Page 54 of Fueled Fury

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Lainey

Sitting in the chair, I stare around the small hospital room. The beeping still sounds, but now he’s awake. I didn’t know where to go last night, so I came here. It was silent for awhile until he woke up during the night. Thankfully, the doctors and nurses have been running in and out, doing tests, monitoring vitals, administering IVs, and have prevented us from awkwardly conversing. But now, everything is calm.

He stirs, looking at me as he moves to sit up in the bed. “What’re you still doing here? Don’t you have class this morning?”

“No.” I should be there, but I can’t go. I hadn’t even humored the idea. I wasn’t going back today. Maybe not ever.

“You don’t have to stay. I want you to, but I don’t want you falling behind in school.”

“A few days off won’t put me behind.” Lie. I was already behind, but I guess that doesn’t matter if I’m transferring out. “I’m thinking about taking the semester off.”

“Did something happen?”

“A lot.”

“Lainey, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have placed blame all on your mom. I was at fault too. We both were.”

“Why did you leave us?”

“That’s between me and her.”

“No, it’s not. Y’all have put me in the middle for years. The least you could do is tell me the truth.”

He hesitates then says, “She’d begged me not to go to the preliminary races because they didn’t count, but I went anyways.”

“Every race counts,” I utter. I’ve said those same words I’ve heard him say so many times.

“That’s what I told her before I left. After my laps were over, I decided to leave early, foregoing the press afterwards because I felt bad for choosing racing over her. Again. She was having an affair. I walked out of the house and went back to the only thing I knew how to do. Race.

“I didn’t know what else to do. I went into survival mode. I couldn’t think. Thinking of you made me realize what I’d lost, all because I was away from home all the time. Part of me thought you were better off without me. I figured your mom would take off with you. Instead, she moved into my backyard. Told me she wanted me to see precisely the life I could’ve had with the both of you had I picked family over racing.”

“It’s your passion, your career.”

“It means nothing if you return to an empty house. The glory, the wins, the money. None of it matters when you have no one there to share it with.”

“I didn’t know.”

“That’s why I didn’t want you to race. I was trying to keep you from sacrificing yourself for nothing. But watching you run away from me showed me that I was hurting you more than anything. If you want to race, I’ll back you. I can’t be happy about it, but I’ll be waiting for you at the finish line.

“I need you to understand, Lainey. Standing on that podium, celebrating the win, holding that trophy was the loneliest place I’ve ever been in my entire life because I knew nothing was waiting for me when I stepped off of it. I’d won but lost it all.”

His choked sob cuts through me. I’ve never heard my dad cry, and I never want to again. “Please forgive me, Lainey.”

Years of feeling unwanted, used, worthless, isn’t erased in a split second. Races were won or lost in that time. Life changed that fast. Pain was inflicted that quickly, but not erased. “I want to. But it still hurts.”

“Give me a chance. I’ll do whatever it takes. Even if it means standing by and watching you do the one thing I never wanted for you.”

“I don’t want to race.”

“What do you want? What do you need from me?”

I feel like the sad, lonely ten-year-old little girl, dialing my dad’s number as I ask, “Can I come home?”

* * *

Walking through the door of my dad’s house, it still feels off, but not as much as I’ve felt in the past. The new shiny copper house key sits on the table, exactly where he said he’d left it for me.