Dirt Bike Runaway

by Matt Christopher

  “Hey, buddy, you’re going to give that baby of mine that same TLC treatment, aren’t you?” Giff asked Peter, a broad smile on his face.

  “Why not?” he said, and then went as thoroughly over Giff’s bike as he had D.C.’s. What a beauty, he thought as he looked over its liquid-cooled engine, the plastic fuel tank, the 38-mm Frabozzi suspension forks in front, the Pinter gas shocks in back. The radiator was under the fuel tank, mounted to a pair of backbone tubes less than seven inches from the top of the cylinder head.

  “Did you know it could kick-start while it’s in gear?” Giff said proudly. “I don’t often start it that way, but it’s no problem.”

  “No. I didn’t know that,” Peter admitted. “You have a killer here, Giff. You really have. Know what? I wish it was mine.”

  “Sorry, Pete. But when it comes to that BLB, I’m a stinker. I can’t help it. You can ride it as often as you wish. But own it? Never.”

  Peter laughed. “I know what you mean. I’d feel the same way.”

  He checked the carburetion, which was perfect. It hadn’t loaded up a bit. He had to remove the seat to check the filter and found that it, too, wasn’t bad. He tapped it against the cement floor a few times anyway, to knock out the thimbleful of tiny particles of dirt that had accumulated in it.

  He could find nothing else that needed even a minor turn or twist, and rode the bike around a couple of blocks to make sure.

  “I don’t know,” he said as he rode up onto the floor of the garage and shut off the engine. “Looks to me like you and D.C. have a couple of winners here, Giff.”

  Giff smiled. “Get the Muni fixed up and we’ll have three of them,” he said cheerfully.

  Peter got off the BLB, and Giff rolled it over to the side, where he started at it with soap and water. Peter went over to the Muni, looked at the dirt packed onto its fenders, knobbies, and other parts of it, and began to wipe them off with a soft brush and a cloth. Then he checked the bike’s working parts and found that they could use a little more transmission oil and air in the tires. The points needed adjustment, too.

  It took an hour for him to put it into the shape he felt could make it compete with the best and fastest of bikes, then finished the job with a hand-wash and polish.

  At noon Giff got a call from Jay Wallace of Wallace’s Nursery, asking him if he’d like to help him out on Friday in planting trees and shrubbery at the new mall that was being built just outside of Cypress Corners.

  Giff not only accepted the job, but got one for Peter, too. He said that every once in a while, since last summer when he had worked at the nursery, Mr. Wallace would give him a call when he needed extra help on a job. The opportunity to earn a few dollars sounded good to Peter, who went to bed that night wondering what he’d do with the money.

  He’d give it to Giff, he decided. Or to Mrs. MacKenzie. After all, look what they had done for him during these two weeks that he’d been with them.

  But on Friday evening, after the work was done and Mr. Wallace paid them in cash, Giff refused to accept the money from Peter.

  “You crazy?” he said, staring at Peter as if he were insulted. “It’s yours. You earned it. You owe me nothing.”

  Later, when Peter offered to give it to Giff’s mother, she refused to accept it, too.

  “Keep it,” she told him. “You’ll find use for it, don’t worry.”

  He couldn’t believe it. They were so good to him.

  That night he began to think of buying a gift for them. He had to do something for them to show his appreciation. And they had to accept a gift if he got it.

  But what could he buy?

  “You’ll find use for it,” Giff’s mother had said about the money. Of course, he would — if this weekend was the last time he was going to stay with them.

  The thought worried him. How he’d like to stay! He had come to like the MacKenzies very much — more than he had ever liked anyone before. They were family. They had fun together. They joked, they laughed. Oh, sure, they argued some, and they disagreed some. But in the end they always resolved their differences. It was home, a kind of home in which there was friendship and love, things Peter had never really known, things he’d like to be part of very much.

  So now, if he left, the reason would be different from the one that made him leave the Bentleys. He had run away from there purposely. He’d had to. But he didn’t want to leave the MacKenzies. If he did, it would be because they asked him to go.

