The chatter continues but I tune it out. Over my right shoulder, a tiny version of me dressed as a devil would reside, if in fact these intangible parts of my subconscious were real. She would probably have a motorcycle too. She’d ride donuts around my shoulder while telling me to go ahead and do the bad things that were tempting me. She and I would get along great. I smirk, chin still turned to my shoulder, and then Teig’s mouth falls open in confusion as he watches me make faces to thin air.
“Hana has a date tonight.” My father’s words rip through the thick shield my ears wear when I tune out adult conversation. I almost choke on my pancake. Dorothy and Molly burst into big grins as they launch into hyperactive mother-figure mode and bombard me with questions.
“Who is it?”
“Is it Ash?”
“Where are y’all going?”
“It’s Ash, isn’t it?”
“Have you kissed him yet?” That one was from Dorothy. Molly playfully elbows her when my face turns an obvious shade of red, judging by how hot my cheeks are. I struggle to hear my thoughts well enough to make them into words. Teig watches me, waiting for my answers while he shovels food into his mouth at record speed. Dad and Marty are absorbed in their own conversation about spark plugs for the tractor.
Dorothy asked if I had kissed Ash yet. It’s as if she and everyone else know about my crush on him. But I certainly haven’t kissed him yet and I haven’t even been on a date with him, so why is she asking me this? And that’s when I remember…I have a date with Ryan tonight.
Well, it isn’t really a date, more like attending a barbeque with him. No big deal. I swallow. “It’s Ryan not Ash. No, it’s not a date, and of course no to the kissing,” I answer in one breath that will hopefully end the topic of my pseudo-date. Teig mutters an ewww under his breath.
“I don’t trust that boy as far as I can throw him,” Dorothy says.
“He’s not so bad,” Molly intercedes, throwing a sincere smile my way. “He’s a nice kid.”
Dorothy’s bony finger points straight at me. “You tell him to keep his hands to himself, you hear me?”
Molly and I start hanging banners before the sun is out. These banners are three times the size of the usual ones we use for race days. All of the big name motocross brands are featured on them, from dirt bike manufacturers to clothing and accessories companies. We cover the walls of the tower and then nail some to the main entrance of the track.
While Molly chats about some darling woman who is married to the owner of a local cycle shop, I help her nail the shop’s banner to a fence post in silence. Normally, I’d try to add to her conversation by throwing in a few “Ahhs” and “oh cool”s, but all I can think of right now is Ash and Ryan.
As much as I don’t want to admit it, I like both of them and both of them seem to like me. Ash is obviously the better choice, as Ryan tends to charm me and then ignore me. I should let Ryan fall to the wayside and concentrate on Ash; it would be the smart thing to do. But Ash hasn’t asked me out and Ryan did. Why did I agree to hang out with Ryan tonight? And more importantly, why do the butterflies still do summersaults in my stomach when Ryan smiles at me?
What if Ash finds out about my so-called date with Ryan? A large, elephant-sized portion of me wants him to find out. If he knew I was spending time, not just any time, but flirting time, with his worst enemy then he would have to spring into action and make me his girlfriend. He needs to know that other guys are interested in me so he can fight for my affection. My heart sinks as I reach for another nail and hammer it through the plastic banner. Somehow, I can’t picture Ash being the fighting type.
By noon, the track gets overtaken by a half dozen bulldozers. A high-pitched beep pierces the air every time one of them shifts into reverse. Unfortunately for Molly and me, that’s about every ten seconds.
We sit on the floor of the score tower, opening and organizing boxes of new T-shirts that will be on sale at the races tomorrow. They read “Mixon Motocross Nationals” with tomorrow’s date on the front, and a screened image of a racer whipping through the air on the back. I had seen Ash and Shelby wear Nationals shirts from other tracks, all with the dates of previous races on them. We have at least three hundred shirts ordered. Molly assures me we would sell all of them so if I want one I should take it now.
