The Outside Groove (5 page)

“I need some advice,” I said.

“What kind of advice?”

“Driving advice.”

Uncle Harvey looked at me a moment longer, then retreated into the shop. I followed him, watching as he stood at a workbench and thumbed through a manual about as thick as five Granite County phone books bound together. I took the opportunity to check the place out. Two cars filled the left half of the garage. One of them was an SUV with its front end squished in, bits of grillwork sticking out like straw from a hay bale. The other was an old Volvo station wagon with its hood open.

“Guy who drives that SUV should've come to me for driving advice,” Uncle Harvey said. “I'd have told him to get off the cell phone and drive.” He lifted the manual off the workbench and dropped it with a thud. “The parts on these monsters don't come cheap.”

“What's the story with the Swedish job?”

“Alternator. Wear-and-tear thing. They just give up eventually, those old parts”—he flipped his chin at the SUV again—“if you don't go smashing them up first.”

“So, are you doing body
and
engine work?”

Uncle Harvey smiled his gap-toothed smile. “If you've got a toaster isn't cooking your bread the way you like it, bring it on in.” His smile dimmed. “But something tells me you're not here about a toaster.”

“I need a car.”

“What's that you're driving, a bicycle built for two?”

“I need a racecar.”

His expression grew very dim, on the verge of dark. “A racecar,” he said. “What's this all about then?”

“I'm racing in the season opener at Demon's.”

“You are?”

“I want to.”

“This year's? The one in just two weeks or so?”

“That one. I got the idea while you and I were talking last night.”

“Oh, no.”

“Actually, I've been thinking about it for a while. I don't want to make a career of it or anything.”

“A wise choice.”

“I just want to, you know, see what it feels like.”

Uncle Harvey looked around the shop, his eye falling on the SUV's smashed grill. “Well then, I can get you set up and you can drive around the field out there.” He gestured toward the pasture out back of the garage.

“No. I want to race. Bumper to bumper. I'm doing it.”

Uncle Harvey stared me down.

I stared back. I was tempted to deliver a mini-speech about how I was sick of living on Planet Stock Car without knowing what was so special about racing, about how racing was the only language spoken in my house or in any house within fifty miles in any direction. But I resisted. After all, Uncle Harvey had run Big Daddy's crew back in the old days. What could I tell him that he didn't already know? “I figured you might have some, you know, tips for me,” I said.

“Tips. Right.”

“But if you're too busy, I'll just go out to Granite Autoland. See what they've got in the way of four-cylinder—”

“Well, if you're so determined about it...” Uncle Harvey cut me off, eyes still locked on me and narrowed, as if telling me to spare him the game of pretending that I'd actually dare go anywhere but to him to hook up a Road Warrior ride. “I'm glad you came up. But I'll tell you something: a car's the least of your worries.”

“What do you mean?”

He stepped out of the shop and surveyed the inventory, if the word
inventory
could apply to the beaters and wrecks dotting his property like a herd of sick cattle. “You don't need anything fancy, do you?” he said.

“I don't have much money to spend.”

“We're not going to discuss money. We'll call this a belated birthday present for the last, oh...” He seemed to lose his train of thought as his eye fell on a yellowish pickup truck covered to its wheel wells in weeds. “I can get you the better part of a four-cylinder engine out of that. But the trannie's no good. Might need part of that Chevy over there.” He pointed to a red sedan up on blocks. “Springs, wheel bearings...” He scratched at his chin stubble with his left hand while his right pointed out cars as if he were adding them up. He rested his hands on his hips and turned back to the shop. “I could get the torch and work up some kind of rollbar and cage. Pull some seatbelts for a harness. They're real picky about the harness now, I've heard.” He spat.

“I don't care what kind of car it is,” I said. “I just need something that runs as fast as the others. I want a fair shot.”

Uncle Harvey looked at Hilda. “Well, fast is definitely important,” he said. “But there's more to it than that.”

“Like what?”

“Like techniques, strategies, rules, and regulations.”

“What kind of rules and regulations?”

