Shifting Gears: The Complete Series (Sports Bad Boy Romance)

by Alycia Taylor

  Slowing down to only thirty above the speed limit, I pull the phone out of my pocket.

  There’s a text message waiting for me, reading, “The envelope is in the glove box of your truck.”

  There’s nobody at the finish line, but apparently, someone was watching.

  It’s not something I’d usually recommend, but I go back to the start line, only everyone, including Kate, is gone.

  “Shit!” I bark at my windshield.

  The only place I can think she might have gone is back to the flatbed. That’s where I need to go next anyway, so I flip around, tires screeching behind me as I drive the few blocks back to the truck.

  Kate is sitting on the back, her legs dangling off the end of it.

  She jumps down and moves off to the side when she sees me, and she’s waving me on frantically.

  I pull the Chevelle onto the back of the flatbed and I quickly get the cover over it. If the cops know we’re here and see the truck with the car on the back, the jig is up.

  Kate and I run to the doors of the flatbed and we get in.

  “Check the glove box,” I tell her.

  “They said the police are on their way, something about screwing with traffic lights or something?” she asks.

  “Yeah,” I tell her. “I’ll fill you in later. For now, we just need to get the hell out of Dodge.”

  I’ve driven the flatbed many times over the years, but one thing it’s not is cut out for racing anything. All we can do is take back roads to the shop and hope nobody spots us on the way.

  “Whoa,” Kate says, pulling an envelope out of the glove box. “It looks like there’s $2,000 in here.”

  “$2,000?” I ask. “That doesn’t even cover my entry fee.”

  She shrugs. “I guess you have to keep winning then,” she says, putting the money back in the envelope and putting it back in the glove compartment.

  “So you won?” she asks.

  “Yeah,” I tell her. “I’m sorry you couldn’t see that part of it.”

  “I saw quite a bit, actually,” she says. “Even after you guys turned, where I was, I could still see you guys going past distant intersections. Wasn’t that spaceship car thing beating you for a while?”

  “It’s a Ford GT,” I tell her, “and yeah. I almost lost that race to all three of them.”

  I’m really starting to get sick of hearing sirens. Fortunately for Kate and me, though, it sounds like they’re a ways away from us.

  It takes about an hour to get back to the shop using the backroads, but we don’t come across any cops on the way. When we get to the junkyard, I hop out and unlock the gate before backing the flatbed all the way through the maze of broken-down cars and parts to the Chevelle’s spot.

  I remove the cover once more and pull the Chevelle back off of the truck and into its spot. I cover it again.

  Kate and I meet at the back of the flatbed and, with the words, “For the winner,” she throws her arms around my neck and kisses me on the cheek, saying, “So, you’re buying dinner tonight, right?”

  * * *

  Kate and I go to dinner in my Galaxie. Her eyes are wide as I recount the race to her.

  We talk for a while, and she asks me questions when she doesn’t understand something, but she catches on really fast. In fact, I think she’s getting this stuff easier than I did.

  When it finally comes time to take her back home, the race doesn’t even feel real. There was nothing to wait for at the start, and by the time I crossed the finish line, everything was all packed up except the four cars finishing out the run.

  It was like a dream, but that two grand looked pretty real.

  We pull up in front of Kate’s house and, just as soon as I get the car stopped, it dies.

  “You’ve really got to look into finding something else to drive around town,” Kate says.

  I’m nodding along with her. Not that I have any definite plans to get rid of the thing.

  “Can I walk you to your door, or do you have another ‘family thing’ going on tonight?” I ask.

  She seems to have a lot of those.

  “You can walk me to the door,” she says, “but I don’t think you should come in.”

  “That’s fine. Are we still on for tomorrow?”

  “Of course. You won the race.”

  “If I’d lost it?”

  “Well, I would be very sad for you,” Kate smirks.

  We get out of the car and I take her hand as we meet at the end of the walkway.

  Kate’s whispering, “We need to be quiet. My parents aren’t exactly thrilled about you.”

