He huffed for a bit then admitted defeat.
“Bobby’ll get it,” I said with smiling certainty.
Todd, my old shift leader from Lyndale College for adults with learning disabilities, rang me up. “You’re a complete pest, Eve, you know that don’t you? You knew exactly what you were doing, didn’t you?”
“So are you coming then?” I asked.
“Bobby is having a sit-down protest in every doorway until we do…”
“Well you shouldn’t have sacked me then,” I said sharply.
There was a lengthening silence. “The students love the show,” he said at last.
“Good,” I said.
“Bobby gets things thrown at him because he insists on sitting cross legged right in front of the screen…”
“Ring me when you arrive and you can bring them across to the pits,” I instructed.
The points were counting now. The season had started. Belle Vue. Shale which was a real plus point at the moment.
I warned Pete and Paul that the students would be coming and we got on with the scrutineering. When we got back to the pits and were just checking everything was in order I straightened up and stared around. “The place seems absolutely ram packed,” I observed, “And I’m beginning to feel like an exhibit in a zoo. Why are so many people hanging round the pits?”
Pete and Paul glanced at each other. “Well you only went and invited everyone to come and see you at Belle Vue.”
I stared at them. “I invited Bobby.”
“And Jo says you’ve had five hundred people contact you on your team racing Facebook page to give you the answers to your puzzle.”
“I presume you’re exaggerating?” I dismissed.
“No,” Pete shook his head at me. “You’ve had five hundred and thirty four answers to your conundrums – and that was just up until eight o’clock this morning…”
“Blimey,” I said faintly. I looked uneasily behind me. There appeared to be a wall of faces all jostling and staring at me. “How long till our first race?”
“Half an hour,” Paul said.
“Eve, will you give us your autograph?” Someone yelled. They were waving a Belle Vue race day programme at me.
“Oh G-a-a-w-d,” I groaned. “Is half an hour too long to disappear into the toilets for?”
“Definitely,” Pete said with a grin. “Even for a girl…”
“Go and give them a few autographs,” Paul directed, “and then we’ll try and get rid of them.”
I rather reluctantly went over to the press of people and then tried to muster up a smile. I joked around a bit, signed some programmes and tickets and put up with some selfies, then walked back to my car. When a clamour started up for me to come back Paul said severely, “Give the girl some space – she’s got some important races to run today.”
The car and myself were completely ready so there was nothing for me to pretend to do and I figured that the onlookers would get pissed off if I just sat around ignoring them, so I was never more grateful in my life to see first Mr. Beardy himself – Rog and his camera pushing through the semi-circular crush of audience, and a second later the maniac grin of Bobby following close behind him.
Bobby made his trademark leap in front of me, pressed his fists together, rolled his eyes at me. “Honda CBR 125R, E-e-e-ve! Kawasaki ZXR400, Quinn!” And then he gave a quick finger wiggle under his chin. “SSC Ultimate Aero.”
“That’s right Bobby,” I agreed with a smile, “and which one is the most-” I put my hands up under my chin and wiggled my fingers wildly.
“Yours, E-e-e-e-ve, yours!” He wiggled and gave a huge beatific smile.
Suddenly Todd appeared. “Thank God for that! Here you are Bobby!”
“Yeah, he’s fine,” I reassured him. “Who have you brought?”
Dev, Mikey and then Adam appeared at Todd’s elbow. “Was Adam a good idea?” I said worriedly.
Todd looked uneasy. “It’s just that he got violent whenever we suggested that it wasn’t the best place for him to be, so…”
“Adam, are you listening to me?”
He had his face averted as usual but darted me a sideways look and nodded.
“It gets really noisy when the cars start driving so if you don’t like it, I want you to promise me not to panic and run away. What’s the best thing to do?”
He immediately pulled his jumper over his head to cover his face.
“That’s right Adam,” I encouraged. “And you can put your fingers in your ears and hum really loudly like this…hmmmmmm.” I demonstrated the action to him.
Dev was tugging my sleeve, “Naz, Naz?”