My phone lights up and vibrate from across the room. Hoping to see a message from Ash or Ryan, but knowing it is probably neither, I lurch across the pile of shirts and unlock my phone. Molly gasps at my ninja-like moves.
“It’s just Shelby,” I say aloud, obviously disappointed as I take my spot on the floor between the adult small and child large piles. Molly rolls her eyes. I read the message, typed in perfect English because Shelby hates typical text lingo.
“I’m so excited and I can’t wait to talk to you. Jake and I went to dinner last night and he totally KISSED me! I know you’re busy at work now, but can we hang out tonight and gush about it?”
“Oh no,” I slump, letting my phone drop into the shirt I’m supposed to be folding. Molly lifts an eyebrow, looking for an explanation.
“She wants to hang out tonight, but I’m supposed to go out with Ryan.”
“Why don’t you ask her to come over for lunch?” Molly offers. “Dorothy gave me some delicious homegrown tomatoes. I think I’ll make sandwiches.”
“Thanks, I’ll ask her,” I say, grateful for the idea. I do want to see Shelby and squeal and freak out about her new boyfriend, but I certainly don’t want to tell her about seeing Ryan tonight. I type out a reply telling her to be at my house in fifteen minutes. While I wait for her to accept, I get up and gaze out the large windows in front of the scorekeeper’s table.
The track is no longer a twisting trail with jumps, turns and long sweeping berms. It’s still normal on one side but completely flattened on the other. What was once a section of tabletops and doubles is now a pile of loosely packed dirt. My heart catches in my chest. Those jumps had been there since I was a little girl; they were so old they had grass growing up the sides and now they’re gone. I watch as a bulldozer levels a section of whoops, Ash’s favorite part of the track. I wonder if they will be able to rebuild it in time for the races tomorrow. Does my dad know what he is getting himself into?
When lunch is over and Shelby and I have thanked Molly for the extraordinary sandwiches (the tomatoes were delicious), we head to my room where three hours of MTV-watching and gushing about boys ensues. This time I let her lead the conversation because lately, most of our talks involved her twin brother and my insane crush on him. Shelby is the most selfless person I know, besides maybe Ash. I take this opportunity to try to be more like her.
Jake is a real life Prince Charming to Shelby. Even her tanned skin can’t hide the crimson that rushes to her cheeks when she talks about him. He is handsome, Christian, which meant a lot to her, and came from a family of money, which I consider a great quality but Shelby doesn’t seem to care. He isn’t the fastest motocross racer, but that doesn’t bother her. She is most enamored with the fact he teaches Sunday school to five-year-olds at his church every week.
Like any teenage girl, Shelby tells me every minute detail of their dinner date last night. She is an amazing storyteller, able to talk about three minutes straight without using the word like or umm.
I tell Shelby I probably have to work some more tonight as an excuse to have her leave around five. It’s a white lie, the easiest of all lies, but it pains me to look her in the eyes and say it. She doesn’t seem to mind, and instead she apologizes to me for what she considers bad friend behavior on her part.
“I’m so sorry I haven’t hung out with you as much lately.” Her hand grabs my arm and squeezes in sync with the sparkle in her eyes. “I’ve just been so excited to hang out with Jake. I’ll make it up to you I promise.”
Guilt digs an even bigger hole in my chest. She thinks she is the bad friend here… I am the one about to go on a date with her brother’s enemy. We walk to her car a
nd right as I feel like I’ll crack and tell her all of my plans for tonight, Dad drives up next to us on his four-wheeler. Saved by the smell of exhaust.
“It’s all done!” Dad yells to me over the roar of the four-wheeler as I ride with him back to the track. The bulldozers are lined up the way they were yesterday, only dirty this time. Apparently hiring the most expensive track engineering crew was a good move because they worked faster than I imagined.
We ride up to the new section of the track that has jumps several times larger than the old ones. The dirt is new and crisp, without a single tire mark on it yet. It is impressive. The whoops section has been replaced with new whoops that re now about six feet tall instead of the old ones that looked more like speed bumps. I hold on as the four-wheeler lurches forward and Dad shows me each new section of the track while beaming with pride.