  “They haven’t met me,” I tell her. “I’m a very charming young man.”

  “You are that,” she says. “I doubt that’s going to work so well on Mom and Dad, though. They can be a little uptight.”

  “All right,” I tell her and we walk up to the door.

  We kiss on the stoop like a bad romantic comedy; only it’s pretty great being on this side of it. I’m giving her one more kiss before I head back to the car when the front door opens.

  “What are you doing?” a very angry woman asks.

  Kate and I separate.

  “Mom, this is-” Kate starts.

  “I know who he is,” Kate’s mom says. “He’s the young man you’ve been sneaking out to go see at night.”

  I have no idea what to do in this situation, so I just stand there trying to keep my mouth from falling open.

  “Mom, just calm down,” Kate says. “This is Eli, and he’s a really nice guy.”

  “Oh, he’s a nice guy, is he?” Kate’s mom asks. “Well, never mind then. Hi, I’m Jill, Kate’s mom, it’s so nice to meet you, Eli, now will you kindly get off my porch and realize that my daughter is not for people like you.”

  “Mom!”

  “I’ll tell you what,” Kate’s mom says. “Since you’re ‘such a nice guy,’ I’m going to give you ten seconds to be somewhere else before I call the police.”

  “You’re overreacting,” Kate says, but her mom’s already got her cellphone out.

  “I was just dropping her off,” I tell Kate’s mom. “I was on my way out, anyway.”

  “Good,” Kate’s mom says. “Now see if you can be on your way out in the next seven seconds.”

  “Go,” Kate says. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

  I look at Kate’s mom who’s looking at her watch, and I look back at Kate. Is there any other option? “All right,” I say and stupidly lean forward to kiss her goodnight.

  “Are you that stupid?” Kate’s mom asks.

  I’m gritting my teeth, but I force a smile before I turn and head back toward my car.

  I had figured that Kate was hiding me from her parents, but I had no idea they were this bad. Sure, if she knew I was taking her daughter on illegal street races and being chased by the police, she’d probably be justified, but she doesn’t.

  I’m just a guy who likes her daughter.

  I get to my door in time to see Kate’s mom dialing.

  “You’ve got to be kidding me,” I murmur to myself and get in the Galaxie.

  I turn the ignition, but the car doesn’t even pretend that it’s going to start.

  Looking back toward the porch, Kate’s mom is now talking into the phone.

  “Come on,” I say, trying the ignition again. Nothing.

  The alternator probably went out, so the battery can’t charge. If I had an hour, some tools, and a new alternator, it wouldn’t be a huge deal, but Kate’s mom has already hung up the phone.

  I get out of the car and take one last look as Kate shoulder-bumps her mom on the way inside.

  The Galaxie’s street legal, it’s just broken down. The cops will know who I am and they’ll probably drop by sometime to ask me a few questions, but it’s not the end of the world.

  I can get the car tomorrow. It’s probably best to wait until her parents are at work, though.

  After I’ve made it a few blocks from the house without be
ing stopped by the police, I pull out my cellphone and dial up Mick.

  “Dude, I don’t want to talk about it,” he says.

  Apparently, he lost his race.

  “I’m not calling about that,” I tell him. “You wouldn’t believe what just happened.”

  Chapter Seven

  Distraction

  Kate

  “Ooh, I cannot wait for you to meet Keith,” Paz coos, shoveling a forkful of spongy hospital cafeteria pasta into her mouth.

  “So it’s Keith now, huh?” I ask. “What happened to Marcus?”

  Paz shakes her head. “He was no good. He came over to my house wearing jeans and a t-shirt when we were supposed to go to the opera. Can you believe that?”

  “Since when do you like the opera?”

  “It’s something I was planning on getting into,” Paz says.

  I smile and nod. “So it’s something Marcus was into, only you were expecting him to show up dressed to the nines. Then, when he didn’t, all of your girlish fantasies about being escorted to the Grand Ball were torn to pieces, is that about right?”

