Motocross Me (8 page)

The analyzing turns to fantasizing until Ash’s dusty truck pulls up, crushing my daydream of Ryan and me making out. He doesn’t have to leave his truck since it isn’t lifted ridiculously high off the ground. His window lowers and I rest my forehead on the top of his door while he signs the clipboard.

We don’t speak as he prints his name illegibly, signs it even more sloppily and writes the date. He pulls the stick shift into neutral. He watches me a few seconds before saying, “Anything wrong?”

We’re the same level as I stand outside his truck with my head still pressed to the dirty surface of the door. I’m scared to move it now, figuring I’ll have a dirty smudge across my forehead.

“Nah.” I take the clipboard and decide to be generous to him as well. “You don’t have to pay today. It’s on the house.”

“No, I can’t do that.” He pulls the clipboard away from me and slides ten dollars under the clasp. He pushes a couple dreads behind his ear and returns the clipboard. “Thanks for stealing my sister last night. It was really horrible not having her around.”

“Anytime.” I snicker and he shakes his head at me, smiling as he drives away. I wipe my forehead and press the talk button on my walkie-talkie.

“Molly, tell Shelby her brother is a dork. Over.”

Shelby spends most of the day with Ash, watching him practice and cleaning his goggles when he comes back to the pits to rest. Thursdays are uneventful; nothing happens besides signing in riders and the occasional phone call. Molly and Dorothy play cards in the tower, while my dad stands on the sidelines of the track teaching Teig valuable riding skills. Since everyone is busy, no one will notice if I turn off my walkie-talkie and abandon my job to head to Ryan’s truck.

I climb to the top floor of the tower, holding onto the railing for balance as my knees tend to wobble when I’m three floors off the ground. The view of the track is amazing from this high. I can see the night track, the day track and even the kid track, all spread out over twenty acres. I find Ryan’s bright yellow helmet and follow it around the track. He zips around turns and flies over jumps twice the length of semi-trucks.

Ash is his only competition in the state, yet I they never ride together. When Ryan is practicing on the track, Ash will ride on the other track or stay at his truck. Without fail, Ash always pulls on his gloves and cranks his dirt bike within a minute of Ryan exiting the track. Their hatred for each other is as thick as the padding in their helmets. I can almost feel it, and I’m  a hundred feet away, viewing them from the top of the tower.

As soon as Ryan pulls off the track, I hustle down the stairs as fast as my fear of heights will let me. Ash rides past me on his way to the track and waves. I wave back hoping Ryan is out of eyesight. A dark feeling forms in my chest. I have a mini-secret that I’m keeping from Ash and Ryan. Ryan doesn’t want me to be friends with Ash, but Shelby is my friend and I truly like her. Shelby and Ash are a package deal, regardless of what Ryan wants.  Besides, it’s not that big of a secret, and I’m sure he will understand when I get around to telling him (or not telling him).

If I only knew why they despised each other so much, there may be a way to resolve the fight, and we can all be friends. I mull over the things two seventeen-year-old guys would fight about. All I come up with are girls and maybe something motocross related. They may be rivals on the track, but I’d heard enough of Dad’s “Motocross is a big family” talks to know that most rivals were enemies on the track and friends off of it.

Just because they’re the two fastest two-fifty Pro riders in Texas, doesn’t mean they have a reason to hate each other. I promise myself I’ll find out the big secret that Shelby doesn’t know. I’ll find it and I’ll fix it. But when I see Ryan, all thoughts of anything remotely comprehensible drift out of my mind like a message in a bottle, tossed out to sea.

He’s on the tailgate of his truck, slouched over with his elbows on his knees, staring at the ground and breathing heavily. A half-empty bottle of lemon-lime Gatorade teeters in his hand. Sweat rolls off his hair in all directions – down his ear, through his bangs, and probably down the back of his neck though I can’t see that far. It’s amazing how something as gross as sweat can be so gorgeous sparkling in the sunlight on a sculpted, beautiful, and extremely talented body.

I have to stop thinking in metaphors, or my heart might share the fate of an over-inflated water balloon. There I go again. I slow my steps so as not to seem eager, and approach him with as much apathy as I can gather in my weakened state of mind. Apathy is, after all, one of my more prominent talents. 