“What do you think?”
“It’s nice, Dad.”
He shuts off the motor and we climb off and walk around the fresh dirt. My dad’s satisfied smile stretches across his face as he looks over his masterpiece.
“Hana, I’ll try this out on you.” He points to the long row of jumps that lead to a sharp left turn.
“Try what out on me?” Surely he wouldn’t make me ride a dirt bike over it?
“Say you’re on a bike and you’re about to take off down that section of track,” he says.
I focus on the part he points to and try to see where he’s going with this. There are six huge piles of dirt on the track. I would consider them jumps, but I know smaller piles like that are usually jumped in sets of two or three. Out of the six ahead of me, each of them have a different face, slope, and height. Right before the first jump, I notice the track veers to the left and a large sweeper goes past the first two jumps and connects with the last four. I have never seen the track have two options like this. It’s right about now that I realize I don’t know the first thing about riding motocross.
“Okay…”
“And you want to be as fast as possible now, which may be tricky. A bike can ride on the dirt at a faster speed than it flies through the air,” he explains.
“Really?” Home-schooling myself in physics probably wasn’t the best idea.
“Yes, but sometimes it’s faster to clear a jump instead of ride over it.”
“How do you know which one to do?” I must ask the magic question because my dad slaps his hands together with excitement in his eyes and says, “Exactly.”
“There are two triples ahead of us,” He says, pointing. “Show that to any rider and they’ll tell you, those six hills are perfectly positioned to be two sets of triples which will keep you in the air for a while.” He paces back and forth in front of me, all the while keeping his eyes on the track as he explains. “But, I had this sweeper put in that bypasses the first double which would allow you to race through the sweeper and then jump the remaining two doubles.”
He waits for my reaction. When I don’t jump into summersaults and cheers, he elaborates. “I had it engineered to where not jumping the impressive triple would actually be faster. You spend more time on the ground, but that time on the ground is faster as you will lose speed soaring through the air on an eighty-foot triple.”
This is too convoluted and scientific for me and although I want to stand here and bask in glory with my dad forever, I really need to get back and prepare for tonight with Ryan. I steal a glance at the watch on Dad’s wrist. I only have thirty minutes to wash the dirt off my face and get ready.
“Dad, can we get back now? Ryan will be here soon.” I cringe. Talking to my dad about guys even as innocently as what I just said makes me want to dive head-on into one of those bulldozers.
“Oh yes, Ryan. I wonder how many laps it’ll take him to figure out my secret jump sequence.”
We get back on the four-wheeler and head home. “He’s a fast boy, but he likes to show off.” Dad motions to the shiny new set of bleachers that is strategically set up in front of the big triple. “I bet he will triple it every time just to take advantage of the fantastic photo opportunity.”
Thirty-seven minutes later, not that I am purposely procrastinating, I emerge from my room to find Ryan hanging out in the kitchen with my parents, laughing and eating cheese dip. He wears those ripped-up jeans again, flip-flops and a tight-fitting black polo shirt. His bleached hair is coated in a layer of manly hair-styling goo that makes his shaggy blond locks stay perfectly shagged.
“There she is!” Teig shouts from his place on the couch when he sees me walk down the stairs. I shoot him a look that says shut up, you little jerk and proceed into the kitchen as if I’m not nervous enough to chew off not only my nails, but my whole arm.
“You look pretty,” Ryan’s obligatory compliment when picking someone up for a date is met with a smile and an awww from Molly. Obviously I am the only one who can see right through him, but I blush anyway.
He wraps his arm around my lower back as we walk to the front door. I haven’t been this close to his chest in a while and now that I’m here I notice how muscular he is. Ash isn’t nearly as bulky as Ryan is, and I have always considered Ash to be chock full of muscles. Has Ryan always been so large or have I spent so much time with Ash lately that I’d forgotten how big his chest was? And why does it even matter, I chide myself.
