I turn on the TV and flick aimlessly through the channels.
“Call now and get forty percent off—”
Click.
“—unrest spreading throughout the country—”
Click.
“—Travis Keeping, champion of the world!”
I freeze in place, my heart rendered motionless in my chest.
I didn’t even realize it was a Sunday.
I didn’t realize it was the last race.
It’s nighttime in Abu Dhabi, and fireworks are exploding over the track. The Harper mechanics are hanging off the fencing beside the finish line, cheering furiously as Travis flies past. Mahoney and Clayton from Crosswire Racing roar by, a second behind him.
The cameras shift to the Harper garage, where the team is in hysterics, jumping up and down and cheering.
I watch, frozen, as Travis pulls his car into parc fermé. He sits for a moment without moving, and my chest feels so tight, I’m not sure that I’m breathing.
He gets out of the car and puts the steering wheel back in. The commentator is laughing about how he still seems so unflappable.
“A man of few words,” he says.
“Catching his breath, I’d say,” the other commentator laughs. “That was incredible. I really thought Mahoney had him in those last few laps—”
“I think we all did! Ah, there we go—now we’re seeing some excitement—”
It’s true. Travis’ pace is picking up, he’s jogging to the crowd of Harper crew waiting for him. With his helmet still on, he pulls two of them into a tight hug.
“Look at that,” the commentator says. “That’s what we like to see, incredible sportsmanship from Matty—such a shame he didn’t finish the race—”
“Ah, and that’s Travis’ partner, Heather—”
Travis is hugging a gorgeous girl with long dark hair and freckles, and there’s something in the way he holds her that just breaks me into a million pieces. She’s got tears in her eyes, and Travis’ teammate Matty is grinning so hard it looks like his face is going to split open, and I think I might be sick.
I know that Travis is not straight. I know that girl is not his girlfriend.
But I’ve never seen him hug anyone the way he’s hugging those two.
They let him go eventually and he walks back to take off his helmet, but I turn the TV off before it happens. I don’t want to see his face.
My chest hurts so badly, and there’s the most vicious, painful lump in the back of my throat.
He did it. He won the championship.
And he did it without me.
Paul is shouting something at me from the kitchen, but I can’t really hear him. There’s a horrible rushing sound in my ears, and it’s getting harder and harder to breathe. I stumble up the stairs to my bedroom and lock the door behind me. I curl up on my bed, hug a pillow into my chest, and suck in shallow, wheezy breaths. I’ve never felt this way before. I can’t breathe—I can’tthink. Ihaven’t cried since my crash, not once, but my breath is coming quicker now. Hot tears spill out over my cheeks, and then I’m sobbing, flat-out bawling like a child. The commentator’s words are stuck on a loop in my brain, playing over and over and over.
Travis Keeping.
Champion of the world.
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