Chapter Fourteen
One question haunts and hurts . . . too much, too much to mention.
Maybe it was her frame of mind, but Pixie could have sworn Elphaba was talking to her this morning.
She grabbed her steaming mug of coffee off the counter and wandered out onto the balcony.
It was warm, and the cloudless sky and brilliant sunshine promised a perfect day.
Summer was finally in Miami, even if it was technically still spring.
Leaning up against the balcony, she closed her eyes and breathed in the salty air.
Never in all the hours she’d spent in her mom’s trailer had she imagined she’d live somewhere so luxurious.
There would come a day when she’d have to leave this building—after all, she didn’t have a granny with a couple of Jackson Pollocks to spare—but she’d treasure every moment she could.
“Hey, Pixie,” Lia said, joining her. “It’s going to be a beautiful day.”
Pixie lifted her face to the sun, and let it wash over her. “Mmm-hmm.”
They stood in a peaceful silence, until Lia sighed, and Pixie opened one eye in her direction. “Mornings like this, I wish I had someone special to eat breakfast with out here . . . oh wait, that’s pretty insensitive—”
Pixie chuckled. For the first time in days, she could feel bubbles of laughter work their way out, and before she knew it, Lia was laughing with her. She threw her arm around her best friend. “Thank you, Lia.” She gasped between bursts. “I needed that.”
“Glad I could be of service. I gotta go, I’ll see you later. Don’t forget, we have Cujo’s big surprise tonight.”
“How could I forget?” Drea’s surprise for Cujo was to let him tattoo her.
She’d gone to Trent with the idea of booking an appointment under another name, to ask him what he thought.
Everyone knew Drea had been pretty anti-ink.
But the death of her mom had brought about a huge change in Drea, and now she wanted her boyfriend to tattoo a rose in memorial of Rosa on her shoulder.
Cujo was going to freak out in a seriously crazy way when he found out.
“I’ll see you later,” Lia said.
Pixie watched Lia leave and then wandered back into the condo. She set about making breakfast until the phone she’d set on the counter vibrated.
The sight of his name on the screen made her stomach cartwheel.
Dred wanted a video call. Pixie wiped her hands on the sides of her jeans and pressed accept, expecting to find Dred, not an adorable little baby snoozing in a little recliner.
And expecting to hear Dred, but instead, she could swear .
. . yep . . . I’ve heard it said, that people come into our lives for a reason .
. . That was most definitely “For Good” from Wicked.
A hand snuck into the shot to hold a card in front of Petal. On it was black messy handwriting.
MY DAD IS STUPID . . .
The card was removed, and another was placed in front of Petal.
SOMETIMES HE ACTS BEFORE THINKING . . .
The process repeated itself, as Petal dozed on.
SOMETIMES HE RUNS INSTEAD OF STAYING . . .
SOMETIMES HE’S SCARED AND DOESN’T KNOW WHY . . .
SOMETIMES HE WISHES HE’D FIND . . .
SOMEONE WHO WOULD LOVE HIM LIKE I DO . . .
I POOP A LOT TO SHOW HIM JUST HOW MUCH! !
Tears started to burn her eyes, but Pixie wiped them away quickly, scared of missing a message. Petal hadn’t moved, clearly still fast asleep in her little pink onesie that said Rock Royalty on the front.
HE’S SORRY HE DIDN’T STAY AND LISTEN . . .
HE’S SORRY HE LEFT YOU ALONE . . .
HE WANTS TO LISTEN TO YOU . . .
BUT HE CAN’T COME TO YOU . . .
BECAUSE OF ME . . .
I DON’T HAVE A PASSPORT . . .
The card held what looked like twenty attempts to take a passport photograph. Pixie laughed through her tears.
SO PLEASE COME SEE US . . .
TOMORROW. . . .
The card was removed but not replaced, just as Elphaba sang about asking for forgiveness for the things she’d done.
“Hey, Snowflake,” Dred said roughly as he the camera panned to his face. “Have you met my daughter, Petal?” He coughed to clear his throat.
Pixie bit her lower lip and breathed deeply. She shook her head and wiped the tears threatening to leak.
Dred looked tired. His hair was tied back off his face. She’d missed the gold flecks in his eyes, missed the way one side of his mouth lifted before the other when he smiled, she’d just all around missed him. He also had a puddle of what looked like spit-up on his shoulder.
“Your daughter’s beautiful,” she managed.
