Page 12 of Kiss & Collide
His love of racing had come straight from his dad. His earliest memories involved sitting on Dad’s lap watching Formula One online as he explained the intricacies of the sport and the cars. He’d grown up worshiping Michael Schumacher and Ayrton Senna the way other Chicago kids worshiped Michael Jordan.
“Nic!” his father called away from the phone. “Come talk to Chase. He has news.”
“No, Dad, don’t bother her if she's working—” Chase protested, but it was too late.
He listened to the familiar sounds from back home—his mom calling down from the upstairs landing, the thud of her bare feet on the stairs, his parents’ brief discussion as Dad passed off the phone—and felt a tug in his chest.
His parents were devoted to each other. He’d grown up believing that one day, inevitably, he’d find a relationship like his parents’, and at one point, he’d thought he had. Something real and honest when every other relationship around him seemed cynically transactional.
But he’d been wrong. Not only was his relationship transactional, but he’d been traded in for a more valuable player. That was the first time his instinctive trust in others had been abused, but it wouldn’t be the last. So he’d sworn off hunting for The One. Maybe that shit only happened once in a millennium, and his parents were the lucky two.
As long as he was racing, he didn’t have the time or energy for dating anyway. For now, transactional relationships suited him just fine. A little fun, a lot of pleasure for both parties, then everybody goes their separate ways with no hard feelings. It worked for him.
Dad put Mom on the phone and he related his news all over again. Mom was thrilled, of course, but not like Dad had been. His dad was the one with the love of racing, a passion he’d passed on to all three Navarro kids. Mom was supportive, but she joked that racing had stolen her family, which wasn’t entirely untrue.
“I’m going to call Sam and Tyler,” Dad said when he got back on the phone. “They’re going to be so excited. And your grandmother. And my sisters.”
“Dad, it’s late here. I’ll call them all tomorrow. I promised to meet some of the guys from Engineering for a drink. I gotta go.”
“You go,” Dad said. “Have fun and celebrate. Chase, we’re so proud of you. We love you, my boy.”
Those words were more meaningful than the call from Pinnacle. “I couldn’t have done this without you guys. Love you too.”
When he got off the phone with his parents, he pocketed his phone and headed into Wetherspoons. Leon had asked him to join him and some of the engineers for a drink after work and he’d jumped at the chance to get to know the crew better. Leon was right. He’d always preferred hanging out with the mechanics.
He paused inside the door, scanning the room for Leon. He saw him and the rest of the group in a booth on the far side of the room, but then he also sawher… Violet, sitting alone at the bar with a tumbler of vodka.
For a beat, he hesitated. He could head straight over to Leon’s table and ignore her. That’s probably what she’d prefer. But there was something so dejected about her hunched shoulders, a kind of weary defeat that he’d never seen in Violet before. And instead of celebrating her new job and getting to know her new coworkers like he was, she was drinking alone.Some stupid instinct told him he should check on her. She’d probably just hand him his ass, but at least he’d know he’d made the attempt.
He waved at Leon and held up a finger, then headed over to join her. When he slid onto the barstool next to her, she turned her head and scoffed when she saw him.
“Of course,” she muttered.
“Nice to see you, too, Violet.”
The bartender stopped in front of him. “What can I get you?”
“I’ll have a Guinness. And another for the lady.”
“I buy my own drinks,” she snapped.
“Come on, just one. Celebrate with me.”
She swirled the ice cubes in her empty glass. “To be honest, Chase, I’m not seeing much worth celebrating right now.”
He looked at her curiously. “Are you kidding? Do you know how long I’ve worked for this? I moved to Spain to live with my grandma when I wasfifteen, just so I could race.”
That caught her attention, and she cast him a curious glance. “You did?”
“I did. All for a shot at this, and now it’s here. I’ve made it.” He smiled at her. She did not return it.
The bartender set their drinks down in front of them, and Violet scowled at hers, but she still picked it up and took a sip.
“Look,” he conceded, “I know this team’s not the best on the grid—”
“They’re theworst.”
“Rightnowthey’re the worst. But we can turn this around. I have to believe that. If I stopped believing I could do that, I’d have quit years ago. I’d be …” He waved a hand in the air. “I don’t know. Running a go-kart track back in Chicago, boring all the kids with stories about how I almost made it to Formula One. But I didn’t quit. I stuck it out. And now I’m here.”
