The Champion (Racing on the Edge)

by Stahl, Shey

  Jameson had always been incredibly talented at everything he did but with racing...it was easy to see it came naturally to him. I remember the first time he got inside a race car and actually raced with other drivers.

  Up until that point, he would spend hours sitting inside my cars, just sitting there.

  It was two weeks after his fourth birthday and after careful consideration, and wanting to have my spare car back, I bought him a quarter-midget. Within a week of buying the car, we took it down to Grays Harbor where he broke the track-record. At four fucking years old, this rusty haired little shit broke my record!

  Talk about feeling inadequate. I guess you also had to realize this kid was not your ordinary four-year old. He had the street smarts of a goddamn ten-year old. His mother and I were no match for him and learned when he wanted something, he’d stop at nothing to get it.

  From that point on, I knew he’d be up here someday. But I never imagined how I would feel about that. Proud yes, but it was more than that. It was everything.

  Being a driver myself, I knew what he was feeling. Jameson had one quality you rarely saw in drivers though. We all second-guessed ourselves at some point in our careers but not Jameson. Sure, he was out of control and completely reckless on the track but bordering on the edge of his sanity was where he always shined the most.

  Today, his smirk told it all. He didn’t want to let on how much this all meant to him. I knew though. I also knew how much he was giving up for this. He was giving up a chance to see his son grow up, as did I. The moment you’re handed that trophy though—not that those sacrifices still don’t hurt to make—they seem less like sacrifices and more like opportunities.

  Burn off – Jameson

  “How does it feel to win your second Cup Championship and the first Nextel Cup Championship?” Neil asked me standing next to me as I wiped away the sweat and the champagne Kyle and Spencer just drenched me in.

  “It feels good...again I don’t even know what to say...I’m gonna need to work on my speeches.” I teased while the crowd around me chuckled. “I need to thank my family...my wife, Sway. I honestly wouldn’t be half the man I am today without you.” I bowed my head and looked down at the trophy in my hands. “I don’t really deserve this...my family does. This is for you Charlie.” I said and held the trophy up to the sky.

  My parents taught me very early on you pay respect where respect is due, and with Charlie, I owed him everything and I wished like hell he was here to see this.

  The last few races of the season Sway was at home with Emma, who was ready to pop any day now. Since Emma had been there every step of the way for Sway and me during her pregnancy, she felt the need to be there for Emma since Aiden couldn’t.

  I knew when I married Sway that there would be times when she wouldn’t be able to follow me around like I wanted. It was part of the life we’d chosen. What I didn’t realize was how much it’d hurt to win my second championship without her by my side again. What was best for one of us wouldn’t necessarily be best for the other but that’s marriage, right?

  After the loads of press and photos I was finally on a plane home to Mooresville.

  When I made it home around one the next morning, the house was dark and quiet. I smiled at the note on the counter from Sway asking me to wake her when I returned home. I smiled again once inside the room at the sight of the two halves of my heart sleeping on our bed.

  Sway was curled up with Axel in her arms. His pacifier had fallen out beside him, his cheeks flushed from the heat of our fireplace. Sway had dressed him in Jameson Riley pajamas that had my sponsor logo and my number plastered all over them.

  I stood there leaning against the doorframe, watching them sleep for a good fifteen minutes before I made my way inside the room.

  Slipping off my shoes and jacket, I crawled into bed beside Sway, kissing her shoulder softly.

  I knew she said to wake her but looking at her now, I couldn’t. Instead, I watched them sleep and wondered how I got so lucky to have the dream and the wish.

  Burn off – Sway

  I was in a deep peaceful sleep. The kind where you are so relaxed that you are actually smiling in your sleep. It might have something to do with the fact that my dirty heathen was finally home and we’d just made slow passionate love with each other and now, I was now peaceful in my champion’s arms.

  As soon as my eyes fluttered closed that night, Axel started crying. Knowing Jameson wouldn’t wake up, I made my way across the hall to his room.

