Drift

by Patrick Jones

  Billy raced toward the road up Tantalus. Tucker fell in behind, with Shane third, Ryan fourth. With a light rain falling, only a few of the other White Sands drifters joined the caravan. By the time Billy reached Tantalus Road, the rain was falling harder, but he wasn’t worried. He had skills and courage the others lacked. He’d show Tucker.

  Even in the rain, Billy nailed some tight drifts at the start. When he reached the one long straight section of the road, he decided it would be a perfect location to put Tucker in his place. The engine of Billy’s Toyota roared as he hit 90 MPH. He pulled the emergency brake, sending his car into a perfect drift back and forth on the wet road. He pulled out of the drift, looked in his rearview, and waited to see Tucker’s distinctive headlights. And waited. And waited.

  “This is the life,” Kekoa said. He adjusted his blue headband, which was damp with sweat. He and Sonny had spent an entire Saturday working on the Skyline’s engine. “If I’m going to hit some killer drifts, I’ve got to get this baby tuned so every plug and point is perfect.”

  “K, you won’t be the show until you get a new turbo,” Sonny said.

  “I know, I know, but I don’t have a kit in this garage. I’ll need to buy it, and I just don’t have the scratch together yet,” Kekoa said. “Sales are slowing down.”

  “Well, when you rock it tonight, people will see,” Sonny added.

  “I’m gonna crush it, no doubt.”

  Kekoa put his head back under the hood and listened to the engine hum. It was like music.

  They had modified everything small with the parts on hand: new air filter, hoses, fuel pump, fuel injector, and much more. Sonny had drawn up the list, and they’d worked piece by piece until the Skyline 350 was 350 percent improved.

  Kekoa loved listening to the engine, but he wished he could listen to something else almost as beautiful: that girl who came to buy parts. He had her number, but he couldn’t bring himself to call.

  Sonny joined Kekoa under the hood, tightening every bolt. “Only one problem, K.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Cops might crack down after that thing last weekend,” Sonny said.

  Kekoa looked puzzled. “What thing?”

  “K, if you’re gonna drift here, you gotta get hooked up with the scene,” Sonny said. He told Kekoa about an accident on Tantalus Road the past Sunday morning. “All the reports say that folks in the neighborhood heard the sounds of people drifting just before.”

  “That sucks,” Kekoa said. “Somebody get hurt?”

  “Somebody died. Kid who went to White Sands,” Sonny said. “Every time there’s an accident, the cops bust things up. We might show up out by Pearl tonight and see it’s empty.”

  When Sonny went inside to go to the bathroom, Kekoa pulled out his phone. He brought up the girl’s number and took a deep breath. You drifted alone in your car, but not through life. It was time to tune his status quo.

  As he listened to the dial tone, he thought again about the accident. Unlike whatever kid crashed and died, Kekoa had more skills and more sense. You don’t drift in the rain on a mountain road. He knew that, so how come some White Sands kid didn’t?

  “Hello. Um, is this the girl who bought an anti-roll bar recently?” Kekoa asked.

  There was silence on the other end. “I can’t talk now. Later.”

  Kekoa’s heart revved faster than his Nissan. “When?”

  “After the funeral,” the girl said in a whisper.

  “Dad, I swear I don’t know anything about it!” Billy shouted. His words echoed off the walls of the limousine taking them to Tucker’s funeral. “We hang out at the mall, that’s it.”

  “Then what was he doing up on that mountain road?”

  “I don’t know because I wasn’t there. Look, Dad, why would I do that? Why would I ruin a good thing? Do you think I’m that stupid? You know I’m smart, right? I’m your son.”

  Billy’s father nodded, smiled, and then went back to his phone.

  “I can’t believe he messed this up for us,” Billy said to Shane and Ryan as they stood outside the Church of Prosperity, the biggest mega-church on the island. With the sun beating down on them, they began to sweat in their black suits, but none of them as much as Billy.

  “What a selfish tool,” Ryan offered.

  Billy didn’t reply. His thoughts were already elsewhere. Adila stood with her mom and other servants.

