Hot Laps

by Shey Stahl

  “So, if I asked, you would say no?”

  “Probably.” She answered in a gentle demeanor, one that led me to believe she wasn’t trying to hurt my feelings.

  “Why?”

  “We’re too young.”

  “My brother was nineteen and my sister was eighteen.”

  I wasn’t trying to convince her because, deep down, I didn’t think we needed marriage. Just because we were having a baby didn’t mean we needed to get married. In my head at least. I did, however, want it out there if it was something she wanted, I would have done that for her.

  “So? I thought you weren’t asking. Why are you trying to justify it now?”

  “I don’t know.” Reaching out I stopped her raft as it went by rolling her off it to hold her in my arms. “We’re having a baby together.” My hands gently went to her stomach. “I thought girls wanted marriage.”

  “I guess maybe some might, but not me.”

  I sighed, relieved almost. “Me either.”

  I kissed her then, slow and with some passion I thought she’d appreciate. My hands moved to tip her head for a better angle and then I had her against the side of the pool, her legs wrapped around my waist. Her belly was pushing against mine hard and letting me know it was there and to be mindful of it.

  “Not in the pool!” my dad yelled from inside the house.

  Hayden raised her hand and flipped him off behind her head, never breaking away from my kiss.

  I started laughing when I heard him complaining to mom that Hayden flipped him off.

  She didn’t need marriage. She was already part of the family.

  Ride Height – The distance between a car’s frame and the ground.

  Every time some fucker explained a little more about pregnancy I wanted to fucking kick them. Without thinking, I sat there at my desk in early December reading a pregnancy book when Jameson called.

  “I can’t find my phone,” Jameson said, irritated and talking fast.

  “You’re calling me from it.”

  “No, I mean my cell phone.” I could hear the faint rumblings of sprint cars in the back. “Can you look in my office and tell me if it’s in there?”

  “Yeah, hold on.”

  When I walked into Jameson’s office to find the cell phone he’d apparently lost, I noticed a few pictures I hadn’t noticed. It was one of Jimi holding a baby in a fire suit in only his underwear.

  This family was so weird. Now I was having a baby with one of them.

  Lucky me.

  I ended up finding Jameson’s phone on the floor under his desk. Didn’t even want to think about how it got under there but, nonetheless, he seemed pleased I found it.

  He had Alley pick it up for him and though I’d never directly spoken with Alley, she was very sweet to me and even handed me a bag of treats for the mommy to be.

  Donuts.

  I loved her.

  I didn’t, however, love that it was adding to my increasing weight gain.

  My stomach now looked like Adam’s. Literally the same size. I don’t know how in the world he walked around every day like this. I mean, how was his back not killing him?

  My time at work became predictable. Casten checked on me constantly. It got annoying, and Olivia hated me even more.

  It got to the point where I had to say something to Casten about it. In July, Jameson fired her. I threw an office party for me and Bailey when she left.

  Charlie had quit and after a few weeks, it was apparent he was needed around there whether Casten wanted to admit that or not.

  As Noah said, shit went south and it had created tension amongst everyone.

  Cole was out of rehab and took Anna on a date last night. Surprised the hell out of her when he showed, fully clothed too, and took her to dinner in Charlotte. He went from a guy who brushed his teeth with Jack Daniels in the morning to in a committed relationship with my best friend.

  Casten was busy preparing for the Chili Bowl next month and I was getting fat. I hated being pregnant. Nothing about it was fun for me. I felt like I gained weight daily. My usual size B bra didn’t fit and now I was in a D. Casten seemed to enjoy that.

  I was now wearing those fancy pants with the butt pouch in the front. I had to admit they were comfy but I found myself constantly pulling them up. Bailey tried to tell me I was buying too big of a size but I think they just fit that way.

  Late one Thursday night, I walked down to the shop after everyone left to see Casten and ask him to take me to dinner. I was craving Chinese food and damn it, he was taking me to dinner whether he wanted to or not.