  When I opened the door, his tears said it all—or maybe it was the quivering lip.

  He’d recently been doing this at night. He would do great for the first half of the night and then around three in the morning, he’d wake up crying hysterically.

  “Mamama,” he babbled and reached his tiny arms up to me, which melted my heart.

  I picked him up and sat down in the wooden rocking chair next to his crib. Anyone who says they let them cry it out in bed doesn’t have a heart.

  Jameson and I tried this one weekend in Richmond. I’m not sure who cried more, Axel or me and Jameson. After about two hours of this, Bobby, whose motor coach was parked next to us, asked us to either pick the screaming kid up, or to stop crying. He was more disturbed by our crying than by Axel’s.

  I couldn’t blame him on that one.

  “Mama’s here for you baby,” I whispered against his rusty locks that stuck out. “Mama’s here...”

  Axel’s hair cracked me up. It was exactly like Jameson’s. Same color texture and everything. I tucked a few crazy strands away from his eyes and kissed the top of his head as I settled in the rocking chair with him. He wormed his way closer to the foodbags for comfort and rubbed his fleece blanket against his nose.

  Though parenthood wasn’t exactly everything I thought it would between with the temper tantrums, the not wanting to wear clothes, screaming in the middle of the night and being kicked in the tits any time I changed his diaper, I’d say we were making it through and hey, he was still alive.

  That right there was a good sign that we at least had something under control. Sure there were the times when I’d forget he couldn’t feed himself but he was quick to remind me of that task. Or the times when I wondered how something so tiny could scream so loud but we were making it through this.

  Within ten minutes, Axel was fast asleep in my arms with his head resting on my shoulder, breathing slow steady breaths against my neck.

  It was times like this that I wanted to stop time.

  I wanted to stay in this moment with him, keep him this age and cherish every moment with him, before there were no more moments like this and he was telling me he hates me.

  I’m not stupid. I knew once he became a teenager, he’d hate me and I was already mentally preparing myself and contemplating how I’d deal with it.

  I wondered if everyone felt like this, as if your life is passing you by and you’re only left the moments you can’t describe?

  There are moments in my life that I want to remember as though I was living in them. I wanted to record my life, if that were possible. Like the “ass-sucking-in-process” I discovered on our honeymoon. I thought this would useful.

  I’ve always felt like there were days when I wanted to go back to a certain moment and remember the exact emotion I was feeling. I want to go back to sitting with my mother on Sunday mornings when we gave ourselves pedicures and remember the way her infectious laughter sounded or what her smile looked like. I wanted to go back to the days at the track on Saturday mornings where my dad and I would prep and water the track together.

  I wanted to go back to the exact moment I fell in love with Jameson during our summer together. I remember the feeling, both comforting and harrowing, that washed over me knowing that I loved him. Jameson was sitting inside his car after a race in Knoxville. His helmet was off but he hadn’t gotten out of the car yet.

  In that particular moment, with sweat and dirt smeared over his face, the distinct
smells of burnt rubber and methanol floating around us, I knew that I loved him. I didn’t know why, but looking at that smirk of his that night having just won the Triple Crown Nationals at eighteen and how his green eyes glowed in the dark summer night, I just knew. I remember feeling anxious and excited all at the same time and wanting time to stand still so I could stay in that moment.

  I wanted to go back to the moment I felt Axel kick for the first time, standing in the flag stand watching his daddy race. I wanted to go back to the moment I heard his first scream and the look on Jameson’s face when he held him.

  These are all moments that you take for granted in life when they’re happening but they mean the most to you. And you don’t realize when they’re happening that later you’ll wish like hell you could get that moment back. The comforting thing about it was that even a smell can bring you back to that one special moment.

  Every time I smell nail polish...I remember my mom. Every time I smell rain...I think of being with Charlie at the track. Every time I smell racing fuel...I think of Jameson and the moment I fell in love with him.

