The Way Barred

by Dominique Kyle

  Finally they seemed to give up, and go with the flow and made the following week’s episode about the ‘end of season blues’, suggesting that driving campaign exhaustion was combining with approaching winter to cause gloom all round.

  They showed Quinn looking glum. “Yeah, I’ve not done as well in the F2 season as I should have, and the band’s folded because Oz, the keyboard player and writer of all the lyrics is heading off for his first term at Exeter Uni and my best friend Kes, who as you know has been our lead guitarist ever since I decided it didn’t work for me to play lead and sing at the same time, has been persuaded by his mother to go for a last minute Uni place, so he’s leaving for Coventry next week. So all in all, it’s endings all round.”

  “And your friend Nasim is off to take up her place at Oxford as well,” Tanya pointed out to me. “Will you go and see her there do you think?”

  “Can’t afford the train fare,” I said bluntly. “I look at it and think, ‘that’s a set of tyres’. Tarmac racing really knackers your tyres you know. I measure everything in the cost of a litre of diesel. Do I want one cup of Costa coffee, or two litres of diesel? That sort of thing…”

  “So are you feeling a bit down at the end of the season too?” Tanya prompted, clearly wanting me to open up. So I did my best to oblige with something.

  “Yeah well, it’s been good to head up the points tables and make an impact by winning a title – even if it is the most ignored one. The other shale drivers respect it anyway. Their point of view is that shale driving is more about the driving skill than the amount of money you can manage to spend on getting the fastest car like it can be on tarmac. But yeah, I agree, I do feel unaccountably depressed. The landlord’s given us three months’ notice hasn’t he Quinn?”

  Quinn nodded.

  Daisy put in, “I’m not sure I mind moving out actually, it’s getting dodgier and dodgier round here now. Kerb crawlers, unsavoury men hanging around outside the flats…”

  “I thought this Old Mill area was going up market,” Tanya cavilled. “All that ‘Waterfront Development’.”

  “What those posh flats they’ve put up in place of the old factory by the scummy polluted river?” Quinn queried. “That’s quite a few streets away. We figured the landlord was hoping to cash in with rising property values in the area, but if he saw some of the characters poor Daisy here has to pick her way through he might think twice.”

  I nodded. “Quinn and I try to give Daisy a lift places whenever we can.”

  “So no exciting romances?” Tanya nosed trying to change the subject over to something more interesting to the viewers.

  We shook our heads.

  “I’m taking Rob’s advice to stay single for as long as possible,” Quinn said.

  “After watching last week’s episode, I’ve decided that I need to give it at least ten years before getting into another serious relationship,” I remarked.

  “You’ll never last out ten years!” Quinn was scornful.

  “I didn’t say I’d be celibate,” I corrected him. “But I’m not giving my heart away in a hurry. It’s just not worth it.”

  Quinn looked a bit mournfully at me.

  “What?” I challenged.

  “That blasted Pete,” he said with an unusual flash of anger in his eyes. “I could throttle the guy! If he wasn’t going to look after you, why did he start it? It wasn’t fair. It’s spoilt everything for you. And now you’ve gone all grim and stony about everything. I hate it. You always used to be a bit Teflon, but now you’re- ”

  “What?” I said fiercely.

  He backed off and shrugged. “Never mind…”

  “So how do you feel about what happened with Pete?” Tanya needled.

  Damn Quinn, bringing the subject up! I did not want to talk about this, especially on camera. I shrugged. “Well clearly it was a mistake. We were a good team before, and Quinn’s right that it’s spoiled it.”

  “Aren’t relationships inevitable when you’re working together and spending so much time together?” Tanya suggested.

  I shrugged. “I’ve lived and worked with lots of other men and it’s never happened before.” No-one stepped in to fill the pause that followed, and I felt my statement was beginning to sound too significant, hanging like it was in the air between us. “So I’m using it as a learning experience and I’m intending that it won’t ever happen again.” I finished off quickly.

  Annoyingly, they used pretty much all of it on the next episode, only cutting out the stuff about how dodgy the area was getting.

  After Tanya was gone I snuck in under Quinn’s arm as he sat on the settee. He automatically put his arm around me, because he’s a cuddly soul.

  “What were you going to say that you stopped yourself when the cameras were here?” I asked.

  “I dunno,” he said. “I’m not great with words, and I knew it would come out wrong and make you angry and I realised you wouldn’t want the Satterthwaites hearing it…”

  “What though?”

  “I dunno!” He sounded frustrated with himself. “You’re like a wounded animal shut up in a box. The outside’s all hard and there’s just these bewildered hurt eyes looking out. But now you’re going to get angry for me saying it, aren’t you?”

  “Oh shit, Quinn,” I said limply. “Is that really what everyone is seeing when they look at me? What can I do to get over it? I must seem so bloody pathetic!”

  He rested his cheek on the top of my head. “I don’t know what everyone else is seeing when they look at you, Ginty. But I’ve watched you every day since we were four remember? So when you got it together with Pete I saw it was a completely new unrecognisable you which made me insanely jealous because he’d managed something no-one else had, and now he’s trashed all that and I’m so furious that he has no idea what he’s done or how important it was to you.”

