The Distance (11 page)

“What did the people watching the race say?”

“That it was Trigger’s fault, but again, it was over so fast: the tire blew, our cars collided, and mine rolled. Right after it happened, one of the guys on the sidelines said Trigger swerved at my car and it looked deliberate, and everyone else picked up on that, me included. I became convinced I saw him coming at me. But who says that first witness was right? He hated Trigger because he always lost to him, so maybe he was quick to point the finger, just like I was. It wasn’t like there was an impartial judge on the scene, or an instant replay. What if all of that was just mob mentality turning an unpopular driver into a scapegoat?”

“If that’s true,” Zachary said, “I feel bad for Trigger.”

“Same here.”

“So, what are you planning to do about all of this?”

“For starters, I’m going to apologize to him at the races tonight.”

“Do you know he’ll be there?”

“He should be. My friend told me Trigger hasn’t missed a Saturday in the last year,” I said. “I’m also planning to ask him out after I apologize, but I don’t know why he’d say yes. He was absolutely right that I always assumed the worst of him. He must think I’m such a jerk.”

“But hopefully he’ll see he’s wrong about you, just like you were probably wrong about him.”

“I don’t deserve another chance after all the accusations I made, but I hope he gives me one anyway.”

“Good luck.”

“Thanks.” I took a drink from my cock bottle, then asked, “Want to come along tonight? Six will probably be there.”

“That’s a good reason to stay home.”

“Why do you say that? He likes you, and I think it’s mutual. I know he’s young, but don’t you want to see what happens?”

Zachary shook his head. “There’s no point. A guy that age wouldn’t be interested in a relationship.”

“Is that what you want?”

He considered the question, and finally said, “I’m not sure, but I do know I don’t just want casual sex.”

“I wish you’d change your mind and come tonight, but it’s your call.”

The red-faced neighbor backed out of his garage just then. He glared at everyone in the yard as a vein bulged in his forehead and his Mercedes slowly rolled past. All the dancers smiled and waved pleasantly, including the two who were very nearly dry-humping on top of the cock-shaped mechanical bull. “Score one for Cockstock,” Zachary said.

I grinned with satisfaction, then turned to face him and asked, “So, what’s going on with you? What have you been doing this week?”

“I got a job.”

“That’s great! Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

“It’s not that newsworthy. Finn’s cousin Jamie hired me to work at his restaurant, I’ll be a waiter on the lunch shift. I started training yesterday and it won’t be hard to pick it up, since I waited tables in high school. Chance is still working at the restaurant too, and Colt and Elijah hang out there a lot, so it’s basically an extension of home. I feel like a barnacle that’s attached itself to Chance and Finn’s life.”

“I’m sure they don’t see it that way.”

“Maybe not, but I still feel like that.” He took a long drink from his bottle, then added, “By the way, I spoke to Chance for you and he doesn’t want to put his photos in the new artists show. He’s convinced it’s a pity thing and that Christopher Robin would never be interested if they weren’t family.”

I sighed and said, “He’s such a brilliant photographer. Why would it be pity?”

“Chance doesn’t believe in himself, never has.”

I thought about it for a while, then asked, “How mad would he be if I borrowed some of his photos and put them in the show without asking?”

“Really, really angry.”

“You think so?”

“Yup.”

“But this could launch Chance’s photography career! It’s going to be a huge event, especially since it’s paired with a masquerade ball for charity. Nana told me it’ll get a ton of media attention. A national art magazine’s even covering it!”

“Still.”

I chewed my lower lip for a moment, then said, “If I bought a few of Chance’s photos, then just happened to hang them in the venue where the event’s taking place, maybe that’d kind of be a loophole.”

“He’d still be mad.”

“But probably less so than if I just went all kleptomaniac with his portfolio.”

“True.”

“I’m going to do it,” I said, nodding resolutely. “Chance may be furious with me after that, but if his photography career takes off as a result, it’s totally worth it.”

He thought about it for a while, then said, “Yeah, okay. He really does need an opportunity like this. I’ll help if you want.”