“Yes, Dev, Naz is very well and I’m sure she sends her regards.” I guessed Roger would be recording all this and turned to camera. “See Nasim, if Rajesh lets you down, Devendra’s still keen!”
Huge Mikey smiled on benignly from his great height and Bobby lived up to his name and bobbed impatiently beside me, “E-e-e-e-ve, 882kw, 1200HP at 6400rpm, 1500NM at 3000 to 5000rpm, 7 speed DSG, 254mph, E-e-e-e-ve!”
I paid it the attention it deserved. Stood frowning for a moment. “Veyron Grand Sport Vitesse?”
“Yes, E-e-ve, yes! 150 Multijet 11 Euro 6, 150hp, 380 at 150rpm, 100mph,” he pressed his fists very hard together and looked slyly at me.
“Fiat Ducato minibus, Lyndale college van,” I deduced triumphantly.
“1199cc, 4 cylinder, 205 Nm ISO, 130hp, 119mph, 6 speed manual, 16 valves, 132(97) hp DIN,” his eyes rolled but there was no giveaway finger wiggle.
“Hmm,” I worked my way systematically through my knowledge. “Hmmmm, let me think about that one, Bobby…”
Paul tapped his watch. “Time to go, you two.” Pete and I were in the same heat.
“See you later, you lot,” I said. “Take them up on the stands, Todd.”
But as Todd gathered them, Bobby escaped. Luckily, from force of habit after months of having to swerve around him arriving at and leaving Lyndale, I was ready for his leap in front of the car, fists pressed together, manic smile, and had slammed my foot on the brake.
Paul swore, Todd shouted. I leant out the window and said persuasively, “If you get out the way and behave yourself, Bobby, then I’ll let you sit in the car later on… Is that a deal?”
He nodded with an excited finger wiggle and got out of the way.
And we got on with the race.
Quinn was in the first heat as well so I figured that the cameras would be on us. Despite the hype in the first episode about us going head to head, up until now there hadn’t been much opportunity to make that a reality. But now that the points counted it was going to start to be true.
It had rained a great deal in the previous forty-eight hours so the track was slippy, slidey and getting ridged. We were caught in the generalised scrum of the middle rankings, and only four cars ahead of us took the first corner cleanly. Quinn and I both managed to emerge by some miracle out of the other side of the colliding melee and carried on whilst others took longer to extricate themselves or were having to retire to the infield. A lot of the red roofs had been held up by the initial bottleneck but now they roared up behind us. I felt a sense of personal betrayal for a moment as Pete lunged me out of the way. I knew that I shouldn’t feel like this, but I did. It was important that I didn’t let any personal feelings come into my driving – if I had to behave aggressively to a friend or partner on the track to win, then I had to get used to doing that, or I’d never manage to get ahead. Even as I attempted to slew my way back into the race I saw Quinn aggressively hurl his car at Pete’s. It didn’t look completely necessary to me. I hauled my wheel round and my engine screamed to a high note as I chased after them.
All three of us qualified, but I was in eighth place.
Back at the pits I bit back on any comment to Pete about the bash he’d given me. I was desperate to refer to it by means of a joking remark or similar, but I knew that I needed to make it completely unremarkable for one or other of u
s to make competitive contact. I had only ever partly wanted to beat him in a race, as it didn’t seem the best psychological tactics to be a better driver than one’s boyfriend, but now I had every intention of becoming so, and after all, he’d started it.
“Bit mucky out there,” Pete remarked as he slipped himself out of the window of his car.
“I like mucky,” I said.
“An asset in a girlfriend…” He murmured with a wink.
I rolled my eyes and turned to find Bobby behind me. “One of the Renault Kadjar range,” I said to him. He bobbed delighted assent. Dev leaned in and made an unusual physical contact, running a finger down my cheek then looking in a perplexed way down at his finger. “Dirty,” he said.
I looked down at myself, splattered from head to foot. No glass in the cars meant the outside had free access in.
“Yep, Dev, I’m really dirty. I’m absolutely filthy!”
“As I said…” Pete leant from behind me, his lips close to my ear and his arms grabbing me round the waist.
