Page 7

I don’t usually get scared before a race. There’s always a sense of anticipation, always some nerves, but never all-out fear.

But today, as I wait for the lights to go out, I’m icy with it.

Jacob survived the night. Survived the second surgery. My doctor friend from the stairwell, Dr. Ines Martin, told me that

just before I left the hospital. I should’ve been more relieved, but her eyes were worried and her voice was cautious, warning

me not to get hopeful. It’s still bad, she said. Still very bad.

I tried to get in to see him around six a.m., family be damned, only to be told politely but firmly by a ward clerk that the

nurses were doing their morning rounds, and no one, not even family, was allowed in.

Now, I’m going two hundred miles an hour down the straight at Circuit Paul Ricard, and it’s a good thing I’ve driven this

track before, because my brain sure as hell isn’t telling my body what to do.

I tortured myself all night on my cell phone, reading every article I could on the crash, but they all said the same thing, so I started stalking Jacob’s friends on Instagram instead.

His closest friends said nothing, except some who’d known Parrot and posted photos of him.

Some of Jacob’s more distant acquaintances posted long, narcissistic posts about how devastated they were.

His ex-girlfriend, a model, posted a photo of the two of them on a beach together, arms wrapped around each other, with the caption “You never know what you’ve got until you might lose it. ”

It got two thousand likes and about three hundred comments. A news site even reposted it with the caption “Nichols’ girlfriend

mourns as F2 driver remains in ICU.”

Girlfriend. The whole world thinks she’s his fucking girlfriend . She and Jacob dated for about three months, nearly two years ago. But now everyone thinks she’s his goddamn girlfriend.

In desperation, I even tracked down his friend Nate’s e-mail address and sent him a message asking if he’d heard anything.

He answered within a half hour— Sorry man, nothing yet . He probably thought it was weird I’d even asked. None of his friends know about him. About us.

My car barrels around turn one and an image flashes in my mind, Costa’s and Jacob’s cars smashing into Parrot’s. We held a

minute of silence for Parrot before this race. His younger sister and his father were there, and the two of them cried silently

through the whole thing. In a horrible, despicable way, I was jealous of them. At least they got to show their grief.

Meanwhile, all morning, people asked me what I thought of the crash, and I had to pretend to feel nothing. Or at least, to

feel no more than any other driver who hadn’t known the racers well. Matty, my teammate, was one of the first to find me.

“Did you get my texts, man?” he asked, the minute I saw him. His expression was unusually grave. “It’s so fucked up. I know

all those guys.”

“Nichols and Costa might still be fine,” one of Harper’s engineers chimed in.

Matty’s face was grim. “Even if they pull through, though, there’s no way they come out of it without some kind of brain injury.

At those speeds?” He shook his head. “No way.”

It’s stupid, I know, but until that moment I hadn’t thought about brain injuries. Something must’ve shown in my face, because

Matty frowned at me. “You alright, man? You look like shit.”

“M’fine,” I muttered.

But I’m not fine. I’m not even close to fine, and I’m definitely not safe to be racing right now. The g-forces in F1 cars

are always intense, but I’m so exhausted right now that my vision is going spotty in the corners, and my head feels like it’s

clamped in a vise. I’m driving so poorly that my race engineer is asking if something’s gone wrong with the car. I pick up

my pace automatically, but I’ve already been overtaken by two cars, and there’s a third coming up close behind me.

Brain injuries. It’s all I can think about. It’s what Parrot died from. That isn’t public knowledge, but I overheard the track

medics talking about it earlier. They weren’t gossiping, just talking about it in these low, hollow tones, like they’d never

seen anything so awful.

Fifty-two laps later, I cross the line in tenth place. It’s my worst finish this season, and I’m grateful for a reason to

look pissy and miserable as I step out of the car. I disappear into my trailer for a few minutes, but there’s no escaping

my obligations. I’ve got a press conference to do, and I just know all the damn questions they’re going to ask.

There are only five of us being interviewed—Mahoney and Clayton from Crosswire Racing, Josh Fry from Torrent, me, and Matty, who wound up finishing third from P7. The reporters settle in front of us in unusual silence. No one feels like celebrating today.

“Alright, first question from Sky1,” someone says. A beleaguered-looking reporter with gray hair stands up. I think his name’s

Pat.

“Tough race out there today,” he says. “Tough race. Obviously it’s hard to be out there today, after yesterday. Talk us through

your feelings coming into today.”

