Last Ride Read online

  He grunts again and keeps on pressing.

  “Can you?”

  Blair stops mid-press. The leg press smashes back to home. “Why are you bugging me about this now?” He grabs a towel, wipes a trickle of sweat from his forehead. “I’m trying to work out. Or did you miss that part?”

  “Ray’s threatening to take away my car,” I blurt.

  “Holy shit.” Lucas stops bouncing.

  Drew’s dumbbell stops midway to his shoulder. “You’re kidding, right?”

  “I wish.” I jump from the bench, grab a seven-pound hand weight, flip it nervously between my palms. “Ray says if I don’t get him five grand in cash or bring in sixty-five hundred dollars’ worth of work by Friday, he’s taking the Acura.”

  “He can’t do that,” Drew says flatly. “That’s illegal.”

  “I owe him twenty grand for the rebuild.”

  “Are you making payments?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “Then he can,” Lucas says.

  Luc’s mom is a lawyer. I’m betting he’s right.

  “I can’t lose my car.”

  “Why not?” Blair says. “It’s not like you’re racing it.”

  Lucas tries not to laugh and ends up snorting.

  “It’s my wheels. Cut out my heart, why don’t you?” They won’t meet my eyes. Not even Drew. Of course, he’s probably embarrassed because he doesn’t have a car to defend. “How would you like it if someone took your car?”

  A weighty silence falls. Luc and Blair look at each other. Drew stares at his feet.

  “What can we do?” Blair finally asks.

  “You can get your car in this week.”

  “I can’t.” Blair holds up his hands when I start to speak. “I’m sorry, okay? Really. But my brother has this big Christmas gift idea for the parents and I told him I’d kick in some cash. I can’t do my car until after the holidays.”

  “There must be guys you know who need work done. Can’t you ask around?”

  “For sure,” Drew says.

  “Today,” Blair adds.

  But ever-practical Lucas says, “It’s a long shot. You know that, right?”

  “Of course I know that. But I’m desperate. Tell them they’ll get a great price. Tell them what a good mechanic Ray is.”

  Blair gulps from his water bottle. “Even if he is a jerk.” He wipes his mouth.

  “It’s gonna be a hard sell,” Lucas says. “Guys are still hot on the new mechanic in Everett. Not so much on Ray these days.”

  “He did a good job on Luc’s trannie,” I remind them. “And he did a total rebuild of my Acura.”

  “Yeah, except…” Luc’s voice trails away. Who knows how it’s performing. I know exactly what he was going to say.

  Blair returns his dumbbells to the rack. “You have anything hanging around your house you can sell? My grandmother sold a couple of old paintings and made over three grand.”

  “Doubt it.”

  “You should look in your basement,” Drew says. “You never know what you’ll find. We made twelve hundred bucks in a garage sale last summer.”

  Luc scowls. “He doesn’t have time for a garage sale. It’s Monday. Ray wants the cash by Friday.”

  “Who said anything about a garage sale, dweeb?” Drew turns to me. “Hey, it was just an idea. Secondhand stores buy stuff all the time.”

  “It’s a good idea. Anything helps.” I return the hand weights to the rack, mentally review the contents of my basement. I’m sure there’s a box of old ski equipment down there. Piles of books. “I’ll have a look.”

  Blair unfolds himself from the weight machine. “We’ll get on it right away,” he says as he heads for the door. “There’s no way we can let a prick like Ray take your car from you.”

  “No way,” Drew and Lucas echo.

  As I follow them into the hall, I’m almost grateful for my nightmare. And I’m certainly grateful for my friends.

  Chapter Eight

  That afternoon, Hannah hits me with a bomb. And she does it in senior seminar.

  “ I saw Amy on Friday, ” she whispers.

  And I saw her yesterday. Nausea turns my stomach inside out. But I don’t want to talk about her. I’d rather talk about the assignment Lansky has given us. Ten minutes to write two paragraphs on who we’d like to have as a mentor in our second semester. “I know. You took her to a show.”

  “Yeah.”