  She purses her lips and glares at me.

  Maybe I’m in a bit of a mood. Things have been a bit tense around the house lately.

  Mom called the cops that night. They showed up and told her that they weren’t going to spend any manpower trying to find someone whose only crime was dropping her daughter off after a date.

  That’s when mom called the station and requested to speak with “Officer McGough’s superior.”

  I caught the conversation through my open window. Mom doesn’t have a volume control option when she’s mad about something.

  Things have been okay at work mostly because I’ve gone to great lengths to avoid my mother.

  “Something like that,” Paz says, still glowering as she puts another forkful of the same bland, nothing pasta that I had the bad luck to get today. Her face brightens up a moment later though. “Keith is the perfect gentleman, though. Plus, he’s smart enough to tell me I’m pretty all the time, so I think I might have-”

  “Oh, please don’t say it for the ten billionth time,” I groan.

  It’s not going to matter. She’s going to say it anyway.

  “I might have found the dick I’m gonna want to hang onto for the rest of my life,” Paz says and bursts into laughter.

  Ten billion may be an exaggeration, but I honestly don’t know how she still finds that phrase so hilarious. She has said it about each of the forty-seven “boyfriends” she’s had since I met her.

  The problem is that once she starts laughing, it’s so over the top that it’s impossible to not start laughing with her. There are people three tables away who couldn’t possibly have heard what she said, but they’re hunched forward, faces red, laughing.

  I’m laughing, too. There’s nothing I can do about that.

  It takes a minute for everyone in the immediate vicinity to stop laughing—there are a lot of false stops. Finally though, as Paz and I are each wiping away our own tears, she says, “How about that guy you’ve been seeing? How come I never hear anything about him? The two of you still a thing?”

  “A thing, yeah,” I tell her. “We haven’t really had the conversation, but I’m hopeful.”

  Paz is out of her chair and into the one sitting next to me in no more than three seconds. It’s an especially impressive feat as we’re sitting toward the middle of a long table, facing each other.

  I’m giggling at her as she tries to catch her breath and speak at the same time.

  “Dish,” she says. “Have you done it yet? Is he any good or is he like Lamar who didn’t really have adequate tools for the job?”

  “You know that stuff makes me uncomfortable.”

  “You don’t seem to mind when I go on about it,” she retorts.

  I scoff. “Would it matter if I did? I’m used to you, okay? I’ve never been that open with stuff like this.”

  Paz’s breath is bated. She says, “I know. So, are you going to make a change and embrace the new you or what?”

  “We’re just wired differently,” I tell her. “You like to talk about this stuff. I like to keep it more private. Neither one’s a bad thing, we’re just different. That’s all.”

  Now, will Paz see reason?

  “I am not moving from this spot until you give me something,” she says.

  I shrug and grab my tray. “All right. I’ll see you-”

  She puts her hand on my shoulder and pushes down. “How about you give me something that’ll make me smile? I work hard around here for very little money and I get tired. From time to time, it’s nice to hear something nice, something that’ll make the world seem a little bit better because I know my chica’s getting her pipes cleaned!” she bursts into laughter again.

  I don’t know why she thinks this is going to work. It’s because of stuff like this that I don’t tell her anything.

  Actually, now that I think about it, it’s because of stuff like this that I don’t tell my parents anything, either. They’re not so much with the laughing, though. It’s more the concerned looks and the low voices. It’s the quiet sternness that makes me feel like I’ve just killed the twin sister that I don’t have.

  Paz is still laughing, so I go to get up again. She pushes me back down in my seat—still laughing, mind you.

  “This is why nobody likes you,” I tell her.

  “What are you talking about? Everybody loves me, isn’t that right everybody?” she asks loudly.

  There’s some scattered agreement, but not a lot.

  Paz clears her throat and turns around in her seat, keeping her hand on my shoulder for good measure. “I said everybody loves me. Isn’t that right everybody?”

