It’s twenty-four hours until race day and things are actually going as smoothly as I hoped they would. The pits are overflowing with racers and their families, and I managed to get them all signed in with only Dorothy’s help. Massive motorhomes and small tents fill the track’s sixteen acres. Professional motocross scouts are setting up, reviewing the resumes of the teenage racers who have dreams of going pro. Dorothy has set up the computer software and printed out the moto lists for the races tomorrow. Trophies are assembled, thanks to hours of Teig and me putting them together in the middle of the night, prize money has been counted and separated into envelopes, and the track guys have revamped our motocross track into something worthy of an award.
I uncap the thermos I brought from home and down another gulp of coffee. It scalds my throat, but I ignore the pain and gaze out at the track from the tower’s second-floor window. Marty drives the water truck over the dirt, making sure it’s packed down and wet enough to ride on tomorrow. It’ll be another scorching hot Texas day, and the track needs to be watered frequently so it doesn’t turn into a dried out dust ball.
Dorothy walks in wearing a purple Mixon Motocross shirt and a pair of jean shorts that go down to her knees. Having her around helps make everything feel normal and safe even when it isn’t. She’s like the grandmother I never had, and I feel the sudden urge to run up and hug her. I’m just about to do that when a man wearing khakis and a crisp button up shirt enters the room behind her. The presence of a stranger ruins the moment, and even worse, there’s something intense about this guy that doesn’t seem quite right. I don’t know what he wants, but I’m pretty sure he’s not here for a casual hello.
I take another sip from my coffee, wishing the term liquid courage came from this drink and not the other kind of drink that I don’t have right now. “Good morning,” I say, meeting the man’s skeptical gaze. “How can I help you?”
He glances at Dorothy as if one look at me was all the evidence he needed to settle some bet between the two of them. “Are you the kid in charge?”
Excuse you?
I grip my coffee as if I drink it every day. “I’m the legal adult who is in charge, yes. What can I do for you?”
“Where is Jim Fisher?” he demands. “Why isn’t he here? I drove all the way from Dallas this morning. We’ve had this meeting scheduled for two months.”
“What meeting?” I ask, taking in his clean-cut look one more time. Are we in some kind of legal trouble?
He snorts. “I guess Jim wasn’t as serious as he sounded on the phone. My money is clearly better used elsewhere. Do me a favor and pass the word onto Jim that I don’t appreciate him wasting my time.”
He turns toward the door, but I beat him to it, pressing my back against the cool metal surface. “You want to try that again?” I say, all of the worry and lack of sleep surfacing in the venom in my voice. “Who are you and what is the meeting about? I can probably settle this for you.”
“I am Mark Durant, an investor,” he says condescendingly. He presses his lips together but doesn’t try to move me away from the door. “Jim was seeking a half-a-million-dollar investment to open a second motocross track in Dallas. He assured me that our meeting today would show me exactly how successful he is in this business, but he’s ignored all of my phone calls and doesn’t even seem to be here, so I really have to question the integrity of the man who’s asking for my money.”
I take my time drinking another sip of coffee, but really I’m letting all of this information sink in. Dad was hoping to open a new track a few hours away? He hadn’t told me anything about it. Mark clears his throat impatiently, and I step aside. Something in the way he looks at me like I’m some kind of idiot doesn’t sit well with me.
I mock him and clear my throat as well. “Sorry you had to come all this way, Mr. Durant, but we won’t be needing your investment. We’re going another way.”
“Another way?” he scoffs. “Who the hell would invest in a chunk of dirt with a guy you can’t get a hold of who has no credit score because he claims he doesn’t believe in credit?”
Anger boils inside of me, reaching a tipping point in the form of full bitch mode. “Sorry not everyone is a slave to high interest credit cards,” I seethe, using words I’d heard my dad say about debt before.
“Whoa now, little girl,” the man says, holding up his hands in a joking surrender. “This is an adult matter, so you don’t need to get all upset over things you don’t understand.”