“Yeah,” he said, his gaze shifting in Petal’s direction.
“She is, isn’t she?” He studied her for a moment, then looked back at the camera.
“I’m sorry, Pix. With every part of me, I regret behaving like a complete asshole.
I should have listened and not stormed off like a jerk.
You deserved so much more than that. But I’m here, and I want to know. Can you tell me about it?”
Pixie walked over to the couch and sat down.
“I was thirteen when Arnie, who is my stepdad, came to live with us. He was a small-time dealer in Pahokee. The trailer was never big enough for the three of us. Slowly but surely, Mom started to use. Recreational at first, but over the course of the year she was using almost daily.” She looked at Dred’s concerned face, wishing they were having this conversation face-to-face.
“I was fourteen when he first threatened to kill my mom if I didn’t sit on a stool with my sundress wide open so he could jerk off while looking at me. ”
“Fuck,” Dred mumbled and rubbed the back of his neck. “I’m sorry, Snowflake. If I’d known, I would have crushed the fucker where he stood. Did he . . . Shit. Did he . . . sexually assault you?”
Pixie shook her head. “No. And yes. He was a voyeur. And he got off on embarrassing me. He’d make me sit and watch porn with him at fifteen.
” The tears came, but it was useless trying to stop them.
“Sometimes he’d touch me inappropriately or get me to stand naked and read stories to him.
Shit. I’ve had years of therapy, but things still get tangled in my head when I think about it. ”
“Tying your wrists?” Dred asked.
“Yeah. He’d do that, but I’d fight sometimes, especially when he invited his friends to watch.
One day, he forced me to take two pills.
I had no idea what they were, but when they kicked in, I could escape.
Nothing mattered. I could slip away from what was happening and pretend I was something or someone all together different.
Then next time, he didn’t need to force me to take them.
Eventually I started to ask for them. At the time, I thought it was one of the only things I was in control of, but I realized in rehab it was pure addiction. ”
They sat in silence for a while, Pixie lost in her thoughts, Dred obviously trying to process everything she was telling him.
“There’s something else. He was trying to blackmail me. I’ve never told anyone the why. Not my therapists, not Trent and Cujo, my sponsor kind of guessed, but you need to know.”
“I’m here, Snowflake. And I really wish I was fucking there with you right now.” He glanced toward Petal.
Strangely, Pixie felt her confidence building.
They were going to come through the other side of it if Dred could accept the one fact she still hadn’t told him.
“I wanted out. The day before my sixteenth birthday I had packed a bag, planning to run the next day because school would no longer care if I showed up or not. That night, Arnie had some of his friends over. They were playing poker. He told me to sit on my stool like a good girl. The pot was larger than I had ever seen. Arnie played dealer. When the last player went out, and only Brewster, a friend of Arnie’s, was left, Arnie split the pot in half.
He gave half to Brewster, and then walked over to me, told me to open wide.
I looked between Brewster and Arnie. I just knew.
I was the prize. I shook my head, but Arnie forced my head back and dropped powder into my mouth.
I couldn’t spit it out. It stuck to my gums and coated my tongue.
He looked at Brewster, and told him to give it a minute, and walked out of the trailer.”
Dred leapt to his feet and started to pace. It was hard to focus on the screen as the background bobbed about. She saw him reach for the anchor he always pulled on, but it wasn’t there.
“Come to me, Pix. I spoke to Trent this morning. He said you could fly up here tomorrow morning. I’ll get you on the early flight. Please, come be with me, and little-miss-poopy-pants over there. We’re a package deal now.”
She took a deep breath. The hardest part. “There’s one more thing. I—”
“It doesn’t matter. Whatever it is. We need to talk some more. And we have enough shit to deal with to fill the SkyDome twice over. But let’s deal with it together.”
“Dred . . . I killed Brewster.”
* * *
Dred walked to the living room window and looked out onto the street.
Nothing. He pulled the phone out of his pocket and checked the time of Pixie’s text message telling him she was in the limo he’d booked for her and was on her way from the airport.
Tapping his fingernails on the windowsill, he calculated the time to get to the house, and by his reckoning, he still had seven more minutes to wait.
How did he feel knowing she killed someone?
Her revelation was shocking, but he felt relieved.
Relieved that her stepdad and the asshole he did the poker deal with hadn’t been able to rob her of the one thing she’d held sacred for so many years.
The fact that someone had to die for the violations committed against her was a trade-off he’d make over and over.