  Axel was starting to snore by now so I gently carried him back over to his crib and laid him down. He curled around his piggy Jameson had gotten for him, sighing contently.

  There were also times when your memories bring you back to horrible moments in your life that you want to forget, but can’t. Just the same, even a smell can bring the moment crashing back to you as though you’re living in that painful experience.

  I still remember the day my mother died. Valentine’s Day will also be a day I associate with the death of my mother. I’ll always associate the Daytona 500 with the day my father died and I’ll always associate a dark stairwell with Darrin.

  I hadn’t forgotten about what Darrin did to us but I moved on and focused on the positive side of it. Darrin showed Jameson and I how unbreakable our bond with each other really was. He showed me what a beautiful love story the two of us had. Sure, it was different, but that’s what made it so goddamn perfect in my mind. We were writing it to our perfection.

  It wasn’t something that everyone else had. It was us. Crazy but exciting, irrational but stable and I felt pretty fucking lucky to have found the other half of my heart’s missing piece. So instead of focusing on the dark haunting moments, I focused on the ones that took my breath away. The ones that made me feel like this life I was living, was epic.

  I focused on the magic. I focused on the magic between a man and a woman, the sparks, the fluttering hearts, the fairytale and the Mama Wizard, her Dirty Heathen and their flailing spaz.

  The next morning I got up early intending on making my champion and our adorable spaz pancakes. I tried, I really did. Jameson didn’t let me get more than an inch out of bed before his arms of steal were wrapped around me, pulling me toward him. After being apart for so long I didn’t mind. Pancakes could wait.

  In the middle of our morning dyno-testing, Axel had other plans. By ten he was screaming his adorable chubby little face off and crying profusely that we hadn’t come and rescued him from his crib yet. I usually would have freed him by now and we’d be eating breakfast, only now I was enjoying dirty heathen for breakfast.

  Eventually I managed to get Jameson to focus and we made our way into his room. Not prepared was an understatement. He was not in his crib but was instead standing next to his dresser, smiling, while removing all the clothing from each drawer.

  Perfect. I just put those away.

  “Does he always do this?” Jameson asked leaning against the doorframe, scratching his mess of hair.

  “No...I’ve never seen him get out of his crib before. I didn’t know he could get out.”

  Axel looked up at us and handed Jameson Mr. Piggy and his pajamas he’d taken off, leaving him in just his diaper. Looking down, Axel watched his own tiny arms swinging back and forth as though he never knew they could do that. Then, with a smirk, he looked up at us.

  “I think he knows something we don’t.” I told Jameson.

  “He does. He knows we have no clue what we’re doing. He can smell the fear.”

  I grinned. “Like a cougar?”

  Jameson smacked my ass. “Not funny.”

  “Can you change him?”

  “Yeah...sure,” he agreed with a wary expression.

  I made my way down stairs to make breakfast thinking they’d come down soon. An hour later, he finally came down stairs with Axel walking behind him holding Mr. Piggy.

  They were both wearing different clothes and Axel’s hair was all wet.

  “What took so long?” I asked placing the pancakes on the table. “Your breakfast is getting cold.”

  Jameson reached down and picked Axel up.

  “He peed on me...and him...”

  Axel giggled in his arms and reached for me.

  “Did you pee on daddy?” I cooed at him, giving him a high-five.

  “Yayaya...” he babbled nodding his head. I personally found this new nodding thing adorable. Every time you asked him a question, he nodded as though he was so proud he could nod his head.

  The offseason was passing quickly and before we knew it Thanksgiving had arrived.

  “You’d be surprised where your life can take you, Andrea. Hell Jameson and I got drunk on Purple Rain drinks and slept together. Look where that landed us.” I motioned to Axel sitting beside Mr. Jangles on the floor while he took a few handfuls of his fur from him.

  Andrea and I were discussing her recent involvement with Van. I kind of thought something was up between them when they left together after our Fourth of July party, but I didn’t want to assume anything.