“Hey there,” I say, hands in my front pockets. Ryan looks up and sweat rolls down his temples like water. For something with no body fat, how was
that
much sweat coming out of his head?

“Hey.” He shuffles to the left and taps his hand on the spot next to him. The tailgate is as high as my neck so there is no way I can climb up there. He sees my hesitation and grins.

“Put your foot on the tire and grab my hand and I’ll pull you up.”

I do as he says, and when my foot is on the tire I grab onto the side of the truck and reach for his hand. In one swift motion he pulls me onto the tailgate like how Wesley saved Buttercup from harm in the Fire Swamp. There may not be any Rodents of Unusual Size under Ryan’s truck, but it’s fun to daydream.

My legs swing freely below me. I need to say something clever that will show off my intellect and charm, or at least make it seem like I have some. Ryan gulps the rest of his Gatorade and tosses the bottle on the ground.

“So what kind of gas mileage do you get with this thing?” I ask.

He laughs. All of my careful conversation planning, and he laughs.

“If you really want to know, I get about ten miles to the gallon with these tires.”

He leaps off the tailgate, grabs the empty bottle and tosses it in a blue plastic trashcan. Then he comes back to his truck and unzips a large duffle bag full of clothing and extra riding gear.

“Sometimes it’ll get up to twelve.” He chooses a white t-shirt from the bag.

“That must get really expensive.”

“I can afford it.” He grins, removing his jersey in a quick motion. My heart stops and a chill runs through my body. I curse myself for wasting sixteen years of life never noticing how gorgeous a man’s chest can be. How could I have been missing out on this? But then again, I’ve never seen one this close. With the t-shirt still in his hand, he stands in front of me on the ground, letting his eyes meet mine. I’m so high in the air, I can probably see over the top of his head if I dared to look away from his shirtless torso, but that isn’t a dare I want to make.

“Girls ask a lot of questions about my truck but
that
my dear, is never one of them.”

“Well, maybe I’m just not that kind of girl.”
Girls ask him about his truck? Way to be original, Hana.

 
“And what kind of girl are you?” He keeps the shirt in his hand and put his elbows on the tailgate on either side of me. My stomach does a somersault.

“Whatever kind of girl you want me to be,” I say. It’s lame and cliché, but it feels like something a guy like Ryan would want to hear.

He’s close to me. Really close. Closer than a guy has ever been to me. He is still shirtless. Does he want me to feel this uncomfortable and intimidated? Do I want him to? My heart is no longer dead; it is, in fact, beating faster and louder than it has in that whole semester I took of cross country running.

He curls out his bottom lip and peers into my eyes. We are so close now I’m afraid to breathe. My heart thumps and my brain is a blurred frenzy trying to make coherent thoughts from the electrical currents shooting through my veins.

“Oh, I don’t know about that.” He leans closer to me. “I really like your little good girl image.”

His lips hover inches from mine. I brace for him to kiss me. He backs away and puts on the shirt. I sigh with force of the breath I had been holding. Ryan notices. How freaking mortifying. At least it’s dusk and the sun is setting in on us because my cheeks burn with the fury of a thousand suns. What if he wasn’t about to kiss me and I just thought he was and now he thinks I’m a loser?

He straightens the shirt over his abs and reaches up to help me jump down. My feet hit the ground and a little poof of dirt covers my shoes. His arms slip around my waist and pulls me straight into him. We kiss. Right on the lips.

And we’re still kissing.

KISSING.

His hands let go of me and his lips tear away from mine. I think he says something but I don’t know. All I know is I just got my second ever kiss and this time, it wasn’t from a lanky kid with braces.

As the sun sets on my wonderful day, the track continues to thrive with life. Kids under six are given free rein to ride on the big track now that practice is over. Bugs crowd together under the glow of the lights and generators roar to life. The campers cook dinner or have pizza delivered. Many of them have small fires in their pit. Anticipation for tomorrow’s race hangs in the air, and it is one of the most positive vibes imaginable. I have the feeling at this very moment no one is worrying about work or school or that funny-shaped mole on their back. All everyone cares about is tomorrow.

