“Yes, but will they also be faster than Sterling and Gabby?” Ethan laughed as Sterling jumped into the kart with a shout that sounded like a battle cry, which Gabby echoed.
“You may have a point.” I shrugged.
A beeping sound went off, and the first drivers for each team began lining up behind a big white line as a red light blinked to yellow. Besides us and the Gym Rats, there were two other teams: a group of dance influencers and a collection of self-proclaimed geek girls, including Emmie. Sterling revved the kart’s engine at the starting line, taunting Emmie playfully. Then a big blasting sound went off as the light turned green. Tires screeched, and a couple of karts fishtailed, knocking into one another as the creators driving them cackled. Of course, neither of them was Sterling, who was already halfway around the first curve, yelling curses and driving like Cruella de Vil going to get the dalmatian puppies.
“Right,” Ethan said, speaking quickly to try to teach me as much as he could in two minutes or less. “Because you are smaller and all the engines have the same horsepower, you’ll be able to accelerate faster. Drifting to the outer edge of the track will be easier, too. Take the turns wider than you normally would. Stay in the middle so they can’t pass you easily. It’ll force them to either take the curves behind you, or go wide. If they do that, they’ll lose time since they are too big to accelerate faster than you on the straightaways.”
“Okay.” I nodded. My heart was pounding as we stopped towatch while Sterling came into the final stretch a breath ahead of the opera singer, this time alternating between yelling tips at Gabby—already in her helmet—and more curses at the other teams.
After taking my helmet from my hands, Ethan placed it on my head and gently pressed down, the world automatically getting quieter and my vision limiting. Bending down slightly so he could meet my eye, he added, “For the straightaways, cut back into the inside of the track. And accelerate out of the turn, not into it.”
Moving us close to the pit where drivers would switch, Ethan kept talking as Gabby pulled onto the track, howling like a demon set loose as she cut off the Gym Rats. As Ethan predicted, everyone else wasn’t taking this nearly as seriously. The third team was still a curve behind, and the fourth team had managed to stall sideways on the track. Meanwhile, Sterling had gone back to filming the action, complete with commentary on how bad the other drivers were, compared to our team’s prowess.
I shook out my hands to release the tension and found him squinting at Gabby. She made Sterling look like a tortoise crossing the road. She was basically a bat out of hell, constantly checking over her shoulder and taunting the gym bro behind her, whose entire body seemed to have gone red with rage.
As Gabby rounded the curve toward us, Ethan said, “Remember, you don’t have to add to the lead, you just don’t want to come in last. You got this.”
“Go!” Gabby hollered as soon as she was close, already unbuckling her seat belt. Taking a deep breath, I jumped off thecurb and began cramming myself between the little bars that were meant to keep us safe if the car rolled over before Gabby was fully out. Even if I lost this thing, I was gonna look like I tried to hurry. Gym Rats pulled up behind us, and Gabby reached in to help me with the strap of my seat belt as I searched for the gas pedal, then stomped down.
The last thing I heard was Gabby shouting at me, then nothing but the vibration of a go-kart engine. Hitting the first curve, I did my best to take my foot off the gas and swing wide, the cart sliding sideways with the unexpected movement. I held my breath and tried to glance back. Sure enough, Dakota from Gym Rats was weaving around behind me, trying to figure out how to pass. Coming to the end of the curve, I floored it and cut back down to the inside of the track, forcing Dakota to waste time swinging wide so he wouldn’t hit me.
I let out an excited shriek and focused on the road. Ethan was right. This could work. I gripped the wheel tighter as a series of hairpin curves came up. Unlike Gabby and Sterling, I wasn’t about to turn around and yell at Gym Rats; instead I stuck myself in the dead center of the track and made wide arcs like Ethan said to do. From behind, I could hear Dakota holler at me to get out of the way, but I didn’t care. Ethan knew cars. He’d given me a plan, and I was sticking to it.
As soon as I came out of the hairpins, I cut back to the inside of the track, then realized that I would need to get to the pit. Instead of waiting and moving over gradually, I cut over fast, forcing Dakota to swerve in order to avoid me one more time. Grinning, I took my foot off the gas and coasted toward the pit before coming to a stop.
