CHAPTER THREE
Emma
Lifting weights usually made my body feel good. But that Friday, it wasn’t having any of that.
It really just wanted me to crawl into bed and stay there. Maybe forever.
The iron weights echoed through the vast space of the airplane hangar as I slid them into position, then screwed on the bolts to get them to stay. It was cooler in here, away from the hundred-degree Arizona sun, but my face was already dripping with sweat. Along with our old go-karts, I had my favorite thing in the world, my 1987 Canyon Red Ford Thunderbird I’d nicknamed Killer, as my audience. I’d gone about a million laps around the dirt track out back in that thing, and it was like my baby, so it should’ve inspired me.
Wrapping the weightlifting gloves tight around my wrists, I sat down on the bench and wriggled under the bar. Then I tried to press the barbell over my chest.
And I couldn’t.
Seventy-five pounds was an easy weight for me too. A lightweight. I should’ve been able to lift it like it was nothing. Race car drivers needed muscles in their upper body to perform the longer, more grueling drives. Instead, my chest muscles screamed for mercy. I took a deep breath, trying to funnel all my determination into the muscles of my upper body. I managed to lift it off the support but knew the second I had it free that, without anyone to spot me, I was in trouble. Muscles trembling, I let the barbell clatter into place, then sat up and groaned.
Barbell one, Emma zero.
Last thing we needed was two injured Jameses in this house because injured Jameses were the worst kind of pissed off you could imagine. Take Brody, for instance. He’d come home from the hospital a few days ago, and since then, he’d become the dictionary definition of… silently enraged. Or maybe just bitter. Or simply sad.
He didn’t smile, did nothing but lie in bed, and on the rare occasion he got his butt moving, just sat on the couch, looking out the window. He wouldn’t talk to anyone, and when I attempted any kind of conversation, he acted like I was a ghost he couldn’t see or hear.
He’d seriously begun to worry me.
I rolled my shoulders. My arms felt like jelly, like they’d never be normal again. I stretched my bi’s and tri’s, linked my fingers together behind my back to expand my chest, but I felt what it must’ve been like to be an eighty-year-old lady. My back muscles ached, my neck tendons ached, hell, body parts I didn’t even know I possessed were yelling at me.
I’d thought I was in reasonably good shape, but apparently a three-mile run every day and modest weight lifting wasn’t enough. I could handle driving two hundred miles. That was the farthest I’d ever gone, and all we’d ever done on our little races in Phoenix. But just how little I knew and how pathetic I was became clear yesterday, during my first three hundred in Iowa.
I hadn’t made it. Well, I had, coming in dead last, screaming and crying behind the wheel, delirious from the extended play of the G-forces upon my body, and the strain from keeping my arms erect in front of me for that long. To think, Brody wasn’t the only James who’d kissed his biceps. I used to be proud of my arms. My “guns,” I used to call them. Now, they ached, and my head felt like it’d been kicked repeatedly. I had blisters on my palms, even with the gloves. Forget my dreams of doing a big race like the TicketGuardian 500 at ISM or the Daytona 500. The way I felt, doing a five-hundred-mile race sounded like a fate worse than death.
On top of all that, I’d had to deal with the Sandersons. They were assholes when it came to working for my brother, but they were a hell of a lot worse when they were working as my crew. Before I’d even gotten in the car, I had to deal with two pinched ass cheeks, half a dozen remarks about how they’d wished I would be servicing them instead, and a hell of a lot more comments about how girls like me didn’t have what it took to race.
It just about killed me to see their smug faces when I’d proved them right.
I’d never hated racing until that moment. In fact, the way I felt that night, soaking in a bathtub after the long, grueling ride home in our bumpy old piece-of-shit camper, I didn’t want to sit behind the wheel of a car ever again. I didn’t even want to look at one.
Daddy said I’d done good. He said lasting a race like that was a feat in itself, never mind placing. But dammit, I’d played sports all my life, and I’d never come in dead last. I didn’t want exceptions made because I was female then, and I didn’t want them now. If it wasn’t good enough for Brody, it wasn’t good enough for me. And this sure as hell wasn’t good enough for me.