“You shouldn’t be too involved. It’s one thing if he gets mad at me, but you guys are best friends and you’re living with him, so I don’t want my crazy idea to cause problems between you two. There is one thing you can do, though. You’re more familiar with his work than I am, so you can tell me which photos I should buy. He must have thousands.”

“You can’t go wrong with any of them, but a couple weeks ago, he took some absolutely amazing photos around the city. Chance’s dad was visiting with his foster son, this teenager named Cory. The kid has an interest in photography, so he and Chance took pictures all over San Francisco. When they came home and printed some of them, I was floored by what I saw. Chance let himself have fun and get a little experimental since he and Cory were just goofing around, and the results were stunning.”

“Then that’s what I’ll ask for. This is going to be great!”

He looked worried, though. “I hope so, but people can be assholes sometimes. What if the critics at the art show have negative things to say about his stuff?”

“It’s not just our opinion that Chance’s work is brilliant, everyone who sees his photos thinks so, too. The people at the new artists show have to be able to see that.”

“They’d better,” Zachary said. “It would devastate him if they tore his work apart. A while back, he had an instructor in a junior college photography class who was overly critical of his work, and that alone was almost enough to make Chance quit photography. I think that teacher was just jealous of his talent, but Chance took the criticism to heart. Hopefully critics and reviewers at a show for new artists will be less cruel and petty, but you never know.”

“It’s sad that there are a few jerks in the world who build themselves up by tearing others down, but the vast majority of people aren’t like that, thank God, and they’ll love his work. I believe in Chance, and I have to believe this’ll be a positive experience.”

Zachary chewed his lower lip for a few moments, and then he nodded. “You’re right.” He pulled out his phone and clicked on Instagram, then handed it to me. “Cory got Chance to open an account and post his photos from their day out, I think they’re all on here. Let’s pick some for the show.” I slid my lounge chair closer to his and we got to work.

*****

Since I never did talk him into coming to the races with me, I dropped Zachary off at Chance’s house that night before continuing to the South Bay. The races had moved, just like every week, this time to a place I was unfamiliar with. We used over a dozen makeshift tracks in the most obscure, forgotten corners of the Bay Area, and it was never the same location two weeks in a row, to make it less likely for the police to find us.

The relatively new location was in the foothills to the east of Morgan Hill, so it took over an hour to get there. It was worth it though, because the track was outstanding: long, straight, and perfectly level. It was also in the middle of nowhere. That was vital. Not only did it mean our chances of being discovered were really slim, it also meant there was no chance of the general public getting hurt. It was one thing to risk our own lives, but endangering innocent bystanders was absolutely not okay.

Several guys were walking the strip with flashlights to check for rocks and debris when I arrived. I parked beside the other colorful, highly modified cars, my pulse already quickening with excitement. I popped my hood, then got out and immediately started talking shop with the nearest racer as I admired the long, sparkling row of machinery. There was a lot of variation. Both foreign and domestic models were well-represented, and they encompassed at least four decades. Each was its owner’s pride and joy and so immaculately maintained that they gleamed like jewels, both on the outside and under the hood.

It was customary to do a mini car show before the racing got underway. I propped my hood open and felt a sense of pride as another racer admired my engine. Guys like me loved getting to talk about our cars, especially with other racers who could appreciate the blood, sweat, tears, and small fortunes we put into them.

Six pulled up beside me a couple minutes later and popped the hood like the rest of us. His engine in particular was enviable. He must have put well over thirty grand under the hood of his fire engine red Acura. As I leaned in and admired the pristine turbocharged V-8, he said, “Pleasure to see you, again, Rocket. Is your cute goth friend going to be joining you tonight?”

I grinned at that and straightened up to take a look at the tall eighteen-year-old. “Zachary’s not goth, he just tends to wear a lot of black. And no, he couldn’t make it this week.” The hopeful expression on the guy’s face drained away. I felt kind of bad for him, so I added, “You know, racing’s not really his thing, so he probably won’t come to most of these. But I happen to know he’s going to be at a masquerade ball for charity end of next month. If you want, I can text you the link to the website so you can buy a ticket and conveniently run into him there.”