  “Brah, it’s steaming out here. Let’s get inside,” Ryan said. “Maybe the sooner we’re in, the sooner we’ll get out. I got stuff to do.”

  Billy pointed toward the church. “You guys go in. I’m waiting for someone.”

  “You going to say something to Tucker’s dad?” Shane asked. “Tell him we’re sorry. You’ll take the lead, as always.”

  “If I see him, I sure will.” Billy’s eyes scanned the sea of white faces in black suits until he spotted the person he was looking for. Not Tucker’s father but Adila.

  “I’m so sorry for your loss,” Billy whispered to Adila’s mother. “I know that many of my—I mean, you get to know someone working for—I mean, with them. So, I’m sorry.”

  “Thank you, young man,” Adila’s mother said softly.

  “My name is Billy Cain. Tucker was a friend of mine.” Billy kept talking so he could continue walking with Adila and her mother. When Adila arrived at the pew where most of the other servants sat, Billy followed close behind.

  All through the service, Billy didn’t look at the closed coffin but at Adila’s closed eyes. He tried to remember their color. He wondered if she took off her glasses when she kissed. As the preacher spoke of the richness of the next life, Billy thought of his. As the service ended, Billy watched Adila’s eyes produce a tear. Billy concentrated and squeezed one out himself.

  When the service was over, Billy walked outside with Adila and her mom, his arm on her mom’s arm. He walked them all the way to their car, a blue-and-rust Impala. Showing his good manners, Billy opened the door for Adila’s mom and then walked over to do the same for Adila.

  Billy stood next to her and whispered. “After a few days, you and I should get together.”

  Adila took a step back. She covered her face.

  Billy reached out and touched her hands. “Don’t worry. I can make it okay.”

  Adila pulled her hands away and slapped Billy’s face.

  “Don’t you know who I am?” Billy said. He smiled large to fight off the pain and shock.

  “Yes, but more than that, I know what you are.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “You’re a taker. You take from people who work hard to serve you. You take away people’s dignity and respect. You take and take but give nothing in return.”

  Billy smiled. “I guess that’s why I have everything, and you’ll always have nothing.”

  “Some way to spend a Saturday night,” Kekoa joked.

  Adila laughed, again. She’d laughed at most of the things he’d said. Kekoa knew he’d tried too hard with girls in the past. The secret to getting girls to look at you was simple: be yourself and keep the pressure off. They’d met in the morning for coffee but ended up spending the day together.

  “Well, it’s only the beginning,” Sonny added. “They want to see you drift? Wait until they see what this car can do with the new cold air intake system.”

  “This is Hawaii. There’s never any cold air to intake!” Adila said. She sat on a stool a few feet away. She wore a long white sleeveless dress, sandals, and her Giants ball cap.

  “That’s why you need a baller fender mount like we installed,” Sonny said.

  “How does cold air make your car better?” Adila asked.

  Kekoa smiled. “It’s for the engine. The colder the air, the denser it is. More density, more oxygen. More oxygen, more power. It’s science!”

  Adila laughed. “Well to me, it’s just noise.”

  Kekoa closed the hood, got into the 350, and turned it on. It roared louder, meaner than before. He
loved the hard steel rev of the engine, but the soft sound of Adila’s laughter was just as welcome.

  While Sonny finished reconnecting the intake snorkel, Kekoa and Adila sat on the porch outside.

  “I’m glad you called,” Adila said. “What school you go?”

  “Farrington. How about you?” Kekoa asked. He tried to sit as close to her as he could. As much as Kekoa loved the smell of the drift, the drifting scent of Adila’s perfume was sweeter.

  “Waipahu High. We could’ve gone to high school together if Mom and I hadn’t moved. We used to live there.” Adila pointed at the closed-down projects.

  “I guess somehow, some way, we were gonna meet up, don’t you think?” Kekoa asked in a whisper.

  “Maybe, Kekoa, maybe.” Adila laughed and touched his arm. “Fate?”

  “Fate is superstition. I’m a man of science and action!” Kekoa said. Adila moved closer.

  Adila lifted her left eyebrow “Action?”

