Hot Laps

by Shey Stahl

  “What?” I answered, knowing it was Rosa, who was downstairs.

  “Your Dad is coming up there.”

  “What the fuck is he doing here?” Cole, who was slouched against the wall smoking a cigarette I told him to put out five times now, looked up at me in full on panic.

  “Came home early,” Rosa said. “Engine blew in Calistoga last night and he’s not happy.”

  “Uh, tell him I’m not home,” I snapped.

  Rosa snapped right back at me. “Fuck you. You tell him you’re not here. I’m not telling him that.”

  She was so inconsiderate.

  “Rosa, it wouldn’t make any sense if I told him that. Then he’d know I was here.”

  After a moment of silence, I did what any other kid would do. I begged her.

  “Oh, come on, Rosa! Can’t you just please tell him I’m not here? You saw the house. He’s gonna kill me, or kick me out. You wouldn’t want that, would you? Who would snuggle with you and watch movies?”

  She sighed, I was wearing her down slowly but surely.

  I paused in my groveling, waiting, when she said nothing.

  Unbelievable.

  “Where is he?”

  “In the living room staring at the piece of carpet missing. He looks pissed,” she laughed. “I can see the veins popping out of his head from here.”

  “Thanks for helping,” I said sarcastically. “Knock something over to divert him.”

  Just then, Cole stood and walked over to my bedroom window.

  “And where the fuck do you think you’re going, asshole? Get back here,” I started jabbing my finger at the floor. “Sit the fuck down. It was your idea to have that band play and shoot mud balls out of that bead seater. It was also your idea for the fucking jelly. And what about the carpet? Did you actually think he wouldn’t notice a piece missing?”

  “It’s better than the alternative, Casten,” he said sourly walking back to his place on the floor. “That shit was still smoking in the morning. We’re lucky the fire department didn’t show up.”

  “Relax for a while,” I said to Cole when he slid down the wall to sit on the floor. “We could be here for a while once he finds us.”

  I turned back to Rosa on the phone, she was eating something, smacking loudly in my ear. “Hold on, Rosa, don’t let him up here.” I turned back to Cole. “You think I’m taking the full blame for this shit you’re out of your goddamn mind. Besides,” I smiled. “There’s strength in numbers. If we stick together we have a better chance of survival.”

  Adjusting my phone, I went back to Rosa and kept one eye on Cole to make sure he didn’t jump out the window. “Can you tell Noah to come back up here? I know he’s down there. He’s gotta deal with this shit, too.”

  Thankfully Noah returned right then, holding a few cans of soda and bags of chips, his eyes wide. “Your fucking Dad is home! We’re fucked.”

  “No shit.”

  I hung up when Rosa started laughing on the other line and tossed my phone back on the nightstand.

  I thought about jumping out the window like Cole had planned. Sooner or later he would have found me though. Might as well face the fire now.

  Noah immediately started pacing, arguing with himself. Noah was a breed apart from Charlie. They were so different it was hard to think they were brothers, let alone identical twins. Noah was smarter and more refined and driven while Charlie was more paranoid and indecisive, much like his father.

  Right now though, Noah was just like Aiden and Charlie in that manner.

  He also had this talent of saying the most asinine shit at times. Manly when he was nervous. Like now.

  “I know, what if we told him that someone broke into the house while they were gone and we had nothing to do with it?”

  “No shit?” I gave him a thoughtful nod. “That might work.”

  “Really?” he stopped pacing and looked right at me.

  “No. Fuck you.”

  I heard my dad stomping up the stairs. Even heard his breathing and then the roar when he opened the door.

  His eyes were bulging, pacing, his face contorted in anger. I’m positive most kids see this side of their parents at one time or another.

  Me, I’ve seen this side a lot.

  All at once, Dad stopping pacing and stopped mumbling, giving me that look. “What do you have to say for yourself, Casten?” and he didn’t even let me explain what I had to say for myself. “You know, you’re a fucking dumbass. What were you thinking? What’s wrong with you?”