Six eagerly agreed to that, and as we pulled out our phones and exchanged numbers, he grinned and said, “Meeting at the ball sounds a bit like Cinderella, yeah? Think a bloke like me has any chance of being your friend’s Prince Charming?”

“Well, you certainly look and sound the part, and I think Zachary likes you. I’ll be honest though, he’s concerned about the 5-year age gap. I think he assumes guys your age are only interested in sex. If that’s all you want, do me a favor and leave him alone, okay? Zachary’s one of the kindest, gentlest, most genuine people I know, and he deserves so much more than just being treated like a piece of meat.”

“I appreciate your candor,” he said. “If it’s any consolation, I’m not even sort of your typical eighteen-year-old, and I’d never treat anyone like that, not in a million years.”

I hit send on the text with the event’s website and told him, “In that case, I wish you luck.”

“Thank you. Now please tell me you’ll go head-to-head with me in a race tonight. I think you’ll give me a decent run for my money.”

I returned the phone to my pocket and smiled at him. “Think so? I think I’ll leave you and this nice, shiny money pit in my rearview mirror.”

He laughed and sounded very American when he exclaimed, “Oh, it’s on!”

Racing Six was the highlight of my evening. He was the only person I didn’t beat in any of my five heats, but I still loved it. The race was incredibly close, which was a huge adrenaline rush, and he barely inched me out right at the end. Afterwards, we joked around and made each other laugh, and he promised me a rematch the following week. He seemed like a good guy, and I found myself rooting for him and Zachary.

My only disappointment that night was the fact that Trigger was a no-show. Kenji and a couple other racers even commented on it, since he’d been turning up like clockwork every Saturday. It made me worry about him.

The races wound down around one a.m. On the way home, I decided to swing past Trigger’s shop just in case he was working late again, both to make sure he was okay and to apologize. Sure enough, a light was on in the garage when I parked out front an hour later. Trigger was under the hood of his Impala, once again dressed in a black tank top and worn-out Levi’s. When I knocked on the door, he didn’t respond. I gave it a little push and it swung open, setting off the chimes. He still didn’t turn around, and after a moment I noticed the cords from a pair of earbuds trailing down the sides of his neck.

I stepped inside and chewed my lip for a few moments, waiting for him to notice me. I even waved my arms around when he turned his head to the side. Still nothing.

Trigger started singing and shaking his hips to an old Bob Seger song, and it was so sexy that I could barely stand it. He had a great voice, but the way he moved his ass was what really riveted my attention. When he straightened up and started belting out the chorus to ‘Katmandu’, using a wrench as a microphone and putting his whole body into it, I really wanted to cross the garage and join in. I knew he’d stop singing though, the moment he spotted me.

Instead of interrupting him, I decided to come back the next day and turned to leave. I’d just put my hand on the door when Trigger exclaimed, “What the actual fuck!”

I turned toward him as he pulled out his earbuds, and I mumbled, “Sorry,” because I didn’t know what else to say.

“How long have you been there?”

“A minute, maybe. I tried knocking. Then I tried flagging you down. You should start locking your door, an axe murderer could wander in here.”

Trigger’s expression went from startled to slightly amused, and he asked, “Is that why you’re here, to axe murder me?”

“Obviously. Can I borrow an axe?”

“I already loaned mine out to a guy in a hockey mask, but I think there’s a plastic takeout knife by the sink.”

“Not quite as good.”

“What are you actually doing here?” He wiped his hands on a clean shop rag, even though they didn’t look dirty.

“I came to apologize,” I said as I took a couple steps toward him. He in turn stepped around the front of his car and took a couple steps backwards. “What are you doing?”

“Maintaining a safe distance between us.”

“Why?”

“Because if you get within five feet of me, we’ll probably start fucking.”

I took two steps forward, and he took two more backwards. “You’re going to hit the wall pretty soon. Then what?”

“I’ll attempt to burrow my way out of here.”

I kept advancing, slowly. When he reached the wall he started moving along it, away from me. “Good thing you abandoned the burrowing idea,” I said.

“I just cut my nails. I never would have made it.”

“Why weren’t you at the races tonight?”