  Peter thought he could easily see their side of it if they decided not to keep him. They already had two grown children. The cost of raising them was astronomical. After D.C. graduated from high school, she was going to attend a school to become an airline stewardess, and Giff might go to college, even though he’d said he wasn’t sure what he wanted to do yet. But he was intelligent, and aggressive. He’d want to go. Probably to one of the more prestigious colleges in the country. That would mean a lot of money. Why would the MacKenzies want another kid in the family? Mr. MacKenzie’s salary certainly wasn’t so deep into the thousands that he and Mrs. MacKenzie could support a third kid, even if Giff didn’t go to college.

  Peter found himself intimidated by these thoughts, and when he finally fell asleep he dreamed of being chased by someone whose face was hidden in shadow. The person was laughing a loud, crazy laugh and drawing closer to him. Peter tried to scream … to run faster … but the scream choked in his throat and his legs refused to move.

  “Pete! Wake up!”

  Someone was shaking him, and he woke, trembling and sweating. He looked up and saw Giff staring down at him, his blond hair disheveled.

  “You must’ve had quite a nightmare, Pete,” Giff said. “You all right now?”

  “Yeah. I’m okay.”

  “Want a drink or something?”

  “No. I’ll be all right.”

  “Okay. See you at breakfast.”

  Giff tucked the covers under Peter’s chin and around him, as if Peter were a kid brother, and he slept better the rest of the night.

  The next morning at the breakfast table Peter told the family about his dream, confessing that he’d had that same dream — or a similar one — for as long as he could remember.

  “I’m not surprised, Peter,” Mr. MacKenzie said sympathetically. “You haven’t had a very happy life, and your future is in question. It’s no wonder. And nightmares can be scary. I have them now and then myself.”

  “Right,” D.C. said, her eyes flashing with mischief. “When stocks take a big fall.”

  Everyone laughed at the way D.C. had turned the seriousness of the conversation into a joke — even if it wasn’t a funny, rib-tickling one — and Peter wondered if he would ever learn enough about stocks to understand what was meant by “stocks taking a big fall,” or, as he had heard Mr. MacKenzie say the other day, “a two-point jump in the Dow Jones average.”

  There were twenty-four entries that afternoon at the Bumble Bee Speedway, more than in any other moto in which Peter had competed. The number of bikes scared him. Twenty-four bikes meant that his chances of winning were pretty slim.

  He was ninth from the end, Giff was sixth, and D.C. fifth. Giff was wearing his usual blue gear and blue helmet, the number 11 prominent on the front number plate on the bike and on his helmet. And D.C. was in her crimson uniform, which she had washed the day before, giving it a brand-new look.

  Peter felt like an old warrior in the scuffed orange uniform that Giff had worn during his early moto-crossing days. But if he hadn’t kept it, I might not be racing, Peter thought. Uniforms, or protective pants and jackets, helmets, face shields, and boots were a must in motocross competition.

  Four other girls besides D.C. were racing, though Peter would not have known it if he had not heard their names announced over the public address system. In their uniforms and helmets they didn’t look any different from the boys.

  Three other names that he couldn’t help hearing were Dexter Pasini, Jess Kutter, and Bill Rocco. This mig
ht be my last moto, Peter thought. He determined to do the best he could, and try to make those bums eat his dust as they had done a few times to him.

  Promptly at twelve noon, the first twenty-minute heat got under way.

  The gate dropped, and all twenty-four bikes rolled over it and headed for the hill. Peter climbed it with hardly any problem, except near the apex of it when the bike next to him almost collided into his as it clawed its way up. But Peter, turning the handlebars slightly to the left, succeeded in avoiding a collision, and seconds later he was roaring down the grade amid a thundering roar of engines and exhausts.

  He was happy that the first treacherous obstacle was over, and felt inclined to see whether Giff and D.C. had made the hill, too. But he didn’t dare look until he was safely on the level stretch, heading toward the first jump-hill just beyond the curve ahead.

  Then he looked and saw both of them blazing down the track, their hands stretched out, gripping their handlebars, their helmeted heads crouched low, cutting down air resistance.

