“No pointing, Walker,” Brooke hisses, shoving his arm down.
“It is her! What’s she doing here? Shouldn’t she be at school?” His eyebrows furrow in confusion.
I bark out a laugh and shake my head.
“Teachers have lives outside of school,” I tell him.
“Weird.” He shakes his head.
“She sent me a text message the other night,” Brooke leans in and whispers.
“Is everything okay with Walker?” My back straightens.
“Yeah. It was an accident. Apparently, she meant to send it to her friend.” Brooke laughs, pulling her phone out.
I grab it and read over the message.
Ms. Andrews sent an entire message about how men are assholes and dating sucks. Checking the date, I note this was the same night I went to her apartment. I guess she was having a rough night.
“She apologized profusely as you can see, but it made me laugh.”
“That is funny.”
“Ms. Andrewsisfunny. She makes a weird sound when she laughs, like a pig, but we made ice cream in science the other day and it was good. It didn’t taste like the ice cream from Cones that I loved in Dallas, but it was pretty good for making it in a plastic bag,“ Walker rambles.
He must’ve been listening to our conversation.
“Ice cream in a bag?” I lift my eyebrows incredulously. “That doesn’t sound good.”
“It was an experiment,” Brooke explains. “Turning liquid into a solid. He loved it.”
“Yeah! We got to eat it and not do so much work, so that was cool.” He leans back in his chair, hands clasped together over the table.
This kid could be my twin when it comes to personalities. I’ve never known a nephew and uncle to be so alike, but he’s almost my carbon copy. I hope he makes better choices than me, though. I’ll make sure of it.
My eyes wander back to Ms. Andrews. She’s eating a taco, her hands messy from the sauce. There’s no filter when it comes to observing her, and it’s kind of refreshing. A pile of crumpled napkins sits by her plate, some tucked under the rim of it.
“You’re staring,” Brooke says.
“At what?” I snap my head toward her.
“Not what,who.“ She waggles her eyebrows.
“You’re ridiculous.
“You also have to make a life for yourself. Do you think I don’t know what you’re doing? Putting your life on hold for Walker and me? It isn’t your responsibility.” She shakes her head.
“You know how I feel about relationships. They’re not for me.” I shake my head.
“You aren’t Dad. We’ve discussed this before.”
My jaw clenches. I hate thinking about my father, but his ghost haunts me no matter how different I want to be from him.
“Let’s enjoy dinner.” I divert the conversation and look at Walker. “Let’s do this word search.” I point to his kids’ menu.
“My son won’t always bail you out of difficult conversations,” Brooke mumbles.
She may be right, but he bailed me out of this one. I’m not in the mood to discuss the ways I’d rather focus on my family than let someone into my life.