Worse than how I felt was the knowledge that Daddy was worried. Had it been Brody, we’d already have had sponsors lined up. There had been three potential sponsors at the race that took his arm, and we knew for sure one of them would come through. But after the race, when Daddy announced I’d be taking his spot in the James team, they all pulled out. He tried to woo them back, but they weren’t having it, never mind that I’d put in just as many track hours as Brody had.
My father couldn’t keep this little dream of ours going just on determination. We needed money — a lot of it. And to get money, I needed to perform.
Which was why I’d gotten up at the crack of dawn that morning, intent on a three-hour workout. But my confidence was shaken. My next race was in a couple of weeks, in Kansas, and at two hundred and sixty-seven laps, it wasn’t much shorter than the last one. I’d like to say I was determined, that I didn’t care how much my muscles screamed or my head hurt. That even if my head exploded in the driver’s seat, I’d make it across that finish line at least ahead of half the other drivers and prove I belonged among them. But every muscle in my body seemed to be saying, No fucking way are you subjecting me to that torture again.
I lifted twenty-pound dumbbells and started to work my biceps, but even those hurt. Damn, I was weak. I’d read about other drivers getting massages after a race, and while before I used to think they were pretty boys, now I thought maybe they had a point. Sure as hell would’ve been nice to be working out in a gym with a masseuse to work out my kinks and maybe a juice bar right now. Instead, I had to deal with a wobbly weight bench and old, rusty pieces of shit in an old airplane hangar in the backyard of the shop.
Not that I liked things fancy. I just couldn’t help thinking that the boys with sponsors, with real money behind them, good facilities, proper support, had an edge over me, and would whip my ass all over the oval.
Maybe this was just a pipe dream. Maybe I’d never be better than them.
I forced down the bitterness in my head before it could spiral into something like jealousy and finished the set. Then I worked my tri’s and my shoulders, ignoring their protests. When I was so exhausted I couldn’t see straight anymore, I ripped off the gloves, gave my dusty red baby a pat, and slid open the door to the hangar.
The stifling Arizona heat assaulted me. I took a swig from my water bottle and blinked, adjusting to the bright sun. I walked across a field of scrub brush to the first open bay of the shop, where Daddy had his top half buried in the engine well of a truck that was older than me, as most vehicles were around here.
My father was the best person on Earth, truly. He’d always been a fan of fast cars, driving them himself, but it was only when Brody and I got into it that he and my mom started throwing their life’s savings into it. And he’d always been behind us, one hundred and ten percent. Not only that, he was a big teddy bear with a heart of gold.
“Hey, Daddy,” I said. “Where’s Brody?”
“Where’d you think?” he said, backing out of the engine’s guts and wiping his hands on a rag.
I looked at the door, which was the way to our upstairs living quarters, and frowned. Then I stood next to my father and surveyed the damage. I handed him a wrench. “That hose is about a thousand years old and made of Swiss cheese.”
“I got this under control,” he said, nudging me. It’d been a long time since I’d helped Daddy in the shop, but I still knew my way around a car better than half the mechanics out there. “You go on up and see if you can talk some life into that brother of yours. I could use some help cleaning up around here, and one arm is better than none.”
Easier said than done.
I sighed and turned toward the door. I went through it and up a rickety flight of steps. Sure enough, when I got inside, Brody was sitting on the couch, staring up at the corner of the window, focusing on nothing in particular. I walked in and followed his line of sight, wondering if he was tracking the appearance of UFOs, when I noticed a fly buzzing there. It was half-mad, bouncing against the glass, the way flies get when they’ve been at it for a while and are just about ready to give up.
“Hey,” I said to him.
He didn’t answer.
I studied him. He was wearing a sleeveless t-shirt that had sweat rimmed under the arms and down the front of his chest. His face was coated with a heavy sheen of it. Our house had a window air conditioner, but with the shades of even that one window pulled back to let in the sun, the poor appliance was just humming along for dear life, not producing any results.
“Earth to Brody,” I said, to which he still didn’t reply. “Can you pull down the shade so we can get this place to cool off a little?”
His therapist had told us to treat him no differently than we would have treated him before the accident. So, I held my breath and tossed my empty water bottle at him, and it hit him square in the head. When it bounced on the floor and rolled under the sofa, he swiveled his head and scowled at me.
