Page 94 of Trading Paint
My grin widened and thankfully I hadn’t pulled off my helmet and could disguise it.
I still hadn’t figured out what had gone wrong with my mechanical failure but I had a good idea of where to look. Sway.
Something was changing within our friendship but instead of trying to locate it, I overlooked it. Now wasn’t the time. She had the college thing going and I was still undecided as to where I wanted my racing career to go. So, it was what is was...friends who talked almost daily, texted like high school girls and kissed when they saw each other. To the outside world, it looked like we were dating on our own schedules but it wasn’t that. I just could never control myself around her and ended up attacking the poor girl.
I ended up winning the feature that night and felt good about my chances for next season after battling my dad all night long I beat him by a mere three inches.
If you think about it, slowly, I was rebuilding my engine and was trying to ensure it wasn’t just a rev motor because it needed to be one to last.
I also needed to work on my concentration. I wasn’t focused as I’ve always been so I was working on that too.
Sway came out to see me during her spring break when we were racing in Kansas City at Lakeside Speedway. She was originally going to come for Eldora but she ended up needing to stay and finish a few classes.
After that trip to Kansas, I swore I’d never return to that goddamn city. Eventually I did but never during tornado season.
The day started normally as I picked Sway up from the airport and we went to the track after eating some breakfast. I admit that I did kiss her and it was just as gratifying as it had always been.
When we got to the track, the weather started changing and the sky started talking.
Ryder and Justin were both racing with us this weekend. Sometime after we ran out hot laps and before the heat races began, Ryder came up to me.
“Those skies are rumbling man.”
I looked up from the tires I was scrapping mud from into distant fields. Through a dark skyline, you could see thunderclouds rumbling and lightening flickering.
“Yeah, they’re talking that’s for sure.”
The race was scheduled to start sometime after three that afternoon but the weather, being spring in the Midwest, was sketchy. We sat around most of the morning wondering if they’d even get the race in until the announcer came on and said they were cancelling it.
We packed up and pulled onto Highway 5 toward Wolcott when I noticed the sky turning colors off to the east of us. Having been around some crazy weather at times in the mid-west, I just chalked this up to a thunderstorm rolling though. Oh was I wrong.
It wasn’t until the hail started and cars began to turn around and travel the opposite direction from us that I realized something might not be right.
Spencer, being Spencer was just driving whileblaringhis new Britney Spears CD.
Sway was just as alarmed as me but because of Spencer’s singing voice and not the weather. Alley, being pregnant and extremely exhausted was sleeping.
I could still see Ryder’s hauler in front of us and knew Emma was with him and Tommy.
No one else seemed to be alarmed. I thought maybe I was overreacting. I was so wrong. The shit was about to hit the fan.
While merging onto Hutton Road, I realized this shit was flying. Looking off to the West, the sky had turned a pea soup color and the hail, was coming down so hard that you couldn’t see a foot in front of the car.
Spencer turned the stereo down. “Shit, look at that hail!”
Ryder pulled over before merging onto the Interstate and got out to run back to our truck with Tommy and Emma following close behind. So now we had seven people piled into the truck with Tommy sitting on my lap.
I was not amused.
“What are you guys doing?” I was more specifically asking Tommy this question, but not directly.
Everyone looked skeptically at each other before answering.
“We thought it was safer in here...” Tommy answered.
None of these assholes seemed particularly sharp at the moment.
I couldn’t understand the reasoning behind them thinking they were safer in here and I was not impressed that Tommy felt the need to sit onmylap, but was cut off by a loud siren blaring. It sounded like a bullhorn but kept going, and going.
