Phase (Phoebe Reede: The Untold Story #1)

by Michelle Irwin

  I sighed. “It’s about that. And it’s not. It’s about everything and nothing. I just feel like I’ve hit this age where I’m almost an adult and yet I don’t know who I am.”

  “No one knows who they are at eighteen. God, I certainly didn’t.”

  I picked at the polish on my nails again. “But I don’t even know if I’m heading in the right direction or whether I’m being led astray.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Everyone has this expectation of me. I never know if people are being nice to be nice or because of who I am and the connections I have. Then there’s the boys.”

  Dad grimaced, no doubt remembering what he was like at my age. “Do I want to know?”

  “Not like that, Daddy.” I used the term specifically to put his mind at ease. Not that I’d go admitting it to him, but I was a long way off sharing that much of myself with anyone. The closest I’d come was second base with a friend in the back of a classmate’s VE Commodore. The opportunity had been there plenty of times, but I didn’t want to regret my first time. It had to be with someone I knew wanted me for me, and not for Phoebe Reede.

  “Then what is it?”

  I decided not to raise the topic of my fear that I’d only hurt someone if I tried to care for them and talk about the other issue instead. “How am I supposed to know who to trust?”

  “I thought I taught you that much at least,” Dad said, ruffling my hair.

  I laughed as I fought him off. “Yeah, yeah, I know. When it comes to boys, trust no one because they all just want to get in your pants and will say and do anything necessary to achieve that goal,” I recited from a conversation we’d had when I turned sixteen.

  He chuckled, the sound reverberating in my ear. As the subject turned more and more to growing up and sex, I felt less comfortable drawing solace from Dad. He seemed to feel the same way because he moved to lean against the small desk in the room. “Exactly.”

  “But you know what I mean. How do I know who wants to be with me because of what’s up here”—I tapped my forehead—“instead of the fact that I’m apparently some pin-up chick in a hot car? And don’t get me started on the ones who seem to think bagging me will somehow give them a link to you.”

  He screwed his nose up in disgust and opened his mouth ready to argue, before snapping it shut, no doubt understanding that I wasn’t just making up scenarios. There were actual instances that had occurred: boys who thought dating me would get them into the pits to watch a race at Queensland Raceway or a chance at an apprenticeship.

  “I thought racing is what you wanted?”

  “It is.”

  “But?”

  “But I don’t know why I want it anymore. How am I supposed to know that when I don’t know who I am?”

  “You’re a big sister to four gorgeous kids if I do say so myself. You’re a rising star on the track. You’re a sweet and driven young lady.” He thought for a second and then smiled. “You’re my daughter.”

  “Ugh, exactly!” I threw my hands up in resignation as I climbed off the bed and started to pace the small room.

  “What?”

  Spinning around to face Dad, I ran my hands through my hair, pulling it up into a makeshift ponytail before letting the strands slip through my fingers to fall back around my face. “I’m your daughter.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Dad, I love you, but your shadow is big enough to swallow the sun. I don’t know who I am away from that. Away from you.”

  Once again, his mouth opened, as if he had a ready answer, but then he frowned and snapped it shut. That happened a couple more times. Each time his eyes grew just a little sadder and the frown a little deeper. “I didn’t realise having me as a father was such a bad thing.”

  Tears welled in my eyes as I moved closer to him. “This is why I didn’t say anything, Dad. You take so much personally; accepting guilt long before it’s offered. This isn’t a you thing. I’m so proud of you, and everything you’ve built. Everything you’ve done. Coming from that background has made getting into racing that much easier for me. And that’s part of the problem.”

  “What is?”

  Unable to meet his gaze, I glanced down at my hands. “Do I even deserve to be out there?”

  “Of course you do. You didn’t get a spot in our junior production cars three years ago because you’re my daughter. You got it because you were the best driver there.”

  I threw my hands in the air and spun away from him, taking up my pacing again. “But how do you know that?”

  “Because I wasn’t involved. I had independent people make the selection.”

  “Independent people whose salaries you pay, you mean?”

  “Well, yeah, but they can’t exactly fake times. You beat everyone else hands down.”

  “Because I’ve been doing this for as long as I can remember.” I sank back onto the bed and buried my head in my hands.

  “But that’s nothing to do with Emmanuel Racing. Even if I’d never climbed into another ProV8 after reuniting with your mum, I probably would have had you out on the track. And I think you’d have paved the way anyway. It’s in our blood.”

  “Maybe. It doesn’t really matter though, does it? That’s all hypothetical. You did get back in the car. You did start Emmanuel Racing. And I don’t know me away from all that. Or away from being a big sister.”

  “What do you need?”

  “Space.”

  “Oh.” He frowned.

  I brushed my fingertips through the ends of my hair repeatedly, trying to undo the tangles left from sleep—wishing it was as easy to untangle the knots in my stomach and around my heart. “I just want to go somewhere where people don’t know me. Not forever. Just for a while.”

  “Don’t know you, or don’t know me?”

  I smirked at his perception and gave a small shrug. “Both.”

  “I can have a chat with Danny if you like? I think he’s still got his flat in London.”

  I shook my head. “No, you don’t understand. I want to do something that’s just me. All me. Only me.”

  “Like what?”

  “I don’t know, just jump on—” The words “a bike” were on the tip of my tongue, but I swallowed them because they wouldn’t help my case. “—uh, in a car and just drive somewhere.”

  “I don’t see how that will help. Most people in Australia will recognise you.” He looked thoughtful. “Your manager has done a stellar job at getting you in front of the public and the sponsors, after all,” he added, talking about the work Mum had done ever since I’d expressed an interest in driving professionally.

  “I was thinking of maybe heading to the States.” The idea wasn’t entirely new. In fact, it was something I’d been daydreaming about for a while, but it wasn’t until that moment that I understood how desperately I wanted it.

  “I’m not sur—”

  “I can use my savings,” I said to cut him off. “That way it won’t cost you a cent.”

  His brow dipped before he looked away. “It’s not the cost I’m worried about.”

  “What is it then?” I challenged, certain there wasn’t much he could say that I hadn’t thought of before.

  “You aren’t even eighteen yet.”

  “I will be soon.”

  “How are you going to hire a car? Most places will need you to be twenty-five.”

  “So I’ll use public transport, or go to a place that does rent to younger people. Or better yet, I’ll find a beater online and drive it around.” He didn’t need to know that it would likely be a bike, not a car.

  He raised a brow. “You’ve thought about this a lot, haven’t you? You’ve got an answer for everything.”

  “Daddy, you’ve taught me to take care of myself. To live as much as I can in the time that I have. I can do this. Please?”

  His lips stretched into a grin. “I’ll tell you what, let’s run it by your mum. If it’s okay with her, then I guess it’s okay with me.”<
br />
  It was obvious that he was banking on her to be his get-out-of-jail-free card. That way he could agree and play the good cop, so that when Mum said no, she’d be the bad guy and I would take it out on her. He didn’t know that I had a trump card for getting my way with her, something I didn’t use often but would drag out if I needed to in this situation. Guilt.

  Well, guilt and her desire for me to have a normal life despite the challenges I’d faced long before I was aware they were challenges.

  With that agreed, he left the room so that I could get organised to shower and change. When I finished getting ready, I found him deep in conversation with Morgan about the changes they were facing with Eden’s uncle retiring and passing over the reins of Sinclair Racing to Eden.

  We stayed in Sydney for another day before flying home together. As I boarded the plane, I smiled and thought that maybe, just maybe, it wouldn’t be the last one I’d be on for a while.