  “Did you know that he finished with me because he firmly believed that I was going to trot off into the sunset with you Quinn?”

  “No, I didn’t realise that,” Quinn looked taken aback.

  “Yeah, mental huh?” I flipped.

  “Yeah, mental,” he echoed.

  Jo picked up on it in work the next day. “They get really personal with you don’t they?”

  I was filling in the work book. “They’re getting short of material and poking desperately around to get a reaction.” I explained. “But I was pissed off with Quinn for bringing Pete up, I’m trying to get everyone to forget about the whole thing!”

  “He’s right though,” Jo said. “We’re still pretty pissed off with Pete ourselves for starting something up with you that he wasn’t willing to stick with, and then hurting you so bad. It has spoiled things a bit. You don’t seem to be enjoying your triumphant season as much as you ought to be…”

  I stood silently, resting my weight through my hands on the workbench. “You’re right,” I said heavily. “A spark did go out. And I don’t know how to get it back.”

  The Grand National Championship in late October this year was at Kings Lynn. A popular shale track with the F2 drivers. Fifty five cars had entered. Tyler was on pole position, but I wasn’t too far back, and frankly I’d be terrified of being on pole position because you have to decide when the race starts and then stay ahead wondering what’s going on behind you. Arriving here as the new World of Shale title holder, I was expected to put on a good show. It made me a bit more nervous than usual. I’d heard about young winners of the Gold roof who went to pieces in their year of being the Champion because the expectations are suddenly so high. I could understand how that could happen. Well this was my chance to practice ignoring the pressure while in a lesser title…

  It was quite similar race conditions to my winning one. Not quite as wet, and everyone with their cars set up correctly for the weather conditions this time, but the F1 heats that had taken place before we came on had set up a two tier track and several cars ended up rolling around mired in the deep before the end of the first lap. Lu
ckily I was ahead of most of that. A yellow flag in the middle of the race allowed me to catch up with the three cars still ahead of me (I’d passed another five). Tyler, Horrocks and the current European holder, Smith. Pete was much further down the grid to me, and hadn’t caught up yet. Towards the end, Tyler caught the corner of a floundering back marker that I felt sure we’d lapped twice now, and Horrocks ploughed horribly into the back of Tyler and Tyler’s car shot up into the air and rolled twice, ending up the right way up but into the fence. Smith nipped by on the inside, followed closely by myself and that was the end of the race. Smith first, myself second, a star grade Kings Lynn local driver third and Pete came in fifth.

  Afterwards I went looking for Tyler. I found him sitting hunched over on a low wall looking a bit grey.

  “Ouch,” I said, looking down at his steadily blackening and swelling left hand.

  “I’ve obviously broken it,” he said glumly. “That’ll be the third time in the last fifteen years.”

  “Really?” I grimaced. I really hoped I never did that, Entwistle would kill me if I couldn’t work for weeks. Then I thought about Tyler, responsible for running his own business to keep a roof over everyone’s head and realised it was probably fairly disastrous for him too.

  “How’d you do it?” I thought I’d pick up some tips on how to avoid doing it myself.

  “Oh you know, the usual. As I rolled my hands were on the wheel and I got thrown onto my wrists and then I think I somehow bashed it on the doorframe during the second roll.”

  “Do you need me to drive you to A and E?” I offered.

  He smiled wanly at me. “Thanks, but one of my team has gone to sort out a car to take me.”

  I pulled a face at him. “Poor Tyler. But at least you got your Gold roof first and it’s nearly the end of the season…”

  “I’ll miss Birmingham,” he said gloomily.

  Yes, you will won’t you? I thought. Now how about that for an opportunity for me? Two of the only races of the year with big financial prizes attached to them. Tyler had been dominating the F2s for so long now the outcome was always considered a foregone conclusion if he was in a race.

  He looked ironically up at me and pointed at his cheek with his good hand. “You’re supposed to be giving me a sympathetic kiss, not machiavellianly working out your odds of winning without me there!”

  “Sorry,” I said. “Was I that obvious?” I obediently kissed his cheek to make up for it. It was gritty and unshaven. “You’re not good kissing material at the moment Tyler – a bit prickly – in more ways than one…”

  He smiled. “Piss off Ginty, happy hunting at Birmingham…”

  I walked back to the Beast. “Tyler’s broken his hand,” I announced.

  “Fantastic!” Pete exclaimed.

  “’Tis isn’t it?” I agreed.

  “Why couldn’t he have done that before the World Final?” Jo complained.

  “Yeah, I couldn’t help thinking it was good news, but I did feel a bit sorry for him. He was looking pretty miserable.”

  “He’s going home to an empty house,” Paul reminded me. “Having no-one there to nurse him and make him his tea is really going to rub it in…”

  The second weekend of November found us at the Birmingham Wheels Raceway. Wet again.

  “Is it ever going to stop raining?” Jo said with a disgruntled look at the sky.

  But the rain hadn’t stopped either the crowds or the entrants turning up for the big Gala night with F1s, F2s, Ministox and V8s all on the same bill together. Eighteen Stock Car races in one evening! The pits were heaving. I bumped into Tyler wandering around with his hand in a cast and sling.