“Because I thought you might be there.” We were still slowly circling each other, and finally came to a stop with the trunk of the Impala between us.

“And you’re so pissed off at me that you couldn’t stand the thought of seeing me?”

“I wasn’t nearly pissed off enough. That was the problem,” he said.

“What does that mean?”

“It means that if I’d gone to the races and seen you there, I might have ended up sleeping with you again, and it’s really fucking stupid to keep doing that with someone who thinks so little of me.”

“But I don’t. In fact, I was looking for you tonight to apologize to you. I did a lot of thinking over the last week, and I realized I could have been wrong about everything, about all those things I accused you of. Like you said, I never gave you the benefit of the doubt, and I should have.”

Trigger looked surprised. “You seem so stubborn. I never thought I’d hear you say any of that.”

“I’m stubborn when I know I’m right about something. But I haven’t been right about you, have I?”

“I swear to you I didn’t hit your car on purpose,” he said. “I was definitely fishtailing when your tire blew, but that’s not what caused the accident.”

“I believe you.”

“Finally.”

I slowly circled around the back of the car, and he stood his ground. “Apologizing to you was only half the reason I hoped you’d be at the races tonight.”

“Did you want a rematch?”

“No, not really. I don’t always have to be on top.” I grinned a little when I said that.

“So, what was the other reason?”

I stopped right in front of Trigger and looked up at him. “I wanted to ask you out. Or, well, in. Will you come over next Friday night and let me cook you dinner?”

Now it was his turn to grin. “Can you cook?”

“Yeah, as long as you like Italian. The woman I work for has a cooking show on cable TV. Mostly, she just cusses a lot and accidentally makes things look like a dick. But I’ve been helping her out for a while now, and in the process I’ve actually learned my way around a kitchen.”

He smiled at me. “So, you can make dick-shaped Italian food.”

“Basically. It’s a funny thing. She doesn’t set out to do it, but maybe she always has dicks in the back of her mind or something and it comes out subconsciously.”

Trigger watched me for a moment, then said, “As fun as that sounds, we shouldn’t go out.”

“Why not?”

He turned partly away from me. “Even though I’d intended to ask you out on Valentine’s Day, I thought afterwards that it was probably a good thing we ended up arguing. This would be a mistake.”

“What makes you say that?”

“The fact that it was so intense when we had sex. I think I’d have a really hard time keeping my distance from you.”

“And that’s the goal? Keeping your distance?” Trigger nodded, and I said, “So, you don’t want to start anything with me because we have amazing chemistry.”

He frowned and said, “It sounds stupid when you put it that way.”

“Hey, you came up with it, not me.”

“Asking you out was impulsive. I don’t date, so I really don’t know what I was thinking there.”

“You don’t?”

“You already know I’m a parent, and my daughter comes first,” he said. “If I dated, that would mean bringing people into Izzy’s life who she’d probably get attached to, and when they eventually broke up with me, they’d break her heart in the process.”

That sounded an awful lot like he was finding excuses for not getting involved with anyone, but I didn’t call him on it. Instead I said, “Sounds lonely.”

Trigger sighed and looked over his shoulder at me for a long moment, then headed toward a door at the back of the shop. “I need another drink. Do you want one?”

“Another? Sure. What are we drinking?” I asked as I followed him.

“Whiskey now. I finished off the beer before you got here.”

The back room was part office with a cluttered desk, cluttered shelves, and a rickety-looking swivel chair, part kitchen with a mini fridge and small counter with a coffee maker, and part bedroom with an unmade twin bed. Beyond it, another door revealed a small restroom. “Do you live here?” I asked as he pulled a bottle and two coffee mugs from the shelves.

“No, I just spend the night here a couple times a week, after my daughter goes to bed. I tend to work really late, obviously, and sometimes I’m too tired to drive home.”

“Where’s home?”

“The other side of Bernal Heights. Izzy and I live with my sister, mom, and grandmother.”

“You and four women. That’s a lot of estrogen.”

He poured some whiskey into a mug and handed it to me with a crooked grin. “Now you understand why I need this man cave.”