  When I got down there it was similar to the time I walked in on him singing “Baby Got Back” and shaking his ass. The only difference here was he wasn’t singing and I wasn’t drunk.

  My panties were immediately wet, and not from pee like they ordinarily are these days.

  It was honestly like someone had opened the gates down there and when I saw him standing there in his racing suit with his helmet getting his seat adjusted with Lane and Axel, I asked them to get out. I did. May have been rude but I found these days that everyone did what I wanted. They were probably afraid I was going to sit on them.

  “What?” Axel looked at me as he shook his head, chuckling lightly. “We need to see if everything fits okay.”

  “Do that later. I need to talk to him,” I said, keeping my eyes on Casten who was sitting in his race car, visor open, smiling at me. He was so excited to be racing again.

  I think he knew what I was thinking, he was reading me pretty well these days. “It fits, man. Thanks,” he said reaching up to pull himself from the car and stood beside it. Then, to tease me, I know this for a fact, he leaned against the side of it resting his hands on the roll bars. “We’re good here if you guys want to take off.”

  Lane and Axel knew and walked out leaving us alone. Axel got to the top of the stairs and laughed. “You should probably lock the doors …”

  Quickly as I could, which took like three minutes, I walked back up the stairs and locked the door behind them. When I got back, he was in the same spot still leaning into his car.

  I didn’t exactly feel sexy being eight months pregnant, but I knew Casten found me sexy since he told me nearly every day.

  Shedding my clothes as I went, I was left standing in front of him but nothing but heels and my bra and panties.

  “Touch me.” I pleaded. He was cautious at first, watching his hands as they explored my body. It felt like there was an electric shock sent throughout my body at his touch. I shivered, not only from the temperature, but from the way his hands were touching me.

  He went to take his helmet off so he could kiss me when I stopped him and flipped his dark visor down. “Leave all this on.”

  “How can I fuck you with my racing suit on?” his voice was muffled under his helmet.

  “Well,” I hadn’t thought about that. Damn. “Just unzip the top part.”

  “It’ll fall off,” he said demonstrating and, sure enough, it fell to the floor.

  Oh well. Once I saw him partially naked, I went with it. The helmet would be good enough.

  My belly was in the way these days so the only position seemed to be doggie style. This time though, he tried what he could. Bringing me against the front of his toolbox, he lifted me up on it and then pulled my hips to the edge. I thought for sure he was going to throw his back out. Thankfully, he did not.

  He tightened his hold just enough to let me know I wasn’t moving unless he permitted me to. Covering my mouth with his, he spread my legs apart by twisting his hips from left to right.

  I’ve wanted to have sex on that tool box since I started at CST Engines. Never did I think I would be eight months pregnant while doing so.

  What freaked me out wasn’t that he had his helmet on because, holy shit, that was insanely hot. No words could even describe how hot that actually was.

  But … he had a GoPro on and the light was flashing.

  “That’s on, i
sn’t it?”

  He nodded but I couldn’t see his eyes once I closed the visor. I’ll admit, it was like fucking Robo Cop or something.

  “Ah, fuck it,” I said, going with it. I just hoped this video never got out and knew damn well it would.

  The hottest part of the whole event?

  When he came and his head fell against my shoulder. I couldn’t see his face but the way his body was tensing around me was the hottest goddamn thing I’ve ever seen.

  Not so hot part?

  Watching said GoPro video later and realizing how fat I actually looked.

  When we walked back through the showroom heading to the parking lot, I saw the Monster Million car Jameson had parked in there and laughed, having never noticed the dent in the hood.

  “What’s that from?”

  Casten laughed pulling his sweatshirt on and looking out at the snow in the parking lot, then back to the car. “It was raining that day and after the race it just poured. Like hurricane rain and dad was up on the hood celebrating and slipped. That’s where his ass hit.

  I smiled and looked around the rest of the showroom that I don’t think I ever truly appreciated. Among the sprint cars and stock cars were thousands of memories Jameson had collected over the years. It was amazing to me how consuming this sport had been for this family.