Talk us through your feelings.

Well, Pat, my boyfriend’s lying unconscious in a hospital right now, possibly dying as we speak, and I’m not allowed to set

foot inside his room. I haven’t slept in almost thirty hours and if someone asks me a single question about it, if someone

so much as says his name out loud, I might break down right here and now.

Eric Clayton answers for all of us. “Yeah, it’s not easy. No one wants to be here right now. I’m sure none of you want to

be here. But we have to be, so we are. It’s definitely not easy, but yeah. I think we were all racing for Ellis today.”

“Josh, you knew Ellis Parrot quite well,” the reporter says. “How are you holding up?”

Josh scrubs a hand over his head. He looks almost as bad as I feel. “Yeah, I knew him from F2. It’s definitely hard.”

“You raced with Nichols quite a bit, too, didn’t you?”

My heart twists. I know he doesn’t mean it the way I’m hearing it, but the way he says it makes it sound like Jacob’s already

dead.

Josh nods, and the reporter continues, “Have you heard any news about him or Antony Costa?”

“I spoke with Jacob’s brother this morning,” Josh says, and my head swivels toward him so fast, I get dizzy. “They can’t give out much information, obviously, but... yeah. It’s not good. It’s a really tough time for all of us. And I haven’t heard anything about Antony, unfortunately.”

Matty is giving me an odd look. He leans toward me with his hand over his mic, like he’s going to ask me something, but another

reporter interrupts.

“Travis, I have to ask—starting from P4 and ending up in tenth, your worst finish this season. Do you think yesterday’s crash

was playing at all on your mind? Did you know Ellis Parrot well?”

All eyes move toward me, and I hear myself answer as though from far away. “No, I don’t really know any of them.”

Matty frowns at me, but luckily the reporter moves on to him, leaving me to feel disgusted with myself. I should’ve said I

knew them, I realize belatedly. Then I’d have an excuse to go back to the hospital. I should’ve said I was going to visit them, that way no one would be surprised when I showed up. But no, instead I sat there on television

and said I don’t know the only person in the world who means anything to me. The only person I’ve ever loved.

Not that he’ll ever know I loved him. I’ve wanted to tell him for months now—I’ve felt it for even longer—but I kept chickening

out. I had a hundred opportunities. A hundred chances. Now, even if he wakes up, he might not be in any fit state to understand

me. God, why did Matty have to mention brain injuries?

Matty grabs my elbow on the way back to our trailer after the press conference.

“Yo, Keeping, are you okay?” He punches me hard on the arm when I weasel out of his grip. “Seriously, man, you look like hell

and you raced like shit. Do you need to see the team doctor or something?”

“I’m fine,” I say. “Slept like shit, that’s all.”

Matty grimaces. “Yeah, I know what you mean. It’s so fucked up. Ellis was a really good guy.”

I grunt in acknowledgment and then escape into my room. I pull on my street clothes without bothering to shower. I catch a

glimpse of myself in the mirror and see that, yes, Matty is right. I look appalling. The dark circles under my eyes are almost

violet, but more than that, I look like I’ve aged ten years overnight.

I can’t blow off our team debrief without calling attention to myself, so I trudge over to the motorhome meeting room and

spend an hour reassuring the team that no, the car doesn’t have any issues, and no, I’m not sick, just tired. Matty shoots

me suspicious looks from across the table, frowning even deeper every time I repeat my lies. My temper starts to fray by the

end of the hour, and I snap at one of my favorite engineers, Katie.

“I just had an off day, alright? I’m not allowed one fucking bad day?”

I regret the words even as I’m saying them. Forget about being unprofessional, I sound like an absolute dick. Katie raises

a sharp eyebrow but mercifully doesn’t call me out on it.

“I think that about wraps things up,” says our chief engineer, Freddie, after shooting me a frown.

Harper’s team boss, Stefan, who sat silently through the meeting, corners me afterward. He’s a gruff, bearded fellow who’s

usually about as talkative as I am, but today he thumps me on the shoulder like we’re old friends.

“It isn’t easy, racing after a bad crash,” he says in his thick Swedish accent. “You rest up the next two weeks.”

“Yes, sir,” I mumble.

“And you talk to your team like that again, I send you packing, yes?”

He’s probably not kidding. “Yes, sir,” I say quietly.

I escape to the parking lot, avoiding every microphone and camera and fan in sight, and then drive alone back to my hotel

room.