  I frown at my paper, pretending to be thinking hard. I’ve written Ray’s name down, with a big question mark. Hannah, I note out of the corner of my eye, has finished her two paragraphs.

  “She’s doing okay,” she adds.

  How okay can she be? She’s lost her big brother forever.

  Hannah fiddles with her pencil. “She asked about you.”

  Sweat beads on my forehead . “Right.” I don’t want to know. I cross out Ray’s name and write down Cam instead. He’s a bus driver. Probably not the kind of mentor Lansky has in mind, but Cam’s honest and he’s smart.

  “She wants me to ask you to come to Logan’s party.”

  My head jerks up. “Logan’s party?” Lansky is staring in our direction. I lower my voice. “What party?”

  “Logan would have turned eighteen in December.” She taps her pencil lightly against her desk. “Amy wants to hold a party for him.”

  Another roll of nausea. This one makes me full-on queasy. Maybe I’m coming down with the flu. Or maybe I’m sick with guilt. “You’re kidding, right?”

  “No.” Hannah shakes her head. “She’s having a party. Her parents have said it’s okay. Amy wants you to come. They all do.”

  My heart skips a beat. Like I believe that. Not. “Logan’s dead. A party’s a dumb idea.”

  “Maybe, but they’re having one and Amy wants you there.”

  She might want me there, but for sure her parents don’t.

  “What should I tell her?”

  “Tell her no.”

  “You won’t go?”

  “I won’t go.”

  Hannah puts her pencil down. “Why not?”

  “I just can’t.”

  A veil of disappointment falls over her face. “Please?”

  “No.” It was bad enough seeing her on the street when I was inside my steel safety net. I can’t walk into Logan’s house and see her there. See his parents. I can’t take another reminder of what I did.

  “I’ll be there too,” she adds.

  And that’s supposed to help? Logan was Hannah’s boyfriend. I don’t need a reminder of that either. I shake my head.

  She turns away, but not before I glimpse the flicker of disgust in her eyes.

  Lansky stops me after class. First I think it’s because Hannah and I were talking too much. Then I think it’s because he’s seen that my assignment is incomplete. As I brace myself for another lecture, he says, “I went over the self-assessment sheets you finished Friday. I see you’ve picked a direction. You want to be a licensed mechanic.”

  Now it’s coming, I think. The lecture. The reminder that I could do better.

  “So I dug up some information for you.”

  Huh?

  He holds out some brochures. Lansky’s helping me? He’s barely been civil since Logan died.

  He flaps the papers. “Inside you’ll find some of the technical colleges that offer the courses you’ll need to become a licensed mechanic. It appears the two best contenders are Renton Tech or Bellingham Tech.”

  Realizing this isn’t some kind of joke, I take the material. His fingers are squat, like him, but his nails are perfect rectangles, and shiny. Lansky gets manicures? It’s just one surprise on top of another.

  “Don’t look so shocked, Mr. Shields.” He says my name like he’s calling me Mr. Turd. “It’s my job. I’m paid to find this stuff out.”

  I guess civility is too much to expect. “Thanks.”

  He reaches for his briefcase, gathers up his papers.

  “I, uh, I’m thinking of becomin
g an apprentice.” I’m not sure why I’m telling him this. Maybe he’ll know someone? Maybe I want him on my side when I tell Mom? Maybe both.

  “Look at Renton then. They have an apprenticeship program.” He grabs his brown blazer from the back of his chair. “There are lots of opportunities out there for you.” His bulbous blue eyes fasten on my face. “As long as you don’t screw up.” Again, he is thinking. I can read his mind. “And are willing to work hard.”

  His squat little body disappears out the door.

  Hard work is the least of my worries. It’s holding on to my car that’s the problem. A puff of breath hits the back of my neck. I shiver. And figuring out how to get rid of a ghost.

  After school, I crank my iPod and head down to the basement to see what I can find to sell. I spend the first five minutes sneezing and looking nervously over my shoulder, expecting Logan to jump out of the corner. He doesn’t. No surprise. The guy never liked dark places. Or hard work.

  And since our basement is the size of a small apartment, going through it is hard work.