  AFTER WE LANDED, Dad arranged for a truck to come and grab my bike from the airport parking garage, refusing to let me ride it home. Instead, I ended up in his Commodore. When we got home, the house was in typical full swing. Mum was in the kitchen getting dinner ready, or at least doing the best she could with Nikki balanced on one hip. Brock and Beth were at the table with their homework books open in front of them, but they were trying to out annoy one another rather than study.

  Parker was sitting on the couch, deeply engrossed in a car racing game. Either he’d already finished his homework, didn’t have any, or had convinced Mum to let him have a break somehow.

  “Here, let me take Nikki,” I said, reaching for my baby sister after kissing Mum’s cheek to say hello. When I had Nikki secure in my hands, I lifted her into the air and spun her around.

  “Careful, you don’t want—”

  “Relax, Mum, I’ve got her,” I said, cutting her off before she could launch into a rant about not overexciting Nikki and not letting her get hurt. It was ridiculous. I knew the rules, and I wasn’t going to do anything that would endanger her, but I wouldn’t stand by and watch Mum and Dad surround her with a bubble of safety either. I knew firsthand just how frustrating that could be. My earliest memories were of being wrapped in cotton wool, at least by Mum.

  Just as she’d started to let go and understand I was okay despite the rocky start to my life, Dad’s protectiveness had kicked up three notches. He never had a problem with me climbing behind the wheel—he understood those cars were built for safety—but started trying to gain control over other aspects of my life.

  Leaving Mum and her worries behind me, I balanced Nikki on my hip and headed to see the rest of my siblings. Dad passed me on his way into the kitchen to greet Mum. It was always the same with them—whether they’d been apart for a day or a few weeks. The first few minutes were always spent sucking face. It was almost sweet how in love they still were, but that didn’t mean I wanted to stand around and watch it either.

  As I walked past Brock and Beth, I flicked each of them on their left ear to stop them from kicking each other under the table.

  “Hey!” they both exclaimed, one after the other as I struck.

  “Homework,” I said pointedly as I nodded at the table. “Before dinner or you don’t get dessert.”

  “Yes, Mum,” Brock said with an eye-roll.

  “You need to go easy on Mum; she’s been under a lot of pressure lately.”

  “Yeah, because you ran away. Again,” Brock retorted.

  “I didn’t run away,” I lied. “I just went to visit Aunt Edie.”

  Brock perked up at that. “Did you see Max too?”

  I tried to keep my face neutral as I told him I had. The information I’d discovered didn’t have anything to do with Brock, after all.

  “No fair. I wanna go see Max.”

  “Well, maybe you can ask Mum to convince Edie to bring Max with her when they come up to Queensland Raceway in a few weeks.”

  “You think she’ll let him stay here?”

  “I’m sure she’ll be far more likely to say yes if you’ve done all of your homework.” I rubbed my hand over his short, shaven hair. He’d demanded Mum give him a buzz cut after the kids at school started teasing him for being a ranga. She’d tried to explain that Dad had the same problem when he was younger and that it had become almost a trademark trait, but Brock refused to listen. In the end, they’d relented because Mum and Dad had learned a long time ago that with as many kids as they had, it was better to pick their battles, and a hairstyle wasn’t worth the fight.

  “Yeah! He can stay in my room.”

  “Yay,” I said the word under my breath. I’d be happy if I didn’t see Max again for a while. A year or two might suffice. At least then, I might have a place of my own.

  “Phoebe, did you really go on a plane all by yourself?” Beth asked. Sweet little Beth. She was the spitting image of Mum. I was too, almost. It was only my inheritance of Dad’s eyes that set us apart. Beth, however, had lucked out genetically and had Mum’s honey-brown ones. It made it so much easier for her to blend into the background.

  “Sure did.”

  “Can I go on a plane by myself?”

  “Don’t you go giving her any ideas,” Dad said, coming back out from the kitchen with a goofy smile on his face. At least the time alone with Mum had put him in a good mood.

  “Not until you’re an adult,” I said to Beth, making sure Dad knew I wasn’t filling her head with dangerous thoughts.

