I toss my phone aside and go to the kitchen to make some food, but I’m so distracted I’m barely aware of what I’m doing.
I remember how close Martha, Divya, Fallon, and I used to be. We’d go out on weekends and get hangover brunch together afterward, we’d have movie nights at our apartment and commiserate with each other about bad exams, bad breakups, bad days. Sure, we annoyed each other sometimes, but we also had a ton of fun together. We really were best friends. I’m not misremembering it.
But I suppose it’s only natural it couldn’t last. University was a long time ago now, and we’ve all gone our different ways and grown into different people. And if I’m being totally honest with myself... even if they lived here in Waldon right now, I’m still not sure we’d still be close friends. We’re too different now. And it isn’t a bad thing, it’s just... a thing. It’s just the way it is. I think I wasjust trying to hold onto it because I was lonely, or because I felt like I still needed them. Even if what I needed was something they were never going to give me.
I sit down at my kitchen table and take a bite of my dinner. And yuck, okay, I should have paid more attention while I was cooking. I’ve definitely put sugar on this haddock instead of salt.
Oh, well. I take another bite of sugared fish. This was an important revelation.
My phone dings with a text, and for a split second I wonder if it’ll be Divya, saying something that will prove my whole theory wrong. But it isn’t. It’s Kiara.
[6:07]Kiara:Awesome! We can chat more about it tomorrow—I hear you’re riding with us?
[6:07] If that’s okay??
[6:08]Kiara: Duh. Pick you up at eight?
I smile.
[6:08] Sounds great.
24
Motors growl in the distance, and the air is thick with the smell of gasoline and burning rubber. I rise up onto my toes to see the race cars approaching, winding around the last corner of the track.
They roar by, one by one, and I grin a little wider when John’s car goes by. He’s not actually driving it—his friend Tim does most of the driving—but he’s up in the control tower with a radio, giving Tim updates on his lap times and waiting to leap into action whenever there’s a pit stop or when the car breaks down (which it’s done, like, three times already).
“Are they winning yet?” Kiara asks. She’s lying on a blanket on the grass beside me, with her sunglasses on and her hands thrown up over her face to block the sun.
“Nope,” I say, sitting back down beside her. “Still second.”
It’s the third race of the day, and I’m getting better at being able to tell what position John’s car is in. It sounds like it would be obvious—if he’s the second car that whizzes by, they’re in second place, right?
Wrong.
All the cars are in different classes—John and Tim’s car is in GT3, which means... I don’t know, something about the speed—so he’s not actually racing everyone that’s out on track. And after a few laps, the cars in the slower classes have been passed so much that it’s hard to tell who’s doing well.
I take a slice of watermelon from the container Kiara brought and turn my face up into the sun. This whole day has been way more fun than I thought it would be. The racetrack has wide green fields and trees all around it, and there’s this one slope of grass that overlooks most of the track, so all the spectators (and by that I mean me, Kiara; her husband, Jake; and like twenty other people) sit on blankets or lawn chairs on the grass.
The atmosphere is kind of fun too. It’s a community of Johns, people who love talking about cars and looking at cars and thinking about cars, but everyone’s really friendly and all the drivers visit each other’s trailers to chat between races. And whenever something goes wrong with one of the cars (which happens, like, every ten minutes), people drop by to help out or loan out a tool or replacement part.
When Kiara and Jake and I arrived, we sat in John’s trailer for a while, watching people come and go. And I swear I’m not being biased, but it seems like whenever something goes wrong, people want John’s opinion. It’s kind of cool, seeing how knowledgeable he is—even if I don’t understand half of what he’s saying.
It’s also kind of cool to see him and his friends racing. It’s just a small track, but they still drive crazy fast, and it’s sort of thrilling when John or Tim pass another car (sorry, “overtake” another car—no one here calls it passing) or win a race. Meanwhile, Kiara and I nibble on snacks she brought from home, and Jake tells us stories about vet school, and it’s all just really lovely and fun.
Kiara and Jake make a really good couple. She’s super cool, and he’s sort of nerdy, so they kind of balance each other out. They bicker a lot—we got a bit lost on the drive down and I thoughtKiara was going to murder him—but you can tell it’s just their way of communicating with each other.
“How long have you two been married?” I ask.
“Too long,” Kiara says.
“Seven years,” Jake answers.
“Wow.” I take a bite of watermelon. “When did you know Kiara was the one?” I ask Jake. I say it in a teasing way, like I’m not seriously asking, but Kiara isn’t fooled.
“Ooh, thinking John might be the one, are we?” she teases.
“No,” I lie. “We’ve only been dating, like, a few weeks.”
