Running Wide Open (28 page)

Denny tried to help, visiting several times a week in an effort to boost Race’s spirits. “You just gotta keep on keepin’ on,” he’d tell him. But the encouragement was like rain on a freshly waxed car, beading up and rolling away.

A lot of other people stopped by, too. Holly Schrader, Randy Whalen, even Tom Carey. But never Jim. Race was nice to their faces then complained when they left. “Why can’t they just leave me alone?”

One Saturday in late July, Kasey took desperate measures to stir Race from his funk. She came home early and confronted him as he sprawled on the couch reading
Early Autumn
, the seventh book in the Spenser series.

“We’re going to the speedway tonight,” she said. “You should get ready.”

Race didn’t look up. “Unless you’ve been putting the Dart back together on the sly, I have absolutely no reason to go.”

“Yes you do. Your friends are worried about you. It would help if they could see that you’re okay.”

Race lowered the book and extended a hand to indicate his reclining body. “You call this okay?”

“I’m not in the mood to argue.” Kasey shuffled through the handful of mail she’d collected on her way in. “There’s a letter here for you, Cody. Your mother again.”

Mom had continued to call, and I’d continued to hang up on her. Race did the same. Only Kasey took the time to speak to her, but she didn’t try to force me to.

I accepted the envelope, ripped it in half, and tossed it in the nearest wastebasket.

“An appropriate response,” said Race.

“You need to get ready,” Kasey told him. “We’re leaving in half an hour.”

I didn’t know if I bought into this speedway idea. On one hand I could see it being very effective. On the other, it might be a complete disaster. What if we ran into Jim? He still hadn’t bothered to visit Race or even call. Besides, Race was always at his worst in the evenings—tired, crabby, and easily rattled. It didn’t seem like the optimal time for his return to the public eye.

At the track, Race let Kasey pay the entry fee in order to avoid a spectacle at the ticket booth. Several people stopped us on our way to find a seat, wishing him well and wanting to know when he’d be back. Kasey fielded the questions, with Race mumbling an occasional answer and looking overtaxed. When a pack of Super Stocks screamed down the front stretch, he flinched at the noise.

“Race!” Jim’s kid, Robbie, waved madly at us before sprinting down the bleachers. “Hey,” he said, screeching to a stop in front of us. “You got a haircut. I liked it better the other way.”

“So did I,” Race said.

Kasey’d had the final word on that, convincing Race the Mothra look wasn’t particularly becoming. He wasn’t happy with how short they’d had to cut his hair to even it out. I’d suggested a Mohawk, hoping to spare at least some of it, but had been overruled two-to-one.

“Come sit with us,” Robbie said, grabbing Race’s hand to drag him up to the spot where his mother was seated. Irritable as Race had been lately, he seemed to draw the line at taking his problems out on a little kid. He trailed behind, releasing Robbie’s hand and gripping the kid’s shoulder as they navigated the bleachers.

Laurie scooted over to make room for us. “Hey, Race, good to see you,” she said, smiling up at him. “I’m sorry Jim hasn’t stopped by. It isn’t that he hasn’t been worried about you.”

“I know.” Race lowered himself with the aid of Robbie’s shoulder.

Time trials got underway and Robbie jabbered at Race throughout them. It surprised me to see that talking with the little squirt seemed to recharge Race’s batteries. But as the night wore on, I watched him sag. He hunched forward during the Super Stock heats, shutting his eyes and massaging his temples. I’d heard enough about brain injuries to know the noise and action were too much stimulation.

“I’m sorry, Race,” Kasey said as the cars of the fast heat decelerated to leave the track. “I should have realized how overwhelming this might be for you. I just thought—”

“Well, maybe next time you’ll listen when I tell you I don’t wanna do something.”

Kasey put her hand on Race’s arm. “Let’s go home.”

“Are you kidding?” He straightened up, eyes pinning her. “I look pathetic enough to all these people. I’m not gonna wimp out and leave early on top of that.”

“Race, you’re not being reasonable.”

“Tough.”

He stuck it out through the rest of the night, giving in only toward the end of the Super Stock main, when taking off early to get a jump on the crowd became a legitimate excuse. Kasey stole worried glances at him the whole time, and Race seemed to take satisfaction in watching her squirm over his discomfort.

