by Bromberg, K.
“Checkered flag time, baby.” I smile at him as I rise from the chair. He reaches behind him and tugs on a new T-shirt—an endorsement T-shirt—to wear beneath his fire suit now that the requisite lucky T-shirt has been worn for the superstitious allotted amount of time. I glance over at the clock and am struck by the nerves that start fluttering when I realize that there’s only a short time left before the cranking of the engines while he seems so calm and collected.
“Don’t worry,” Colton says bringing me back to the here and now, not realizing that I had pressed a hand to the butterflies in my stomach. “They’ll hit me the minute we walk out of the RV.” He points to my stomach and then nods his head toward the door before shoving a hat on his head. His lucky hat. And I smile softly when I realize it’s the same hat that he wore on our date to the carnival.
Mr.-I’m-So-Sure-Of-Myself wore his lucky hat on our first official date. As if my heart could swell any more.
“You ready?” he asks as he walks a few steps and then turns and holds his hand out to me.
“Hey, Ace?” Colton stops with the door ajar and looks back at me with curiosity. Time for me to show him just what’s waiting at the finish line. I’d found the skimpy pair of black and white checkered panties that have Revved and Raring embroidered across the butt at a little novelty store back at home. With the state of things between Colton and me, I’m not sure why I’d even brought them on the trip, but obviously with last night’s turn of events, I’m glad that I did. His eyes widen as I unzip my shorts and wiggle my hips, pushing them down so that he can see a hint of the lace and checkering on the fabric. “This is the only checkered flag you need, baby.”
His smile widens and the open door is forgotten as he strides two steps back toward me and yanks my body against his. He stops a moment and stares at me, mouths a whisper apart and emotion brimming in our eyes before he crashes his lips to mine in a kiss of pure hunger and carnality. He breaks away just as suddenly as he starts it and looks at me with a smirk. “You can bet your ass that’s one checkered flag I’m definitely claiming.”
I CAN FEEL IT.
That complete certainty that hits you like a fucking freight train on very few days in your life. I have it today. I feel it today. It’s in the air circling around me as my head flickers here and there through what I need to do today when I hit the track and the rubber connects. Stay clear of Mason—the fucker’s got it out for me—like I knew he had his sights on that barfly last year. It’s not like he was waving a flag or anything staking his fucking claim. Bad blood is never good on the track. Never. Stay high and tight through turns two and three. Binders light. Pedal heavy. Bring it in low on one. I keep repeating my responsibilities in my head, over and over. My way of making sure that I don’t have to think down the chute. Just react.
Today I’m taking the checkered flag, and not just those dick hardening panties that fucking Rylee has on. Sweet Christ, am I claiming that flag. But I can feel it. Everything feels right with the world, and shit, maybe I’m being a pussy but that right feeling started when I woke up with Rylee wrapped in my arms, head nuzzled under my neck, lips pressed to my skin, and heart beating against mine.
Right where she’s supposed to be.
I take a bite of another of my pre-race superstitions—a Snicker’s bar—and look up to search her out. She’s sitting quietly out of the way toward a corner, and her eyes lock with mine immediately. Her lips form that shy smile that turns me motherfucking inside out, and instead of the fear that usually snakes through my system, I feel settled. At ease. Can you say fucking pussy to the whip? But you know what? I’m okay with it because I’m pretty sure she’ll be gentle with me. Won’t crack it too hard. Well, unless I want her to.
“Wood?” I turn and look at Beckett.
Now Becks on the other hand is still going to hand my ass back to me in a hand basket once the stress of this race is over and he realizes it’s minutes before a race and I’m thinking about my fucking voodoo pussy. My fucking Rylee.
I flash a quick smile at Ry before I turn to Becks. “Yup?” I say as I stand and begin the routine of zipping up my suit.
Getting ready to race.
Getting ready to do the one thing I have always loved.
Getting ready to take that motherfucking checkered flag.
THERE IS SO MUCH TO take in. So many sights and sounds to assault and overwhelm. Hand over my heart, I stand beside Colton as the national anthem is sung on the stage at our backs. Flags wave. The breeze blows. The crowd sings. And my nerves go into overdrive for the man beside me who has transformed into an intense, introspective man as he focuses on the task at hand.
He reaches out a free hand and places it at the small of my back as the camera crew makes its way down the line of drivers standing on pit row with their crew and significant others at their sides. The fact that he’s trying to comfort me in a moment strictly about him warms my insides. I’d tried telling him that I could sit in the pit box during the anthem—that it wasn’t a big deal to me—but he refused. “I’ve got you now, sweetheart, I’m not letting you out of my sight,” he’d said. Argument won. Hands down.
Fireworks boom as the song comes to an end, and all of a sudden pit row is a flurry of activity. Crews going to work to try and make all of their hard preparation come to fruition for their driver. Men descend around Colton before I can wish him one last good luck. Ear buds are stuffed in and taped down. Velcro is fastened. Shoes are double checked to make sure nothing will interfere with the pedal. Gloves are pulled on and situated. Last minute directions are given. I allow myself to be led from the craziness and am helped over the wall by Davis.