Dorothy steps forward and says my name, but I ignore her. “Jim is in the ICU fighting for his life right now, you dumbass. Had I known about the meeting I would have cancelled it, but I didn’t because we’ve all been busy keeping this place running. You know who would invest in a chunk of dirt with Jim Fisher?” I ask, standing to my full height. “Someone who wants to make a lot of money.”
I throw open the door. “Too bad that’s not going to be you. Now get the hell off my property.”
He leaves, and I slam the door behind him, then I sink to my knees on the cold floor. All the stress of this week and time at the hospital, and I hadn’t cried, but now it’s about all I can do. Exhaustion overtakes me, and my head feels swollen from all the tears. Dorothy pats my back, bending down as far as her old bones will let her.
“Honey, you need to go home and get some sleep.”
I shake my head. “Why would Dad want an investor? I didn’t even know he was thinking of opening a new track. Do you think he’s out of money?”
Dorothy shakes her head. “No, honey. Your father is very good with money. People get investors for all kinds of reasons. But I think you made the right call with that one. He was a bad seed.”
“More like an asshole,” I mutter.
“You need to go home and get some sleep,” she says, her hand on my shoulder.
“I can’t. The races are tomorrow and everyone is showing up today. There’s still people to register and—”
“I’ve been registering racers since you were a baby, Hana.” Dorothy chuckles. “I’ll handle it for now. You get some sleep and come back this afternoon. That’s an order.”
I push up to my feet and nod. It’s only seven-thirty in the morning. A few hours of sleep wouldn’t hurt. Unlike the last few nights that I have sat up worrying about the track and Dad and Ash, I think I’ll actually be able to fall asleep without a problem now. My body has finally become so exhausted that nothing can keep it awake any longer.
Before I leave, I turn back to Dorothy, who has already started making copies on the copier.
“I’m sorry you’re stuck doing all of this without me or Dad to help,” I say, just as a yawn overtakes me. “I promise I’ll make this up to you.”
“You don’t owe me anything,” Dorothy says as her gaze softens. “The motocross family sticks together no matter what.”
*
Waking up in the afternoon always feels wrong. Like I’ve fallen asleep in the real world and awoken on some strange foreign land, where morning is when the sun is starting to droop over the horizon. My thoughts are heavy and my chest still aches when I roll over in bed and remember back to last night and this morning. This has been a terrible two weeks, and tomorrow is the biggest business day of the year for Mixon Motocross Park. Although our staff most likely has everything under control, it still feels like it’s all up to me to make sure everything works out.
Tears spring to my eyes, and I immediately wish I were at the hospital with Dad instead of at home trying to run things like it’s a normal day. Staying home and working feels like a daughter’s betrayal of her father, but at the same time, being at work seems like something Dad would want me to do. He’d prefer me to be here, helping the track, right? Not stuck at the hospital fussing over him when that’s what the nurses and doctors are for.
Still, it doesn’t feel exactly right. In bed, I close my eyes and stretch my arms up over my head. Everything hurts. Sleep has only cured the exhausted parts of me, leaving all of the broken part
s still aching for relief.
I am worried about Dad.
I miss Ash.
When I check my phone, I see two missed calls from Shelby and then a text from her.
Dorothy said she sent you home to sleep. Don’t worry about us, we’re keeping the track afloat and I’ve already signed in three extremely hot guys. Don’t tell Jake.
I smile despite the pain and check on my other text message. It’s from Teig, telling me that the doctor made him leave the room so he could talk to Molly. I let out a ragged breath and try to type something back to him, something comforting and assuring, but I’ve got nothing.
If Ash were here, he’d know what to say. It’s probably some kind of sleep-induced insanity, but I can’t stop the sudden urge to want to call him and tell him everything. It’s a few hours earlier in California, but he’s no doubt practicing for the supercross race tomorrow. He’s currently ranked second in the whole nation, and after missing three races from his broken arm, he said he has to place at least third tonight or he risks losing a podium finish for this season.
