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I’ll tell you one thing for certain. I’m jealous of every motherfucker making eye contact with her. I’m pissed off at the ones who tickle River’s sides and attempt to get on her good side. They’re only doing it for one reason only.
Good God, what the fuck is wrong with me? Boyfriend?
What in the hell possessed me to agree to that?
“You’re up after Shade,” Scarlet tells me, tossing me my helmet.
Catching it, I sigh, my eyes drifting around the riders’ paddock set up in the streets of Pasadena. I can’t for the life of me get my mind on anything but Amberly and River.
My stomach burns, my throat tightens and the thoughts inside me spin so fast I’m nauseous and on the edge of insanity.
I’m jittery and shaking, and it’s not from cocaine or pills. It’s me and my mind. The chaos inside me I can’t understand.
Rod walks by and it’s worse. So much worse. Just seeing his face sends a rush of warmth through my veins. I have no real reason to hate him, or do I? My mother is dead, so I can’t hate her. Might as well hate the man she chose over her own kids.
I saw a therapist after my dad died. The courts made Ricky send us. Anyway, that therapist told me anger needs a face. I’m thinking she meant something else entirely, but I was six years old and took it literally. Still do.
“Glad to see youshowedup,” Rod says in passing and then stops in front of my bike with his walkie-talkie in one hand and a Monster Energy in the other. Look at him, promoting the sponsor.
Sellout.
Rod eyes me, his black polo neatly pressed and barely concealing the fact that he’s put on twenty pounds in the last year. “Stay out of the crowd this time.”
Ha. Like I’m going to listen you to, motherfucker.
Adjusting the Velcro on my gloves, I contemplate how much trouble I’d get into if I did a wheelie and gave him a face full of my front tire.
Probably a lot. I’ve already been arrested once this week.
To my right, holding a baby on her hip, Willa points at me, her warning clear, and for good measure, she mouths, “Knock. It. Off,” when I rev my bike and rock it forward.
It’s in neutral. It’s not like I’m going to do anything. . . maybe.
Rod glares, leaves, and I’m left alone.
You may or may not be aware of this, but freestyle motocross is fuckin’ corrupt as any other sport. It’s about as dirty as professional boxing. And it’s because of the riders and judges. Favoritism provoked by popularity and the occasional outright cheating takes place. I’ve seen riders buy medals in some of the biggest events. Certainly not me or my brothers, but it happens.
Doug Johnson, as the race director, he’s as corrupt as they come. It made me question all our sports and if there was the same bullshit going on.
With Doug Johnson being the head judge, naturally, I knew I was never winning any of the events.
So then I thought, if I can’t win, what the fuck am I doing on the tour? It’s bullshit, right?
Freestyle riders are constantly hurt. I’ve broken more bones in my body than I care to admit, so if I was going to use the excuse of, “Hey, man, I’m hurt and can’t compete,” to get off the tour, I had to do something gnarly and hopefully not kill myself before Amberly lets me fuck her.
I’m kidding. Partially.
Anyway, I decide I need to miss a jump. Or bail mid-air. Again, risky, but I’ve done it before so hopefully this time I won’t break my pelvis. Done that and don’t care to ever again.
Maybe noticing the crazy on my face, Shade stares at me, his brow pulled together, his hair wild and sticking straight up, helmet in hand having just come off his own run. “You got that look in your eye, Wild Cat.”
Shade’s had the best run all night, by far, and put up a flawless run before me. He’s always so calculated, so smooth, so technical. “Maybe I’m going for the triple,” I taunt, winking.
He revs his bike, shaking his head and putting his helmet back on. “Yeah, right.”
I won’t. I haven’t practiced it, and that’s fucking suicide. Shade would know. A year ago, in Madrid, Spain, he attempted the triple and broke his neck. Obviously he lived, and eventually landed it six months later in Sacramento at the opening night of AfterShock.
That’s Shade’s thing. He goes for the never been done tricks for dramatics. I go for the flare and fuck you of the sport. The tricks that get the most shock from the crowd and leave the judge thinking, “I can’t score that.”