Our hotel room.

Not that it was really ours, technically speaking. Jacob always had his own hotel room, several miles away and several hundred

dollars a night cheaper, but when our race weekends overlapped, without fail, he’d show up past dark with a duffel bag and

a smile, and we’d spend the nights together.

It takes me a few minutes to work up the nerve to go inside the room. I wouldn’t have come back at all, except I can’t exactly

leave all my things here. I can’t leave all his things here.

I flash my key card over the lock and step inside. I walk through the room, moving like I’m in slow motion. I thought I’d

cried myself out in the locked ICU bathroom, but I’m not prepared for this at all. Housekeeping hasn’t been in—I always leave

the “Do Not Disturb” sign on the door—so everything is just how we left it yesterday morning. Jacob’s half-empty coffee cup

is on the table, with his laptop beside it. His hoodie is thrown over the back of the sofa. His toothbrush is in a cup by

the sink.

I sink onto the edge of the bed, holding onto control by a single, rapidly fraying thread. With shaking hands, I pull out

my phone and open up my texts from Jacob again, this time staring at the last one he sent me. It’s from early Friday morning,

right after he flew in.

Just landed. Headed to track now, soo tired lol. Pizza tn?

Pizza was definitely not on the list of approved foods for my strict diet, but whenever I pointed that out, Jacob would grin

and say we’d work off the calories afterward. We didn’t, though. Not Friday night. He was totally beat from traveling, and

I’d strained my shoulder a bit during free practice. Our last night together, and we spent it watching old MotoGP videos on

YouTube and eating takeout.

I don’t even remember if I kissed him before we fell asleep.

I don’t remember the last thing he said to me the next morning.

I’ve been racking my brain since the accident, but I still can’t remember. I know I made him coffee, and I remember asking

him where he and his parents were planning to go to dinner that night, but I don’t remember what he said before he left. I

was so focused on working up the nerve to tell him I loved him, I wasn’t listening to the last thing he said to me.

The lump in my throat is a vicious thing, and if I’m going to break down again, I should do it now, in private. But even as

the thought pops into my mind, someone raps on the door.

I freeze, hoping they’ll go away, but whoever’s out there knocks again.

“Yo, Keeping!” Matty hollers.

I bite down so hard on the inside of my cheek that I taste blood, and then force myself to go to the door.

“What?” I say unhelpfully.

“You left your ID at the track,” Matty says, holding it out to me. I take it from him with a muttered “Thanks.” Matty studies

me—really looks at me—and my stomach turns over. “What the fuck is wrong, man?” he asks. He tries to step inside, but I move

to the side, blocking him. The last thing I need is for him to see Jacob’s things everywhere.

“I told you, it’s nothing,” I snap. Then, almost immediately, I realize my mistake and backtrack. “I just have a brutal migraine, that’s all. Need to lie down,” I add pointedly.

“Ah shit,” Matty says, frowning. “I didn’t know you get migraines. My sister gets wicked ones. I think she takes Imitrex for

’em. You have any of that shit around?”

Of course Matty would have a sister with migraines. “Yeah, I’ve got something,” I lie. “Really gotta lie down, though.”

“Right, of course. You need me to get anything for you?”

The offer sounds genuine, and for a moment I feel awful. I’ve been brushing Matty off since I joined Harper, but that’s never

stopped him from being nice to me, or texting me, or generally being a good person. Even in the last few months, with some

of the media running snarky stories about how much I’m outperforming him, he’s never once been anything but pleasant to me.

“I’m good, but thanks, man.” I try to close the door in his face before I can do something stupid, like burst into tears,

but he catches it just before it closes.

“Did you hear the good news, though?” he asks. “Antony Costa’s conscious again. Totally fucked up his legs, but he’s completely

with it. The doctors think he’ll turn out okay.”

“That’s great,” I croak.

“Yeah. Doubt he’ll be racing anytime soon, but at least he’s going to make it.”

I nod twice, blinking quickly. “No word about Jacob?”

I’m such a mess, I forget to call him Nichols. I don’t think Matty notices.

“No, nothing. Still critical, that’s all it says online.”

“Right.”

“Anyway, I’ll let you crash. You text me if you need anything, yeah?”

“Yeah,” I say, already closing the door.

I wait until I hear the telltale ding of the hotel elevator, then I curl up on Jacob’s side of the bed, hug his favorite hoodie

into my chest, and cry like I’m a fucking toddler.