“Yes. Good, good, good!” Sterling shouted, running around to my side of the kart. Grabbing under my arms, he hauled me out as soon as my seat belt was unbuckled. Meanwhile, Ethan swung himself through the passenger side like I had done.
I had just enough time to catch Ethan smiling at me before I was on my feet, and he was gone. The adrenaline that had coursed through my body during the race was making me shake like I was still in the kart as I tried to get my helmet off.
“Oop, let’s do that on the other side of the railing. Don’t want anyone to run us over,” Sterling said, placing a hand on my arm and steering me and my wobbly legs to safety.
I managed to get my helmet off, feeling a bit like I’d been pulled from a vacuum hose in the process, and sighed. Giving my head a shake, I saw Sterling still standing there, watching me.
He said, “I might have underestimated you. That cut maneuver was dirty.”
“I didn’t—”
“Oh no. Don’t get me wrong, I loved it. We’re going to win because of you.” Sterling grinned. “Also, I’m obsessed with your grandma. Her retirement party get-ready-with-me videos and her Cookies and Tea TV recaps are my favorites. Introduce me?”
He said all of this so matter-of-factly that it took me a moment to process what he was asking for. He liked BamBam’s videos where she spilled the tea about the latest celebrity drama while making cookies with a friend like “a good grandma.” And he wantedmeto introduce him to her.
I pushed my hair over my shoulder and tried to play it cool, like I was mulling it over and not dying to accept immediately. Shrugging, I said, “Sure. She is kinda booked up, but maybe youtwo could have breakfast tomorrow and work something out. I could let her know to meet you.”
“Perf. I’ll see her then.” Sterling smiled and turned to go, then stopped. Glancing back at me, his face grew thoughtful. “Hey, you seem nice, and I’m serious about wanting to work with Mini, so you should know that I’m not sure how over Ethan and Emmie are. Ethan says they are done. Emmie says they are not. Anyway, whatever y’all seem to have going on may be real for him, or a rebound, or a boomerang moment. Only he knows, I guess.”
“Oh, it’s not like…nothing’s going—”
“I don’t need to hear any details. In fact, it’s better if I don’t. Ethan is my friend even if we’re in a weird place right now.” The crowd cheered as Ethan crossed the finish line first, although Sterling and I were too distracted to care much. Sterling’s shoulders sagged a fraction of an inch, like the rift between him and Ethan hurt more than he was letting on, before adding, “I thought you should know. Do with that knowledge what you will.” Glancing up as Ethan lifted himself out of the car, Sterling adopted his usual playful expression again. Smiling, he said, “I should go get my phone from Gabby. See you soon, babes.”
With that, he was gone, leaving me to wonder exactly what to do with this information. Ethan and I weren’t anything other than business partners, so who was I to care if he and Emmie were done or not? I’d just have to ignore the fact that the idea of being a rebound bothered me a little more than it should.
CHAPTER NINE
I stood in an alcoveof the hallway leading to the ballroom where lunch was being served and adjusted my camera bag for the umpteenth time. Trying to quell the nervous knot twisting in my stomach, I reminded myself that it was unlikely BamBam would bust out of lunch and start checking the different casino food courts for me. It was equally unlikely that Gabby and Nittha would accidentally blow my cover by skipping TrendCon’s under-twenty-one content creator pool party. They wouldn’t pass up free mocktails.
That said, the longer Ethan took, the more anxious I got. I was starting to think that maybe I should find a better place to wait for him, when one of the ballroom’s heavy soundproof doors swung open. I stepped back about three feet and got ready to run if so much as a hair that looked like BamBam’s walked out of the door, then calmed down as Ethan rounded the corner, checking from side to side as if he were sneaking out past curfew.
“Ethan,” I whispered from my hiding place, then tried to stifle a laugh as he jumped, a small, goofy squeak escaping him. Spotting me, he exhaled and walked over, still surveying the area as he crossed the hall.
