Page 65 of Trading Paint
Dad reached into his pocket and threw the number on the table.
“They were bold.” He said tucking mom into his side and kissing her forehead.
I knew this wasn’t the first time this happened to him. Jim Riley was the king of sprint car racing. Not only was he a king of spring car racing but with piercing blue eyes and black messy hair, he had looks going for him, so I’ve been told. My mom never paid a mind to it though. She always smiled and looked the other way as if it wasn’t happening. Don’t get me wrong. He had never once acted on the advances that I knew about and I doubted he ever would. Mom was it for him. I watched for years the way his eyes light up each time he saw her and the way she grinned like a schoolgirl every time he whispered in her ear. After twenty-two years of marriage, they were still madly in love. Seeing that type of devoted love made me hope one day I’d find that but I also knew my love for racing overstepped that.
I wasn’t looking for love. I was looking to make a name for myself that didn’t include being Jimi Riley’s kid.
When I started the summer my dad provided us with five sprint cars and deposited money in our accounts but we still had to work within a budget. Racing is not cheap.
Cars were upward of forty grand each and when shit breaks, it’s expensive.
Knock off a wing like I did in WilliamsGrove, thatwas $600. Front shock in Terre Haute was $900. An engine after the race at River Cities Speedway was $10,000. A broken left front axle at Columbus was $200. And a driveline after Eldora was $1500. I kept waiting for the priceless part like the commercials but it never came.
As you can see, racing couldn’t be done without sponsorship. For me, sponsorship didn’t even cover all that shit.
By the time August rolled around that summer, it was apparent a change needed to occur. Either that or I was done racing sprint cars and needed to find a job to support my racing hobby. I couldn’t rely on my dad’s financial support forever and I didn’t want to. I hated that he was even paying for as much as he did.
I was still racing in the USAC divisions for Bowman Oil and Bucky but that wasn’t enough. To get to where I wanted to be, I needed as much experience as I could get.
Funny thing was I didn’t know where I was heading. I knew I wanted to compete for the Triple Crown this year but next year, I hadn’t given much thought to it.
Again, I just wanted to race.
Open wheel guys usually go one of three ways.Indy, IRL, or NASCAR.
Being an open wheel guy, Indy appealed to me but I was curious about those stock cars. I liked racing the outlaw late models so I thought for sure I’d like those stock cars as well.Although I’d never raced them on asphalt yet.
After Knoxville Nationals in early August, I was heading to Grain Valley, Missouri to race in a USAC Silver crown race there on Saturday afternoon.
So far, I was fourth in the USAC Sprint points, second in the Silver Crown and first in the midget series...this meant that overall in the National Triple Crown points I was third behind Justin West and Tyler Sprague.
I was confident going into Grain Valley and that was exactly the mentality I needed to win there, and I did.
The following week I raced in Sun Prairie. I won both the midget and sprint race. It seemed that even though I was destroying a lot of cars, I was beginning to win. This was a good thing because I needed the money to pay for all that shit I broke.
Sleeping in my truck was getting old fast. I was at my wits end with my sister and Alley constantly bitching at me and I frequently found myself offering Sway my sweatshirt so she’d cover up. It was going on six months since I had sex and I wasn’t sure how much longer I could go.
After the race in Sun Prairie, all of us, including Tommy who had been traveling more often with us, headed out for a night on the town. It had been a while since we had let loose since I raced sixteen days in July and already thirteen in August and we still have another week to go.
“What is that smell? Roll up the damn windows!” I barked plugging my nose as we rolled through the farm town.
It smelled like shit at the track and it smelled like shit at the hotel, so naturally, it smelled like shit at the bars.
“It’sshit, I think.” Sway said rolling up her window as we pulled up to a bar.
“I’m not going in there.” Emma announced.
“Good,” I replied sarcastically. Emma kicked at me from her place on Sway’s lap. “Kick me again and I will throw you out of this goddamn truck.” I warned not looking at her but checking my emails on my phone. I had three revisions to my schedule that Nicole from Bowman Oil sent me. They had me racing in LaSalle and Terre Haute on the same day...I was sure that wasn’t going to work unless I could be in Ohio and Illinois at the same time.
“Can we even get in there?” Sway asked pointing toward the Canary Grill we sat in front of.
“It’s Sun Prairie Wisconsin. I doubt they check ID’s.” Spencer said from the front seat. He sighed looking at the bar. He looked defeated. “Let’s pray they don’t.”
After four speeding tickets in two weeks, I was no longer allowed to drive. My license was suspended. Bullshit if you asked me but I wasn’t about to argue with the cop who pulled me over for doing 110 in a 45.
I think I got off good considering he could have thrown me in jail for that one.
No one was making any attempt at getting out so I did. I for one was tired of being cooped up in a car with these assholes and needed to get away. I didn’t think this bar would sell us any alcohol but when I walked in there was a large USAC calendar on the wall. I had never used my connections for anything so far but right then I did. I don’t believe in using your popularity or who you know to get anything in life but there are times when this will work for your benefit. When you’re eighteen, in a bar, and surrounded by your annoying family, you’d use your connections to get alcohol any way you could.
