Page 68 of The Champion
Van made the move to Mooresville with us, though I couldtell he was torn by the decision. Every time I flew home to Elma, he came withme. I think over time he’d formed a bond with the Lucifer twins. Van was theonly one that could stand to be around the little shits without wanting to killthem.
After Charlie passed away, Logan and Lucas got into ashit load of trouble in school. They were becomingalmostunbearable forAndrea. I had no idea how Andrea made it through the day with them withoutmedicating herself or them. I would have shipped their asses off to boardingschool a long time ago. You’d think turning seven would have at least maturedthem slightly. Not a chance.
Jameson’s season was going great. He was leading thepoints with Tate and Paul close behind. He’d won three of the last six racesand had jumped to a 230-point lead over Tate last week in Charlotte. Thetension between him and Colin Shuman was still there at times but Jameson hadlearned a valuable lesson. Walking away.
I should probably rephrase that, he walked awaymostof the time. In Richmond after a late race wreck when Jameson blew a tireand collected him and Colin, he threw his helmet at Jameson and ended uphittingmein the back. Jameson did not walk away from that and spent agood amount of time defending his actions to the media and to Simplex whoweren’t pleased.
Racing in the elite levels of NASCAR there was no way forhim to escape the taunting and retaliation on the track all together but heneeded to learn to say when and he had for the most part. He still had histemper tantrums and was still the same hothead that overreacted to theinconsequential things in life but he was maturing. He couldalmostbeclassified as an eight year old in maturity.
You could say, looking back on the last few months, ourlives had changed considerably that’s for sure.
One thing remained the same was that we were still theMama Wizard and Dirty Heathen we’d always been. Some say having a kid changesyour sex life. It didn’t for us. We made use of any alone time we had that’sfor sure.
“Dadadadada,” Axel babbled away crawling around me inamongst the grass and wild flowers that bordered Charlie and Rachel’s graves. Ichose to have Charlie buried next to Rachel in our home town of Aberdeen. Ithought that was fitting since they had spent the majority of their livestogether in that small Grays Harbor town.
And when I thought about it some more, I would havewanted that for Jameson and me. This way they would be together forever in mymind.
I struggled with losing Charlie—some days were good—someweren’t. It was easier being in Mooresville and being around racing again butstill, it was something where I just had to remember what was important andthat was being a mother to my son and a wife to my husband.
I intended on being the best damn Mama Wizard I could be.
I gently traced my fingertips over my mother’s headstone,reading the script aloud. “Rachel Marie Reins, loving wife and mother.”
A few tears fell as I remembered my times with my mom,wondering how different my life may have turned out had she not died. Decidingthis would just upset me more than anything I looked over at Axel as he chewedhis second piece of grass.
“Are you ready to go my little goat?” I asked and pickedhim up. He said dada once again. “And you really should start saying mama. I’mclearly a better choice. I mean look at everything I offer you...you wouldn’t eat if it wasn’t for thefoodbags!”
Axel grinned at me. It was bizarre to see how much heresembled Jameson at such a young age and also reassuring. Whenever I missedJameson, all I had to do was look into Axel’s green eyes and I saw Jameson. Thepersonalities were much in the same. He had one hell of a temper that’s forsure. Other than the temper, he was one of the happiest babies I’d ever seen.Just don’t piss him off and for god’s sake, do not interrupt his feeding time.
Jameson made this mistake once when we were stuck in arainstorm outside of Bloomington. Needless to say; he never asked me to stopbreastfeeding him once I started again.
I sat there at my parent’s gravesites for another fewminutes, telling them everything that happened in the last few months beforeloading Axel back in the car.
Tonight was the memorial race we’d put together forCharlie so everyone was flying in today to attend. We had planned it around thebi-week in NASCAR, the Outlaw races, and the USAC schedules.
Only problem was that my dirty heathen was in Grand ForksNorth Dakota with Justin and Tyler at an appearance for their new sponsor andthe additional car that he added this year. Not that he needed to add anothercar to his team but knowing Jameson I wasn’t surprised he added another one.
So there we were texting all morning but he had yet togive me a final answer on whether or not he was actually coming.
When I got inside the car and my little goat was buckledin safely, I sent him another text while Van drove to the track.
It was now noon and we only had six hours until racingstarted, I needed Jameson for two reasons. One, he pulled the biggest crowd inand we advertised that he’d be there. And two, we hadn’t seen each other inclose to two weeks and I missed him.
Pleasetell me you’re coming!
It took him about ten minutes to respond and by the timehe did, we were at the track unloading the t-shirts into the merchandise tents.
Cominghuh, that can be arranged.
I smiled.Can we please have a conversation when you’re not actinglike a twelve year old?
Notlikely.
Areyou or are you not?
Huh?
Willyou be here tonight?