  “Came along for the crack,” he explained.

  “I wouldn’t have thought crack was your favourite word right now,” I teased him.

  “Ha, ha,” he retorted.

  “Come on now, admit it, you came to see me win, didn’t you?” I told him.

  He eyed me with a fulminating gaze. “You wait till next season and I have two hands again, my girl, and then we’ll see who’s boss!”

  “Oo, promises, promises!” I flicked with a naughty look.

  When I got back to my team, Jo was eyeing me. “Were you flirting with Tyler just then?” She accused.

  I laughed a bit defensively. “Come on Jo, I was just ripping the shit out of him, that’s all. He’s really sore about missing out tonight and I couldn’t resist rubbing it in a bit.”

  Paul glanced at me and said nothing.

  “Are you going to let me by Pete?” I asked. “Or am I going to have to bump you?”

  Pete straightened up and looked at me for a moment. “You’ll have to wait and see, won’t you?”

  “Ok,” I said casually. Oh I would so be lunging him if he didn’t move aside damn quick.

  Tarmac, not my specialism. Pete was best on tarmac. But I had Tyler’s old car. And it was a really damn good one, even with all the wear and tear I’d been putting on it. Birmingham was notorious for cutting the tyres to shreds because of the rough surface left over from the Drifting events they regularly hosted there. Nurse the tyres, I thought. I might need some oomf left in them for the last couple of laps. The Shoot Out final. I came second. Pete came fourth.

  The Wild Card race – the last one of the evening for the F2s. A unique ‘winner takes all’ £1000 prize. (Normally you got a tenner if you were lucky, or sometimes someone would hand you a tyre like it was precious gold dust – I mean wouldn’t four tyres be more useful?). So the field was super-star studded and the competition intense. Actually, I hadn’t got used to being counted as one of the ‘super-stars’. Felt a bit weird really. But I was in a funny mood right now. This was my chance to win without Tyler in my way, and I was determined to do it. I held back a bit to preserve my tyres and my engine, but not so far that I couldn’t hoof my way through with a last minute burst of speed. Timed it for when the three at the front were making violent last minute attacks on each other, nipped past them while they were distracted and took the chequered flag.

  “You are driving like a demon tonight,” Jo commented in a husky voice that indicated she’d got well into her role as enthusiastic spectator. “Your eyes are glittering weirdly. You’re not on anything are you?”

  “Course not,” I said. Just determination, elation and adrenaline. But I knew my old friends from school would recognise the look. When they saw it they knew to back off.

  Tyler wandered past then back tracked when he saw me.

  “Told you,” I said sweetly. “You may kiss my cheek,” I pointed regally.

  He shook his head like at a naughty child and then bestowed the demanded action onto the graciously proffered cheek.

  “Ow,” I said, “Don’t you ever shave Tyler?”

  “Only got one hand at the moment remember?” He reminded me.

  I smiled smugly at him.

  “And we’ll see who has the upper hand next season shall we? When I’m back in the driver’s seat.” He warned.

  Jo was watching this interplay and looking a bit horrified. “Getting my own back, Jo,” I informed her and walked away.

  Paul came over to greet Tyler before he left. I was watching them from under my lashes and they were both watching me. “She’s a right handful Paul, how do you keep her in check?” Tyler commented with a slight laugh.

  Paul smiled in his normal contained way and made no answer.

  In the Beast on the way home Jo was clearly unsettled by my behaviour. “Why did you make Tyler kiss you?” She demanded.

  “Oh Jo! I’m sure you’ve been born in the wrong century. You’ve missed your vocation as a puritan!”

  She folded her arms crossly.

  “When he won the Gold and I congratulated him, he pointed at his cheek and announced I could kiss him, so I was just returning the arrogant sod’s gesture! ‘Cept he’s like one of those prickly Christmas Uncles isn’t he?”

  “What prickly Christmas Uncles?” Jo echoed blankly.

 
“You know, the annoying unshaven ones that always think little girls are just dying to kiss them and guilt trip the parents into making them.”

  Pete laughed. “No, our grumpy Jo won’t recognise that description. She’s never given in to being made to kiss someone!”

  “And then there’s that dreadful year in the life of a girl when she turns sixteen and all the middle aged men lean in and smile suggestively and say, ‘Sweet sixteen and never been kissed,’ then stare really hard at you… Blah!” I made fur ball spitting impressions.

  “Oh God,” Jo said. “I don’t remember that either!”

  Paul’s lips twitched and Pete threw at her, “Not surprising Jo! Sweet is one word no-one ever has applied to you! Raging Chip on the Shoulder Sixteen more like!”

  “At least I never knifed anyone!” Jo protested, glaring meaningfully at me.

  “Whoa Jo, that was a bit below the belt wasn’t it?” I threw back.

  “Well was it? Below the belt? Where did you stab him?” She snapped.

  “Up under the ribs, left hand side actually,” I said.

  There was a bit of a silence in the cab.

  “He fell down straight away and blood started bubbling out of his mouth and nose.” I informed them. “It was fucking scary!”

  In the silence that followed, I said aggressively, “Well you asked!”