Page 23 of The Legend
“Noproblem.” Casten shrugged shuffling his feet. “I want to see him win just asmuch as you do. He needs it.”
“Have youseen your mom around here?” I still hadn’t seen Sway tonight and frankly, I wasgetting nervous as to where she was.
Castenlooked over his shoulder noticing commotion. “She’s here somewhere.”
Raisedvoices around us drew my attention back to Brian’s hauler parked on the otherside of Rager’s pit. Axel was in Brian’s face with Rager standing beside him.
“Shut thefuck up!” Axel hollered and then spun around to walk away.
I wasn’tsure what it was about but I had a feeling it was just the tempers of KnoxvilleNationals.
It’d beena rough adjustment for Axel this year coming from the midget series hedominated, and now he couldn’t pull off a feature win. Through my own struggleswhen racing in a new series, I understood his frustration completely.
Hisshoulders were slowing weighing on him and in turn he was questioning hisability.
Rightbefore the A-Feature, I pulled Axel aside.
“Let’stake a walk.” I told him motioning with my head toward the track. Most driverswalked the track prior to a feature just to see how the track had progressedthroughout the night. Tonight it had that glazed over shiny look meaning it wasdry and slick, just the way Axel preferred it. Whereas I preferred the tackyloose tracks, Axel dominated on the dry/slick when it resembled asphalt. Funnyenough, Axel never liked racing asphalt.
“Howyafeelin’tonight?”I asked kickingup clay with the tip of my shoe and then packing it back down with my heel totest the moisture.
Axeldidn’t say anything for a moment, his brow furrowed as he too checked themoisture content. He shrugged and looked at the direction of the pit bleacherswhere team members and the family usually watched the race.
Lily wasstanding over there with Axel’s buddy, Shane, watching us.
“It’s hardto believe I can come from winning nearly every feature of the season in USACto this.” He kicked at the dirt before meeting my gaze. “You probably never hadthat problem, did you?”
Laughing,I remembered my second fulltime season in USAC when I couldn’t pull off afeature win to save my ass. “I’ve had dry spells just like any other driver. Wecan’t win them all.”
“But youdo now.”
One wouldthink with my fifteen championships that I won all the time. Well, yeah I did.But there were dry spells as well and when that happened, we looked for ananswer in the engines and all the way back to ourselves wondering what in thehell went wrong. I couldn’t tell you what it was but every racer knew thefeeling well.
“My onlyadvice is, don’t think about it. It gets to a point where you start toover-analyze every move you make on the track thinking it’s something you’redoing, when it’s not. It’ll all come together eventually and you’ll get thatfirst win buddy. Yougottahave patience.”
Castenpulled up on the 4-wheeler behind us. “They’re calling the drivers to theircars Axel. We got the engine in.”
Axelnodded but didn’t look up at Casten.
Castengrinned and spun the ATV around to roost up clay at us.
“You guysshould have stopped with me.” Axel noted brushing a few chucks of clay off hisdriver’s suit.
“Youknow,” I let out a laugh throwing my arm over his weighted shoulders, “I feltthe same way about my siblings.”
When wegot back to the pits Casten was busy flirting with some girl standing inRager’s pit. Before Axel got inside his car, he unscrewed the cap to a quart ofoil sitting on the counter in the hauler and dumped it down the inside ofCasten’s shirt, then climbed inside his car.
Casten,never wanting to compromise his chances with the girl by freaking out, justgrinned at his brother and continued to nod to whatever the girl was saying tohim.
Logan,Sway’s half-brother and part of JAR Racing these days, was standing with Willieon the other side of Axel’s car adjusting the timing for the track conditions.They both broke into a fit of laughter when Axel pulled one over on hisbrother.
Timesnever changed. It may be a different set of kids now, but they were stillpulling the same shit we used to in the pits. I can’t tell you how many times Idumped oil down my brothers back. It made me smile thinking back to the timeswhen we did this at the local dirt tracks growing up. Thinking of that made methink of Sway. She was supposedly somewhere but had yet to show.
Part of mewas worried but I also knew if there were a problem, Clint or Van, ourbodyguards, would have called me. The paranoid part of me checked my phone tomake sure nothing was wrong.
Turns outshe was stuck at the merchandise hauler but made it just as the cars wereperforming the 4-wide salute to the fans.
Kissing myshoulder, her tiny arms wrapped around my waist as the announcer said thatfamous World of Outlaws saying. The cars lined up four-wide coming out ofthree. “Knoxville Speedway, you wanted the best you got ‘emfour of the best. Often imitated, never duplicated, the greatest show on dirt...the World of Outlaws!”