Somehow, I couldn’t blame him.

* * *

Kasey’s plan to kick-start Race’s attitude backfired in more ways than one. The next morning he got up at a decent hour and came out to the patio where I was practicing a karate kata.

“Kid, I’m gonna need you today.”

I didn’t know what to make of that, but it sounded interesting, so I went inside and told Kasey I wanted to stay home.

“What’s up?” I asked Race half an hour later as I stood by the window and watched the Charger disappear down Spring Boulevard.

Grinning, he held up the keys to the van. “We’re going to the shop.”

I wondered what unscrupulousness he’d stooped to in order to find those. Kasey’d had them stashed away in some personal Fort Knox. “Dude,” I said, “you can’t drive. The doctor said six weeks and it’s only been like, four.”

“So now you’re the voice of reason? What irony.”

I studied the sly smile on his face, torn between caution and the desire to keep that triumphant look from fading away. It was the first glimpse of the old Race I’d had in a long time.

“What if we have a wreck or something? You hit your head again and your brain could turn to mush.”

“What makes you so sure that wouldn’t improve my quality of life?”

I looked at the key ring again. What could it hurt? Kasey would kill us if she found out, but wasn’t she pushing Race into it every time she weaseled out of taking him to the shop?

“Okay,” I said, “but if Kasey catches us, you gotta take the fall.”

“Naturally.”

I trailed behind him down the steps. “You want me to drive?”

“No.”

I began to have doubts when he struggled to fit the key into the ignition, but once he got the van started, things went pretty smoothly. At least until we reached West 11th. As Race navigated the downtown area with parked cars on one side and traffic whizzing by on the other, his face went rigid and his focus zeroed in. He looked as jittery as I’d felt that day he’d given me my first driving lesson, but we made it to the shop unscathed.

Race tussled briefly with the locked door then led me into cool darkness where the familiar scents of grease and racing fuel brought on a wave of nostalgia.

“Well, let’s see what we’re up against.” Race switched on the lights.

The mangled Dart, still on the trailer, sat just inside the bay door. The roof was mashed down against the roll cage and bore deep gouges from its slide across the track. Door bars stuck out against sheet metal, like ribs on a starving dog. The hood had been torn off completely. It rested against the workbench, the baby blue Mopar emblem scuffed through to bare metal.

As I took it all in, an Ice Age unfolded in my gut, advancing glaciers through my veins.

“Wow,” said Race.

My head buzzed and I took an awkward step forward, feeling suddenly off-balance.

“Cody?” Race grabbed my arm, steering me toward the couch, where he forced me to sit. “Jesus, kid, I’m sorry. I didn’t realize.”

The buzzing faded into anger. “What—that it was serious? That you damn near got yourself killed?” My voice shook as I yelled at him.

Race sat down beside me. “It never occurred to me that seeing the car would hit you like this.”

It hadn’t occurred to me, either.

“You okay?”

I stared at my shaking hands as if they were someone else’s. “I think I need a cigarette.”

“I’ll take you home if you want.” The look in Race’s eyes told me he was hoping I’d refuse.

“What kind of wuss do you think I am?” I took a deep, slow breath to center myself, like my sensei had taught me, then stood up. “Let’s get to work. We’ve only got a few hours if we want to make it back to the house before Kasey.”

I didn’t realize what we were up against. Even getting the car on the ground was a trial. It took Race several attempts to line the trailer hitch up with the van’s receiver, something he could normally do on the first shot.

“Son of a bitch,” he grumbled, pulling forward with a little squeal of the tires on his fifth or sixth try. He looked like Mt. St. Helens on the day of the big eruption by the time he finally he got it.

Before we could back the car off, we had to change both right side tires, which had been flattened by their impact with the track. It was no easy task. Maneuvering the jack on the bed of the trailer was a pain because the fender kept getting in the way. Race swore the whole time. After repeatedly dropping lug nuts and making me fish under the trailer with a broom to retrieve them, he finally growled at me to finish the job.

“Now what?” I asked after wrestling the second tire into place.

Race pushed himself up off the tongue of the trailer, where he’d been resting. “Now we see if she’ll run. Crawl in there and crank her over.”