  Turns out, Andrea needed a woman to talk to.

  “Is that supposed to make me feel better?” Andrea asked peeling potatoes for dinner.

  “Yes, did it?” I stuffed a cookie in my mouth.

  We were waiting for everyone to show up for Thanksgiving dinner at Emma and Aiden’s house. Andrea and the twins flew in last night and when Van’s eyes lit up, I knew something was up.

  “Well...I think you just told me to get drunk and sleep with Van.” Avoiding eye contact, her eyes focused on the beer I was holding. I knew that look. I’d perfected it in my pit lizard days.

  I angled my beer toward her. “Pretty much,”

  She smiled.

  “You whore!” I giggle snorted.

  “You’re one to talk!”

  She had me there. I shrugged once. “True, what did he say afterwards?” I asked wondering what it was like for others that this happened to.

  “Umm...it happened after the Fourth of July party.” Her eyes did that please-don’t-judge-me sideways glance. “I freaked out afterwards because of the whole Charlie thing and being too soon and that he would think it was a mistake...anyway,” she shook her head reaching for another potato in the bag. “He said one thing that I’ll always remember. He said: I just want to feel...feel anything. For so long I’ve hidden myself away but I want to feel something. I don’t want to be like this forever.”

  When she looked up, I was emotional eating and stuffing cookie after cookie in my mouth. “Oh my god...poor Van! I had no idea he felt like that.” Another cookie, “He just seemed so...together.”

  “That’s what you see. When he’s not working or...he’s just different.”

  “I guess so.”

  Our conversation soon drifted as everyone made their way into the kitchen to check on the food we were cooking.

  I should clarify. Nancy was cooking and Andrea and I were catching up and peeling potatoes. I hadn’t seen them since the Fourth of July party. I couldn’t believe how much the Lucifer twins had grown.

  Logan was finally as tall as Lucas and they seemed to have been acting more mature. The other thing I noticed was how much they were starting to resemble Charlie.

  Emma waddled into the kitchen, holding her side. “Is there anything to eat in here? I’m starving.”

  Just about then, Spencer walked in too, looking for food.
“Careful sis, if your ass gets any bigger you’ll need a beeper when you back up.” He snickered popping a couple deviled eggs in his mouth and sat down on the stool next to me.

  “You’re such an asshole, Spencer.” I told him shaking my head in disapproval when Emma burst into tears that someone called her fat.

  “Hey...I’m honest.” Spencer crammed another egg in his mouth. Jameson walked in right about then and leaned against me. “You’re just lucky you didn’t have twins with all the ice cream you ate.”

  Jameson stuck up for me and smacked the back of Spencer’s head.

  “What the fuck are you talking about? Sway was never fat when she was pregnant.”

  “Ow fuck!” Emma screamed and clutched her stomach.

  Aiden ran into the kitchen to grab her but slipped on the water she had spilled.

  Only problem was, that wasn’t water from the sink. Emma was in labor.

  It’s just like the women in our family to go into labor on a holiday or a major event. All the Riley children were born after a race that Jimi won. Lane was born in the pits at a dirt track. Axel was born on Christmas. Lexi was born after the Daytona July race and now the twins...Thanksgiving.

  What can I say? We specialized in excitement.

  The next few hours were spent calming Emma and Aiden down. They were freaking the fuck out, worse than Jameson and I when we went into labor. At least she didn’t need to get dressed and spend hours just getting her husband to wear his own clothes.

  Once they were at the hospital, Emma delivered the twins within two minutes of getting there. Jameson drove them because he insisted that he was the only qualified driver. Smartass.

  Everyone stayed out in the waiting room until Aiden came out with a huge grin.

  “Emma is doing great...after being sedated...but she’s great.” He waited for a moment, as though he practiced saying that in the mirror or something before his eyes went wide. Clearly, we wanted to know more. “Oh...the babies are great too.”