Uncle Harvey crossed his arms and looked beyond me, in the general direction of town. “So you haven't signed up for this thing yet?”

“No. Not yet.”

“Did you know that you had to sign up?”

“Yes. Well, no. I figured that there had to be some kind of, you know...”

“Oh, there's definitely some kind of ‘you know.' You need to see Don Blodgett.”

“The track boss?”

“The director of racing, yes. Know where his office is?” “Out at the track. In that cinderblock building behind Beer Belly Hill.”

“That's right.” Uncle Harvey snorted and shook his head. “I'd almost forgotten. The infamous Beer Belly Hill.”

The few times I'd been to Demon's Run, early in Wade's career when my parents made me go, I usually sat in the grandstands. Once or twice I sat in the section at the far end, adjacent to a grassy embankment that everyone called Beer Belly Hill. That seating area got its name because it was popular with fans who went to Demon's Run as much to drink beer as to watch the races. The Beer Belly Hill crowd could get pretty rowdy, especially when there were a lot of wrecks. All that smashing and crashing got them worked up.

“What do I do, fill out a form?” I said.

“Yeah. Exactly. And you pay Blodgett the license fee.”

I hesitated, and Uncle Harvey eyed me.

“You didn't know there was a license fee?”

“No.”

“Well, there is. I don't know how much he's charging, Blodgett, but the license is good for the whole season. I doubt he gives scholarships. He's a businessman. Runs a tight ship.”

I automatically began considering waiting for my financial-aid award letter from Cray before plunking down hard-earned baby-sitting and tutoring money on a few spins around a racetrack. “I'm doing it,” I said, then repeated the statement, just to make sure I'd said it the first time. “I'm doing it.”

Uncle Harvey scratched his chin again. “What do your folks think about this?”

Again I hesitated, and he seemed to pick up on something. He nodded. “I see. They don't know.”

“Oh, I told them. They just don't believe me. Or if they believe me, they don't think I'll follow through. But it's not like they care one way or the other.”

Uncle Harvey whistled a faint laugh through his teeth. “I had a feeling it was something like this. Don't ask me why, Casey, but when I saw you power-sliding across my lawn, I just had a feeling something was up.”

“Will you still help me?”

Uncle Harvey looked at his boots. He appeared insulted. When he looked up again, he wore a serious expression. “Sure,” he said. “I'll help you. You should know one thing, though.”

“What?”

“If people know I'm helping you, that's not going to be such a good thing.”

“Why?” I asked, though I'd sensed, the moment I left my house to come up here, that I shouldn't tell my family that I'd reunited with Uncle Harvey, not if I wanted my racing plans to be anything more than plans.

“Never mind why,” Uncle Harvey said. “It's a long story, and it's got nothing to do with anything anymore. You want my help, I'm glad to give it. Just let's focus on racing.” He looked into the sky above his cottage and hooted. “Two weeks. Girl wants to run the Demon in two weeks.”

I resisted the urge to tell him what I was thinking, what I'd always thought: that I didn't see how there was
that
much to learn about driving a racecar around in circles. Four left turns. Then four more. And so on until the checkered flag came out. Frankly, I was surprised that no one had trained monkeys to do it yet. It seemed that simple. But instead of presenting this theory, I told Uncle Harvey, “I just want to do my best,” which was true enough. It just so happened that I thought my best would be a shock to anyone who thought the idea of my racing at Demon's Run was about the funniest thing they'd ever heard. They might just notice me after all—just before I put them in my rearview mirror for good.

“Well all right then,” Uncle Harvey said. “I'm not going to stand in the way of a girl trying to do her best.” That light I'd seen dancing in his eyes down at the fishing access flickered.

Just seeing that light and hearing him utter an encouraging word made me feel strangely close to him, like I'd known him all my life, which I guess I had, just not well.

“So here's what we're going to do.” He pointed toward his driveway. “You go and see Blodgett. Right?”

“I'll go today.”

Uncle Harvey surveyed the cars again. “And I'll set up a ride. It may not be pretty, but it'll get you around the track.”

“It doesn't need to be pretty.”