  After a couple of hours, I find a box of used tools Ray unloaded on me last year, a couple of pairs of skis that are too small and an ancient guitar that belonged to my mom when she was a kid. Acoustic, not electric, but when I brush the dust off I see nice wood and pearl inlay. In the old bathroom, I find a carton of dusty books. Under a pile of blankets by the back door, I discover an old oak rocker with cool carved arms that apparently belonged to my grandmother. Mom doesn’t want the stuff. She says I can go ahead and sell it.

  Tuesday and Wednesday, I make the rounds of secondhand stores. I manage to pull together almost three hundred bucks. I spend my nights playing more Need for Speed 2, my days hustling work. I find someone who needs a new exhaust system, and the guys find someone who needs a cold-air intake system. It’s good but not good enough. The two jobs together don’t even total a grand.

  Thursday, with my panic edging into the red zone, Blair and the others help me brainstorm how I can convince Ray to give me more time. Blair also offers to write Ray a note.

  “What are you going to do?” I ask as we eat our lunch in the cafeteria. “Beg for me?”

  “You wish.” Blair stuffs a third of a burger into his mouth. It’s a full minute before he can talk. “I’ll promise to bring my car in after the holidays.”

  “That’s not enough.”

  “It’s the best I can do.”

  I hand him a paper and a pen.

  “You still have twenty-four hours,” Lucas reminds me. He points to my fries. “You gonna eat those?”

  Wordlessly I slide them across the table. I still can’t eat.

  “That’s right,” Drew says. “Maybe somebody will turn up tomorrow needing a new engine.”

  “Maybe, but I doubt it.” And I can’t wait until tomorrow. I need to talk to Ray today.

  Chapter Nine

  I almost chicken out.

  What’s the big deal about waiting another day? I wonder after I get to the garage and see what job Ray has lined up for the afternoon. Maybe something will happen in twenty-four hours.

  Like a miracle.

  But I can’t live like this. I have to settle the car thing. Then I can put my energy into getting Logan off my back.

  I approach Ray when he stops for a coffee and a smoke. “Here.” I dig Blair’s note out of the pocket of my overalls and slap it, along with the three hundred dollars, on the desk in front of him.

  Ray peers through a veil of cigarette smoke. “What the hell’s that?”

  I straddle the chair beside the desk and work at keeping my voice casual. “Three hundred bucks I raised by selling every single piece of useless shit I could find in my basement.”

  He laughs. “Don’t tell me. You want me to put that toward your debt?”

  “Yes.” I point to the paper. “And that’s from Blair promising to bring in his Mazda by the end of January so you can lower his front end.”

  “What good’s that gonna do me?”

  “Lots in January when business is slow. The kind of front-end work Blair wants will bill out at two grand, easy.”

  “So?”

  A gust of wind rattles the metal pull-down door. I almost jump. “So in the last week I’ve brought in almost six grand worth of work, three hundred bucks in cash, and the promise of two grand more in another month or so.”

  Ray slurps from his yellow Happy Face mug. “That’s not the ten grand I wanted.”

  “It’s close.”

  “Close isn’t good enough.”

  I will myself not to panic. “Taking my car away is going to mess you up, big time.”

  He puffs on his cigarette. “What do you mean?”

  “I know a lot of people. Everybody will know what you’ve done.”

  He’s silent.

  “You think business is down now? Watch what happens when word gets out that you took my car. That you left me with no wheels. You aren’t going to be popular.”

  “Who said anything about leaving you with no wheels?”

  “Don’t mess with me, Ray.” He’s twisting things, like he always does. “You’ve made it pretty clear that if I don’t come up with what you want by tomorrow, my car belongs to you.”

  “That’s right. It will. But you won’t be without wheels. You can drive the shop car whenever you want.”

  Great. A rusty old Ford.

  “And it’s not like you’ll never see your Acura again,” he adds. “It’ll be around. It’ll still be a contender.”

  I’m trying to remember what else the guys told me to say, so at first his words don’t register. But when they do, a shiver creeps up my spine. “What do you mean, my car will be around?”