  Have you ever noticed when people get mad, they start repeating themselves?

  Cole stood up and smiled. “Come on, Uncle Jameson. It was just a little party—”

  “He’s going to kill you,” I said to Cole.

  “I’m trying to get him to relax a little,” Cole defended, entertained by all this. “He’s gonna give himself a heart attack. Look at him.”

  “Sit down and shut up, Cole. You’re a little asshole and I know you were behind the carpet, you fucking pyromaniac.”

  That wasn’t the first time Dad had called Cole an asshole. In fact, it happened daily.

  Noah, who was eating a bag of sour cream and onion chips on the couch by the door in my room, said, “We’ll clean it up.”

  Dad turned to Noah who was smiling, said nothing, but reached over and took the bag of chips and dumped them over Noah’s head. “Clean that shit up if you’re so into cleaning,” he paused, and then added, “And stop your fucking smiling, goddamn it.”

  Cole and I exchanged a glance and I found it hard not to smile.

  I glanced over at Noah again, he was busy staring at the floor now.

  A heavy silence filled the room.

  “Calm down, Dad.” I smiled at him, joking.

  “You want me to calm down when you three fucktards trashed my goddamn house, again, and filled a swimming pool with grape jelly? Where did you even find that much jelly?”

  No one answered. We may have been idiots but you don’t interrupt Jameson Riley. We found that out by the murderous glares we got now and the previous times we’d all been in this exact situation with him.

  “It’s always a fucking good time for you three, and I let a lot of shit go. I do. But this is it goddamn it!” He looked out my window and had a better view of the backyard. That did nothing to improve his mood.

  In fact, it sent him further into flames.

  Just then Cole started laughing, for whatever reason, I have no clue. He did that when he was nervous sometimes.

  Dad spun to face him, pointing his finger at him. “What are you laughing at?”

  “I—”

  “Shut up. You speak when spoken to.”

  I raised my hand, not waiting for him to look at me. “You asked him a question, so technically—”

  I stopped speaking when he faced me. He didn’t look well. His face was all red and his eyes were blazing, narrowing accusingly. “You three maniacs … how did you even manage that?”

  We all exchanged looks again but said nothing. After all, what was there to say? It seemed any time we spoke that just set him off again.

  “Is it just one big fucking party with you?”

  I humored him with a response. “Not always.”

  “Well, let me tell you something, all this horseshit, I’m sick of it!”

  He paused staring the three of us down, mostly me, his own son who he seemed to want to murder.

  My mom chose then to come up. “Casten,” she sternly regarded me and if you knew my mom, never did she treat me that way. “What the fuck happened in my closet and why did you videotape a fashion show in my clothes?”

  At that moment, Dad, who was staring at me, had me wondering whether he actually wanted me dead. I was sure he did just then.

  Mom looked down at the handheld video camera I thought I had hidden. Apparently I did not. “Wait a second,” she looked closer at the video. “Is that my bra, you little fucker? You wore my bra?”

  “Well, no,�
� I finally said, rubbing my hands over my sweating face. “I wore your underwear,” her eyes went wide. “Over my own!” I held my hands up in surrender. “Cole wore your bra.”

  Mom slowly exhaled, maybe a tad relieved and then yawned. “Go clean up my closet.”

  I went to stand when Dad glared. “Sit the fuck down.”

  “But she said—”

  “I don’t care what she said. You have some more explaining to do. Fuck the clothes. What happened to the side of the house? It looks like you were flinging shit at it. And why is your brother’s car on its side in the driveway.”

  I forgot about that. I don’t even remember how that happened or even who did it. I came home after dropping Hayden off and it was on its side. If I had to guess, it was Nathan. He always did weird shit like that for no reason.

  “I don’t really know how the car got on its side. And, no, we weren’t flinging shit at the walls. It’s mud.”

  “I don’t understand what made you think having a thousand people over at my house was a good idea.” He was losing his voice from all the yelling, and maybe even calming down.