Uncle Harvey slid the wrench out of the loop on his pants. “I'm glad to hear it,” he said, “because pretty isn't worth much on a racetrack. And it sure doesn't last.”

***

Two vehicles sat parked outside the Demon's Run office, a one-story cinderblock building behind Beer Belly Hill. One of the vehicles was a new-looking, red-and-chrome tow truck with a big winch, crane, and hook. I remembered a vehicle like it from past visits to the track: People called it simply “the Hook.” The other vehicle was an enormous black pickup truck that also looked brand-new. Mr. Blodgett, the director of racing, was reputed to maintain extremely high standards for his enterprise. Rumor held that he personally inspected the Demon's Run restrooms for cleanliness every race day before opening the front gates. The condition of his vehicles supported that characterization. Only a shade of dried mud painting the pickup's undercarriage and a peeling bumper sticker indicated that the vehicle had been driven anywhere but around a dealership lot. I knew the bumper sticker well. Big Daddy had one on his pickup truck, Mom had one on her station wagon, and Wade had one on the Red Snake and on his bedroom door: DEMON'S RUN RACEWAY—
CATCH IT IF YOU CAN...

I knocked on the door.

A man bellowed, “It's open,” and I stepped into a cramped room, where two chairs behind a coffee table faced a metal desk. The office was windowless, so my eyes needed a few seconds to adjust to the space before I spotted Mr. Blodgett rising from behind the desk. He was a large man, probably six-three and thick, which, along with his neatly trimmed beard, gave him the appearance of a tidy lumberjack. “Hello, Casey,” he said, as if we were well acquainted, which we were, in a way, since he'd been with Demon's Run since before I was born.

“Hi, Mr. Blodgett.”

With a wince, he shifted his weight. Mr. Blodgett had one problem leg—the result of a car accident, ironically enough, at least according to local lore. He gestured toward the chairs. “What can I do for you?”

I took a quick look around the office. It may not have been spacious, but it certainly was neat. The racing magazines on the coffee table were laid out like fan folds.

“Well,” I began, “I came to sign up for the Road Warriors.”

Mr. Blodgett sat down and nodded thoughtfully. “Road Warriors,” he repeated, but the fact that he didn't begin opening drawers and pulling out papers suggested there was more to discuss.

“Yes. I've heard there's a season's license I have to get.”

Again he nodded. “That's right.” Again he didn't pull out any papers.

“How much is it?”

Mr. Blodgett drummed his knuckles on his desk. “Hold up a second.” He passed one hand over his beard, smoothing it down, even though it was trimmed so neatly it looked like a patch of gray-black flannel. “It's like this,” he added. “I like to ask the drivers a few questions before anyone commits to anything here.”

“OK.” I slipped my checkbook from my sweatshirt pocket and reached for a pen in the papier-mache mug on his desk. The mug resembled one that I'd made in art class when I was in elementary school—same size, same shape. I could make out the word
Dad
creeping around the side of the mug. The one I'd made read
Big Daddy.

“First off, do your folks know you're doing this?”

I nodded. “Told them last night.”

“And what do they think about it?”

“They think it's pretty funny.”

“Funny.” Mr. Blodgett frowned, as if unfamiliar with the term. “Hmm.” He straightened a couple of envelopes on his desk and clasped his big hands, then stared at the door leading out to the track. “Did they discuss with you the dangers involved?”

I shrugged. “Not exactly.”

“Well, maybe they should. And once that's done—”

“My mind's made up,” I said and began writing the date on a check.

Mr. Blodgett watched me for a few seconds. “You've seen your brother race,” he said, “so you know those cars get banged around pretty good. ”

“Yes, I know.”

“Now, granted, those are Thundermaker cars. In the Road Warrior division, the cars don't move as fast, but just ask Wade—he's driven in both divisions—running with the Warriors can be rough.” He drummed his fingers again and tilted his head, as if hearing an odd sound off in the distance. “Come to think of it, don't ask Wade,” he said. “The kid's fearless. You remember the Firecracker 50 from a few years back?”