My mom wasn’t thrilled.

I was grounded for two weeks, which actually kind of sucked.

But my dad . . . he kind of got it. My dad says loyalty is important and that I get this from my mom. He said sometimes, when you learn about the world a certain way, like me and him did, you sort of learn how to deal with your problems and emotions a certain way. Doesn’t mean it’s the best way, just means your instincts might not always be in line with the kind of behavior that is okay with like teachers and cops and stuff. He taught me about counting my heartbeats to calm down so I can think about the possible consequences of my decisions before I act.

I count my heartbeats a lot.

Sometimes I still make mistakes, but both my parents and my aunt Robyn and uncle Dallas say this is okay.

It used to not be okay. My biological dad didn’t think mistakes were okay. He punished me for them, even some that I didn’t make. The dad I have now, the one who taught me to play the drums, he says sometimes grown-ups make mistakes too and that the things my biological dad did were mistakes. He’s paying for them in prison, which is how I learned about consequences. And I guess how he did, too.

It took a long time for me to be okay with mistakes. Learning to play the violin with my mom and the drums with my dad taught me that sometimes something really kind of, well, beautiful and awesome can come from mistakes.

“Some of the best songs were written by accident,” my mom always says. “Or from something sad or really painful.”

Learning to find the good in all the bad and control yourself even when you can’t—my parents say that’s how you grow up and how you learn to make good decisions.

I’m working on it.

But at thirteen, I’m the only linebacker who plays violin and my best friend wears bow ties so I get a lot of practice trying to make good decisions.

It’s easier said than done, that’s for sure.

The music begins onstage and my heart beats in time with the drums. My dad is a pretty talented drummer and he’s on a lot of magazine covers. I grin back at Malcolm, because yeah, okay, so my parents are kind of cool. For parents, I guess. They look different than some parents because they have tattoos and stuff, but most of my friends seem to think that just makes them cooler.

Tonight’s concert is to benefit an organization my mom started called Over the Rainbow. She wanted to give kids like me, well, like I used to be, a chance to learn to channel stuff, which I think means deal with stuff, through playing music.

After she and my dad adopted me, some people found out and wrote an article about us and how we met. Then all these other musicians started calling and asking how they could help out. Now it’s a really big deal, which makes my parents really happy.

My mom says I’m her pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, which makes me feel kind of special. I am pretty thankful that she met me and loved me and wanted to adopt me. I am also thankful she doesn’t say the pot of gold thing in front of the guys. Only at night before bed.

I’m pretty lucky I guess. Not only do I have a cool mom but my dad understands how I am sometimes—even when I don’t understand it myself. Through some of the events for Over the Rainbow, I’ve met some other kids like me, kids who had not-so-great parents or for one reason or another didn’t get to know their parents. It’s kind of nice not to feel alone in the world. There’s this girl, Abby, she lives near me and had kind of a tough time before Over the Rainbow and she’s okay. For a girl I guess.

Mom says that’s what music does. It connects us, makes even the loneliest person a part of something special. It helps us to feel and to heal, she says. She’s right. She usually is, but my dad says not to tell her that too much or she’ll get a big head about it.

Last week at school I turned in my essay on why I wanted to be a drummer when I grow up, a professional one like my dad. My teacher, Mrs. Kingston, said music was a hobby, not a career, and that I should rewrite it.

My mom came to school and had a very long discussion with her about this. I don’t know what happened during their talk because I had to sit out in the hall, but after it was over Mrs. Kingston said she’d made a mistake and gave me a hug and an A on my essay.

“Why do you want to be a drummer, Liam?” my mom asked me in the car on the way home. “Is it because you really love playing or because you want to be like your dad?”

I had to think about it for a while. “Both, I guess. And because on Career Day they said you should do what makes you feel good and what makes a difference in the world.”

She smiled at me and I smiled back because she’s got a really nice smile that makes it hard not to. Even if you don’t want to at first, like I didn’t when we first met, she will keep smiling at you until you do. “Music has sure made a difference in our world, hasn’t it?”

I nodded.

When I was younger, I used to wander around town. I found my mom because I heard the music coming from her house where she gave piano and violin lessons. I don’t like to think about what might’ve happened if she hadn’t been there, if she’d been on the road with the band or away at college or at any of the other places she could’ve been, if she hadn’t played the kind of music that brings you back again and again—the kind that makes you feel safe . . . connected. I shook off the weird feeling remembering those days before knowing her gave me and told her about how Teddy Gleason said music doesn’t make a difference, that doctors did because doctors saved lives and music was “unnecessary.” She rolled her eyes and said Teddy was going to grow up to live a very dull life like his dad and not to worry about it.

The song my parents wrote for me the year they didn’t think they were going to be able to adopt me begins to play and I watch my parents and my uncle onstage for a few minutes. It’s called “Losing Liam” and it launched their career, according to my mom. It also makes people cry, yet it was number one for like a ton of weeks. I guess some people like to cry.

It doesn’t make me cry. It makes me feel . . . I don’t know . . . happy, I guess, that they wanted me that much. My mom says it’s important to find happiness and that not everybody’s happy ending looks the same, and that’s okay.

Watching them, listening to the words they wrote about me and how much they love me and how badly they wanted to be my parents, I realize that Teddy really was wrong.

Music does save lives.

It saved mine.

MISSING DIXIE PLAYLIST

“Goodbye,” Who Is Fancy?

“Lonely Eyes,” Chris Young

“Turning Tables,” Adele

“Games,” Luke Bryan

“Better Than You Left Me,” Mickey Guyton

“Marry Me,” Train

“She Don’t Love You,” Eric Paslay

“Sippin’ on Fire,” Florida Georgia Line

“Not in That Way,” Sam Smith

“Burning House,” Cam

“I Know You,” Skylar Grey

“Love You Like That,” Canaan Smith

“Just a Kiss,” Lady Antebellum

“I’m to Blame,” Kip Moore

“Life Support,” Sam Smith

“Devil’s Backbone,” The Civil Wars

“I Believe,” Christina Perri

“Take It Out on Me,” Florida Georgia Line

“Not on Drugs,” Tove Lo

“Playing with Fire,” Katie Armiger

“I’m Coming Over,” Chris Young

“Ride,” Chase Rice

“Lead Me,” Kip Moore

“Fly,” Maddie and Tae

Acknowledgments

WHEN I LOOK back on the year it took to write this series, it feels like a blur. A beautiful, bright, neon lit blur.

I have to confess that I didn’t know exactly how the Neon Dreams series would end when I began writing it. I knew the band would finally make it big. I knew that they would never want to share their backstory but that it would be a story worth telling. What I didn’t know was how real their hearts and souls would become to me. While Liam may not be Dixie and Gavin’s biological son, I did learn this year that family truly does come in the form of people who love and support you in both the best and worst of times and that it’s not always comprised of people who are related by blood or marriage. Liam was born from that discovery.