I leave my walkie-talkie in the tower and since no one is in there, I change out of my Chucks and put on sandals. Then I run my fingers through the braids in my hair, leaving my head a wavy mess. Since Ryan isn’t camping out tonight, I can relax and not have to focus on making my every move perfect. I go find Shelby to see if she wants to sleep at my house tonight instead of in their tent.

The Carters’ pit is larger than usual, since their cousins are staying a few extra days, so I can’t see Shelby at first. I search for her face in the crowd of people sitting around the campfire.

Someone plays the guitar and the song is familiar – an oldie maybe. Her cousins roast marshmallows, and her parents cuddle in a two-seater lawn chair. When I spot Shelby, she’s holding a little boy’s hand, dancing by the fire.

As I get closer, I realize the bluesy guitar rhythm comes from Ash, sitting on an old tractor tire. He looks different when he’s not wearing riding gear. Almost like a normal  guy and not a motocross fanatic. He is so laid back and relaxed all the time, I can’t picture the boy wearing any emotion other than serenity. The hair, of course, makes him look like one of the guitar-playing hipsters who collect change in a guitar case on the bench outside of the mall. At least he sings better than those guys.

I sit next to him and return the smile he flashes me. Shelby dances with her eyes closed and still hasn’t noticed my arrival. She is barefoot and shimmying to the music like a child, innocent and free.

My clothes are radiant on her. It’s as if the clothes themselves bring out confidence Shelby never knew she had. She isn’t the same shy girl from the sidelines who freaked out this morning; she’s brighter. She’s happy. She’s dancing her heart out like no one is watching. I think I’ll let her keep that outfit.

The song ends and Ash asks if anyone has a song request.

“Wonderwall!” Shelby spins around, noticing me. “When did you get here?”

“Just now,” I lie. She runs over and sits next to me on Ash’s log. I scoot over an inch, knocking my arm into Ash’s guitar. The strings aren’t cut off at the ends and a sharp one stabs in my arm. I
eep
like a mouse, and jump back. A thick drop of blood pours out of the tiny stab wound. It all happens so fast, me jumping, and Shelby falling, and before I know it, I’m about to crash into the ground. Ash throws out his hand and catches me. He rubs my arm with his thumb.

“Aw, it’s bleeding a little bit.” He wipes off the blood, then tries to curl the wild guitar strings into themselves. “Sorry about that.”

Shelby’s eyes catch his, and she gives him a look. And that’s all it is to me: a look. I don’t understand twin language, but from the look on Ash’s face, it must have had a negative connotation to it. Maybe she was telling him he was gross for touching the blood of a stranger and
oh my God
, now he’s probably reeking with diseases. Well, probably not, but I don’t know why she’d give him a look like that.

“So…Wonderwall,” she says again. Ash strums the first chords to the classic Oasis song, and Shelby and I sing along. Malissa and Christine join in and together we sing the first verse, all out of pitch and off-key. The Carters laugh at our performance, and for that moment, my arm doesn’t hurt. No one is competing. Ryan totally kissed me tonight and everything is perfect.

“Thanks so much for letting me stay with you,” Shelby says as we make our way through the thick grass to my backyard. I want to say, “Are you kidding? I’m so happy I have a friend now, you can stay with me every single night if you want.” But I choose to go the less creepy route and say something funny instead. “It’s the least I can do. I’d hate to see you sharing a tent with your horrible cousins.”

It’s almost midnight when we get home, so everyone in the house is asleep. I dread the thought of waking up so early tomorrow morning. Though I’m sort of used to it by now, I haven’t tested my waking abilities after only five hours of sleep. At least Shelby is here to shove me out of bed if it comes to that.

I shower and let Shelby borrow some new pajamas. I have to tell her three times to stop thanking me because loaning out my clothing isn’t nearly as big of a deal as she makes it out to be. When I turn off the light, she kneels to pray. Guilt sweeps over me again.

My eyelids are heavy as I set my phone on the nightstand and feel around for the power cord. And then my phone makes a sound much like that of an incoming text message. Only this time, it isn’t my imagination. A chill goes from my chest and down through my fingertips as I reach for it and hope against all odds that it is him.

And it is.

For the second time ever, Ryan’s name is in my inbox. I open it and read the two most perfect words to have ever been typed on mobile keypad: