Looked like Joey was back for the night.
I dried off, slipped my shorts back on, and walked out of the bathroom.
Joey now sat in the chair by the dresser. He might have just been a wispy, wavy version of himself, but it was him. He stared straight ahead like I wasn’t even in the room and as I felt the pills start to kick in I climbed back into bed and drifted off to sleep.
The next two weeks were a haze. The final race of the season was in a desert race town outside of Vegas and a win would get the team the open wheels championship for the year. A lot of money was involved and all the leverage I could ever want for getting my new contract next year was at stake.
But my concentration was hit or miss.
The team had pushed Joey—pushed him real hard. He’d gone six seasons as the lead driver without missing a race and he’d brought home three league championships during that time. I’d learned a ton as the number two guy during Joey’s reign and when his car had gone up in flames last year I’d gotten the call just a day later to take over his spot—before what was left of Joey had even been buried. It had all been great at first, a big bump in prize money, the women damn near ran each other over to get me at the clubs, and for the first time in my life I felt like a success.
But then the stress of being one bad race away from winding up an ink spot on the race track myself hit.
And that’s when I started to get the nightly visits from Joey.
We arrived in Vegas on Monday and I did the time trial on Tuesday. I ran the third fastest time and got the three spot in the poll position. The race was Saturday at 1:00 p.m. and I spent the next few days going over the race plan and hanging out by the pool. Joey didn’t visit me the first couple of nights, but around 3:00 a.m. on Friday I opened my eyes and saw him hovering over the foot of the bed staring at me.
Thank God for Xanax.
I shut my eyes and went back to sleep.
My alarm went off at 9:00 a.m. and I showered, got a quick workout in the hotel gym, and then met with the team to go over race stuff. By noon we were at the track and at 12:50 p.m. I was doing the warm-up laps on the race field. The image of Joey floating over my bed popped into my head and a cold sweat broke out on my chest.
When the checkered flag dropped I hit the gas and the car shot up to ninety. A few seconds later I was at 1:30 and I settled in for the long race. The first hundred laps went smooth; I was in fourth which was a good spot for me and I held the position for the next thirty laps. I made my move after that, burning around turn two and passing up the #8 car to move into second place. Another few laps went by and the rest of the field started to fall back. It was just #3 and me. We hit the final lap and he was a single car length ahead of me.
I gripped the wheel tight as the image of Joey’s car igniting in flame shot into my mind but I shook it off and floored it. I got the nose of my car to dead even with #8 and then I was ahead. Another two hundred yards and I was there. I glanced up and saw Joey’s blank ghost face staring at me in the rearview mirror. My eyes flipped back to the track—clear road ahead, a hundred yards to go. I glanced at the mirror.
Joey was gone.
A second later I shot through the finish line the winner.
I lapped around the course while watching the crowd clap and cheer but for me everything had gone quiet. When I got to the winner’s circle my team had bottles of champagne overflowing and were all smiles and hugs. I got out of the car, took off my helmet, and handed it to Sam, our crew chief, and just kept walking.
“Caleb! Where you going?” Sam yelled.
I didn’t answer and just kept walking. Past the other drivers, past the crowd, and towards an open gate that would let me exit the track. I walked through the gate and ignored the pats on my back. In the distance, the Nevada mountains rolled against the blue sky and the desert highway stretched in a straight line far past the raceway.
And I just kept walking, never looking back.
I stumbled out of the car and onto the desert roadside. My upper leg hurt like hell but luckily the bullet had only hit muscle and I’d wrapped it tight enough that the bleeding had stopped. A full moon had risen in the light purple sky and it gave the old church a soft, white glow. Fortunately, the place looked like it’d been abandoned years ago. I pressed the car door shut, limped around the front of the car, and started making my way around the sharp rocks and stubby cacti towards the church.
As I hobbled past a couple of ravens sitting on top of a ten-foot-tall saguaro cactus, the church got watery like a mirage. Fatigue