“Rylee!” In all of the complete, organized chaos, his voice rings out. Stops me. Starts me. Completes me.
I turn around and face him in all of his suited up glory. His white balaclava is in one hand and helmet in the other. So achingly handsome. So damn sexy. And all mine.
I look at him confused since we already had our moment of privacy in the motor home. Did I do something wrong? “Yeah?”
His smile lights up. A solid figure standing still while everyone else moves in one big blur around him. His eyes hold mine, intense and clear. “I race you, Ryles,” he says in a voice that’s implacable and unwavering amidst the swirling chaos.
My heart stops. Time stands still and it feels like we’re the only two people in the world. Just a damaged boy and a selfless girl. Our eyes lock and in that exchange, words that I can’t shout out in the chaos between us are said. That after the little he explained last night, I know how horribly difficult it is for him to utter those words. That I understand he’s telling me he’s still a broken child inside, but like my boys he’s giving me his heart and trusting that I will hold it with gentle, compassionate, and understanding hands.
“I race you too, Colton.” I mouth to him. Despite the noise, I know he hears what I’ve said for a shy smile graces his lips, and he shakes his head like he’s trying to understand all of this too. Beckett calls his name and he gives me one last glance before his face transforms into work mode. And I can’t help but just stand there and watch him. Love swells, overwhelms, and heals my heart that I once thought was irreparable. Fills me with happiness over the man that I can’t tear my eyes away from him.
My storm before the calm.
My angel breaking through the darkness.
My ace.
My chest reverberates as the cars fly down the backstretch. Fifty laps in and I’m still a nervous wreck, my eyes flicking between the track and the television monitor in front of me when the cars are at my back and out of my sight. My knee jiggles, my fingernails have been picked clean of nail polish, and the inside of my lip has been chewed raw. And yet Colton’s voice comes through confident and focused at the task at hand every time he speaks on the headset I’m wearing.
Each time he talks to Beckett or his spotter I feel a trickle of ease. And then they hit a turn, cars side by side—masses of metal flying at ungodly s
peeds—and that trickle of ease turns into a pound of anxiety. I check the monitor again and smile when I see “13 Donavan” under the number two spot fighting his way back to the lead after a pit stop prompted by a caution.
“Dirty air ahead,” the spotter says as Colton comes out of turn three and heads toward traffic a lap down.
“Ten-four.”
“Last lap fastest yet,” Beckett pipes into the conversation as he studies a computer screen several seats down from me that’s reading all of the gauges in number thirteen. “Doing great, Wood. Just keep her steady in that groove you’ve got. The high line has a lot of pebbling already so stay clear.”
“Got it.” His voice strains from the force of the car as he accelerates out of turn number one.
There is a collective gasp from the crowd as a car comes into contact with the wall. I turn to look, my heart jumping in my throat, but I can’t see it from our position. I immediately look to the monitor where Beckett is already focused.
“Up one, Colton. Up!” The spotter yells in my ears.
It all happens so fast but I feel like time stops. Stands still. Rewinds. The monitor shows a cloud of smoke as the car that hits the wall first slings back down the track at a diagonal. The speeds are too fast so the remaining cars are unable to adjust their line in that quick amount of time. Colton had once told me you always race to where the accident first hits because it always moves afterwards due to the momentum.
There’s so much smoke. So much smoke, how is Colton going to know where to go?
“I’m blind,” the spotter yells, panicked as the mass of cars and the ensuing smoke is so large that he can’t direct Colton. Can’t tell him the safe line to drive with his car flying close to two hundred miles per hour.
I watch his car fly into the smoke. My heart in my throat. My prayers thrown up to God. My breath held. My soul hoping.
MOTHERFUCKER.
The smoke engulfs me. The blur around me now gray with flashes of sparking metal as cars collide around me. I’m fucking blind.
Don’t have time to fear.
Don’t have time to think.
Can only feel.
Only react.
Daylight flashes on the other end of the tunnel of gray. I aim for it. Not letting up. Never let up. Race to where the crash was.
Go, go, go. C’mon, one-three. C’mon, baby. Go, go, go.
The flash of red comes out of nowhere and slings in front of me. No time to react. None.
I’m weightless.
Lifted.
Weightless.
Spiraling.
Spinning.
White knuckles on the wheel.
Daylight again.
Too fast.
Too fast.
“Fuck!”
I SEE COLTON’S CAR RISE above the smoke. It’s up on the nose. Spiraling through the air. I hear Beckett yell, “Wood!” It’s only one word, but the broken way he says it has lead dropping through my soul.
I can’t react.
Can’t function.
Just sit in my seat and stare.
My mind fracturing to images of Max and Colton.
Broken.
Interchangeable.
SPIDERMAN. BATMAN. SUPERMAN. IRONMAN.
To Mom and Dad ~
Thank you for teaching me that life isn’t about how you survive the storm, but rather how you dance in the rain.
And I’m finally dancing…
THWACK. THWACK. THWACK.