  Through what I can only imagine is some form of Stockholm syndrome, nearly everyone in the cafeteria voices their approval.

  “This is how dictatorships start,” I tell Paz.

  “This dictatorship’s been in place since long before you got here,” she answers. “Now, give me something or I’m gonna be late to check on Mr. Durbin’s blood sugar. He’s very diabetic. I really hope nothing happens to him while I’m sitting here waiting for you to-”

  “Fine,” I answer. “I don’t even know why I’m friends with you sometimes.”

  “Because you’re too scared to be my enemy,” she says. “You’re not the only one. It’s part of my charm. So?”

  I lean toward her, whispering in her ear like a child, I say, “We did in the back of his car.”

  With a sound that’s remarkably similar to what cats sound like when they’re in heat, Paz gives me a firm pat on the shoulder and then removes her hand.

  “Now was that so hard?” she asks. “How was it? Was it good?”

  “I gave you something,” I tell her. “I think we’re done here.”

  I’m waiting for Paz’s retort, but it doesn’t come. I look up to find my mother standing over me.

  “Are you still on lunch, Volunteer Chavez?” my mom, or Dr. Chavez at the moment, asks.

  “I’m still within my time, Dr. Chavez,” I answer.

  “I think it sets a bad example for other volunteers when they see their fellows shirking their responsibilities to gab with their friends over lunch; wouldn’t you agree?”

  Paz is still silent. That’s how intimidating my mother is to just about everyone.

  “I take my duties very seriously, Dr. Chavez,” I respond. “I will make sure that I’m back working by or before the time my lunch break is over. Would you care to join us?”

  That last part is just to get her to go away.

  It works.

  On the outside, I’m the respectful, though assertive, employee. On the inside, though, I am boiling rage and little else.

  “Your mom creeps me out,” Paz says when Dr. Chavez is sufficiently out of earshot.

  “It’s part of her charm,” I mutter, spearing a few of the rotini noodles on my plate.

  * * *

  For once, I�
��d like to be able to hear Eli while we’re driving, so we take my car. The fact Eli’s is in the shop again only makes him more agreeable.

  I’m supposed to be in class right now, but after the week I’ve had dealing with my parents, especially my mother, I could use a night off.

  We just drive around for a while, but I’m finding it difficult to break the silence.

  “How was work?” Eli asks.

  He’s trying; I just don’t have a lot to give right now.

  “It was fine,” I tell him.

  “Save any lives?”

  “I’m not really involved with that,” I answer.

  He’s quiet for a beat. “What’s wrong?”

  When we first met up, I was so excited about cutting class. I felt like all those kids in the parking lot of my high school, or at least how I imagined they felt as I’d walk past them on the way to class.

  For a while, I thought everything was wonderful.

  Now, though, every minute that passes, I’m adding another one-hundred and fifty to the sum in my head. That’s about how many words Mrs. Draper speaks a minute. That’s how much lecture I’m missing every single minute.

  “It’s nothing,” I tell him. “Things are just a little off-balance at home.”

  “Got ya,” he says, leaning back in his chair.

  He’s about to say something else, but I jump in, saying, “You showed me Grog Hill. Would you like to see where I go when I need to clear my head?”

  It’s already dark, so sunset’s not an option, but still, overlooking the city in the warmth and comfort of my very own car sounds like my only other option than to drop Eli back off at his shop and see if I can catch the last bit of tonight’s class.

  I’m committed to breaking out of this stupid rut, so there’s really only one way to go.

  “Sure,” he says. “Where is it?”

  “It’s a cul-de-sac in the middle of nowhere,” I tell him. “They were going to put in a new subdivision, but after the recession, they lost their investors. It’s not too far from Ghost Town, actually.”

  “All right,” he agrees and so we go.

  I’m still having trouble finding words until we’re about a block away from the cul-de-sac. “There’s really nothing intrinsically special about it, other than they just left it there out here past town with nothing around it,” I tell Eli. “They’d only started digging the first foundation before the whole thing fell.”