  I didn’t see this as much with my Uncle Tate. He had a passion for racing but to have an entire family dedicated to the sport the way the Riley’s were wasn’t anything like what the Harris family had.

  Now that Casten was preparing for the Chili Bowl, I’d taken a lot more interest in racing. We went to every Outlaw race in September and the first time I saw Casten race I thought I was going to have a heart attack. He had a very different style from his rowdy father and even his brother. Where Jameson was all in and made you work for everything in a race, Axel was more patient and timed his passes.

  Casten came on strong in a race and stayed that way, just like Ryder raced, so they told me. He was never very aggressive unless he needed to be and I’d yet to see that side of him. So far I’ve watched him race eight times, and all eight times it never got any easier.

  I don’t know how Lily and Sway did it.

  “What are those?” I asked pointing to the helmets that lined the wall above the doors. There were about a hundred helmets up there on hooks.

  “That’s my dad’s helmet collection. He collects them from his friends or racers he admires.” Then he smiled, his hands picking one off the hook and bringing it down to us. “This was the last helmet Ryder ever wore.” Turning the helmet you could see the crack down the side where he’d hit that wall.

  I knew how much Casten cared for Ryder and how affected he was by his death, still, but the look on his face right then kind of surprised me. He was close to tears.

  “Jack has a collection, too,” he went onto say, putting the helmet back up. “He has Grandpa Jimi’s last helmet and my dad’s from that night too. He also has Tate’s.”

  “From what?”

  “His last championship. He has my dad’s from his last win at Homestead, too.”

  “Wow,” I laughed, shaking my head as we walked toward the door. “He’s a little helmet whore.”

  When we got into the parking lot the snow had started to fall again. Casten took the opportunity to draw a dick on the hood of Tommy’s car that he left parked there. I hated to tell him it wouldn’t be there when Tommy got back home from seeing his parents in Washington, but I let him do it anyways.

  I’ll admit, through this pregnancy I’ve had a lot of doubts. A lot of them. More than most soon-to-be-mom’s would.

  But then there’s moments like this when this full of life boy, so determined to see the good in any situation and gives me talks like, “Everything will be okay pretty girl,” and “We’re a team now.”

  He’s always quick to remind me that this isn’t on me alone. He’s here, too.

  He may be making snowball dicks on the hoods of cars, but he’s here. With me.

  I’m starting to feel like I know myself. I’m starting to understand that there’s just some things in life you have to give up and let go of. There’s also things that just come naturally. I don’t need a lot to be happy. I don’t think I ever have.

  But this, right here, this makes me happy.

  I wasn’t sure what to expect with the Riley family at Christmas. I had a feeling it would be similar to any other experience with them.

  I really enjoyed this family but some days I wondered what I was thinking. Every day it was a new practical joke with them and it got harder to trust anyone. That became my rule. Don’t trust anyone.

  As I sat there holding Jacen, Axel and Lily’s newborn baby, the fear got to me. I had literally no business being a mother. Truthfully, it was then that I understood how badly I could fuck this up. Look how fragile they are.

  Running my fingertips over his soft squishy forehead, I kissed it to see if I felt anything motherly come out. I recognized this wasn’t my baby and Anna kept telling me my baby would be different.

  “I don’t feel anything,” I cried to Anna next to me. She’d pretty much been adopted by the Riley family as well. Spencer adored the little ginger and I learned that if Spencer adored you, that was a good thing because he played the worst jokes on the ones he didn’t like. His brother Jameson, for instance.

  “I told you that you won’t until it’s your own,” Anna said when Lily took Jacen from me. Probably for the little guy’s own safety.

  “Give me that cookie.” I snatched the plate of cookies Tommy had when he walked by.

  He wasn’t pleased. “What the hell? You said you weren’t eating any more cookies. Those are mine.”