The resonating pain in my head pulses to the sound assaulting my ears.
Thwack. Thwack. Thwack.
There is so much sound—loud, buzzing white noise—and yet it’s eerily fucking quiet. Quiet except for that damn thwacking sound.
What the hell is that?
Why the fuck is it so damn hot—so hot I can see the heat coming in waves off of the asphalt—but all I feel is cold?
Motherfucker!
Something to the right of me catches my eye—mangled metal, blown tires, skins shredded to pieces—and all I can do is stare. Becks is going to throttle me for fucking up the car. Shred me to pieces just like my car strewn all over the track. What the fuck happened?
A trickle of unease dances at the base of my spine.
My heartbeat accelerates.
Confusion flickers at the far away edges of my subconscious. I close my eyes to try and push back the pounding that’s suddenly playing percussion to my thoughts. Thoughts I can’t quite grasp. They sift through my mind like sand through my fingers.
Thwack. Thwack. Thwack.
I open my eyes to try and find that goddamn sound that’s adding pressure to the pain …
… pleasure to bury the pain …
Those words whisper through my mind, and I shake my head to try to comprehend what’s going on when I see him: dark hair in need of a trim; tiny little hands holding a plastic helicopter; a Spiderman Band-Aid wrapped around his index finger that’s spinning the pretend rotors.
Spiderman. Batman. Superman. Ironman.
“Thwack. Thwack. Thwack,” he says in the softest of voices.
So why does it sound so loud then? Big eyes look up at me through thick lashes, innocence personified in that simple grace of green. His finger falters on the rotor as his eyes meet mine, cocking his head to study me intently.
“Hi there,” I say, the deafening silence reverberating through the space between us.
Something’s off.
Completely not fucking right.
Apprehension resurfaces.
Hints of the unknown whirl around my mind.
Confusion smothers.
His green eyes consume me.
Anxiety dissipates when a slow smile curls up the corner of his little mouth smudged with dirt, a lone dimple winking at its side.
“I’m not supposed to talk to strangers,” he says, straightening his back some, trying to act like the big kid he wants to be.
“That’s a good rule. Did your mom teach you that?”
Why does he seem so familiar?
He shrugs nonchalantly. His gaze runs over every inch of me and then comes back to meet mine. They flicker to something over my shoulder, but for some fucking reason I can’t seem to drag my eyes from him to look. It’s not just that he’s the cutest fucking kid I’ve ever seen … No, it’s like he has this pull on me that I can’t seem to break.
A little line creases his forehead as he looks down and picks at another superhero Band-Aid barely covering the large scrape on his knee.
Spiderman. Batman. Superman. Ironman.
Shut the fuck up! I want to yell at the demons in my head. They have no right to be here … no reason to swarm around this sweet looking little boy, and yet they keep swirling like a merry-go-round. Like my car should be around the track right now. So why am I taking a step toward this polarizing little boy instead of preparing for the ration of shit Becks is going to spew at me, and by the looks of my car, that I obviously deserve?
And yet I still can’t resist.
I take another step toward him, slow and deliberate in my motions, like I am with the boys at The House.
The boys.
Rylee.
I need to see her.
Don’t want to be alone anymore.
I need to feel her.
Don’t want to be broken anymore.
Why am I swimming in a sea of confusion? And yet I take another step through the fog toward this unexpected ray of light.
Be my spark.
“That’s a pretty bad owie you got there …”
He snorts. It’s so fucking adorable to see this little kid with such a serious face, nose scattered with freckles scrunched up, looking at me like I’m missing something.
“Thanks, Captain Obvious!”
And a smart-ass mouth on him too. My type of kid. I stifle a chuckle as he glances back over my shoulder again for the third time. I start to turn to see what he’s looking at when his voice stops me. “Are you okay?”
Huh? �
��What do you mean?”
“Are you okay?” he asks again. “You seem kind of broken.”
“What are you talking about?” I take another step toward him. My fleeting thoughts mixed with the somberness of his tone and the concern etched on his face is starting to unnerve me.
“Well, you look broken to me,” he whispers as his Band-Aid wrapped finger flips the propeller again—thwack, thwack, thwack—before motioning up and down my body.
Anxiety creeps up my spine until I look down at my race suit to find it intact, my hands patting up and down to calm the feeling. “No.” The words rush out. “I’m okay, buddy. See? Nothing’s wrong,” I say, sighing a quick breath of relief. The little fucker scared me for a second.
“No, silly,” he says with a roll of his eyes and a huff of breath before pointing over my shoulder. “Look. You’re broken.”
I turn, the calm simplicity of his tone puzzling me, and look behind me.
My heart stops.
Thwack.
My breath strangles in my chest.
Thwack.
My body freezes.
Thwack.
I blink my eyes over and over, trying to push away the images before me. The sights permeate through a viscous haze.
Spiderman. Batman. Superman. Ironman.
Fuck. No. No. No. No.
“See,” his angelic voice says beside me. “I told you.”
No. No. No. No.
The air finally punches from my lungs. I force a swallow down my throat that feels like sandpaper.