The starter whined eagerly, powered by the battery we’d just charged, but the engine refused to fire.

“Pump the throttle a couple times,” Race ordered. He gripped the top of the door with both hands, and though he tried to look nonchalant about it, I could tell he was running on fumes.

I squeezed the accelerator. The tantalizing zing of racing fuel tickled my nose.

“Not that much! You flooded her! Just give it a rest. She’s not gonna start now.” Race leaned over the fender and pulled a spark plug wire. Then, after wiggling the rubber boot back from the metal connector, he held it a fraction of an inch away from the plug.

“Try again.”

I pressed the starter button and the engine spun.

“Enough!” he snapped. “We’re not getting spark.”

Race went to dig through a toolbox, coming back with what I now recognized as a circuit tester, thanks to my work at Kasey’s shop. After a little more analysis, he told me to climb out of the car.

“Ballast resistor,” he said. “Musta cracked in the wreck. I may be worthless at changing a tire, but at least I can still diagnose a simple electrical problem.”

“So what do we do about it?”

“Buy a new one. But for now we’ll use the come-along to get the car off the trailer.”

Another task that proved easier said than done. I crawled under the Dart and wrapped one end of the cable over the axle. I hooked the other to a chain bolted around one of the steel I-beams that formed the skeleton of the building. Race’s hands shook and sweat beaded on his forehead as he worked the handle on the come-along to take up the slack.

“You want me to do that?” I asked, impressed but worried by his stoicism.

“No,” Race barked. “I want you to get in the car and steer. Be ready to brake when she starts rolling.”

I’d had about enough of getting my head bit off, and it torqued me that Race didn’t seem to realize I was on his side. But, clenching my teeth, I reminded myself of all the second chances he’d given me. Amazingly, even though I was pissed, it was like I was looking at my anger from the outside, instead of being completely at its mercy. Maybe Alex was right about emotional control being a matter of practice, just like breaking a board.

By the time we had the Dart off the trailer, it was almost four o’clock.

“We should go,” I said. “You look like you’re gonna pass out.”

Ignoring my suggestion, Race picked up a couple of jack stands. The determined set of his jaw scared me. I grabbed his wrist, causing one of the supports to clang to the concrete floor.

“Race, you’ve gotta stop. You’re gonna mess yourself up.”

“Can’t get much worse.”

“You really want to take that chance?”

“Do you have any idea how damn tired I am of being useless? If I leave here without at least getting this car up on jack stands, I’m gonna feel like a . . . like a . . . complete loser.”

Alarm prickled my skin. I hadn’t heard him fumble for a word since a few days after the wreck.

“I’ll do it,” I said. “You sit down.”

At last Race gave in, handing me the other jack stand then retreating to the couch.

When I was done with the car, I attempted to back the trailer in beside it. Backing a trailer isn’t easy. When you cut the wheel the way you think the damn thing oughta go, it goes the other way. Even when I figured out I needed to steer the opposite direction, I had trouble. Eventually I got it by pulling forward until the trailer lined up behind the van, then making a straight shot in reverse.

“Good job,” Race said as I released the lever and lifted the receiver off the ball. It surprised me that he’d sat there watching instead of insisting on doing it himself.

I drove the van forward and closed up the shop. “Let’s go.”

Race went for the driver’s door.

“Uh-uh. Other side,” I told him. “I wanna make it home alive.”

For once, he didn’t argue.

It was almost five by the time we got to the house, but, fortunately, Kasey wasn’t home.

I helped Race up the stairs then ushered him inside, where he collapsed in the chair by the door.

“You want some aspirin?”

“No. Get the . . . the . . .”

“Vicodin?”

“Yeah.”

After retrieving it, I glanced nervously out the window. Kasey could come home at any time. Had I parked the van the way it had been this morning? Was Race gonna be okay? What if I’d been an accomplice in him screwing himself up for good?

Race pulled gently on my shirt. “Kid, I’m sorry. I shouldn’a yelled.”

I let the curtain drop back into place. “It’s okay.”

“No it’s not. When you used to get mad, I never understood, but now . . .”

“Really, it’s no big deal. I get it.”

Race sighed, fading back into the chair cushions. “Every morning I wake up thinking . . . this is my life. What if it never gets better?”