  An instant later a bike crept up beside Peter, blocking his view, and he quickly turned his attention back to the track in front of him — but not before he recognized the familiar yellow fenders of a Corella.

  Dex Pasini was pushing past Peter, his white-helmeted head bent as far down toward his handle-bars as he could get it. Peter tried to ignore him but found that it was hard to ignore someone who was riding so close to you. They were almost hub to hub as they sailed over the jump-hill, soaring through space at the same time, then landing at the same time, as if the maneuver were planned.

  Move, baby, move! Peter urged the Muni, realizing that the moment might have come when he could match Dex’s skill, pass him, and stay ahead to win the race. His hands were like steel grips on the handlebars as he kept control of the bike.

  Then came a short, bumpy stretch that had the tails of both bikes bobbing like rabbits, and then another jump-hill, which they both took with equal speed and eaglelike grace.

  It was at the high berm that Dex Pasini, coming down from it with the throttle of his bike wide open, breezed by Peter and got ahead of him by at least two lengths. Peter’s hope faltered and began to drain from him as he accelerated his bike and tried to close the gap between him and Dex again. But just then another bike, from Peter’s left side, skidded toward Peter, forcing him to cut his speed slightly, thus giving Dex an additional advantage.

  Dex was a skilled rider, Peter would be the first to admit, but luck was still riding with him, too.

  Peter got a glimpse of Mr. MacKenzie holding up a pit board with a message on it for Giff — “5 — 19,” which meant that Giff was in fifth place behind the leader, and that there were nineteen minutes left to go in the heat.

  Mr. MacKenzie had promised to be D.C.’s pit-board man in the second heat, and regretted that there weren’t three heats so that he’d be able to give Peter equal time.

  “That’s okay,” Peter had told him. “I’ll just try to do the best I can.”

  There were eight minutes left to go in the heat before Peter was able to catch up to Dex Pasini again. Dex, Peter figured, must have had some trouble that had caused him to lose ground.

  Peter passed Dex as they zipped past the second berm on the track, his hopes of beating Dex soaring again as he remained ahead of Dex going toward the wide, right-hand curve. Peter roared up the high berm on the left side of the track, blazed down it toward the next berm, which was on the right-hand side now, then zoomed around the next two sharp curves that finally led him down the stretch toward the last hairpin curve of the track.

  As Peter started to negotiate the inside curve of the hairpin, he saw a yellow-fendered bike creeping up on his right side, front wheel twisting back and forth in a short arc to keep the machine under control. The rider was Dex. And before the hairpin curve was behind them, Dex was in the lead again. Peter’s lips tightened in anguish as he saw his hopes of beating Dex go up in smoke once more.

  But it was a Suzuki that crossed the finish line first. Dex came in second, and Giff third. Peter finished fourth.

  14

  Third place! Not bad! That’ll keep your points up!”

  Giff smiled as he shook Peter’s extended hand. “Thanks, Pete. You didn’t do bad yourself.”

  “Yeah. But I’m still eating Pasini’s dust,” Peter said, realizing the very few times that he had made Dex eat his. “One of these days.”

  “We’ve been saying that for the last two years, Peter,” D.C. chimed in, taking off her helmet and shaking her head to let her hair fall freely around it. “But coming in third and fourth isn’t bad at all. Look at me. Sixth.”

  Peter shrugged. “Which isn’t so bad, either, when you figure there were eighteen other riders shooting for the same target.”

  D.C. looked at him, her coffee-brown eyes twinkling. “No, not so bad, considering that I was eating your dust,” she exclaimed.

  She laughed, and he laughed, too. “Maybe next time,” he said.

  Giff grinned, and looked at Peter. “You know, she just might do it?” he said, making it sound like a question.

  Peter agreed. He could not argue with Giff about that.

  Only once during the break did a thought other than of the motocross enter Peter’s mind. This is the weekend I’m supposed to find out if I stay with the MacKenzies or if they want me to leave. When am I going to find that out?

