Page 55 of Love Complicated

Once I leave the field, I head back to the track, unable to shake the thoughts of Aly and what a piece of shit Austin is. Who promises their kids they’re going to show up and then doesn’t?

What a tool.

It takes a lot of self-control on my part not to one, kiss the hell out of Aly, and two, hunt Austin down and drag his ass to that fucking field and force him to sit and watch his kids play football.

My anger has subsided when I pull into the fairgrounds and weave through the pits until I’m at my trailer I’ve tucked away from the entrance for some privacy.

I thought the race would have been called given the rain this morning. I make those decisions, right?

Nope. Glen does. He’s in charge of the track preparation and with his and Cliff’s, head of our track safety crew, assessment of the track at two in the afternoon, they’ve decided to go on with the weekly races.

Glen’s standing by my trailer with Cliff, who’s on a tractor getting ready to head out for track prep, something we’ve essentially been doing for the last three days, but with the rain this morning, we have to start over.

“How’d the meeting go with Madalyn?” Glen asks.

I sigh, wanting to forget this morning with her, but sadly, I can’t. Running my hand through my hair, I sit down in the chair outside my trailer. “She asked me to sell her the land.”

Glen hooks his hands on the straps of his overalls, raising his bushy eyebrows. “And you said?”

I raise an eyebrow, twisting my neck to eye him carefully. “What do you think?”

He smiles, nodding and pats my back. I set my helmet down on the table outside my trailer. “There’s a reason why he left this place to you, Ridge,” he tells me. “You’ll understand when the time is right.”

Will I? I’m not sure I ever will.

As the day progresses, it’s race night at Calistoga Speedway and the odor of exhaust and rubber mix with the smell of beer, tri-tip, and kettle-corn and grilling hamburgers. It makes me think of Aly and Saturday nights under the grandstand, my racing heart, her shaking hands. It brings back memories of sitting on tailgates, stealing kisses under the grandstands when her brother looked the other way, and the way she held on tight to my hoodie.

My eyes find the track that captured our childhood and held it captive. It’s buried deep under those red clay ruts. I’m clinging to the catch fence like the tear-offs after the race.

In this moment, I miss Calistoga and the feeling it gave me. I miss my dad and him chasing me through the infield, barely able to walk. I miss the adrenaline of this place. The fan, crowded tightly in the metal bleachers, cheering on their favorite drivers, roaring with anticipation of what the race gave to them.

Nothing lasts forever.

Now what am I left with? Memories of what it used to be?

A man bumps me from behind, his shoulder brushing mine. Our eyes catch, but I look away, shaking the memories with it.

Walking toward the office building, I notice the stands are filling up and it’s looking like it’s going to be a good night for business.

The track has been here for a long time. There are grandparents in the stands who first came as children.

Over the last few years, my dad had done a total transformation on the half mile. It’s one of the most famous dirt ovals on the west with a new catch fence all the way around the track. A massive amount of work had been done to the racing surface. It’s wider and now features a better degree of banking allowing for a smoother transition in the corners.

Owning a dirt track isn’t going to be easy, and as I stand in the infield pits, it’s apparent to me.

With an inexperienced owner, fluctuating land values, high liability insurance, the sagging economy, complaints from neighbors (and my mother), competition from other venues, problems with the Environmental Protection Agency, I know this place isn’t going to be easy to operate. The EPA can be harsh and they’ve always given us a hard time here. I understand why, too. Up until just a few years ago, some dirt-track owners poured used motor oil on the dirt to keep down the dust. Hell, at a closed-down track in Florida, developers had to abandon plans to build on the site after the EPA declared that all the oil had soaked into the dirt making it toxic.

I’m not saying we did that here, but still, you get why the EPA might be up your ass on any given night because of that.

Then there’s rain. Despite living in California, it can still be a problem and one rain-out is catastrophic for revenue. You work six days a week getting the track ready. Our tracks on the west coast are usually open just one night a week, about thirty-five Fridays or Saturdays in all, from March to November—and one shower ruins it all. The fans don’t come, but the bills continue to accumulate.

Then you have the idiots who sue you. Back when I was a kid, a race fan, who admitted he’d been drinking, fell through the bleachers in turn one. He sued and won a million dollars from our insurance company.

My point? Keeping it running isn’t going to be easy.

By the time the races do start, I’m kept fairly busy with complaints about ticket prices that haven’t changed in ten goddamn years, a drunk bastard who fell in the stands and then finally, I spot Aly and the boys in the concession stands.

Over the years, Aly has worked the concession stands since she was old enough to see over the counter. Her kids do the same.

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