  “Whoa,” I held up my hands smiling warmly. “Settle down, Dad. First off it wasn’t a thousand people. It was maybe nine hundred, tops.” I shrugged and changed my tone to one of shock. “Anyway, we had it under control and no one got hurt. That’s all that matters. That damn jelly was like quick sand. More than one person needed CPR.”

  That did nothing for his mood.

  Was he disgusted?

  Oh, yes. Definitely.

  “Here’s the thing, Casten, this shouldn’t have happened … again. You’re nineteen now and I—”

  “I’m eighteen.” As if he actually cared right now.

  “Shut up.”

  See. He didn’t care.

  “Okay,” I said defeated staring at my hands.

  Dad looked out at the field behind the house. It was trashed and littered with red solo cups from the keg, beer cans and who knows what else. “What the fuck happened out there?”

  “We had a live band. It was amazing.”

  “I don’t care if it was a Pearl Jam concert,” he mumbled.

  “I think you’re missing the point.” I stood and walked over to him trying to calm him down by putting my arm around his shoulders, holding him. He did that thing where he looked over at me out of the corner of his eyes. “To truly appreciate it you need to understand, this shit was like Woodstock.”

  By the look on his face, he didn’t care so I dropped my arm and backed away sitting on the edge of my bed.

  Cole, Noah and I all looked at each other when Dad drew in a deep breath and let it out through his nose sighing heavily.

  He turned and walked toward the door. “Go help your mom, all three of you.”

  When we stood, he leveled us all with a menacing glare and got another gust of wind in his lungs.

  “Let me tell you something else, you three are going to pay for all that shit you destroyed. All of it! Mark my fucking words, I write the goddamn check!” he nodded in agreement with his own statement walking out the door. As he walked down the hall he held his left fist in the air and shook it. “Mark my fucking words!”

  Well, it couldn’t have looked much worse for me right then.

  Dad didn’t talk to me the rest of the day, and then left in the morning headed back to California after telling me another engine better be loaded and ready to go by Friday.

  A while back I’d made plans to go to Texas this weekend and part of me didn’t want to go now. Not only was my dad justifiably upset and would make my trip out there hell, I still couldn’t get Hayden off my mind.

  Part of me wanted to call her that night after I finished tearing up the carpet in the living room so it could be replaced tomorrow morning while I was at work.

  I didn’t call her, and instead got started on cleaning up the backyard with Noah and Cole.

  Some probably thought, hey, you don’t need money so what’s the sense in your dad taking your check anyway? You live at home.

  It wasn’t like that. I needed my job in order to move out someday. No one likes to be a bum. I had dreams…those dreams required money.

  So I cleaned and repaired shit. All. Fucking. Day.

  Adhesive – The stick between two touching objects.

  I found myself even moodier than usual once at work and I was taking it out on people and things at work by Monday.

  The first casualty was a box that had a cell phone in it for Noah. Really though, who packages this shit before they ship it?

  And do they put into consideration someone might actually need to get into the box?

  And, another thing, what’s with the staples that are like an inch long and could slice your goddamn finger off?

  And while I’m on this rant of I-hate-my-fucking-job-today, here are some other things I just don’t understand about today’s management: Why, when my boss wants to schedule a meeting, does he wait until the day before, or better yet the hour before the meeting and wants everyone to rearrange their schedules to fit him in?

  Why does he explain something to me, and when I ask for clarification, he talks over me and gives new inconclusive directions? Oh, and one more thing, when you’re having a bad day, why do people insist on commenting on your appearance?

  They’ll say shit like, “You look tired.”

  I want to say, “Why yes, I do. Thanks for pointing that out to me because when I looked at myself in the mirror, I didn’t notice how shitty I looked this morning.”

  What a bunch of senseless fuckers.

  By noon on Monday, I was ready to attack Casten just for some fucking relief.

  So I made my way down there with a hot chocolate I knew he’d appreciate. I wondered last week why he didn’t like coffee and he said it made him sick. Poor guy. I think he was missing out on something amazing.

