What would it have felt like to drive past these stands full of cheering people on race day? To hear them, see them, experience the spectacle of the Indy 500 with them?
When she reached the yard of bricks, that infamous three-foot swatch of the original track surface, she came to her knees and gingerly placed her hands on the textured blocks. She remembered the vibration of the car as she sped over this strip, the briefzoopof the tires as they hit the roughness. She rubbed the bricks, breath catching as she imagined the emotion of driving over this sacred piece of pavement as the green flag waved. She’d been so close. So very close.
A decade ago, she thought she’d lost any chance at the Indy 500. Janet had given her that hope back, and the second loss of it hurtworse than the first. Back then, she hadn’t really known what she lost. But now, she knew it was more than a race she’d squandered: She’d lost the support of a team, the regard of people she respected, participation in something bigger than herself. But more than anything, she’d lost the last chance to prove to herself that her earlier success wasn’t all a fluke.
The Indy 500 was her chance to redeem herself, to herself. And she’d failed.
Mack rolled to her back, lying directly on the row of bricks—a pathetic imitation of Dan Wheldon, a beloved driver gone way too soon, who famously celebrated his win by rolling around on the yard of bricks. The rough texture of the pavement on her back was a pleasure-pain, cold and coarse and full of longing.
Was Wes right? Was Mack living her life like a prison sentence? She knew she was lucky—Wes was healthier than ever, Shaw was bright and solid, Mack had a roof over her head and work that paid the bills—but why could that never be enough for her? Why did she feel like she needed this place, this experience,this raceto complete her?
The ground was cool but Mack’s face heated with shame. Here in the dark silence, she could admit that Wes was right about one thing: Her deepest self had exhaled in relief when Wes told her he was selling the dirt track. She did not want to run a small business. He’d hurt her by going behind her back, but he’d released her, too. She sat up and hugged her knees tight into her chest. The dark sky was starless, the blinking lights hidden by clouds and light pollution. Above her, the bird’s nest hung thirty feet high, the signal flags neatly rolled and tucked away.
If she was released from the dirt track, what would fill that space? Shaw, of course, always. She’d build new stability for Shaw, and if Kelley wanted to fight her for custody, he’d better come with a dozen lawyers and a crowbar because Mack would fight clean, dirty, and everything in between to give Shaw the life she deserved. She’d move the damn galaxy to keep her daughter safe.
But what if the life her daughter deserved wasn’t the life Mack was giving her? What if Wes was right about that, too? Had she made Shaw’s life too predictable and too small? Mack had closed out anyone from her former career who’d bothered to stay in touch. She didn’t have local friends, didn’t hang out with the other school moms, never dated and only did the hookup apps. In closing herself off, had Mack accidentally closed off Shaw?
Mack pushed away Leo because she wanted to protect both Shaw and her reputation. Her reputation was garbage now, but still she couldn’t imagine opening Shaw up to heartbreak and exposure if Mack pursued something with Leo and it didn’t work out. Mack could hardly imagine opening herself to it. But she pictured Leo handing over the keys to the car he’d built with his own hands, putting his faith in her after she’d shut him out repeatedly. Was she right to push him away from herself and, possibly, eventually, Shaw? She’d put Leo firmly in the category of things she could not have, but what about what Mack deserved? After so many years of deprivation and denial, after being released from the family business and Wes’s caretaking, what could she allow herself to have?
Surrounded on both sides by grandstands, she remembered how, as little girls, she and Laurie begged Wes to buy seats in this section so they could see the start-finish line, but her dad insisted they sit in turn three. He swore they were the best seats in the arena, with sight lines coming out of turn two, down the entire backstretch, all of turn three, the short chute, and a solid sight line of turn four. They grew to love the seats, learning firsthand to sit where they could see most of the racing, not only who won or lost.
Racing. Winning. Losing.