  “I’m not getting rid of it. That thing’s a moneymaker. I’ll find someone else to race it a couple nights a week.”

  Someone else will race my car? I grit my teeth. No way.

  Ray smirks. “One of your friends, maybe?”

  My stomach clenches. “I don’t think so.”

  “’Course, there is an alternative.”

  “What’s that?”

  He guzzles the last of his coffee, plops the mug on the desk. “You quit being an ass and race it yourself.”

  “Forget it.”

  “I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that.” He squishes his cigarette butt under the toe of his boot, leans forward and pins me with a look. “I’m setting up an organized illegal for Sunday night. Out at the old Macmillan airstrip. Santiago’s racing. Against your car.”

  I stare at Ray. My Acura will take the Boxter, easy. And Ray knows it.

  “Your car is going in that race. Either you drive it or someone else will.” He pauses for a heartbeat. “I’d rather it was you.”

  “Why me?”

  “’Cause you’re good. ’Cause you owe me.” He smiles. “And ’cause you ain’t the guy who died.”

  It’s the kind of reminder I don’t need.

  “Santiago’s throwing in three grand, and I’m matching him. Winner takes it.”

  My heart skips a beat. “Six grand? On a single race?”

  Ray nods. “That’s right. ’Course, your car will belong to me by then, so I’ll get the whole shebang.”

  So this is the con. Ray’s setting Santiago up. He knows the Boxter’s no match for my Acura.

  “You win and I’ll wipe a thousand dollars off your debt.” Ray winks. “I’ll even give you a few more months to pay me off. How’s that for a deal?”

  It’s a sweet deal. It’s only one race. Just one. And for sure I’d win.

  The door rattles. This time I do jump.

  But I’ve promised Hannah. Promised myself. “No.”

  Ray waves my answer away. “You’ve got till tomorrow to decide. Sleep on it.”

  I don’t need to sleep on it. I’m not racing again. No way.

  But that means Ray takes my car.

  When I get home later that night, I’m scared and I’m angry. I’m out of options. I’m losing my
car, and I have no one to blame but myself.

  I hear the murmur of Mom’s voice as I open the door and hang my jacket on the coatrack. Then Cam says, “It’ll work out. Something will come up.”

  I stop midway through slipping off my shoes. It’s like he’s talking right to me.

  “No.” Mom’s voice sounds thready and too high, like she’s been crying. “It’s the right thing to do. I’ve decided.”

  I walk down the hall to the kitchen. They’re sitting at the table, bent over mugs of coffee and a pad of paper. “Decided what?”

  Mom’s head jerks up. “Oh, Tom. Hi.” Her green eyes are overly bright as she glances at the wall clock. “Wow. Is it that time already?”

  “Decided what?” I open the fridge, scan the contents.

  “Nothing’s been decided.” Cam has a deep, gravelly voice that matches his six-foot-three build and dark brown beard. “Your Mom’s thinking through some options, that’s all.”

  “What options?” At least she has options.

  Cam doesn’t answer. Instead, Mom says, “There’s leftover lasagna if you want it.”

  “Maybe later.” I grab the milk, root through the cupboard for a glass.

  “Hannah came by and left an envelope for you,” Mom says. “I left it on the hall table.”

  “Hannah was here?”

  “Yes. She was with Amy.”

  A splash of milk hits the counter.

  “Something about a party for Logan,” Mom adds. “They want you to go. The details are there.”

  I shove the carton back in the fridge, grab the dishrag and wipe up the spill. “Thanks. I’ll take a look.” I head for the door.

  “Tom?” Cam’s voice causes me to turn around.

  He looks fierce, but he’s not. He’s never judged me. Not once. “Yeah?”

  “It may be hard for you to believe, but trust me, you usually regret the things you don’t do more than the things you do.” He gives me a half smile. “And sometimes we’re asked to do hard things to help others. Not that I’m telling you what to do, get it?”

  But in other words, go to the party. “Yeah.”

  I head back down the hall, pick up the envelope on the table and slide my finger under the flap. A celebration of Logan Freemont’s life, I read. December 16. Gifts not needed.