  “Action,” Kekoa whispered as he turned her ball cap backward and kissed her lips.

  “So how do you work it?” Kekoa asked the crew cut guy, whose name he’d learned was Jack O’Brien. Kekoa drove over in the Skyline, while Sonny and Adila followed in Adila’s Impala.

  Jack explained the scene at Pearl. While people raced in tandem, there weren’t judges or anything. It was all for kicks, no betting, just a chance to show off cars and skills.

  “How can it be a race if you don’t pick winners or losers?” Kekoa asked. If he wanted to compete in Japan, he’d need some real racing experience. This was close, but not it.

  Jack laughed and punched Kekoa lightly on the arm. “Trust me, everybody knows.”

  “So, how about me and you?”

  Jack laughed again. “Listen, kid, I’m the best there is.”

  Kekoa stared back at Jack. “If you think you’re better than me, accept the challenge. Let’s drift!”

  Billy gulped from an energy drink and pointed to the mall parking lot’s smaller-than-usual crowd. “I wonder if they’re afraid of getting caught.”

  “Or maybe of dying,” Ryan said. Billy met him with a hard stare.

  “Hey, Tucker knew the risks. We all knew the risks. It’s his fault, not mine,” Billy said.

  “What do you think about hitting Tantalus tonight?” Shane asked Billy.

  Billy shook his head. “Nah. I bet that road is filled with cops. Now, are we going to drift or sit around feeling sorry for ourselves?” Billy asked.

  Ryan and Shane looked at each other, but Billy knew the answer. They’d do whatever he wanted them to do.

  Billy only broke off a few awesome drifts before the sound of the Toyota’s revving engine was overcome by sirens screaming in the night sky. When the first cruisers hit the mall, Billy watched some of the White Sands kids roar off in the opposite direction. Even Ryan ran away. Billy and Shane were in a tandem drift, but both stopped when the cops got close.

  Billy pushed his car into park and climbed out, hands up. It was just like a scene from one of the Fast and Furious movies. Except Billy wasn’t some hood. He was a Cain.

  Two officers exited their car, lights still flashing.

  “This is private property!” a white cop with the big belly shouted. “You’re trespassing.”

  Billy laughed. “You’re right. It is private property. My family owns it.”

  Shane left his car and stood next to Billy. “Is there a problem, officer?” Shane asked.

  “You’re creating a public disturbance,” the second cop, part Hawaiian, said.

  “Is there a fine?” Billy asked. He reached into his pocket. “Just getting my wallet.”

  “One hundred dollars,” the white cop said. The other nodded in agreement.

  Billy reached into his wallet and counted out five twenty-dollar bills. “Oh, wait there’s two of us breaking the law. Well, to be honest, officer, four of us in all. So that’s four hundred total.”

  Billy kept counting bills until he reached that amount. “I’d like to pay it now.”

  The two cops looked at each other, then back at Billy. The white cop reached out his hand and took the money from Billy. “You best be getting along now, understand?”

  “Shane, let’s say we wanted to continue this. Where might we go?” Billy asked.

  Again the officers looked at each other, seeing who’d be the first to blink.

  “By Pearl, where they were going to build that solar thing. Roll down a window. You’ll hear it,” the white cop said.

  “Billy high-fived Shane again, and they returned to their cars. As Billy pulled out of the ramp, he looked at the massive tire skids left on the pavement. He was like Picasso, and those marks were his masterpieces.

  Billy told Shane to call around, get more information about the Pearl location, and then round everyone up. They’d meet up again, except for Ryan, who Billy told Shane not to call. By midnight, most of the While Sands crew had reassembled at a closed gas station.

  “Follow me!” Billy shouted.

  As always, Shane and the others did as Billy told them.

  “You can do all that without turbo? I’m impressed,” Jack said to Kekoa.

  They’d raced in tandem ten times, and Kekoa knew that even in a lesser car, he was the more skilled driver. Better than that, Kekoa could tell by the sound of Jack’s voice that Jack had learned the same hard truth.

  “I just need a little bit more cash, and then I’m unstoppable,” Kekoa said.

