Page 79 of Dash

“Oh, my gosh, that’s great!” I say excitedly.

“It is,” my father agrees as he nods.

Then a thought hits me. “Did he need a sponsor? Is there a problem with funds?” I ask nervously.

My father laughs as if that was an absurd question. “No. Of course, not. If that were the case, I never would have asked him. I was planning to back him a hundred percent of the way, even though that’s not how this normally works. Usually the rider, or racer, has sponsors. But it was not a requirement. Although we didn’t need it, we are going to accept it. People saw that he won and they want him to represent them. That is fantastic news!” he finishes as he smiles brightly.

“What about Valerie?” I ask, hating to rain on his parade, but no one has mentioned her.

“Uh, what about her?” My father asks slowly.

I look from him over at Dash. “Didn’t you press charges on her as well?”

Dash shifts unconfutable beside me. “No.”

I pull away from him. “Why not?” I demand.

“She was not a problem,” my father answers for him.

I spin around to face him. “Not a problem? She was the one who actually cut your brakes,” I remind them.

Dash runs a hand over the back of his neck, and my father sighs heavily. “I told Dash not to press charges against her,” he says simply. I go to speak but he holds up his hand. “It would have looked bad against Dash filing charges against a woman. Especially one who he was once engaged to.” I grind my teeth. “It would have just brought her into the spotlight, and we didn’t want her anywhere near it.”

“But…” I turn to Dash.

“I swear to you,” he states, looking me in the eyes. “I have had no contact with her whatsoever since the night of my party.”

I cross my arms over my chest and fall back onto the couch. I hate how this works. How your celebrity status has to come first before your personal life. I hate how people who don’t know you can judge you over things that they don’t understand. I take in a deep breath, dropping the subject. It’s two against one; I’ve already lost. “So, what do we do now?” I ask.

“We party,” my father answers simply.

“Party?” I laugh. “Dad, you don’t party,” I remind him.

He nods. “I will tomorrow.” He looks over at Dash. “We have five weeks until your next race. Tomorrow night, I will throw a party here at the house for you.” He points down at his phone. “I already have my wife planning it. And it will be huge. There will be reporters, along with photographers. She has already ordered you a tux.” Then he looks at me. “And she has already gotten you a dress. It will be…”

Dash raises his hand to stop him. “That sounds like an awful lot. You don’t have to do all that for me,” he says softly as if he’s embarrassed.

“Son…” He places his forearms on his desk and leans forward. “I do. This is how this works. You’re all over the news. Calls have been pouring in about you doing covers for racing magazines. More interviews. You’re the kid with a dream who came out of nowhere. And after tomorrow night, you will be a household name.”

Dash shifts uncomfortably on the couch once again. “No offense, sir. I am very thankful for everything that you have done for me. Given me my chance at my dream, but my dream was to race. Not become a star.”

“It comes with the territory.” My father leans back in his seat and crosses his arms over his chest. “Tell me, Erik. Why did you want to race in the first place?”

Dash looks at him with an intense stare and no emotion on his face whatsoever. A few silent yet awkward seconds pass before he speaks. “I used to hate being at home,” he admits softly, and I know he means when his parents would leave him there on his own. “I was always looking for things to keep me busy. One day, Blake and I found this abandoned dirt bike on the side of the road. I talked his mother into stopping, and we threw it in the back of her truck. It took us months to get it to run.” He licks his lips before taking a deep breath. “Once we got it to run, we spent all of our time on it.” He chuckles softly. “We even fought over it. It was never about the racing. Although, I liked to go fast. I liked to see what it could do and then push it a little more. So much to the point it broke on us all the time.” He speaks softly as he stares over at my father, but I don’t think he’s really seeing him. I feel like he’s back in that time of his life. “Blake’s dad ended up finding us an old beat-up motorcycle and put us on that. We were unstoppable. It was faster and more durable. It became an escape.” He blinks a few times as if he just returns to us. “It was never about the race. It was about the power that the bike allowed me to have. It was about the freedom I felt when I was on her. When I’m on a bike, I’m free. And who doesn’t want to be free?”

I sit next to him on the couch trying not to let the tears fall from my eyes. There’s so much about Dash that I think he keeps hidden. Mainly because he was never asked how he felt. Or what he wanted. His parents never cared.

My father smiles softly at him, and I know he understands exactly what he is saying.

***

I hang up my phone as I walk into our bedroom. “Well, my mother has officially covered everything,” I say, tossing my phone onto our bed. “And I do mean everything. She even has a tux picked out for Blake and a dress for Jackie,” I say in awe of her. I swear that woman can accomplish anything in a matter of seconds.

Dash pulls his shirt off and sits down on the end of the bed as he stares down at the floor.

I crawl on the bed behind him and softly run my hands up his smooth back. “What’s wrong?” I ask.

He reaches up behind him and grabs my right hand. He pulls it over his shoulder and kisses it before he wraps it around his neck. “Nothing.”

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