After he poured a drink for himself, I raised a toast and said, “Cheers,” before slamming it down. I didn’t love the taste, but it left a nice, warm sensation in my belly. He tossed his back too before refilling our mugs.

On the shelves to my right, amid stacks of manuals and papers, were several family photos in wooden frames, and I wandered over to take a look at them. Unlike the rest of the room, they’d been dusted recently. There were a few snapshots of Trigger as a kid with a man I assumed was his dad, and the rest were all pictures of Izzy, spanning her infancy to the present day. There were photos of her with Trigger, his sister, and a couple older women with dark hair and bright smiles, but there was someone notably absent, and I said, “What happened to Izzy’s mom, if you don’t mind me asking?”

“She left.”

“Left? What do you mean?”

“I got Candice pregnant our senior year of high school, and let’s just say having a kid didn’t fit into her plans. She gave birth two weeks before she left for Princeton, gave me full custody and never looked back.”

“She didn’t keep in touch?” I asked.

“Izzy’s mom hasn’t seen her since the day she was born. I think Candice likes to pretend the pregnancy never happened. She didn’t stay in touch with me either, but we have a mutual friend, and he told me Candice never mentions her daughter. She was always really focused and ambitious, and after she graduated from Princeton, she went on to medical school on the east coast. By now, I guess she’s moved on to her residency.”

“She sounds cold.”

“She’s not. It’s basically the same as a woman giving her baby up for adoption, only in this case instead of giving her to strangers, she gave Izzy to me.”

I was a bit surprised he’d defend her, and asked gently, “Were you in love with her?”

“She was my best friend, so I did love her, but not in the way you mean.”

I sat down in the office chair and took a sip from my mug before saying, “Now I get why you’re so concerned about Izzy getting attached to people who might take off on her.”

“Exactly.”

“Does she miss her mom?”

Trigger sat down on the narrow bed and said, “In a way. I mean, Candice is a complete stranger to her, so I guess what she misses is the idea of a mom. She sees her classmates with their mothers and wonders why she doesn’t have that. Izzy knows Candice is out there somewhere, and that she’s chosen not to be a part of her life. I’ve always been careful not to talk about her, but my daughter’s overheard my family saying things. My mom hates Candice and doesn’t try very hard to conceal it. All of that’s confusing for a kindergartener.”

“I can imagine.”

Trigger and I finished our drinks and he poured us another. Since each was probably the equivalent of two shots, I was definitely starting to feel a nice buzz. “She’s still talking about you,” he said after a while. “I don’t know what you said to my daughter at that open house, but you made a huge impression. In fact, thanks to you, Izzy agreed to let me sign her up for music lessons and is looking forward to going back to the art center.”

“Kids love me. I think it’s basically because I’m Peter Pan. I never grew up, so they accept me as one of their own,” I said with a grin. “I’m glad to hear she’s going back, it’s a terrific place. A good friend of mine runs it.”

“Christian George? I wasn’t sure what to make of that guy. He looked like a wanna-be rock star and seemed really young to be running such a big nonprofit.”

“Christian’s one of the greatest people you’ll ever meet, and he has a heart of gold. He’s smart, too. He brought in a lot of terrific people, both to run the business end of things and to teach classes. I’m incredibly proud of him. How often do you get to watch someone so young accomplish so much?”

“I feel a bit better about sending Izzy there now, since you obviously have a high opinion of him.”

I smiled at Trigger and said, “Sounds like you’re pretty overprotective.”

“Of course I am. It’s my job to look out for my little girl.”

I thought that was touching. After a moment, I said, “Tell me something, Trigger.”

“What do you want to know?”

“Your name. I only know your racing moniker.”

He said, “I’ll trade you. My name for yours.”

“You already know mine, you’ve seen my driver’s license.”

“I saw what you changed it to. I want to know your birth name.”

“Why?”

“I’m curious.”

I frowned at him and asked, “Do you own this shop?”

“Yeah. Why do you ask?”

I reached to my right and rested my hand on an unopened stack of mail. “All I have to do to find out your name is flip over this envelope. I have no incentive for telling you my original name.”

“Please? I promise I won’t make fun of it.”