  The thought triggered an ache in his stomach, and he turned away from Giff and D.C. to prevent them from seeing the look of despair that came into his eyes. Good thing there’s a motocross, he told himself, or I’d go crazy wondering what the outcome would be.

  Eighteen riders competed in the second heat. Six of the original twenty-four could not race because of various problems their machines had sustained.

  By two o’clock, when the second heat started, the sky became cloudy and the air muggier than it had been that morning. A huge flock of sea gulls was soaring lazily over a field next to the track, and Peter worried that a storm was brewing and might wash out the moto.

  But the storm didn’t materialize, and the heat got under way.

  He was in the fifth position from the right side of the starting line, sure as can be that the bike was in as good a shape as it was in the first heat. He had checked the carb, replaced the plug, filled the gas tank, and seen that the suspension forks were in excellent condition. Nervous and tense, he waited for the starting gate to drop.

  The announcement came for the riders to start their engines. Peter turned the key in the ignition. The engine popped. Seventeen other bikes popped to life, too.

  Then the gate dropped, and eighteen front wheels sprinted over the round pipe as the rear knobbies grabbed the dirt, churned, and propelled vehicles and riders forward. Peter found a line and remained on it as he shot the Muni up and over the hill, his heart singing as this first important feat was accomplished.

  He leaned over as he headed down the stretch, his head and shoulders bent low, and pushed his weight back further on the seat to give the rear wheel all the traction it could get.

  Rounding the first curve and making the first jump made him doubly grateful for the Boykins shock absorbers, which helped smooth out the bumps. The Muni 125 could really take it.

  Peter negotiated the second jump with ease, then gunned the engine and headed for the first wide berm. About eight or nine bikes were in front of him, the first one leading by about two bike lengths. It was Dexter Pasini’s Corella. Somehow Peter wasn’t surprised.

  Slightly ahead of him were D.C. and Giff, D.C. riding about a bike length ahead of her brother. What gumption, Peter thought. She could really ride, that was for sure.

  As it was during the first heat, pit-board men stood at various corners of the track, each with an abbreviated message scrawled on his pit board. And this time, as he had promised, Mr. MacKenzie was giving his messages to D.C. on the board that he was holding up.

  There was little change in the bikes’ positions as th
e first lap ended, except that Dex had increased his lead from two bike lengths to three. Giff squeezed past D.C. on the third lap and got into fourth place behind Dex. D.C. held tenaciously on to sixth place, two lengths ahead of Peter, who found himself now being challenged by Bill Rocco, who had sneaked up on him at his left side.

  Rocco crept up close to him as they headed for the high berm, and almost bumped into him as they came roaring down the incline.

  He’s trying to scare me, Peter thought. But I won’t scare. Not this time. Not when this might turn out to be my last moto here in Cypress Corners.

  He gunned the engine as they headed down the stretch toward the next berm and saw Rocco’s Fitz RK wobble for a few seconds as if, for just a second or so, Rocco had lost control of it. The seconds were enough for Peter to surge ahead of him, and to over-take number 3 just before it reached the next left-turn berm.

  Two laps later he saw a blue-tanked Yamaha sweep past him on the same high berm on which he had nearly collided with Rocco, and seconds later found himself eating D.C.’s dust.

  He caught up to her as the moto went into its ninth minute — eleven minutes to go — and saw Giff about two lengths ahead of them. Only two riders were ahead of Giff: number 16, the Honda ridden by Rick Mendoza, a strong contender, and number 44, the Corella ridden by Dex Pasini.

  With eight minutes left to go, Mendoza was hit with a problem. His rear tire blew as his machine took the track’s first jump-hill and landed on it. The machine swerved dangerously across the track and smashed into the fence on the right-hand side. Mendoza escaped without a scratch.

  With him out of the race, Dex took over the lead. Three lengths behind him was D.C.; two lengths behind her was Giff; and a half a length behind Giff was Peter.

  “Come on, babe! Come on!” Peter whispered to the Muni. “You can do better than this! I know you can!”

  With four minutes to go he swept ahead of Giff and began to creep up to D.C., who was now giving Dex the challenge of his career. Dex was only half a length ahead of her!