Chapter 10: Banned

I texted Myra back: Nothing.

I could have had the gate boys turn Cleve away. It's my track.

I wanted three thousand people to watch me beat him.

By seven the grandstand was full to the top row, where I'd cried the night before.

The human crowd didn't know any of it.

They knew a new blue #03 had rolled off an Ossler trailer, and that the Rydell cousins hated each other.

That was enough to sell out a Saturday.

Roddy had come down the mountain to watch his car run.

He stood on the pit wall in a clean shirt, which Myra said was the most frightened she'd ever seen a man look.

Torrey stood beside him, and half my pack couldn't stop staring at him.

Cleve's car, a white #7 with my uncle's old sponsor decals, was parked four spots down.

Lon stood beside it with a hand on the roof, waving to people in the stands.

I walked past them to my car.

"You're going to try something," I said to Cleve.

"Can't prove it."

"I won't need to. Everybody'll be watching."

I climbed in. Myra pulled my belts tight.

"Bring my car back," she said. "And kill him a little."

Twenty-four cars started the feature, me ninth and Cleve twelfth.

By lap ten I was second. By lap fifteen I was leading.

On lap eighteen the white #7 came up through the field.

On lap twenty-one he hooked my right rear going into turn three.

The car snapped sideways. The wall filled my windshield.

I caught it with the throttle and a prayer, and I came out of turn four backward for half a second, and then forward again.

Three cars got by. The crowd screamed.

I could hear Myra on the radio, swearing in a long unbroken string.

"I'm fine," I said. "Car's fine."

"Roddy says the car's fine. Roddy's crying."

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