Page 1 of Off the Grid

PROLOGUE

Riggs

Sugar.

Little popping sensations burst and snap as I close my mouth around the fluffy, cottony substance. It soon dissolves on my tongue.

I eat the pink cloud first.

A small pinch of it for every lap.

Another bite for every time my dad’s car flies through the narrow back straight making my chest rumble and my ears vibrate beneath my headset.

I try to time it so it lasts until the halfway point of the race. I know it’s halfway when my mum moves to the front of the box we sit in. That’s her thing. Her good luck position. The place she stood when my dad last won a race.

The blue cloud of sugar is next.

I play the game again. One piece for each lap.

Until one piece is left.

I save it for him.

I don’t eat it so that when he gets out of the car and rushes over to hug me, he can put it on his tongue, make an exaggerated smacking sound, and say, “Mm-mmm-mmm, victory is sweet.”

I’ll giggle because he sounds silly saying it with his hair all sweaty and helmet marks creased into his cheeks.

Then he lifts me up on his shoulders so I can see all the people patting him on the back, congratulating him.

So many people love you when you’re a driver—especially when you finish on the podium.

But not like I love him. Or like Mum does.

My body vibrates as another pack of cars zoom through the final straight at the grandstands. But I don’t look up this time. I’m too busy staring at what’s left of my blue cloud of sugar. Too busy wondering if I take another small bite, if that’ll leave enough for my dad.

There’s no way it’s going to last—I look up to the television in the booth to see the number on the screen—ten more laps.

No way at all.

I lick my lips—the sugar sticky there. Maybe if I skip a few laps. Maybe that’ll be okay, and he’ll never know I messed up.

“Goddammit.”

I hear the curse even with the headphones on and glance up. Mum has stepped back from her lucky spot. Gunther, the guy who tells Dad what to do, is mad.

Again.

He likes to yell at Dad and throw his headset sometimes.

He takes too many risks.

He’s going to get somebody killed.

Why do we keep rewarding his daredevil ways?

It paid off this time. What about the next though?

I memorize what Gunther says in the booth. Then later, when Dad’s tucking me in, I tell him what he says. We giggle at how silly his threats sound.