  “You’re not an adult.”

  “I’m not a kid either.” I winked at her. “I’m almost eighteen.”

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Dad frown. Great. I’d just reminded him of my upcoming birthday, and the fact that he was so certain he was going to lose me after that. The way he talked about it, anyone would have thought I had my bags packed and waiting by the door for that magic birthday. It was pointless trying to tell him that legally I could have moved out almost two years ago. I think my upcoming birthday reminded him that he’d already been living his dream alone in Sydney by my age—and that Mum had me before she’d hit the magic one-eight mark.

  I met Dad’s gaze and went to reassure him I wasn’t planning on either moving or kids just yet. Before I got a word out, Nikki grabbed at the pink streak in my hair and tugged it toward her mouth. I gave a small cry of surprise before lifting my hand to prise her fingers away from my hair. “Let’s go get you settled for a bit, shall we?” I asked as I swung her onto my other hip.

  I walked to the living room. For a moment, I watched Parker tackling the race onscreen. His brow furrowed and his tongue poked out the corner of his mouth as he focused his entire concentration on the car. Glancing at the TV, it was clear he was a long way behind the leader and even with the rubber-banding the game did, it didn’t seem likely he’d get up into any decent placing.

  “You need to hit the racing line better,” I said, sitting beside him and swinging Nikki onto my lap. “That way you can brake and accelerate more efficiently.”

  He huffed out a breath.

  “See, there,” I said as he took a corner with too much speed and oversteered his way out of it. “You carried too much speed through that corner. If you’d slowed down a little to hit the apex, you would have actually gone through faster.”

  “I just don’t get it!” Parker cried, passing the controller to me and leaving his car stalled in the middle of the track while the computer AI competitors raced past to lap him. I wrapped my arms around Nikki to make sure she didn’t run off and then held the controller tight as I set about making up the lost ground.

  For the first few laps, I just got into the groove until I’d gained back the lap and was catching back up to the other cars.

  “You wanna hit the corner in the way that best maximises your speed while minimising the time you’re turning,” I said to Parker as I demonstrated on the screen.

  “But how do you know where that is?”

  “You read the track. See, this one is a sweeping ben
d, so I don’t have to brake much at all. I want to start on the outside, and then drift around the curve carrying as much speed as I can.”

  He looked between the screen and the controller in my hand as if some magic secret would reveal itself in the motions I made. “I just don’t see it.”

  Dad appeared then and plucked Nikki off my lap. I glanced away from the TV to watch him, wondering why he’d come to help me out. I was doing okay. In fact, I was enjoying being with my brothers and sisters again. Even though I’d only been gone a couple of days, I’d missed them. I hated to think how bad it would be if I was away from them longer. Like going overseas to the US for a decent holiday. My mouth curled downward.

  “It’s bath time,” Dad said in explanation after seeing the expression on my face.

  It seemed pointless to tell him my frown had nothing to do with him grabbing Nikki and everything to do with worrying about going overseas because he’d be inclined to tell me not to go.

  I nodded and then turned my full focus back to the track. By the time the race ended, I’d fought back from being down a lap to coming third in a pack of twelve cars.

  “I still don’t get it,” Parker complained. To emphasise his point, he crossed his arms over his chest and pouted.

  “Climb over here,” I said, moving my hands so he could sit on my lap. He was barely seven, so was still rather light and compact.

  I held the controller out to him. Once he’d grabbed it, I wrapped my hands around his. For the next fifteen minutes, I guided him through the different turns on the track, telling him the best track position to be in for each one, and showing him the right amount of brake and accelerator.

  “Make sense?” I asked when our combined effort got us to first place.

  “Not re—”

  “You’ll never explain it to him. He’s a thickhead!” Brock said, interrupting him.

  “Brock Curtis Reede, you do not say things like that about people,” I admonished. “Especially not about your brother. Family is important. Without them, you have nothing.”