Racing Outside the Line: A Love Story at 190 Mph (20 page)

I stepped back toward him and hugged him, "Take care of yourself, Gene."

"You too, hun." He kissed me on my cheek and let me climb into the limo.

As we pulled away from the racetrack, tears streamed down my face again. I allowed myself to cry for a few blocks, but when we got a little further away from the track, it was time to suck it up and pull out my strength again.

"Jared," I cleared my throat and leaned towards the divide, "I’d like to go to the airport instead—to the domestic terminal."

"Yes, Miss Alexis."

I managed to get myself on the next flight to LAX. I even managed to navigate my way through the airport without breaking down, but as I sat waiting for boarding to begin, the TV screen in front of me caught my eye. I couldn’t hear the sound, but the image of Seth kissing Alexandria was unmistakable, and my chest heaved with pain again. I was turning away from the TV screen when I saw a figure charging toward Seth. It took me a moment to make out Desmond as he punched Seth twice before the crew guys surrounding them pulled him off. The TV screen went back to the announcers who were laughing and talking about the incident. I leaned over in the seat and put my head in my hands. What a mess. I was so stupid to let it get this far. Desmond must be so angry with me.

I felt my control slipping further and further away, and they still hadn’t called for boarding yet. I had to keep it together. The small store near the gates seemed to be a decent distraction. I thought I might find a magazine or something to keep my mind off everything when my eyes settled on a bottle of cough syrup. The label, "Warning, May Cause Drowsiness" screamed out at me. Talk about a chicken’s way out. Was I really going to resort to taking unnecessary medication in order to shut the pain out?

"Man," laughed a loud voice behind me "it’s a sad day when your public relations manager
causes
your public relations scandal."

"Wonder what he did to deserve that?" Asked the voice next to him as I turned to see them staring at the TV screen that was replaying the fight scene again. They were both finding the whole thing to be quite humorous.

Cough syrup
it is, I thought to myself. I picked up the bottle of cough syrup, grabbed a bottle of water from the refrigerated container next to the register and placed my items on the counter.

"Aww, you sick?" asked the cashier as she rung up my items.

"Yeah," I replied as I handed her my bank card. Oh, yeah, I was sick… sick in the head. I was sick enough to get myself into this freaking situation. I asked for it, I brought it all upon myself. I grabbed my items and had the cough syrup bottle open before I even got out of the shop.

By the time the drowsiness kicked in, I was on the plane headed for California.

When I woke up, my eyes felt heavy still, but my chest felt a little lighter as I looked out the window to see the ridiculous number of houses densely packed together that was unmistakably Los Angeles. A different coast… we were on different sides of the country now.

Everything was pretty foggy. I barely remember getting off the plane or the taxi ride to Chelsea’s house. The second Chelsea opened the door I was immediately pulled into her arms. She was always like a big sister to me, always nurturing and it was a big comfort to be able to run to her.

"Desmond called a few hours ago, he told me everything he knew and pieced together the rest of it. Come on," she tugged on me, "let’s get you inside."

Several hours of crying later, I was able to form coherent sentences again. "I don’t want to see him again. I don’t want to go back there."

"But you’re in love with him?"

"So? I’ve always been in love with him. That didn’t change anything before, and it clearly doesn’t change a damn thing now."

"Lex…" she warned. "Don’t play that game with me, I know you far too well."

I let out a heavy, shaky sigh.

"You’re not a teenager anymore, and you weren’t having a teen’s relationship with him either. You know this is different. You’re really in love with him this time, aren’t you?"

I stared out the window, "You don’t need me to answer that, do you."

"No, honey, I guess it’s safe to say I already figured that one out." She patted my hand before changing the topic, "What do you want for dinner?"

"I’m not hungry."

"Hey now, none of that crap or I’ll turn right back around and put you on a plane for North Carolina! You’ll eat, and you’ll do it willingly, or you’re out of here!"

"Whatever," I said angrily.

More softly, "So, what will you eat… you probably haven’t had any good Mexican food since you’ve been over there, how about a burrito?"

I nodded, not wanting to admit that I had been craving a real burrito for weeks.

"Good!" she exclaimed, "I’ll run down to the Taqueria and get us some dinner."

I was seriously grateful for her and wanted to tell her, but my eyes welled up with tears as I looked over at her. I just felt so pitiful and broken. She turned to me and shook her head, "I know, honey" her voice was shaky as tears formed in her own eyes. She sat back down on the couch and hugged me again, "I’ll take care of you, I promise, I’ll get you fixed up just like last time." I buried my face in her shoulder again as she patted my back.

Time was a bit of a blur at Chelsea’s house. Her parents were very wealthy and owned their own naturally dried fruit business where she helped to run their office when needed. It always amazed me at how down-to-earth Chelsea and her family were considering how much money they had. You could certainly never call Chelsea spoiled. She had to be one of the most giving and kind people on the face of the planet. Spending time with her was like breathing in fresh air. It lightened to stench of heartache I felt and made it bearable to breathe again. After eating half a burrito, I settled down on Chelsea’s couch, while she lay out on the matching couch across from me and fell asleep. I didn’t wake up until the next day when I heard Chelsea talking in the kitchen.

"No, she isn’t okay, but I’ll take care of her. She’s better off here than with you anyway, I can spend more time with her than you can… I don’t know that that’s such a good idea right now… she saw the footage while sitting in the airport… she likely thinks you’re angry with her, too… I’ll pass that along… Well, how the hell did he find out where I live... That’ll make things more difficult… See you then, bye."