Even the best drivers in history lost more races than they ever won, yet they continued to get in the car and floor the throttle anyway. Every driver’s ultimate goal was winning, but no one would race—and take on the risks—if they didn’t enjoy what happened in between the start and finish. Before her first race, Wes had gotten down on his knees, pulledher hands into his own, and said, “Spec, you can’t choose everything that happens to you in a race, but you can choose to never, ever quit.That’swhat racing really is. It’s not always the best driver who wins the race, but the driver who refuses to give up.” The words looped in her head, drawled in Wes’s slow Hoosier accent, as if he were sitting next to her on the bricks.
Mack looked out at the grandstands and watched them disappear around the turns. Over the years, she’d let the dream of the Indy 500 become bigger than any other element in her life except for Shaw. She’d wanted to race here above everything else, and when that dream disappeared, she let all of racing disappear, too. She’d been afraid Kelley would take Shaw away, and she’d let that fear keep her quiet and small. Laurie had hurt her, big and blindsiding, and Mack had never let her back into her confidence. She’d taken every one of her responsibilities and heartbreaks—Shaw, Kelley, Wes, Laurie, the dirt track—and treated them as impenetrable roadblocks.
Mack had been so focused on the finish line of her life, so focused on the one win she would never have, that she’d forgotten to run the rest of the damn race. Hell, she’d stopped pulling up to the starting line.
She’d thought she’d had no choice, but she hadn’t even let herself consider options until that night Janet showed up and forced her hand. Until Laurie let her move in without a single question. Until Leo encouraged Mack to be herself, then told her that her ugly, unruly parts didn’t make her unworthy.
Now she was surrounded by choices: where to live, what to do with her life, how to create new relationships with her family. How to get in the car andrace.
Maybe Leo was right: She’d lost the Indy 500 today, but it didn’t have to be the end of racing. Of her second chance. Of anything.
She got to choose the direction of her life.
She’d always protect Shaw above all else, but maybe Mack could do more than just protect. Maybe she could buckle Shaw in tight, stoplooking in her rearview mirror, and drive the damn car forward toward something instead of staying parked in place.
There was a lot of race left to run, and Mack refused to give up on herself any longer.
With one last glance at the Speedway, she jogged back to Leo’s trailer. She couldn’t figure out her entire life tonight, but she could steer toward one thing she knew she wanted. Leo answered her knock, hair sleep-mussed but his eyes warm and welcoming. He stood several steps above her, and Mack tilted her head up to study him.
“I don’t know where this leads,” she whispered.
“We don’t have to have a map,” Leo said softly, stepping down until he stood barefoot in the grass next to her.
They could do such damage. He could hurt her, or Mack could hurt him more than she already had. They could crash out. But they’d never know if they didn’t start the engine and see where the road led. Slowly, Mack stepped forward until they were close enough to feel each other’s body heat. Leo waited patiently, his breaths audible but his body still. She stood on her tiptoes and kissed him, gently at first and then firm and fast, trying to say everything she couldn’t say with words. With her body, she told him what she needed, what she wanted, until he grabbed her by the waist and lifted her up the stairs of the RV.
Chapter 33
1 week until the Indianapolis 500
The morning sky was overcast, too dark for Mack to see who was incessantly pounding on the RV door at such a cruelly early hour. She fumbled for the lock and when she finally yanked the door open, Laurie took a step back.
“What the hell are you wearing?”
Mack looked down at her body, ensconced in a neon pink-and-orange zebra-stripe pajama set with pink feathers on the cuffs. Billie hadn’t said a word last night when Mack showed up at two a.m. in one of Leo’s T-shirts, and she’d stayed silent as she turned the sofa into a bed and handed Mack a pair of clean pajamas. She’d treated Billie with suspicion and rudeness, and sometimes Billie deserved it with her weird kelp noodles and scented body glitter, but she’d done nothing worse than love on the Williams family with generosity and joy. As she’d left a glass of water and two Advil on the table by Mack’s bed, Mack had decided she’d try to get to know her dad’s girlfriend.