Dad tells us to have a good time. He doesn’t give me a curfew or even hint at what time I should be home. I’m not sure if that’s on purpose or not.
Ryan’s truck smells like a mixture of new car smell, cologne, and sweat. It’s a deadly combination because I can feel my teensy crush on him grow exponentially as I climb into the passenger seat of his brand new, decked out truck. The infamous black Dodge, I think, and here I am sitting in it.
The party is in the next town over. I struggle to keep the conversation going during the drive. Ryan had just upgraded his sound system from two twelve inch to two fifteen inch speakers. With an arm around my shoulders as he drives, he tells me I’m lucky my voice is so cute because he will make an exception this time and keep the radio low so I can talk. I’m not sure it’s luck on my part, because I can’t think of much to say. Then I remember the things Ash and I have talked about.
“How long have you been into motocross?”
He shrugs. “Since I was a kid.” So much for that open-ended question. I try again, “How did you get into motocross?”
He adjusts the air conditioner and his eyes meet mine for a moment before returning to the road. “It’s kind of a weird story.” Excellent. This will get him talking and we can avoid the awkward silence that is sure to ensue since I’m running out of questions to ask.
“Why don’t you tell me then?” I prompt. He turns to me and smiles, lifting one corner of his mouth and relaxing a bit in the soft leather seats.
“My little brother always wanted to be a motocross racer, but I was never really into it,” he begins. I think back to the days I’ve seen Ryan’s parents at the track… I’ve never seen a brother around. All this time I thought Ryan was an only child. Am I really so obsessed with him that I’ve never seen the rest of his family members?
He continues, “I didn’t care about dirt bikes until my parents bought him one for his birthday. Then I cared. And I wanted one, too.”
“I didn’t know you had a brother.” I picture a younger version of the cute guy sitting next to me. “How come I never see him around?”
A pain glazes over Ryan’s eyes briefly as he squints into the horizon. His lip quivers before his jaw sets in a straight line. His knuckles grip tightly on the steering wheel.
“Connor’s been dead for a while now. He was only five when my mom got in that car wreck.”
Chapter 17
“I’m sorry,” I offer in sympathy, but Ryan nods away my condolences as if the death is too far gone to need sympathy now. We drive in silence listening to the low bass reverberating through the speakers in the seat behind me. Ash flashes into my mind as I think about Ryan’s story. Why do
es such a tragic personal story remind me of my dreadlocked crush?
I can’t remember the name of Ash’s childhood friend. Was it Connor? Could Ash’s best friend have been Ryan’s little brother? Is this the reason why the two fastest riders in the state hate each other?
I trace circles with my finger on the smooth leather seat. The sun slowly disappears under the row of trees to the west. Ryan’s truck windows are tinted to a near black so he is a hazy figure sitting next to me. In this darkness, I could ask him about Ash and not have to look him in the eyes. Of course, getting any information out of Ryan will require a talent in tip-toeing that I’m not sure I possess.
“So, ninety-six…” Ryan’s eyebrow rises at my mention of his bike number. “Does it have anything to do with your brother?” It’s an innocent enough question for my first attempt to make him talk. He nods. I wait for a verbal answer but trying to make this boy talk is like asking a two-year-old to take a nap during a marathon of their favorite TV show.
I choose to prod some more. “How is it related?”
“September sixth was his birthday, and he was supposed to get his dirt bike for his birthday,” he spoke quickly, no doubt annoyed with me. “So it just made sense for me to ride in his memory.”
The pain of rejection shoots through my chest as he turns up the volume on the radio, signaling the end of our conversation. I know I should drop the subject, but I want answers.
“So you picked ninety-six because it was his birthday.” I brace myself for the impending rage as I say the next thing on my mind, “And also because three-three-six was taken.”
I knew the moment I said that he would clench his hands around the steering wheel, grind his teeth together and say something ridiculously rude about Ash. But he doesn’t. I guess I don’t know Ryan as well as I thought.
Motocross Me Page 14