  Casten’s back was turned as were most of the guys in the shop but he seemed extremely busy so I just listened to his conversation rather than interrupting. After all, I loved me some engine talk.

  Just the thoughts of Saturday morning had my belly all warm and my panties moist.

  Lapping valves.

  Suck squeeze bang blow.

  Stop. Stop now.

  I didn’t though. In fact, since Saturday, that morning was all I had thought about. Every move he made, the sounds, what he said, the fact that he went down on me, after having sex with me … I mean, who does that? He’d just shot his oil in me and then … Oh god.

  I had to breathe. It was too much. Deep breathing, Hayden. Deep breathing.

  Casten wrote down some notes on his note pad before scratching the back of his head with the wrench in his hand.

  “You could go with a dry sump system. It’s more reliable and it increases the horsepower by reducing the rotating weight put on the engine. There’s a few advantages. The main purpose of all dry sump systems is to contain all the stored oil in a separate tank, or reservoir …” Taking a secure spot out of the way, he finally noticed me and smiled while nodding to something the man on the other end said. “It’s a minimum of two stages, with as many as five or six … yes, exactly. It’s driven by a Gilmer or HTD timing belt and pulleys off the crankshaft … yes … it will ensure the oil is scavenged from the pan that also results in removing excess air from the crankcase. It’s the reason why it’s called a ‘dry sump’ meaning the oil pan is essentially dry…” he did some more nodding, some listening, and then replied with, “It’s not just horsepower you’re gaining. You have a shallower oil pan allowing the engine to be lower in the chassis, horsepower increases due to less viscous drag since oil resistance is due to sloshing in the rotating assembly and cooler oil. And then you have the space and reliability with the evolved system.”

  Olivia walked by just then heading for Charlie’s stall and smarted off with, “Making the rounds early today?”

  Olivia suddenly didn’t like me. I’m not exactly sure why so I asked Bailey this morning
and she said it was because Olivia had tried to get with Casten a few times and he said no.

  Casten, who had just hung up quirked an eyebrow at me, “What was that?”

  “She’s a slut,” I said rolling my eyes.

  “Olivia is a slut?” he asked slipping his cell phone into a pocket.

  I shook my head at Casten’s lack of awareness to this place. “Let’s just say I’m sure she’s had more than one dick slapped against her forehead.”

  Casten did this gaping fish out of water thing again before he chuckled. “Just when I think I know you…you spout off with something like that.”

  “Good or bad?”

  “Good, Hayden, everything with you is always good.”

  Why does he say stuff like that? Why is he so kind and I’m so … well, me?

  I changed my path of direction. “I heard Olivia tried to get your attention first?”

  He didn’t look up but I could see the change in his expression. “Is that what you call it?”

  “What?”

  “Let’s just say her approach was less than original.”

  “Oh,” and then I thought my approach wasn’t real original either. I mean Christ almighty, I got drunk every night of the week, and told him I would rape him at one point.

  “And I was?” I asked with an appropriate amount of hesitation.

  His eyes met mine as he took an oil pump out of the box, tossing the cardboard aside and then taking his shop towel and cleaning the outside of the small red container.

  “You were …” he stopped what he was doing and looked directly in my eyes. “I don’t know how to explain it but you’re different, Hayden. You say things, do things … everything about you is not at all what I expected and I like that. Unexpected can be a good thing.”

  “I told you two to stay away from each other,” a voice bellowed from behind. A very annoying, very hypocritical, and very jerk-like voice.

  “Get lost, Charlie,” I stepped closer to Casten.

  “I won’t get lost. I don’t see why you have to fuck everyone here, too,” he said, in a manner I didn’t appreciate.

  “You couldn’t keep your dick out of one girl, could you?” he asked Casten.

  Casten’s jaw clenched tightly as he stepped forward. “I’d be real careful what you say to me right now, Charlie, if you want to keep your job.” His eyes flashed with anger and warning. “You’re walking a fine line as it is speaking to her like that. You have no say over anything she does.”