“Oh shut up!” I slapped at him.
“Yes Shut Up,” Mikey said rocking back and forward on his heels.
Pete took one look at the enormous smiling lad in front of him, and shut up.
By the end of the racing that day we all came home with some points. It was immaterial at this stage how many. We just had to start collecting them.
Toby, our media link guy rang me up to tell me that there was an article in the Guardian referencing me this week and suggested I went out to buy it and take a look in case I wanted to make a comment on it.
It was an article on offending behaviours and sentencing outcomes. The bit where I cropped up went ‘Reformed young offender, Eve McGinty, shown in the current series about Stock Car racing ‘Thrills and Spills’, exemplifies the success there is to be had with implementing Community Sentences instead of automatically imposing custodial ones. What looked to be unpromising fare following the little known working class sport of Bangers and Stock Car racing, has turned out to be an immensely rich ‘slice of life’ type series, one of the highlights being this young woman currently serving a year-long supervision order, with 150 hours of community service. Her charming interactions with a group of autistic lads that she has worked with as part of her sentence, exemplifies the benefits to be had of harnessing the talents of every citizen of this country, without prejudice. And the joy shown by her as she embraces the dangerous contact motorsport of F2 Stock Car racing, makes one question if these young people, drawn into violence, are just seeking some excitement in their otherwise dreary lives.’
“I’m not a ‘young offender’,” I exclaimed angrily to Kes and Quinn who were lounging around in the background. What a Condescending Git!
Kes glanced up. “Yes you are Eve, you mental bitch, you stabbed someone. You can’t quibble with that…”
Unfortunately, the next interview that the evil Annette did in the flat with us, did nothing to dispel my tarnished reputation. They often arrived without warning. Our theory was that they were trying to catch us out in the hopes of walking in sometime to find us in some drug fuelled orgy.
Annette sat down at the table and beardy Rog set up a tripod. This looked ominous… I darted into the bathroom to check my face looked ok and didn’t have a streak of oil down it. A few minutes later she was grilling us.
“So, Adam, we were talking to your sister earlier this evening, and she mentioned that Eve had once tried to kill you. So we were wondering if this was just a figure of speech, or whether something more serious had happened?”
Quinn and I glanced at each other. He raised an eyebrow at me in invitation to be the first to speak.
“No it wasn’t a figure of speech,” I agreed. “It was a real you-ought-to-be-in-a-secure-unit you mad psychopathic bitch type of incident…”
“So what did you do?” Annette probed.
I glanced at Quinn. “Do you want to start by explaining anything?”
He looked straight at the camera and said, “What I’m about to confess to now, I’ve never told anyone, and not even my parents or Siân know about it, so I’m sorry if it comes to a shock to anyone…” He glanced sideways at me. “I’m afraid I deliberately slaughtered Eve’s rabbit.”
Annette raised her eyebrows.
“We were seven, I was playing ‘Marines’ with a friend and as part of our ‘survival training’ I got a carving knife and slit the neck of Eve’s pet rabbit. The wretched thing screamed its head off. Ummm – better rephrase that hadn’t I? I pretty much took its head off and it screamed blue murder before spurting blood everywhere. Did you know rabbits could make a noise? I didn’t!” Quinn shuddered eloquently. “So the whole street came running and I panicked and threw the knife in the hedge and the rabbit into the dog’s mouth and the dog got the blame… But Eve must have seen me do it. Don’t know why she didn’t dob me in to the adults, but then, she’s not one to allow other people to fight her battles for her…” He looked at me, expecting me to take up the story.
I shrugged. “Flopsy was the last present my mother ever gave me before she died when I was six. So I figured the world, my world, would be better off without Quinn. I planned it carefully. I tricked him into getting into an old fridge in a flooded ditch in our local playground, slammed the door on him and pushed it over onto its door so he could never ever get out, and then I left him there.”
“That’s ummm, rather extreme…” Annette commented. “So why is he still sitting here alive and kicking?”
I grimaced. “After some fair length of time – I don’t know how long – you don’t when you’re a kid do you..?”