Clearly, it was Desmond on the phone. Chelsea wouldn’t talk like that to Wyatt, but she would have said a lot more than that to
him
. I pulled myself up to a sitting position on the couch and noticed the clock on the cable box, 5:17pm. Geez, I slept all night and all day. Feeling slightly recharged, I got my shaky legs to carry me to the bathroom. Looking at myself in the mirror, I barely recognized the eyes looking back at me. Red-rimmed, bloodshot, and puffy, my eyes seemed devoid of life. Stumbling back to the living room, I actually felt cheered slightly by the spacious, open floor plan, light yellow walls and soft décor of the room. It felt like a sunroom with the light filtering in.

"Well, good afternoon, sunshine. How are you feeling?"

"Like something the cat dragged in, then dragged back outside to leave in the rain, and mud, then the lightning hit it, and burned it, and the cat came back to tear it into pieces, before burying it."

"Well, then, I’m glad to hear you’re doing better," she smiled and laughed a little. "Your brother called. He’s been calling every three or four hours since he tracked down my cell phone number. The limo driver told him where he had taken you, and he put two and two together. Genius, that one," she commented rolling her eyes. "He has a flight out here tomorrow."

"I don’t want to see him."

"Yeah, I told him that, but he says he was never mad at you. He wanted me to tell you that he loves you and will move out here and live with you if that’s what you want, but he said he doesn’t want to be across the country from you again."

Okay, that was pretty sweet. I had to admit that, and I had to admit that he was probably pretty sincere when he said it.

"So what do you want to eat? I went to the store while you were asleep and got a bunch of our favorites: cheese puffs, English tea cookies, chickie pot pies, and my mom sent over a box full of fresh yogurt covered raisins."

I managed a small smile over Chelsea’s excellent work at spoiling me, and was surprised to feel my stomach growl. "Where are the raisins?" I wobbled my way to the kitchen.

"You sit there," she pointed to the white wooden bar stools that sat in front of the high counter overlooking the kitchen. "I’ll get them. You know what else I could feed you? Table Round Pizza, now tell me you haven’t missed that sauce."

"Everything on it but anchovies and onions?"

"Coming right up." She picked up the cordless phone in her kitchen and hit a button.

The evening was pleasantly uneventful. No tears, no drama, just Chelsea making me laugh and watching nothing in particular on TV until about 2am.

"Oh! We can watch my favorite show where they annoy the living daylights out of celebrities trying to get them to have bad reactions on camera." She changed the channel and we talked about the stupid things celebrities were saying and doing. "I love the blonde guy, he’s so cute."

We were laughing about a tall brunette arguing with her boyfriend outside a restaurant. She was making a ridiculous scene on the dark street while a cameraman tried to shove a microphone in her face. The guy she was with was in the shadows, so it wasn’t until the cameraman bombarded him with questions about being beat up at qualifying that I realized who they were. I stood up angrily. Was he having dinner with her? Of course, he was. Why wouldn’t he? He was kissing her. Why not have dinner? Why not run off and elope? I stomped off toward the guest bedroom I was staying in and straightened my clothes and all my things in the dresser. It’s often best to take your frustrations out on disorganization.

I noticed Chelsea at the door watching me several minutes into my cleaning tirade, but didn’t say anything to her.

"Lex… I... "

"I’m okay, I just wasn’t expecting that." It was actually true, too, I was okay. I was a little angry, a little upset, but I wasn’t broken like I had been. I was recovering.

"I know. I’m sorry I didn’t catch it sooner and change the channel, but… well… I don’t know if you want to know this, but they were talking about him…" she looked at the floor and seemed unsure of whether to continue.

"Is it something you think I should know?" I trusted her judgment.

"Well… yes," she said, so I nodded, encouraging her to continue. "He broke up with her. On the street right there in front of the restaurant on Saturday night. They were having dinner when she got up and walked out. He followed and told her there was no use running away from him, and it was over."

I crossed my arms in front of me, unsure of what to feel. So he wasn’t there to enjoy her company. Did that change anything? He was still kissing her. Maybe he broke up with her because of his guilt over hurting me. Who knows? I flopped down on the bed and laid my head back. This didn’t make anything any easier. It confused the issue in my mind. I had two warring voices. One told me that he wanted me and the other kept screaming at me not to be a moron, that he had been kissing her.

Did he still want me? And so what if he did? Hadn’t he hurt me enough? Could I handle another round? No, I didn’t think I could. Besides, I was doing okay here. I wasn’t a total wreck as I had been before. I could survive here without him. My heart ached, but it wasn’t the stabbing, searing pain that it had been. That is, not until I thought about what it was like to be in his arms, to kiss him, to make love to him.

Unfortunately, the second my mind snatched on to one small memory of his lips on mine, it didn’t stop until I was balling my eyes out and huddled into a little ball again.

I suppose I fell asleep like that because the next thing I knew it was light out and Chelsea was sitting on the bed next to me with a glass of water and a few aspirin. She was just handing me the aspirin as a knock sounded on the door.

Since my room was near the front door, I could hear Chelsea slide the chain on the door then crack it open. I sprang up out of bed to move closer so I could hear what was being said. It still hadn’t clicked in my brain that he was actually here.