  Jack offered Kekoa a beer, but Kekoa waved it away. The thrill of victory had him buzzed.

  “Tell me in that last turn, how did you do that?” Jack said. “I mean, that was one serious drift.”

  Kekoa explained the basic concepts of brake drifting, the most complex type of drifting and also the most successful. “The key is footwork. Too much, you stop before you drift and understeer. Too little, you don’t worry about understeering—you worry about the undertaker!”

  “Heel-toe.”

  “I don’t dance, but that’s what it’s like. It’s all in the footwork: right-foot toe on brake, heel on gas, and left foot on the clutch. Once you face the corner, you hit the gas and you got it.”

  “Man, it’s the best feeling in the world!” Jack shouted.

  “You’re out of control but also in control. Planned chaos and random direction.”

  Jack saluted Kekoa with a final swig of his beer and headed back toward his car. Kekoa savored the moment, letting Jack’s words bounce around in his head. Then he wiped the sweat of his forehead, then waved to Sonny and Adila to join him. They’d watched from the sidelines.

  “I don’t think I can watch you do this. It’s too scary,” Adila said.

  “It’s only scary if you don’t know what you’re doing.” Kekoa said. “But I do.”

  “Before we come back here, we gotta get that turbocharger installed,” Sonny said.

  Kekoa knew they were way short of the money they needed. “A good kit is 5K, easy, and I can’t sell that many parts. We need to find another way to raise the money.”

  “I need to go,” Adila said as she tugged on Kekoa’s arm.

  “I’m done for the night. Ain’t nobody better than me,” Kekoa said, but before he could return to his car, he saw headlights in the distance. Not cops—the sound coming from the cars wasn’t sirens but loud booming music. The lead car was a red Toyota. The small caravan of six cars circled the track a few times. All of them were drift cars, and all of them were far nicer on the outside than Kekoa’s ride. The navy brats and the Japanese who had been racing pulled to the side.

  “I know that car,” Adila said.

  “Who is it?” Kekoa asked, but the car looked familiar to him too, from some YouTube videos.

  “Billy Cain.” Adila shuddered as if a cold wind had blown in with the cars.

  “Who is he?” Kekoa asked. Sonny, standing a few feet behind the couple, laughed. Kekoa turned to face him, but Adila’s eye remained focused on the lead car. No longer conte
nt to just circle, the red car started to show off, performing spectacular drifts.

  “His dad owns like half the island,” Sonny said. “I didn’t know he did drifting.”

  “My mom is the cook for one of his friend’s family,” Adila said. Over the roar of the revving engines and squealing tires, Adila told Kekoa everything she knew about Billy Cain, except how he’d hit on her at Tucker’s funeral. She told him things her mom had heard while working for Tucker’s parents about Billy’s antics at school. Kekoa pounded his fists together when she told a story about Billy and his friends bullying a kid named Keiichi Yamada in the bathroom.

  Kekoa said nothing as the lead car grew closer, a red Toyota Altezza that looked like a million dollars. The car finally stopped in front of Kekoa, Sonny, and Adila.

  “So what did you think?” Billy asked no one in particular as he climbed out of his car. Behind him, Shane and the others exited their cars too. They all left their engines humming.

  “Nice wheels,” some guy in a crew cut said. A couple other crew cut types, as well as a bunch of Asian gearheads, walked toward Billy’s ride.

  “Did you e-brake?” somebody shouted over the noise.

  When Billy scanned the crowd to find the source of the comment, he was stunned to see Adila. He pushed his way through the onlookers and moved toward her. She stood next to a half-black, half-Hawaiian kid and a white kid who dressed ghetto.

  “What are you doing here?” Billy asked. “I didn’t know you were into this scene.”

  “She’s not. I am,” the hapa said as he pulled Adila closer to him. Adila was taller.

  “Really. And which of these hunks of metal do you drive?” Billy asked.

  The hapa pointed toward a blue Nissan.

  “I used to own one of those but then got myself a real drift car,” Billy said.

  “How long did it take you to tune it so it rides so fine?” the skinny white kid asked.

  “Let me guess, you’re one of those built-it-from-scratch types?” Billy asked.