“Too bloody long!” Quinn interjected with feeling.
“His mum was looking for him and immediately suspected I had something to do with it and came into our garden and shouted at me and slapped me until Dad came out to see what was going on. He asked me where I’d left Quinn and I hadn’t intended to ever say, but I felt bad attempting to lie to Dad so I led them back to the fridge and Dad hauled it up and got it open and Quinn was all unconscious and blue and limp inside and Dad did mouth-to-mouth on him…”
“Did he? I didn’t know that…” Quinn looked interested.
“And then they called an ambulance, and he was ok in the end. But it was a bit of a close call,” I admitted. “I was a bit gutted that he’d survived at the time…”
“Jeez, thanks Eve!” Quinn exclaimed sarcastically.
“…but I wouldn’t have wanted to grow up in some psychiatric secure unit so I guess I’ve come to terms with the continuation of his existence…”
Behind the camera, Roger was holding his nose in a vain attempt not to succumb to the giggles. I caught his eye and that was the end of the recording as the camera action exploded into shakes.
I figured that I’d best be at the Sattertwaites’ for that one, although I’d rather have been in the flat having a giggle about it with Quinn, Kes and some other friends who already knew about it. The episode started with them asking Siân why she’d lied about me to some night-club bouncers.
Siân looked straight at the camera and said, “Because I hate her.”
I noted the present tense. I’d thought we’d left all that behind us.
“Why’s that Siân?”
“Because she tried to kill my brother.”
And then they cut to the interview they’d had with us.
“Well you’re a bundle of nice surprises,” Jo said sarcastically in response to the revelations.
Sue looked worriedly at me. “You can’t have known what death meant, not really – you were only seven…”
Paul looked across at Pete. “Just take my advice son, and don’t piss that girl off…”
Dad rang me one evening on a satellite phone.
“Dad!” It was a huge surprise.
“I’m not going to be able to ring you on your birthday so I booked a call for now instead. Happy Birthday for a few days’ time…”
“Thanks, Dad.
”
“I’ll buy you something for the car when I get home – is that ok?”
“Sure Dad, thanks.”
“Will you do something for me?”
“Sure Dad!” But I wasn’t so happy when I heard what it was. He wanted me to go round and see how Pauline was. He was worried about her. She kept saying she was fine but she’d gone quiet. (I could imagine that might be a bit disconcerting since normally her constant ebullience swelled to fit any space available).
“You can use your birthday as an excuse...”
“Oh Dad, why would she confide anything in me if she hasn’t in you?” I protested.
“I just thought, another woman you know – you might just have an eye for what’s going on…”
Fat chance, I thought, me?
“I suppose you can’t get Thrills and Spills out there?” I changed the subject.
His voice changed, suddenly becoming lively. “On the contrary the common room is becoming increasingly packed on Wednesday nights. The men think you’re great. A cheer goes up whenever you come on and they think Adam’s hilarious.”
“Along with the rest of the world no doubt…”
“When you mentioned the rigs the other night they sent up a massive cheer, so it would be great if you could mention us by name some time…”
“I can’t control what they cut, but I’ll give it a go – try and get it into a sentence they’ll want to keep in. Sorry about all the constant revelations about my criminal past Dad.”
“Seriously Eve, the sort of guys that work on the rig don’t bat an eyelid. Doesn’t do you any disservice in their eyes.”
“Oh, good…” Though probably not that good really…
“I never knew that about Flopsy. You never ever told me, Eve. That lad’s an utter shit! No wonder you were beside yourself! I thought I was never going to get you to stop crying. You just screamed. I assumed you’d seen the dog catch it. I had no idea you’d watched the little turd cut her throat! You loved that rabbit… It was one of those huge fluffy white lops and you used to lie on the rug with an arm around it watching children’s TV after school while it stretched out placidly beside you wriggling its nose. I can only imagine how it must have affected you so soon after seeing your Mum die right in front of you. In fact, the fridge was too good for him…if I’d known what he’d done I’d have arranged a far more painful end for him!”
Thrills and Spills (Not Quite Eden Book 3) Page 10