  “That’s true, Hayden,” Willie said, sitting on my lap, “but you also said that you feared that Casten wouldn’t find you attractive anymore if you kept gaining weight. So you should give me the last cookie.”

  Casten, who was standing in the kitchen turned to face me in shock. “Did you say that?”

  “That’s not what I said!” I bellowed stuffing a cookie in my mouth. “I said I wouldn’t find me attractive anymore if I gained anymore weight.”

  “I didn’t hear that part,” Willie said.

  “Me either,” Tommy added.

  After a while, it was just Sway and I on the couch while the rest of the guys drank, including her. Not participating in drinking anymore, I struggled for a long time because that was my way to relax. I had to think of ways to relax now that didn’t involve me getting drunk.

  I read a lot of books, surprisingly, and helped Casten with his car. Then I got in this mode where I cleaned everything. I’d just moved in with Casten into our home on wheels parked on a piece of property near Tommy. I was fine for a while and then I just went crazy and cleaned everything. It wasn’t like it needed to be cleaned but I did it anyways.

  I think the biggest adjustment during all of this was not drinking. Sway seemed to understand me. In turn, we became very close. It was like I finally had a mother that loved me. I rarely talked to my parent’s these days. They finally accepted the fact that I was pregnant but my mom didn’t even come to the baby shower Lily and Sway had for me.

  “Was it hard for you not drinking while you were pregnant?” I asked Sway, with my eyes on her wine. I didn’t care for wine but it looked appealing.

  “When I got pregnant with Axel it was when I was a pit lizard—”

  “What’s a pit lizard?”

  “It’s a girl who follows around a racer looking for dick.”

  “So like me?”

  “Kinda,” Sway tipped her head back and forth like she was wishy-washy with her answer, “now follow along.”

  “Sorry.”

  “Anyway,” she sighed drinking her wine. “I was binge drinking with Jameson every night and then found out I was pregnant.”

  “So Axel wasn’t planned?”

  “No.” she frowned. “Not at all.”

  “Was Casten?”<
br />
  “No. None of my kids were planned.”

  “I have something to ask you, and I need you to keep it between us.”

  Sway smiled over at me. “Uh-huh.”

  “When you go into labor—and you have the baby—does your vagina go back down to a normal size, or does it stay that size forever?”

  Tommy walking by laughed. I kicked him in the ass. “Mind your own business.”

  Sway wanted to clarify. “So you’re asking if it your vagina resembles a normal vagina even after it blows up?”

  “Yes,” I replied confidently. “That’s what I’m asking.”

  “What do you think?”

  “Given that so many woman are still married after childbirth, I would say it goes back down, right?”

  “Yes, it does.” Sway could barely keep a straight face. “Could you imagine?”

  I sighed staring up at their ceiling. “I just … can’t believe I bleached my asshole preparing for this whole childbirth shit. Maybe I shouldn’t have done that. I mean, after all, do you think the doctor will be able to see it with my vagina that size? What if it’s just like one big hole down there and my asshole disappears?”

  “What?” She gave me that double take look. You know, the one where someone looks at you and they’re like, what the fuck?

  That one.

  I rolled my eyes, annoyed that I had to explain. “I bleached my asshole. If my legs were going to be spread, I wanted it all,” I shrugged as if this was a perfectly natural conversation to have with the mother of the son who knocked me up, “nice and presentable. So I bleached it. The awkward part is that I can’t see it to tell you if it even looks nice.” I made an attempt to lean forward but that didn’t work so I gave up and laid there like the beached whale I was. “I can’t even see my feet anymore.”

  “I’m not looking at it for you, sorry,” Sway said, frowning. “I can’t do that. I can’t even look at my own asshole. It freaks me out.”

  I leveled her a serious look, one of warning. “Please don’t tell anyone about this.”

  “Which part?”

  “Don’t give me that shit. You know which part.”

  “I once glued diamonds to my crank case,” Sway laughed throwing her arm around me. “I have literally no room to judge.”