One For The Road

4: Driven

With the qualifying results in, I realized that I would have to switch to Plan B.

B for Bitch, you better think of something fast, because Plan A ain't working.

I gave qualifying my best shot, but it was only good enough to earn a thirteenth-place start. Everyone's car seemed to handle better than mine, and they certainly were a lot faster, Griffin included. He qualified fifth, and with the information he had, we could hopefully get my car up to that standard. After all, I had the second-best engineering team of Roger Truscott Racing.

My new plan was to make my way up to first place, then lead the rest of the race. It was a bold strategy, but I liked to set my sights high. In this case, I had to. I liked my job, despite the bullshit that came with it, and I liked proving Roger Truscott wrong even more.

Besides, where would I go if I didn't somehow find a way to win this race?

That Sunday afternoon, just before the race, I walked down pit road, where all of the cars were lined up in order. It wouldn't be for the last time, of course, but just in case it was, I wanted to savor the moment. I had quite a few rivals, a couple friends, and a whole lot of people who didn't really care what I did, and in front of the entire line was Tyler Bailey, an old rival starting in first place for the race.

Our lack of positive feelings wasn't limited to the race track, though. We dated for a while, and when he got a little too insecure about my friendship with Griffin, I ended that shit.

"Tyler," I said as I approached his car. He drove the number ten car, and although my Alcoholics Anonymous black and gold paint scheme was pretty slick, his royal blue and white paint looked fit for a king. Of course, we all knew who ruled our rocky relationship, and it sure as hell wasn't him.

"What are you doing up here? Your car's way back in thirtieth or something," he replied.

I was probably drunk the entire time we were together. That was pretty much the only way I would be able to tolerate this shit day after day.

"Look, I don't mean to interrupt your pre-race ritual or anything, but—" What the hell was I even doing? I didn't have time to waste on his sorry ass. I stopped talking.

"But?" he asked.

His dark eyes looked into my grey ones, and I was reminded of just how good he had it with me before he ruined it.

"Nothing. Just wanted to say you're a fucking douche." I smiled. "Hope you wreck."

He rolled his eyes. "Classy as always."

I knew damn well I wasn't classy. Class didn't win races.

He went back to his number ten car, and I headed all the way back to my ninety-five. Alcoholics Anonymous was printed in bold white letters on the hood of my car, and even if I didn't win that particular battle, I was going to win the war with RTR.

***

As the field of cars, lined up in two rows of twenty, rounded the track before the green flag, a voice came over the radio in my helmet.

"Katie, all I want is for you to drive your ass off today," Paul, my crew chief, said. "If you stay out of trouble and the big one, we have a legitimate shot at winning this."

The big one was always a problem for me at Talladega. With cars flying around the track at about two hundred miles an hour, it wasn't difficult to grasp that every single race at Talladega, there would be a crash that collected a lot of the field.

Of course, I also told my team about my situation, but we had to be careful about what we said over the radio. Roger couldn't find out that they knew because if I won the race and the chance to stay at Roger Truscott Racing, he would make my job miserable.