I planted my hands on my hips. “Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t know if that was you, or a statue of you.”
The scowl didn’t soften. He didn’t say a word, simply turned back to study the exciting fly exploits.
Okay, great. I hesitated there before grabbing the shade, which was really just a cardboard slat wrapped in aluminum foil, and fixing it into place. Yes, bright sun might have done him good, but it was probably defeating the purpose to have him boil in his own pudding.
That small chore complete, I turned back to the room. Our apartment was really one living area comprised of a kitchenette-slash-television room, three bedrooms that barely fit twin beds, and a bath that two people couldn’t stand in comfortably, unless one of them wanted to hang out in the shower. As much as I didn’t really want to be in Brody’s company at that moment, I didn’t have much of a choice. I strode over to the refrigerator and opened it. “Want breakfast?”
I pulled out a carton of eggs as he played the part of the Brody Statue again, this time staring at his exciting lap.
“I have eggs this time,” I announced, taking one out. “And they don’t bounce.”
Brody was smart. He knew not to test me on this because, in our childhood, I’d thrown far more dangerous things at his head than a couple of eggs. He didn’t turn to me. “If I was hungry, which I’m not, I’m capable of making my own breakfast,” he snapped.
“Are you really?” I said, mock-surprised. “Because all I’ve seen you do is mope like your freaking world is coming to an end. They amputated your arm, Brody, not your head.”
“Leave me alone,” he snarled.
Fine. “Should’ve amputated your head,” I muttered under my breath, turning up the heat on the stovetop before putting the cast-iron skillet on to warm. I’d scramble up enough eggs for the two of us, just in case.
Truth was, he hadn’t started out so down. Brody had the same fire and spirit all of us Jameses had. Maybe it was our fault. We’d brought him articles of other amputees who’d successfully returned to racing after their accidents and given him hope that he could get right back in the saddle after his other minor injuries — a broken rib, a few bruises — healed.
Then the cold, hard reality came crashing in.
Most of those racers had gotten prosthetics specially made for them by their sponsors. Custom pieces like that cost well over one hundred thousand dollars and weren’t covered by our insurance. The prosthetics that we could afford? Well, they were basically like blocks of wood. The only purpose they served was to take the place of an actual arm, but they didn’t do any of the things arms should do. Brody had gotten fitted for one, worn it home, and then proclaimed it worthless, shoved it under his bed, and never put it on again.
So it was more important than ever for me to finally stop pouring money into this dream and start getting something out of it. I had only one shot, I couldn’t keep going on like this forever. Mom and Dad hadn’t said anything of the sort, but it was in the back of my mind that I could get a waitressing job at the Tin Top and at least contribute minimum wage to getting Brody a new prosthetic.
Unless things turned around, and soon, I’d be nothing but a drain.
And maybe moving on was what I had to do. If my big brother had an arm that actually worked, maybe he’d feel like a real person again.
“Hey, bro,” I said as I added milk to the eggs and started to whisk them with a fork. “I wanted to ask you about something. Why don’t you come over here and get some food in you, and we’ll talk?”
He ignored me again, the snot. As much as I loved him, he had the typical James stubbornness.
I poured the eggs into the pan, and they started to sizzle. Just then, our home phone rang. It was about a foot away from Brody, on the end table by the couch, but did he reach over to get it?
Of course not.
“Hey. Can you…?”
He just watched it ring. Two, three, four times.
I took that as a no. Shit. I didn’t want the eggs to burn, and Brody was obviously doing his statue impersonation again, so I barreled across the room. I got to it on the sixth ring. “Hello?”
“Is this Emma James?” a female voice asked.
I looked back at the smoke rising from my eggs. I probably needed to give them a stir, but now I was tethered to our landline. Our house had been forever stuck in the 1970s — our appliances were avocado colored, and the phone was still a rotary that jangled whenever you put the receiver down. An antique, my mom called it.
“Yes, this is Emma.”
“Hello,” she said, talking way too slowly and clearly for my liking, like a radio announcer. Definitely a salesperson. Venetian blinds? A new cable package? Trip to the islands? Whatever it was, I wasn’t interested. “My name is Laura Cage, and I—”
“Look, if you’re selling something, I really have absolutely no interest, and no money, either,” I said, pulling the receiver away from my ear, getting ready to drop it back on its cradle.
