Page 35 of All That Glitters
I could eat.
I could and should do every single other thing in the world, but all I wanted to do was talk to Helen, be alone with her outside on the terrace again, in the shell cottage… Anywhere, really.
I glanced at her. She was turned toward Brax and Hale again, talking about Daytona, the first race of the season, and laughing, but she was as tuned into my attention as I was to her truth. She didn’t believe her own words from a few minutes ago. Her focus was on me. She didn’t have to be looking at me or talking to me for that to be the case.
God… I had an ego, didn’t I?
She knew as much about racing as everyone else at the table. She drove karts as a kid just like the rest of us and had the talent to take it as far as she wanted. If she’d stayed with it, she could’ve been spectacular. I didn’t know what made her quit, but I remembered being a little put out with her when all of a sudden she turned up in the marketing department of Troye, Ltd. rather than as a driver alongside Hale, Brax, and me.
“Why did you quit racing?” I asked her, realizing for the first time that I never had. I had to lean close in order to gain her attention. If I touched her, it would be in the most inappropriate way for my mother’s dinner party, so, I simply leaned in her direction.
She didn’t acknowledge the question for so long that I wasn’t sure if she was ignoring me or if she just hadn’t heard me, but then she turned her head, her brow furrowed in confusion. I couldn’t blame her. It was a question out of left field.
“What?”
“Why did you quit?”
“I… I don’t know. I just didn’t want to keep going.”
Her eyes shifted and she pulled her lips in, just slightly. She was either uncomfortable with the question, or she was lying to me. Possibly both.
“And that’s it? After all those years racing with us? You just didn’t want to drive anymore?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“Okay.”
There was a moment… Everything and everyone faded away while we stared at each other. The second she blinked, the hum of conversations around us grew to full volume and that small spell was broken.
She started to turn away but didn’t.
“Why were you asking? It’s been what? Three years?”
“I was curious. Of the people who drive at this table, you’re the only one not still behind the wheel.”
“So? Why does it matter?”
“I don’t know yet.”
And honestly, I didn’t, but there was something that bothered me about the fact that she’d quit when I remembered how much fun she’d had, how much she seemed to love it.
It wasn’t lost on me that my focus was all over the place and that under normal circumstances, I wouldn’t be thinking about why Helen quit racing and I wouldn’t be thinking about fucking with her head just to get back at her brother.
But there was that word again. Normal.
These weren’t normal circumstances.
I looked the part, but I didn’t act the part.
Which brought my attention around to my father at the other end of the table and his earlier words to my mother that they didn’t know I’d overheard.
If I was smart, I’d concentrate more on my own issues about getting into a car, getting behind the wheel of one, than what my father might or might not be planning.
I’d concentrate on getting my head on straight and not worry about getting revenge or getting back at Hale through his sister.
If I was smart, I’d stop thinking about getting between the legs of Helen of Troye.
