshield. She released the breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. His eyes. So clear. So deep. She could sense strength and intelligence in their depths—not at all what she expected to see in the eyes of someone living on the streets.

“I’m homeless,” he started, “because I left home before my parents had to make the choice to kick me out a few years ago.” He turned his head to look out the side window. “They should have made me leave so much sooner.” His haunting voice grew quiet.

“How old were you?”

“Nineteen.”

That made him just slightly younger than her. “Why?” she whispered.

“Drugs. I was a druggie.” He turned back to her, searching her eyes as if trying to decide how much to tell her. How far to go. He closed his eyes and blew out a breath. “I put my little sister in danger—I could see that even through the haze of the drugs.”

Again, Kaylee thought about how clear his eyes looked, how coherent he spoke, how strong he’d felt when he’d helped her to stand in her semi-conscious state the other night. None of those things fit with what she knew about drug addicts. “You said you were a druggie, past tense.”

He popped another fry in his mouth and waited until he’d chewed and swallowed it to answer. “I didn’t mean to misrepresent myself, here. Once an addict, always an addict. But I have been sober for about six months.”

Each of his answers brought more questions to her mind. “That’s great. I mean, that’s really great. How…”

“How did I stop?”

Kaylee nodded.

“I met Mama C.” He smiled. “Her number one rule is that if you want to stay in her gang, you have one month to get clean and stay clean. She doesn’t tolerate any slip-ups.”

This was the trail she needed to follow for her thesis. She forced the other questions down and asked, “What drew you to her? What does she do for you and the others that would persuade you to stop? I mean, if you wouldn’t stop for your family, why for her?”

“I don’t know.” His chin rested on his chest as he stared down at his hands. “I wasn’t ready before. The drugs had such a hold on me, all I could think about was where I was going to get my next fix.” He paused, lifting a finger to his mouth to chew on his nail. “I was near starved to death when Mama C came across me in an alley. I have no idea how long it’d been since I’d last eaten anything. Days. Weeks, maybe. I hadn’t shot up in a couple of days and the withdrawal was horrible. I honestly just wanted to curl up in that alley and die like the worthless piece of shit I am.”

“No.” She reached for his arm.

He flinched away from her touch. “Mama wouldn’t let me. She brought me food. A sleeping bag. A coat. She sat with me and nursed me back to health.”

“Why does she do it?”

Clearing his throat, he sat up straighter. “You’ll have to ask her that.”

His tone of voice suggested that his cooperation with her questions was coming to an end. She tried for one more. “Now that you’re clean—why don’t you go home?”

He barked out a short, humorless laugh. “Thanks for lunch. I need to get going now.” He opened the car door and ducked to get out.

“Wait. I can take you back.”

“Nah. Thanks, but I feel like walking.”

“When will Mama C be back?”

“She doesn’t keep a regular schedule, college girl. You’ll just have to keep checking back.” He slammed the door and shouldered his backpack as he strode off.

Kaylee slumped down, pressing her back into the seat. One of the first rules of psychology was to not get emotionally