“I’m not selling anything.” I placed the phone back to my ear as she finished. “You’re the Emma James who races cars, right?”
“Y-yes.” I looked over at Brody, who was now leaning his head against the shaded window. The fly had fallen to the sill and was now wandering drunkenly there, probably wondering where the sunlight had gone. “Who is this again?”
“Laura Cage of UnCaged Fitness.”
UnCaged Fitness. I’d heard of them. Heck, most of the guys on the track wore one of their products. They made those lame little bracelets that tracked the number of steps you took and basically reminded you when you were being too much of a lazy slob. I didn’t realize that they’d resorted to phone sales. Sounded like a pretty shitty marketing tactic.
Then I thought, Laura Cage. UnCaged Fitness.
Holy shit.
“I’m sorry. Who did you say you were?” I asked, holding the phone in a death grip now. “Are you the owner of UnCaged?”
“I’m Laura Cage, I’m actually the COO of UnCaged Fitness. My brother, Locke Cage, is the owner,” she said, sounding professional, making me rue the past twenty seconds when I’d almost hung up on her. “And we’ve seen the videos of your brother. We’ve been following your story very closely. We were wondering if you’d secured any sponsorships yet?”
My heart caught in my throat. Then, it hit me. Obviously, they hadn’t been following things that closely, or else they’d know he was out of commission. “I’m sorry, but Brody is not racing right now.” I looked over at him and spun the cord in the air like a jump rope. “But thank you—”
“We understand that. We’re not talking about Brody, though we were very sorry to hear of his misfortune,” she said. “We’re inquiring as to whether you’ve secured any sponsorships.”
I froze. Wait. Who did they think they were talking to? “Are you sure you have the right number?” I asked, my voice small.
Duh. Of course they did. She’d said my name. She’d known about Brody.
I was, clearly, an idiot.
“Yes,” she said, a laugh in her voice. “Have you?”
I waved my hand at Brody excitedly, but it barely made a ripple. He didn’t even turn toward me.
“Why, no,” I said sweetly to make up for my brusqueness from before, trying to keep my voice calm. “We’re considering offers at this time, but nothing has been firmed up.”
I gnashed my teeth, thinking she had to have seen through that line of bullshit. But she continued on, “Would you be interested in coming out to meet with us at our headquarters in Daytona? Mr. Cage is very interested in meeting with you.”
“Meeting with… me?” I murmured dumbly, feeling like a real idiot the second the words were out. “In Daytona… Florida?”
No, Daytona, Alaska, Emma. Really bright. I closed my eyes and cursed my stupidity for like the twelfth time during this conversation.
“Well, yes. You and your management team. We’d fly you out and put you up in a hotel for a few days while we introduce you to everything UnCaged Fitness is about. Take you around the beach. Have you ever had a chance to see the speedway? We really think you’d be a great asset to our brand.”
Management team? A great asset. Me. I opened my mouth, but only an “Uhm” came out.
“How does next week sound?”
“Oh.” I supposed I should have been pretending to check my jam-packed schedule, but really, what schedule? I couldn’t hold it in anymore. “Yes. Yes, that would be perfect.”
“Good,” she said, all business. “I’ll have my assistant, Denise, call you with travel details within the week. Sound good?”
I nodded, then realized she couldn’t see me. “Uh. Yes. Thank you.”
“I look forward to meeting with you.”
“Yes. Yes, me too,” I gushed, then threw the phone down on the receiver and looked at Brody. “You will never guess who that was!”
He didn’t even turn. “Your eggs are burning.”
I whirled just as the smoke alarm started to blare above us, and we were enveloped in a cloud of black smoke. But it didn’t matter. Burned eggs, asshole Sandersons, belligerent brother, sore muscles from hell… nothing could spoil my mood now.
“Do you realize what this means?” I said to him, grabbing the skillet and tossing it into the sink.
“Yeah.” When I looked back, he’d managed the tiniest hint of a smile. It was heartbreaking, how handsome he was when he smiled. Then it was gone, that blank face taking over again. “It means you’re gonna live the dream.”