Not finishing in the top three would be detrimental to his rookie career and he might even lose his sponsorship. His racing reputation would crash; he’d lose endorsements and have to build it all back again. I know how important the supercross race tomorrow is for him, so I can’t call him. I can’t text him, and I can’t give into my selfish desires to make him listen to all of my problems just because I know he’ll have something to say that will fix it all and make it all seem a little better than it really is. He needs to be focused right now.
As much as it hurts me to go without hearing his voice, I leave the phone in my pocket and decide to give him this night to himself. After the race tomorrow, maybe I’ll call him.
I head back to the track to finish setting up for tomorrow morning, and I tell myself that ignoring Ash is for his benefit, not mine. The truth is something I bury deep down in my subconscious, because there’s work to be done, and I don’t have time to spend on the thought that Ash and I aren’t really together and that my problems aren’t really any of his concern.
Chapter 26
Five months ago – February
For the first time since the semester had started, I had no fuzzy, love-struck feelings about Ash’s impending arrival. I kept trying to get excited, to call back those butterflies that used to swim around my stomach every time we talked on the phone. But they were gone. The last couple of months had been mostly arguments or thinly-veiled sarcasm from the both of us. I knew it started with me getting upset over the stupid television interview, but Ash hadn’t done much to make it right.
He didn’t even update his own social media accounts anymore, saying they were stupid, and that he only had them because his bosses made him stay in touch with the fans. So now apparently some intern at Team Yamaha made all of his posts for him and that was Ash’s reason as to why he never mentioned his girlfriend online.
And why did it even matter to me? Social media was stupid. No one puts an accurate representation of themselves online, always taking multiple photos and only posting the best ones, the ones that make them look pretty and thin and happy. Social media was a lie, especially for someone like Ash, whose small supercross fame had brought him into the public eye.
“You’re my girlfriend, that’s all that should matter,” Ash had said the last time we hung out. But if that was true, then why did he cancel his last two visits?
Work.
A busy schedule.
His excuses where there, but I didn’t believe them. Maybe some people just weren’t meant for long distance relationships. Maybe I was the problem. Maybe Ash had found someone else. All I knew was that things didn’t feel right between us anymore, and I didn’t know why. I just knew that I hated it.
My roommate sauntered into our shared living room space wearing the same black dress from the night before. Her hair was done up in braids and swoopy bun knots that made little sense to anyone but her. She gave me a weird look. “What are you so dressed up for?”
I glanced down. I wore a sage green flowy tank top with skinny jeans and heels that had little rhinestones on them. I wasn’t that dressed up. But I guess I wasn’t in my normal pajamas and Ash’s hoodie that I wore to most classes.
“Ash is coming over today.”
“Ah,” she said, really dragging out the word. “You two haven’t broken up yet?”
I narrowed my eyes at her. “Why would we do that?”
“Because you fight all the time, duh.”
I frowned and she swirled her finger in the air. We were lucky enough to get a deluxe dorm with a living room and two bedrooms and she points to the wall. “These walls are paper thin. You guys are bitter every time you’re on the phone lately. No wonder you get pissed when you can hear me having sex. It’s because you aren’t getting any.”
“Can you just . . . go now?” I said, letting my head fall back against the couch. “I don’t want you skulking around when he gets here.”
“Yeah, yeah, I’m going,” Zooey said, grabbing her purse from the floor.
My phone buzzed and I glanced down, getting weirdly nervous when I saw Ash’s name on the screen.
Flights are shitty today. I can’t stay long. Almost there, btw.
“Damn,” Zooey said with a low whistle. “I never see you looking that pissed off. What happened?”
I shook my head and shooed her off with my hand. “Nothing. Go, he’s almost here.”
“Good luck!” she said, blowing me a kiss before she opened the door. “Maybe you’ll get laid and the fighting will stop for a while.”
I groaned.
“Listen, here’s a test,” she said as if she were some kind of relationship expert all of a sudden. “If he shows up with flowers, then things are going to be okay. If he’s empty-handed, then screw him. Who cares if he’s famous and sexy? You deserve better, kay?”
I nodded, trying not to think back to all the times Ash ever brought me flowers. It wasn’t very often, but it did happen. Of course, sometimes I met him at the airport and he couldn’t exactly have flowers when he was walking off a plane. Would he bring them today? Would he try to make up for all the long distance arguments and bitterness now that he was here in person?
Ash arrived a few minutes after Zooey left, and I was still sitting on the couch, staring up at the spotted ceiling of our dorm room. The knock on the door made me more nervous than excited, as if there were an army of savage murderers on the other side of the door and not my boyfriend.
I opened it tentatively, afraid of what I would find. Ash stood there, a sheepish grin on his tanned face. Hands shoved in his pockets.
No flowers.
My heart careened through the next few minutes. The long, slow hug as I crashed into him, wrapping my arms around the guy that I hadn’t seen in weeks. Ash kissed the top of my head while we stood there in an embrace that felt both welcoming and cold at the same time.
“So,” I said, when I pulled away. “You can’t stay long?”
He shook his head. “My flight back is in three hours.”
My eyes bugged. “Then why bother showing up?”
“Because I wanted to see you?” Ash said, turning his palms up.
“That sounded like a question. I don’t need you to tell me what you think I want to hear, Ash.” I turned and walked into the dorm, leaving him to let himself in.
“Hana, that’s not it.” He caught my arm and turned me around, wrapping his hands around my hips so that I had no choice but to face him. “Can we please not fight today?”
I swallowed, staring into his pleading eyes. “We can do whatever you want,” I said with a ton of sarcasm. “Your stay is so short, you obviously planned it so that you wouldn’t have to be in my presence for very long.”
“Hana, seriously.” Ash’s voice had turned cold. “All we do is fight and it doesn’t even make sense. Why? Why do we do this?”
I shrugged, looking at the floor between our feet.
Why didn’t you bring me flowers? I wanted to ask, even though it was so stupid. I wasn’t a flowers kind of girl. I didn’t need them. But I did need some kind of gesture that showed that he still cared about me.
“I don’t know why we do this,” I settled on saying, the lump in my throat threatening to cut off my airway. My eyes burned and my stomach was twisted in knots. “We’re supposed to love each other and all of that.”
“We do love each other,” Ash said, his voice nearly whispering. “But we can’t keep doing this. All we do is argue or ignore each other. It’s affecting my job, Hana.”
“Why am I supposed to care about your job?” I asked, regretting the words the moment I said them. I was on a roll now, so I wasn’t about to stop even though I knew it was wrong to keep talking. “All your job ever does is take you away from me, throw you into parties with hot girls who you don’t bother telling you have a girlfriend—”
“That is not true,” Ash snapped. His grip on me tightened. “Hana, everyone knows I have a girlfriend. You can’t still be pissed about that stupid TV interview.”
I shoved away from him and took a few steps backward. “I can be pissed about whatever I want! You have this big fancy life now, with parties and money and fame and there’s no room for me anymore.” I took a ragged breath, willing the tears to stay at bay. Ash watched me, making no move to deny anything, so I just kept going, ripping into him with every horrible thought I’d ever had. “You made me fall in love with you and then you left. You said we’d see each other all the time but we don’t. You cancel visits more than you keep them, and I’m just supposed to be okay with this?”
“Racing is hard, Hana.” Ash’s features hardened and I could tell he was trying to keep his emotions hidden. “I put all my money on the line for my parent’s new house, and if I just quit then we’ll be screwed. I’m the rookie here, and I have to prove myself. I have to be at each race and you know that. I can’t help the interviews and photo shoots—it’s all part of my contract. You used to think it was cool, but now you persecute me for just doing what I’m paid to do.”
Supercross Me (Motocross Me #2) Page 15